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Ascending, Do Not Disturb web novel review – My kind of slow romance

Ascending, Do Not Disturb by Yue Xia Die Ying is a Chinese web novel that comes up very often when you ask for suggestions for romance with supportive, non-crazy, non-rapey male leads. Fans call that genre “fluffy” romance, but even then not all fluff is genuinely fluff all the way through. I’m happy to report that Ascending, Do Not Disturb is one of the good ones, though. Not perfect, but really good and fun to read, worth the time to try.

Summary: A deposed young princess named Kong Hou is picked up by an old cultivator and taken to the world of cultivators to cultivate. Blessed with supernatural luck and natural talent, she quickly begins to make waves not only in her sect but in the cultivation world at large. The series is fully translated and can be read here: Ascending, Do Not Disturb.

Cons:

– The chief problem is that the main character, Kong Hou, is a complete Mary Sue. Just total, perfect, almost entirely without flaws, loved by almost everyone except the baddest guys. She also has supernatural luck, which is one of her character definitions.

The drawback of all this is that it’s impossible to get under her skin. You can see the falling in love process and sympathize much more closely with the male lead, Xuan Zhong (Xi) than with the female lead. This is not enough of a problem to ruin the series, but if you want to read about a female cultivator’s love adventures, you’ll be a bit disappointed.

The second drawback is that her supernatural luck takes a lot of the tension out of things. If they need a certain herb, whoops, the grass she just happened to pull up is the herb. The random flowers she looked at are super rare once-in-a-lifetime blooms. The fish she bought is the best in the world. Etc. etc. So although the story is supposed to be a journey of adventure and struggle and hardship, in practice almost everything goes Kong Hou’s way, which is rather boring.

-This Mary Sueness also extends to Kong Hou’s sect, the Splendid Cloud Sect. They’re the smartest, happiest, secretly the strongest. It extends to their city, Harmonious City as well, where all the citizens are so bright and happy and prosperous and clever. You get sick of the endless praise for Kong Hou, Splendid Cloud and Harmonious City, especially in the last few chapters.

– While the male lead isn’t the crazy type, he is still a bit possesssive, and inclined to be extremely cold and unfriendly to any male who even looks at Kong Hou funny. Which is a lot of males because she’s Mary Sue. It’s a bit annoying the further you get in.

– Huan Zhong lies a lot to Kong Hou throughout the series. They’re mostly “white lies” that don’t hurt anyone, but it gets uncomfortable because of its high frequency.

– Misunderstandings occur galore, but not of the series and dumb type. They’re usually humorous. Like people misunderstanding Huan Zhong’s and Kong Hou’s actions of sending fish home – they’re just sending random fish, but it turns out to be super expensive and precious fish. Or people think they’re lovers, wait no they’re not, no wait they are. Even they misunderstand their feelings towards each other before they finally come together. It’s a con because I usually hate misunderstandings that aren’t quickly resolved, but it’s not too bad in this series.

-The last thirty or so chapters were a slog. First you have to read a ton of PDA between the two lovers. You’re so handsome, kiss kiss, you’re so beautiful, hug hug, I love you. Then all kinds of characters come out of nowhere with their centuries-old romance that gets dragged up, then there’s a long period of separation, blah blah, finally the confrontation with the final boss, THEN the end. Seriously tedious stuff.

Pros:
– It’s a slow romance, but it’s not really that slow. Most of the time I dread series with the “slow romance” tag because either the characters meet at a very young age and take forever to get together, or they meet once and then only very very sporadically until poof, suddenly they’re in love. In Ascending, Do Not Disturb, the characters meet early, start travelling together, and have lots and lots of interactions that show them getting closer. That means it’s not a mystery what they see in each other or what brought them together like it often is in other series.

– The characters support, respect and care for each other throughout the series with only one big conflict, which is quickly resolved. This isn’t one of those series where they bicker and banter and hate each other until suddenly they don’t. You won’t have to feel bad rooting for a nutcase married to a doormat like often happens.

– It’s short and complete at 158 chapters. That’s my kind of series. The chapters are also long and meaty, none of this “dividing one chapter into 3 for more views” nonsense. None of that reading 2000 chapters only for the author to drop the series nonsense. Plus because it’s short, the story is also focused – gather ingredients to cure Xuan Zhong, and develops rapidly.

– It’s clean. By clean I mean no sexual assault (kissing or holding a character against their will), no rape or attempted rape, no dumb aphrodisiac storylines, no other sexual content. It takes the main characters a long while to even hold hands, and then everyone’s like “GASP! THEY’RE HOLDING HANDS!!!!” I’m occasionally blindsided by series that start out normal and eventually turn into smut, like The Lady’s Sickly Husband, or that one with the runaway ninja. They should tell you upfront if that’s the case. Happily enough, Ascending, Do Not Disturb is suitable for even young teens to read.

– It’s not all sugar and light. It’s mostly sweet , but there are dark undercurrents and some dangerous moments. These mainly revolve around evil cultivators who go around doing some pretty gnarly stuff, mainly to mortals but also to cultivators. It never descends into horror, but it does have some moments of danger.

