Won in a giveaway!

The story continues from the last volume with Cast and Philomena trying to save Klaus, and the introduction of the big bad, the King. We also see what may be glimpses of Philomena’s past.

This volume explains a little more of the worldbuilding concerning Nextkin and Old Kin and the inciting war that set things into place. Now, the languages German and Spanish exist here but so do Zodiac animals and fire wolves, a good mix of fantasy and real-world elements. The animal mutation coding power was super cool though it came with a peeing/marking territory gene for some reason. 

Cast is still a spunky, bright-eyed engineer. Not much seems to get her down. I did think it was a little ‘not like other girls’ how she thought dolls, dresses, and flowers were inferior to engineering tools, but it was in response to a sexist, condescending comment. And she’s also like what 10-11 years old, so I won’t read too deeply into that.

Philomena is still mysterious and overpowered, but I enjoyed how the story balanced her strength. She’s extremely lethal but

as a half–machine (android?), there are weaknesses to exploit. She was thwarted by fighting a 100% human who was just as strong as her, so her usual code-hacking was null and void.

A great example of you can have an overpowered character and still keep the tension and readers on their toes.

Anyway, for a B&W manga, I was pleasantly surprised by the extended colored flashback. I think the pop of color helped dramatize everything more, indicating a clear contrast from the present narrative. The artwork is excellent and shines in fight scenes or with Cast’s different hairstyles.

The ending was intriguing, so I’d read volume 3.

3.5