Maydare Volume 1 Thoughts

 

My Overall Thoughts (wow this is long)

• Maydare (the story) has a pretty interesting history. The original web novel "Oretachi no Maou wa Korekara da" began serializing on Narou in 2012 and even had two published volumes (under a different label and penname) but I guess it didn't sell well enough to get the whole web novel published. And then the author's Kakuriyo series got popular which allowed them to revisit Maydare and write a new story with many of the elements and characters carried over from the web novel (it's actually surprising how many things are from the web novel). The web novel actually has a pretty big following from what I can see, since it has fanart and even now if you search Maydare on twitter you'll see people talking about "Old Maydare." What's even more interesting is that the web novel is also the basis for the author's other series "Asakusa Oniyome Nikki", which is set in the same world as Kakuriyo. I am once again asking someone (not me b/c I already have too much on my plate) to translate the web novel

• Since all the other works I translated so far are set in the real world with no supernatural stuff or anything, it's nice to translate a pure fantasy story for once. I like how even though it's kind of marketed as one of those villainess isekai stories since they're so popular nowadays, it doesn't only focus on romance and slice of life stuff and instead actually explores the fantasy world. The protagonist isn't OP or a saint and has her own goals that she actively pursues instead of your typical "trying to avoid the bad ends" or "living an easy life" goals most otome isekai heroines seem to have. I also feel like it's kind of rare to have supporting characters who aren't constantly praising the heroine and have their own personalities outside of her. Even characters like Airi aren't one dimensionally evil (But if you already dislike her you're definitely not going to change your opinion in the next volume). It's also nice that it actually has the reincarnation aspect play a central role in the plot rather than just a plot device to set up the story and completely forgotten about afterwards. And it's just nice to have a story with a female protagonist that actually has some sort of worldbuilding

• Makia is set up to be the villainess character, but I will argue that Beatrice fits it more, especially after Volume 2. Maybe there should be a spinoff where someone reincarnates as Beatrice lol

• One thing I do kind of have a problem with is the slavery thing. (Sadly) unlike a lot of series, slavery is treated as unambiguously bad. But also that makes the romance between Makia and Thor kind of iffy for me personally since she technically owns him (or maybe not since he's a Guardian now), and it made me side eye her in the scenes where she kind of acts possessive of him. I think nobility tends to be portrayed very idealistically in otome isekai so the O'Drielle family aren't meant to be seen as bad people, but yeah. I hope this gets addressed at some point but I kind of doubt it