-It’s mainly a romance series, but it does have a decent amount of cultivation discussion and action. It’s not one of those “female cultivator” series where she either doesn’t see the guy for 1000 chapters because she’s too busy adventuring, or one of those where she immediately abandons her sect to chase a guy. There’s a mix of everything that was promised when you read a romance cultivation manga, so that’s great.

-Shoutout to the translators at Dreams of Jianghu for an excellent translation that was very smooth and easy to read. I deplore the current trend of people publishing unedited or barely edited machine translation for quick views and cash. This is a well-made and edited translation that made the reading experience much more pleasant.

Summary

Ascending, Do Not Disturb is a short, fun romance manga with a loving, respectful relationship between the two main characters. In the world of Chinese web novels, it’s like a flower planted in a heap of manure, as the Chinese proverb goes. As I listed above, there are a number of problems with it, most notably Kong Hou’s Mary Sue nature and the sluggish nature of the last third.

If you want a good romance web novel, though, this is a satisfying read that will keep you busy for a few days in a row and leave you happy. Give it a try if that’s your thing!

Isekai de “Kuro no Iyashi Te” tte Yobarete Imasu review (complete at 49 chapters)

Isekai de “Kuro no Iyashi Te” tte Yobarete Imasu reveals one of the biggest flaws of Japanese isekai manga: they take too long to complete! This is a simple story of a girl who goes to another world, finds out she has special powers and falls in love with the lovable but slightly crazy male lead. It’s the same as hundreds of other series in the genre, but it took almost five years to tell because of the monthly release schedule of isekai manga. By the end, I honestly didn’t care that much any more.

Summary: One day, 22-year-old Kanzaki Misuzu is suddenly transported to a strange world. Based on the pop-up screens she can access, it seems she’s entered some kind of RPG as a magic user! Luckily, she can use the gaming skills she acquired as an otaku to make her way in this new world. But before she knows it, people start calling her “the Black Healer”!! (from mangakakalot)

In short, the heroine is reincarnated as a healer in another world. The world is full of cute guys, but naturally she will end up dating Noche, the handsomest and most powerful and craziest. Nothing but the best for our baby girl.

Kuro no Iyashi blah blah (the long title just means “In another world I am called the Black Healer”) has some decent background explanation, i.e. an explanation of why things work the way they do, and how Reene/Misuzu (she goes by an alias for reasons I can’t remember) got there. And even why she and the male lead are drawn to each other, which is often lacking in a lot of series. The explanation is “it’s magic, and that’s just the way the world works” but at least it’s an explanation. Their chemistry isn’t the best either, but he’s decent and treats her well, and after reading one too many crazy Korean and Chinese “evil prince/duke/CEO” series, this is amazing.

As a bonus, Reene doesn’t immediately fall head over heels in love with Noche, and she agonizes for a long time about whether to go back to Earth right away or not. Even though we know what she’s going to choose ultimately, it’s still nice to see some wavering, versus the usual trope where the character forgets all about her home world once she spots a bishie. On top of all that, there’s a super-happy development where she will eventually get to go back to her world once she’s done with living in the other world. Nice.

Other pluses: the art is nice and easy to follow, Noel the demon pup is adorable even though he doesn’t get to do much, the story has its dark moments so it’s not all saccharine sweet, and things don’t drag on forever – and not just because the series got axed.

On the minus side, I think the story went on for about 10 chapters longer than it needed to. Yeah yeah, we know Reene and Noche are going to end up together, why add unnecessary rivals and kidnappings and extra drama? It really would have been better to wrap it all up with a fluffy happy ending since the last-minute drama bombs involving Guzherban and Viola went nowhere. Obviously cancelled series was obviously cancelled.

It was only 49 chapters but between the monthly manga schedule and the infrequent scanlation releases, it feels like it took a lifetime to come out. Just as an aside, I really hate it when a translation group picks up a ton of series and then releases them in drips and drabs? I’ll leave it at that to avoid wading into scanlation drama, but let’s just say a lot of groups are lucky my Korean and Mandarin aren’t very good… for now.😏

Back to Kuro no Iyashi tte, by the end I couldn’t remember the most relevant things like why Guzerbahn’s king kidnapped her, or what was going on with the church and the white healer. The most important thing was that she was brought over to that world to be the soul mate of the demon king. And she waffled a bit, but eventually she became his soul mate. And maybe they all lived happily ever after, maybe they didn’t. The rest is left to the reader’s imagination.

Overall, it’s not a bad series to read if you’re looking for a complete romance shoujo isekai. There are so few of them out there anyway. Even though the ending is abrupt, the real ending came several chapters earlier and the rest was just sloppy tying of loose ends. So if you want something short, fluffy and complete, try Isekai de “Kuro no Iyashi Te” tte Yobarete Imasu. This is the best time to do it now that it’s finally over.

