Mariela has an enviable life now in Labyrinth City with a store of her own and the perfect workshop for her to practice her alchemy in secret as well. A few more people have found out that secret about her abilities, while others are content to not question the “these potions were created hundreds of years ago and have barely degraded while in storage” lie and just make use of her potions. As the forces of Labyrinth City continue their conquest of the dungeon that fundamentally altered all magic in the area, they’re in dire need of Mariela’s potions but are those alone going to be enough to win this war against nature?
There was a moment in this volume where it’s explained to the readers just how close Labyrinth City exists to complete destruction and I thought oh boy, I hope this isn’t a long series. With so many challenges in the way of the background goal of the story, to defeat the labyrinth and therefore restore control of the land to humans (allowing for the creation of new alchemists among other things), there’s a self-imposed time limit on the story and, even if each of these large volumes was to focus on a very short period of time, that kind of detail in the setting really does influence how I at least approach a series and my patience with plot progression. Fortunately, this series is only six volumes long (although size-wise that’s more like 10 standard light novels long) and that seems like it’ll be just right. That’s a relief to me, especially since I’ve seen just how long some light novel series go on for!
Most of my feelings on this volume are the same as they were for the first volume including the slavery aspect; I continue to find the way this story approaches slavery to be rather skeezy and that Usata Nonohara is taking a coward’s way out on the topic. In this series, all slaves are people who deserved their punishment of hard labor leading to early death: that is the view of seemingly every single person in this book including the slaves themselves (who just wish they hadn’t been caught at whatever crime they were doing). It’s strange since The Alchemist Who Survived otherwise seems to enjoy playing around in a fantasy setting with shades of gray — like with some details revealed in this volume about just how the fighting forces of the city have been able to keep going with 200 years of barely any access to magical potions etc. But instead of bringing that complexity into this aspect as well, Nonohara seems to enforce this mindset on every single character and even into the very narration of the book. I continue to find this detail to be a big hurdle in recommending the series and it’s a shame since I do truly like every other aspect to it and I can only hope some nuance in thought appears in the rest of the series.
Speaking of the narration, it sometimes feels as if The Alchemist Who Survived is being narrated by a specific character and not just an omnipresent viewpoint. I have to wonder if Mariela’s old master is still alive and is actually the one relating this story to us — the story keeps framing them as someone rather unusual and special but without getting into specifics which makes me think there’s a future plot point there. Although it’s increasingly treating Mariela like that as well; we the readers already knew that even compared to other alchemists Mariela is exceptionally talented at both the variety and quantity of potions she can create but volume 2 explains that to “create” new alchemists, an older alchemist must connect their apprentices to the ley line and loses some of their power in the process. How lucky for the inhabitants for Labyrinth City that when the day finally comes that they can connect to the ley line again that they have a living alchemist with the potential to create many new alchemists as well!
This is fiction however so I can forgive it for handy contrivances such as this; by this point I do intend to finish the series since I do like Mariela and the world she is in but I sure do hope that the slavery aspect doesn’t remain static for the next four volumes.