Hoshin Engi 7

Case in point with stuff I still need to talk about… I read this over a week ago.  I also have one more volume of this I need to read once I write about this one.  I don’t remember a lot of what happened other than a huge fight took place, which I believe is the largest chunk of this volume.

The enemy sennin show up again, except this time they’re different, and this time they’re sent by their master instead of Dakki or the general she’s manipulating.  I’m not sure what this means in the long run, but for right now, it means that the rebel kingdom (which has just declared itself independent, with a new king and everything) is under an attack that the humans are powerless to stop.

Taikobo is taken out of commission fairly early on, but much is made of the way he sets everything up for battle.  His strategies are praised straight to the heavens, and even I have to admit, as mildly as this series is striking me, I still really like Taikobo and basically what a genius he is.  He’s also humble, and just a very unique character.  I’d hate to think about the series without him.

The enemy sennin are actually pretty cool this time around.  The main threat comes from a gigantic paope shaped like a whale that just eats everything.  It becomes impossible to stop it, so they must stop the user manipulating it.  That’s difficult, because he’s protected by the other sennin, his brothers, and they all have different abilities that run counter to each of Taikobo’s allies.  Taikobo plans everything out pretty well though, and we get bits and pieces of four or five interesting battles here.

The other thing that happens is that Taikobo has to help gather allies for the new rebel kingdom.  One of the people he seeks out uses a reiju like Supushan, and his tactic of distraction are once again very admirable.  I believe that it is Bunchu, and not Taikobo, that does the final round of negotiations, though.

The rebellion still seems to be in the early stages, and we haven’t seen any souls go to the hoshindai in a long time, but things are moving along.  As hard as it is for me to read sometimes, I also admire it in a lot of ways… mostly for its scope and pacing.  As boring as it can be to sit through some of these battles with side characters (much like the problems I have with the Soul Society in Bleach), the actual pacing and how the forces against Dakki are being engineered is fascinating to watch.