The Banished Villainess’ Husband web novel chapter 2 (retranslated) + thoughts

The Banished Villainess’ Husband chapter 2 (retranslated)

An explanation of what this series is about and how/why I came to be retranslating the first two chapters can be found in the previous post on the topic. An explanations of my thoughts about it and why I dropped it after a few chapters (not that I had any intention of doing the full thing) follows after the chapter.
Author: Komori Kiri
Raw link: https://ncode.syosetu.com/n8287fp/

Chapter 2: Banishment
“So anyway, the Prime Minister is completely furious, right? He’s gotta be.”
“Yeah. That’s why…”
“That’s why you want me to marry her and go along with her?”

A desperate measure that satisfies the desires of the King, the Prime Minister and Alephaldo all at once.
Haha, it’s so ironic that it’s almost funny.
Mm, today’s tea is as tasty as ever~.

“More tea.”
“Yes, Master.”
“Fran! Are you listening to me?”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it. Well you’re just a count, so we don’t have a choice, do we? So yeah, okay, I’ll do it.”
“Y-you sound so flippant about it!”
“Welp, time to go pack~”
“… …”

After finishing my second cup of tea, I returned to my room and packed my things.
I understand my father’s concerns, but we have no other choice so we can only obey.
And to be honest… I was a little happy inside.

Lady Elana is the daughter of a duke. She’s way out of my league. Even if I proposed, she would never marry me because I would probably not be the head of my family. What’s more, she was (Lord) Alephaldo’s fiancée. Even calling it a one-sided crush was a stretch…

“…~♪”

That’s why I hummed a little song to myself as I packed my things and left the house.
Father and Mother looked rather conflicted as they saw me off, but my little brothers were still small so they bawled out loud. At least my brother Rooth was too old for that and he was somewhat aware of the situation, so he tried to hold back his tears, but…

“Y-you can come home from time to time, okay?”
“Yeah no, that’s impossible.”
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”
“H-hey, Rooth! You’re a boy. You’re too old to be wailing like that!”

I waved away their cute farewells with a smile, climbed into the carriage and headed to Lady Elana’s mansion.
Looking at Father, it seemed he had accepted our fate.
The servants at Lady Elana’s mansion seemed resigned to it as well. I could tell because even though they couldn’t hide their mixed feelings, they showed me to the reception room right away.

“Ohh! Eufran!”
“Good morning Mr. Prime Minister~”

The Prime Minister was the first to come in. His face looked so murderous that I almost spat out the black tea I’d been served.

“I was moved! By your gallant figure last night! Please take good care of my daughter!”
“(His face is too close!)… Haha, well, I’m sorry you had to settle for me, but I’ll do my best~.”
“Waahhhh~~~! I wish I could punch my past self! For laughing and thinking your report was some kind of joke! My daughter! Please take care of my daughter!”
“All right.”
“…”

Oh, he means the report where I said that Lady Rifanna had won everyone over. Well even I would have found that hard to believe. I smiled and nodded to say yes. I don’t have any special talents, and my family is just above average. I won’t be able to give her a life as luxurious as her current one, but…

“I’ll do my very best~.”
“*sob*!”
“Umm, so, could you release my hands, Your Excellency~? And your face is too close… And could you wipe your tears with your handkerchief?
“You’re such! A kind young man! Really!”
“Whoa, this is the first time anyone’s told me that.”

Maybe the Prime Minister has lost his marbles after overcoming his anger yesterday.

“…Compared to you, Prince Alephaldo… He sure did a fine job abandoning that engagement! He even completed all the procedures last night!”

What? Wouldn’t both houses normally have to discuss it first?
Wait, or did he involve the Guardian Dragon? He’s good at that sort of thing, isn’t he?

“And on top of that, he’s throwing her out of the country the very day after canceling the engagement!”
“…”
“It’s too much! It’s just too much for my poor Elana!”
“Well… it is rather sudden…”

Did he get the Dragon involved in that as well?
You sure are a handy weapon to have, Mr. Guardian Dragon.

“Mr. Prime Minister, as far as I know, neither Lady Elana nor any of the fiancées of the prince’s friends ever bullied Lady Rifanna.”
“What? What… did you say?”
“Please investigate as carefully as you can. Your daughter isn’t that kind of person. Please believe in her.”
“… … Eu-Eufran!!!”
“Gweh!”

I’ve given up on getting his face away from mine.
As he murmured in my ear, he hugged my neck tighter and tighter… I’m choking…
I’m gonna die.
I don’t wanna die in the arms of an old man.

“M-Master, the young mistress…”
“Huh, what?”
“…”

Someone was looking down at me with an extremely suspicious gaze.
Uh-oh.

“A-a-ahem! Elana… take care of your health, you hear?”
“Y-yes… Thank you for taking care of me, Father and Mother.”
“…”

Lady Elana’s mother wordlessly wiped her tears away with a handkerchief. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister turned his back on her… yup, I have a full view of his ugly crying mug…
She’s their beloved only daughter, after all. All she had was a single suitcase. I picked it up and offered her my hand. She obediently placed her hand in mine.
Whoops, that was close.
I almost smiled there.

“…I apologize for getting you involved in this.”

