Title: 7th Garden Vol. 6
Author: Mitsu Izumi
Publisher: Viz Media
Language: English
Format: Paperback
Pages: 202
Genre: Fantasy, Battle
Publication Date: October 3, 2017
The Story
Volume eight of 7th Garden is another battle volume! Fresh off the heels of Loki’s defeat, Vyrde and Awyn are thrust into a battle against the angel Levi. Before Loki set off to battle Vyrde, he crafted a weapon and gave it to Levi to act as a backup plan should he fail. Now that Loki has fallen, Levi hopped into action. The weapon consists of a type of demonic insect that when it bites someone, transforms them into a demonic being. Levi unleashes them upon Awyn’s village, but it’s not as if the attack was entirely unexpected.
Moro shows up out of nowhere and decides that she doesn’t agree with what Vul, Loki and Levi are doing. She warns Vyrde about Levi’s impending attack. Along for the ride is a patisserie named Alice who is, apparently, in a contract with Moro. Vyrde and Awyn decide to evacuate everyone from the village, but they don’t know how to do that as they feel no one would believe that a battle between angels and demons is about to be fought. Awyn then has Vyrde transform into the sword and he uses it to destroy his precious garden. Awyn then tells the villagers that he is going to destroy every single house in the village one by one and to grab their things and go. If they remain in his way, he will not hesitate to cut them down.
The plan was pretty harsh, but it was the only way Awyn could get people to evacuate. Despite his warning, Levi’s attack begins and the villagers begin to get bitten one by one. Awyn has no choice but to cut them down… some of which in front of their own family members. Levi’s plan begins to work as she wanted to overwhelm Awyn with as many demons as possible to drain Vyrde of her energy. After Levi’s creations were demolished, Vyrde transforms back into human form and passes out. When things looked bleak for Awyn, Phigure and Ashleigh show up and transform into Liz and Iola. Once transformed they perform demonbellion and the volume comes to a close.
Honestly, aside from Levi being the backup plan, there really wasn’t much of a story here. This was just a continuation of Levi and Loki going against Vul’s orders in order to try and take out Vyrde before she got out of hand. There is some character development through which did help things, though.
Characters
Awyn’s character went through a bit of a transformation. While he’s still a softie at heart, he showed a lot of mental toughness this volume. His plan to evacuate the villagers was reminiscent of his darker side and with his words earlier of seeing things from Vyrde’s point of view, it looked as if Awyn has become a lot edgier in his character, but during the battle with Levi, there was a moment where his dark side called out to him and Vyrde had to bring him back to reality. I wonder if this is just a form of foreshadowing that Awyn is slowly beginning to lose his innocence. Maybe the edgier Awyn we saw in this volume will be the Awyn that will carry us forward. It is a nice change of pace, though!
The backstory with Levi and Loki wasn’t all that special, to be honest. Levi was defeated previously in the series, but this time with the aid of Loki’s weapon, she looks to finish what Loki couldn’t. That’s about as basic as it gets and there really isn’t anything deeper to this. I wish there was some deeper meaning to this battle and I suppose if you count this being against Vul’s wishes, you can kind of say there is something deeper, but I just don’t see it.
Ashleigh and Phigure are going to get their time to shine next volume. Ashleigh was heavily teased throughout the series as getting involved, but Phigure kind of surprised me. I’m assuming, with the way they have been set up, Phigure is the one in contract with Ashleigh and will be the one fighting Levi next volume. Nevertheless, things got a little bit interesting here.
Final Thoughts
This volume of 7th Garden was another battle volume with some character development sprinkled in. It was nice to see Momo/Alice in action and to see Ashleigh and Phigure join the fight really freshens things up. There is only so much we can see of Awyn/Vyrde taking on the angels before it gets repetitive and boring. I’m glad that we’re getting things mixed up a bit. It does beg the question what will happen to these four once the battle is over. How are they going to explain all of this to the villagers? Will they all form a team or will Awyn and Vyrde still try to take down the angels on their own? There’s a lot of unanswered questions pending the outcome of this battle, but it does broaden the scope of the manga just a bit.
They did manage to give Alice some backstory so I’m assuming, at the very least, her and Momo will stick around at the manor after things settle down. It seems kind of odd to introduce these characters just in time for the battle and then have them disappear shortly after. Then again, I’ve read series where characters are created for the purpose of plot and then are simply written off within a couple of chapters (or in some cases, a couple of pages… I’m looking at you Akame ga Kill!) so who knows? All I know is that the battle will continue in Volume 7 and I’m looking forward to see how it concludes!
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This item was provided for review by Viz Media