She said with a gloomy look after we left the house. We loaded the carriage with our luggage, then I opened the door for her, took her hand and helped her climb into the carriage and signaled the coachman with my eye to set off.

Up to that point I hadn’t replied to her. Once the carriage set off, I began to study her carefully.
She was in an extremely understated dark brown one-piece dress with a decorative hat. Jade-green hair with eyes like a calm ocean. Doesn’t she want to ask where we’re going next or what’s going to happen to us?

“You’re pretty quiet now, aren’t you? You were so bold and outspoken yesterday.”
“Y-yesterday… yesterday was my… big moment, that’s why!”
“Hmm, is that right.”
“W-what is your problem?! What is with that frivolous attitude after I went so far as to apologize? Sh-shouldn’t you be comforting me?!”
“Since you’re not depressed, you don’t need comforting, do you ?”
“Urgh…”

Huh, she’s much livelier than I’d thought. That’s good.
As long as her spirits are up, we’ll manage somehow.

“Well, enough about that…”

“W-what is it?”
“Let’s talk about our next move. Did the Prime Minister… did your father tell you anything?”
“No… nothing. Last night, orders came from the palace for me to leave the country today, but that’s all.”
“I heard about it this morning.”
“W-what?!”

When I laughed out loud, she scolded me: “This is no laughing matter!”
I’m so glad she’s in high spirits.

“Anyway, that means we’re in this carriage with no fixed destination in mind.”
“Are you serious?!”
“…Not entirely.”
“Which is it?!”
“Actually, I have a relative who married someone who lives near the border in the next country. I was planning to go through them to find someplace to live.”
“Oh!”
“If they can put us up for a while until that’s arranged, we’ll be able to get by as long as we have a roof over our heads. However it’s quite a distant relation, so they might very well refuse. If they do, we’ll just have to start our lives there by carrying our luggage and begging the commoners to rent us a place. What do you say? Sounds like we have a delightful future ahead of us, right?”
“~~! S-should you be laughing when you say that?”
“At any rate we won’t be able to live the way we used to. That much is for certain.”
“…”

When I grinned cheerfully at her, her shoulders suddenly drooped dejectedly.
For some reason she muttered “I’m sorry” again with her head down.
Why?

“No, I don’t mind. It seems like fun, really. But this must be rough on you, seeing as you’re a duke’s daughter and all.”
“Oh! I-I am fine!”
“Oh really? In other words, you’re prepared to suffer quite a bit?”
“Y…yes… but, umm, you’re…”
“I told you, it looks like fun so I don’t mind.”
“Looks like fun, he says…”

Just being together with you is exciting.
Man, this is a real problem.
You just never know how it’s going to turn out in life. To think the one-sided love I didn’t think stood a chance in this lifetime would actually come true~.

“I don’t have to be ordered around any longer, I don’t have to be mixed up in pointless power struggles either… I’ve been really busy these days, so I can think of it as finally getting some rest.”

Plus I get to be with Lady Elana. This is the best. Since Alephaldo made such a grand announcement about marrying Lady Rifanna, there’s no way he’ll try to get Lady Elana back. Our marriage papers must have been filed with the state by now. It’s a marriage that my father, the guardian of the law, plotted together with the Prime Minister and King to arrange. The procedures will all be completed today, I’m sure.
Along with the suspension of our rights as citizens. They probably won’t go as far as to strip them entirely. Even though they’re acting like we’ve lost both our citizenship and our court ranks, once they find out she’s innocent, they will recall her. Naturally I’ll be able to go back as well, but I’d rather live peacefully with her in the next country. Being a central national figure is nothing but a pain in the ass.

Alephaldo and his “school friends” do nothing but boss me around, after all.
Well guys, good luck making it on your own from now on.
We’ll do our best over here as well.
That’s all.

“You’re such an optimist…”
“It can’t get any worse. Probably.”
“I hope you’re right.”

Two hours passed as we chatted like this.

“We have arrived at the border.”
“Thanks~”
“Excuse me?”
“Well then, young master… I umm, I’m really…”
“Don’t worry, don’t worry. It’ll work out somehow. Thanks for driving us. Say hi to my father and the Prime Minister for us.”
“What?”
“Yes sir… Well then…”
“*neeeigh!*”
“…Huh?”

We got out of the carriage once we arrived at the border. We had two suitcases to our names, and I had my beloved horse.

“…Eh?”
“Well, time for a fun walk. Lady Elana, can you ride a horse?”
“Huh? What? …Ehhhh?”
“What?”

What’s wrong?

“W-wait… Please wait a moment, Lord Eufran… Umm, a walk?”

“Hmm? Lady Elana, if you can ride a horse then just get up on Lucy. She’ll be carrying our luggage as well, so we can’t both ride her.”
“Umm… I can’t ride a horse.”
“You’ll have to walk then. Here’s our luggage, Lucy.”
“*whinny*”
“Umm…”

Lucy is my beloved horse. I got her as a birthday present when I was young. We brought her along by having her join the carriage horses. My dad gruffly sent her off with me, saying that it would be impossible to walk all the way to the next country, so we’d have to take my horse part of the way. It sure is nice to have her. She’s a horse for riding and hunting, not a pack horse, but having her around still makes a huge difference.

“Um… are you serious? We’re…. seriously… walking?”
“Yup, walking. And we’ll probably spend the night out in the fields too!”
“… …”

I gave her a thumbs up with a grin. Lady Elana looked completely depressed. 30 seconds later, she whispered, “Please let me ride the hose after all,” so I put her on Lucy and began to walk. Before long, the sky began to darken.

We found a wide place near the road to sit, made a rough fire pit with some stones and put in some sticks I had picked up. I brought matches, so I set fire to dried leaves and small branches to create a camp fire.

“Would you like some jerky?”
“…I’ll eat it.”

Haha, her face is completely lifeless.
Well, that’s only natural.

“Want a blanket?”
“Yes… please.”

I took a thin blanket from the bag and handed it to her. I knew she would be new to this kind of thing, but she seems to have suffered quite a shock. As the only daughter of a duke, she probably never thought the day would come when she would sleep outdoors.

I munched on some jerky and tended the fire.
Lady Elana stared at the fire as she chewed her jerky without a word.

End of chapter 2

Thoughts on why The Banished Villaness’ Husband doesn’t make a lick of sense, and thus I dropped it after just three chapters.

As I said after chapter 1, the whole premise is off. The beloved only daughter of a duke wouldn’t immediately be married to a random stranger just because she got dumped in public. That would only be adding insult to injury. The answer to “my daughter got dumped” is not “force her to marry the first guy who comes along.” It’s just too stupid and speaks ill of the intelligence of all the characters in the series.
It’s even worse because nobody says that she has to be banished alone. In other words, Elana’s next fiance doesn’t have to be Eufran and the marriage doesn’t have to be right away. If she needs bodyguards and servants, the combined strengths of the Prime Minister and King should be more than able to provide enough protection for her before she leaves the country.
That realization makes chapter 2 even dumber. Why should the Prime Minister’s daughter, the daughter of a duke, sleep outside and eat beef jerky? With at least 12 hours notice of the banishment, and with the border being only 2 hours away, that was more than enough time to appoint companions, pack proper equipment, set up waystations and camp sites where she can rest, arrange for accommodation in the next country, contact the relative who lives there, etc. Naturally you can’t march a large army into the next country, but enough servants and guards to fit in two or three carriages is well within the realm of reason.
Just in case an explanation was provided in a later chapter, I went ahead and checked chapters 3 and 4. They do explain why the dragon is so important that everyone has to bow down to Rifanna, but nothing is said about why the Prime Minister’s daughter must sleep on the ground and fill her belly with dried meat, why she can’t have servants, why a horse-drawn carriage can’t cross a border (some stuff is said about magic dragon scales powering stuff, but they shouldn’t affect animals). Lazy writing at its weakest.
It’s also quite unbelievable that Eufran sent a report about Lady Rifanna to the King, the Prime Minister and the Chief Justice, they all thought it was a joke, they all didn’t notice how close Rifanna was getting to the Crown Prince even though they’re two of the most important persons in the country… really? How can they set him as a spy over the Prince and then not believe what he says? If they think Eufran is so stupid as to joke about something like that, why would they trust him with Lady Elana’s life? It beggars belief.
My final objection is less about the story, more about the lead character Eufran. It pisses me off how gleeful he is about getting to marry the Crown Prince’s ex-fiancee. A woman he loves, but who barely knew he existed and who certainly didn’t have any feelings for him. And it becomes clearer as the chapters go that he didn’t even know her well, he just liked her looks. His impression was of someone who was prideful and selfish, and he was looking forward to taking her down a peg. What a creep! And what about her state of mind? What about what she wants? Nobody cares. It reminds me of this viral picture of a creepy Chinese man marrying a disgusted-looking Uyghur woman:

Dunno how I’m supposed to enjoy something like this. The story is dumb and the main character is creepy. Two chapters is enough to know where to stop.

The Banished Villainess’ Husband web novel chapter 1 (retranslated)

I don’t normally translate web novels. In fact, I don’t normally translate anything outside my day job. The reason I’m making an exception this time is because I’m currently a sucker for these generic “banished villainess” shoujo manga. The manga for The Banished Villainess’ Husband (追放悪役令嬢の旦那様) came out recently, but the story didn’t make much sense to me. I started to feel that it was a poor translation to blame when I saw this particular frame:

This was my clue that the translation was off. For all their flaws, Japanese manga usually have well-edited and logical scripts, so if a line doesn’t make sense, 99 out of 100 times, it’s the translator’s mistake. In fact, as a general tip for translators when something doesn’t make sense: do a ton of research, ask a lot of questions, look all over the internet before you conclude that the source text is at fault.

So anyway, I was curious about what the line really said, so first I checked the manga raws.

Japanese grammar/vocabulary lesson: The culprit here is the word “おろか”. It comes in two flavors. 愚か, which means ‘foolish, stupid’ or as the translator put it, “naive” and then 疎か meaning “not to mention …; needless to say …; not to speak of …; not only …” and that is what the translator should have used.

Thanks to all that investigative work, I ended up reading two chapters of the web novel. Somehow. And at the time, only machine-translated chapters were available in English from Foxaholic (though they have now cleaned them up somewhat). So I ended up re-translating the first two chapters. Why only the first two? Firstly because I just wanted to get the premise straight in my mind, secondly because after reading chapter two the series just seemed too stupid to me to be worth continuing. But I will explain why when I post the second chapter tomorrow or later.

Summary of The Banished Villainess’s Husband: “I” had the luck of being the one who reached out towards the young lady whose engagement was annulled by Prince Alephaldo, Elana. The day after the annulment, I was banished with her and married even though we dated for exactly 0 days. Well, it’s just a slow country lifestyle of banishment in the neighboring country! Or so I thought, but…? This is my story about becoming a banished daughter’s husband.(Mangadex)

Chapter 1 of The Banished Villainess’s Husband
Author: Komori Kiri
Web novel raw: https://ncode.syosetu.com/n8287fp/

Prince, are you serious?

My name is Eufran D’italie Bailey.
I am the son of a count. My father is the chief justice.
This is the story of how I was deceived by an incredible woman.
It all started when my “friend” the Crown Prince suddenly declared that he was going to switch fiancées and foisted his “ex” on me.
It was a confidential matter when he told me, so not only did his fiancée have no idea, but the King, her parents and my parents were all in the dark.
It sounded like a joke someone would make in a casual conversation, but his eyes were completely serious.
Moreover, the one who brought the topic up was the Crown Prince himself.

His fiancée was the daughter of a duke.
There was no problem with her status.
Meanwhile, I barely qualified to be a noble.
My parents needled me at every opportunity because I didn’t have a fiancée at my age due to my extreme pickiness.
If I didn’t choose someone quickly, I might be forced to marry someone past marriageable age, so I had nothing to complain about if I could get someone who was both beautiful and high in status.
Even if she was an ex, she was still the Crown Prince’s fiancée at one point.

The real problem was the woman the Prince chose as his new fiancée.
She was a girl who possessed the “holy radiance” and was loved by the Guardian Dragon.
The dragon was the protector of the nation. In times of war, it was both its spear and shield.
The Guardian Dragon loved and protected people who had a special magical power known as the “holy radiance.”

This meant that the country had to have someone with the holy radiance – the beloved of the Guardian Dragon.
If the beloved child was slighted or treated poorly, the Guardian Dragon would abandon the kingdom and it would be destroyed.
That is the kind of woman the Crown Prince Alephaldo has chosen.
And thus, no one objects.
They don’t dare.

…And that’s why I’m at my wits’ end right now.

Because Alephaldo suddenly approached his fiancée, Lady Elana Ruthfett Forsythe, right in the middle of the graduation party, and pushed her out of the way, fully intending to break off the engagement. And thus he declared, loudly and proudly in front of everyone…

“You vicious woman! You think I don’t know about all the disrespectful things you’ve done to Rifanna?”
“Wha…?”
“I don’t even want to see your face! As of today, our engagement is over! And I’m going to make you pay for all the many times you bullied Rifanna!”
“Please wait a minute, Your Highness! That woman is the one at fault here! She may possess the holy radiance and be loved by the dragon… but Your Highness is still my fiancé…”
“Shut up! I’m saying I’m sick of that arrogant attitude of yours! Get lost! I never want to see you again!”
“Your… Highness…”

The woman in the purple dress who was pushed away, Alephaldo’s fiancée… no, ex-fiancé, Elana began to shake, fists balled up, biting her lips as she glared daggers at Rifanna, the woman Alephaldo had his arm around.

No one there tried to help her. Some of the young ladies could even be seen holding back their giggles behind their fans. Furthermore, some of the people behind her didn’t even hide their laughter as they commented, “The evil lady is finished now.”
The scornful laughter began to spread.
The scene seemed surreal as the King and the Knight Captain tried to restrain the red-faced Prime Minister who was on the verge of snapping.

In the midst of all that, Lady Elana, who had been pushed away, began to smile. She rose unsteadily to her feet… and curtsied beautifully.
“Very well, then. Since you are that determined, your Highness, I have no objections to canceling our engagement. Since I will be busy with the cancellation procedures, I must bid you farewell for today.”

With that, she tried to make a gallant exit.
Her heels clattered as she made for the exit, an unfading smile on her face.
However she suddenly staggered and lost her balance.
My body moved immediately to save her from danger.
Before I knew it, I was holding her arm and supporting her body.

“Careful there. Did you twist your ankle when you fell?”
“Oh! W-who might you be?”
“Eufran D’italie Bailey. You don’t know me? We’re in the same class.”
“The same class? …urgh…”
“Hey, are you really okay?”

Lady Elana was holding her head. Her face grew paler and paler.
The number of eyes scrutinizing her rudely did not decrease.
I started getting angry at those people and glared back fiercely. In response, some looked away, others pretended not to notice, some began to speak to those nearby…
I glanced at Alephaldo while I was looking at them, but he was laughing away with Rifanna as if nothing had happened.

Hey, hey, Prince… are you serious?
You’re not even thinking about Lady Elana any more, huh?

I could see the furious Prime Minister glowering in this direction with the same death glare that Lady Elana sported earlier, so I bowed to him. This lady inherited the weirdest thing from her father.

“I-if you involve yourself with me, you will put yourself in a difficult position.”
“Hmm? Are you worried about me~? You’re so sweet~.”
“!”
“Don’t worry about me. You have to act tough till the end, right?”
“…”

She left the hall holding on to my arm, not showing the slightest hint of pain in her leg.
She even managed a magnificent curtsy at the end before leaving.
Once the doors closed, she sank to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.

“… …”
“I’ll prepare a carriage for you. Will you wait here? Or would you rather…”
“I’ll… wait… in the arrival hall…”
“Okay. Hang in there!”
“Oh!”

She looked pretty surprised when I offered her my hand. Is it that rare for this lady to experience a gentleman offering his hand to a lady?

“…I cannot understand this. For someone of your position to…”
“I’m Alephaldo’s ‘friend’. And what my friend did makes me feel sick. If there’s a lady in front of me who can’t stand, I’ll give her my hand. I’m a gentleman, after all. Right?”
“…All right.”

She took my hand. She and Alephaldo were engaged to each other since childhood as a result of their parents’ decision.So I have danced with Lady Elana several times at social functions, but…

“Okay, one final push. Hang in there.”
“I…I know.”

She only had eyes for Alephaldo, huh? I didn’t make the faintest impression on her. That fact that she doesn’t even remember me… isn’t a good thing for someone who was supposed to be the Crown Prince’s fiancée. But I guess it just shows how obsessed you were with Alephaldo.

That evening, I took her back to her house and then left.
The trouble began the following morning.

As we were eating breakfast, my father sighed heavily and then said something unbelievable.
“Me? Marry Lady Elana? Huh?!”
“Don’t ‘huh?!’ me. The Prime Minister is absolutely furious. His Majesty is at a loss as well. Urgh, this is such a mess…”
“…”

I stabbed a piece of meat with my fork and brought it to my mouth.
Yup, that’s right.
It’s natural that Crown Prince Alephaldo has made a complete enemy of the Prime Minister after what he did.
Alephaldo is the only prince in this country. Since he has no other siblings, he was rather spoiled as he grew up.

I have five younger brothers, but the third son Courgan is the most talented. I’m sure my father wants to make Courgan his successor as well. In this country, heirs are designated, so you can make your most promising son your heir. However the second son Rooth is 13, the third son Courgan is 8 years old and my other younger brothers are 5, 3 and six months old. They’re all still kids.

I bet my father plans use me as a proxy for a while, then designate Courgan as the official heir once my brothers are old enough to be useful.
Or rather, that’s what he “planned” to do.
Right now he looks like someone whose plans have gone up in smoke.

“There’s nothing anyone can do about it because his partner is the maiden with the holy radiance, right?”
“That’s right. And that’s a whole new problem…”
“It’s not like you can cut her off at this point, either.”
“Argh… if you understand that much, why did you just sit back and not do anything? Couldn’t you have done something about her with your talents?”
“Come on, Father. You’re giving me too much credit. That’s way above my level as the son of a count. That would have been the job of his “study buddies” from higher-ranking families. And since Rifanna won them all over as well, there was nothing I could do. The end.”
“… Is that true?”
“Yes, unfortunately. Didn’t I report it to you, the King and the Prime Minister? Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten?”
“Oh! You mean that… I-I thought it was a joke!”
“…”

When I glared steadily at him, he had the decency to look apologetic.
He didn’t actually apologize, though.
Well, I guess it’s only natural.
Terrifyingly enough, Lady Rifanna had the ability to charm not only the Guardian Dragon and Crown Prince Alephaldo but also Starrett, Nicks and Cars, “friends” of the prince and future aide candidates like me, all of them from ducal households.
They were all sons of extremely highly-placed families.

Lady Elana and I were in a different class, so we had nothing to do with Lady Rifanna. However I did hear rumors that Lady Elana was harassing Lady Rifanna out of jealousy. I wasn’t interested in the truth behind it, because I also heard that apart from Lady Elana, the fiancées of Starrett, Nicks and Cars hated Lady Rifanna and bad-mouthed her.

But daring as they were, those women would not want to face the wrath of the Guardian Dragon. Neither would Lady Elana. So… either the fiancées or some other party whispered into the prince’s ear that Lady Elana was bullying Lady Rifanna. Just that would be enough to push the blinded prince to eliminate the “enemy.”

And since Lady Elana had the highest position among the noble ladies and was domineering and I heard no good rumors about her, she probably made a good target.
Yes, and if I didn’t get involved… I wouldn’t become a target as well.
There was no need to get involved.

[translator’s note: This part was poorly explained in the original as well (yes, I did check). Basically rumors were flying around about Rifanna being bullied and bad-mouthed. The fiancées panicked because the dragon might think the rumors were true, so instead of trying to clarify that they hadn’t done anything, they pushed all the blame for the fictional bad-mouthing and bullying on Elana.

Or it may have been someone else behind both the false rumors and the prince getting to hear of it. Neither the fiancées nor Elana actually bullied Rifanna AFAIK but either way Elana was framed and punished.]

“Back on topic, this talk of marriage between Lady Elana and I is kinda sudden, isn’t it? I just helped her up and sent her home last night, that’s all.”

“I told you, the Prime Minister is livid. So the King wanted to find another fiancé for her as soon as possible. When he saw you of all people helping her up and taking her away, you caught his eye.”
“Oh, really. Well, I don’t mind.”
“Aahhh… I knew. That you. Would say that!”

Father’s head sank into his hands.
Mm, this meat is delicious.

“Listen to the full story! Prince Alephaldo is urging the King to banish Lady Elana from the country!”
“What, seriously? Does he have to go that far?”
“Apparently it’s to avoid angering the Guardian Dragon. I don’t know how aware the Guardian Dragon is of Lady Elana. However, on the off-chance that the story of Lady Elana bullying Lady Rifanna is true, not even the King and the Prime Minister will be able to protect her. Even I have no choice but to support the prince in this matter.”
“Hmm…”

In other words, if the Guardian Dragon gets pissed off, there’s the chance that it will waste the whole country because it thinks we dissed the maiden with the holy radiance.
This is the threat of that “chance.”
That’s why Lady Elana is going to be banished to curry favor with the dragon.
It’s only natural when you think of the importance of the Guardian Dragon to this nation.

The problem is that it’s not clear whether Lady Elana ever did harass Lady Rifanna…
Lady Rifanna never said anything about it. Isn’t anyone going to check with her?
As far as I know, neither Lady Elana nor any of the other fiancées ever bullied Lady Rifanna.
No matter how irritating they found her, the nobles wouldn’t touch her as long as she was the dragon’s beloved and had the holy radiance.

This is an outrageous suggestion but, could it be… that this holy radiance maiden doesn’t give a fig what happens to Lady Elana?

“… …”

Which one of them is the vicious woman, again?

End of chapter 1. And already the key problem with the premise arises: it’s just too unbelievable that they would suddenly marry the Prime Minister’s daughter, and the daughter of a duke, off to a random count’s son just because he helped her once at a party. And not just marry her, but set off together to parts unknown. She can take a random guy along, but no maids, retainers, bodyguards, nothing? Ridiculous. I’ll talk more about the logical problems with The Banished Villainess’ Husband after I post the next chapter.

I Became the Chef of the Dragon King

I Became the Chef of the Dragon King is a combination of colorful art, cute character and mascot designs, an inevitable romance and lots of delicious-looking food. It won’t rock your world or anything, but it’s harmless fluff that is great for passing the time. I just wish there were more chapters.

Summary (from Mangadex): Cheong Shim threw herself into the sea of Indangsu! What will happen when she wakes up in a lazy dragon’s dungeon? Meet many cute monsters while living a delicious, symbiotic life!

As you can see from the cover art, Cheong Shim has a very cutesy design, and a cute, super ditzy personality to match. The reason she threw herself into the sea is not to commit suicide but so her ailing father could receive 300 bags of rice and eventually receive healing from Buddha. From that alone you can see how naive she is.

But it’s not the annoying kind of naive. She doesn’t go overboard being all cheerful and Pollyanna. She seems a little down at times, she suffers setbacks, she doesn’t want to get eaten by the dragon, and she pushes back reasonably enough when the dragon makes illogical demands.

All this to say that the main appeal of I Became the Chef of the Dragon King is the charming main character. Yes, Cheong Shim is very much a Mary Sue, but in a manageable, believable way. She didn’t win the Dragon King over completely in a day, and even her food isn’t that wonderful. One of her dishes was so salty it was almost inedible. Just like the meatballs I had last night… =_=

So since she’s sweet and hardworking, but not completely perfect, it’s easy to root for Cheong Shim as she tries to make a peaceful life for herself in the dragon’s abode. That’s the main reason why I’m following the series.

Although the series will supposedly be about winning the Dragon King over with food, only 7 chapters are out so far (as of early May 2020). In those chapters, Cheong Shim has only made two dishes, so if you’re here for delicious food pics and recipes, you have a long wait ahead.

If you’re reading it for romance, you’re out of luck again. So far the (admittedly cute) Dragon King only finds her to be a somewhat intriguing annoyance. And he himself is a bit grumpy and whiny, so it’s hard to ship them together. Though I suppose one would be grumpy if a noisy squatter suddenly moved into your house.

All in all, I Became the Chef of the Dragon King has made a very promising start. I’m looking forward to seeing more tasty-looking meals once Cheong Shim gets a set of cooking tools together. I’d also like to see the cute mascots on the cover being introduced. And of course, mustn’t forget the romance! I’ll update this post when the series is complete/much further along. Until then!