Synopsis

Autumn is just around the corner, and it’s finally time for Forge Eizo to build a bathhouse! Blacksmithing is exhausting, sweaty work, so who wouldn’t want a natural hot spring to soothe away the aches of the day? As the family begins construction, Eizo realizes he doesn’t have a way to contact his friends outside of the Black Forest—it’s not like texting has been invented yet. Right on cue, Camilo proposes a solution to this problem, but it comes with a catch: Eizo must take in another apprentice. Enter Karen Katagiri from the Nordic region! Eizo prays that Karen doesn’t press him about his fake backstory, but as he gets to know her, he can’t help but feel that something is amiss… Are her intentions as pure as the steel she wishes to forge? Or will she thrust a dagger into the heart of Eizo’s family? (Source: J-Novel Club)

A Blacksmith and the New Apprentice!

Following on from Eizo’s successful meeting with the master of the Black Forest, the latest strike of My Quiet Blacksmith Life’s hammer finds the forge building a hot spring as well as welcoming a new potential apprentice.

For the blacksmithing saga’s ninth instalment, the story’s main plot sets out to explore the continents’ Japanese equivalent and Eizo’s faked homeland, the northern territories. This starts when the forge is introduced to Katagiri, nicknamed Karen, who wishes to apprentice under Eizo in exchange for Wyvern messengers. A seemingly dutiful student at first, suspicions about her true motives begin to take shape when her blacksmithing skills are called into question.

Albeit short, this story involving the forge in a game of subterfuge makes for fun reading. The clues surrounding Karen’s true motives and the reason for her quick discovery are well explained by the author. Moreover, with a plot exploring Eizo’s fake homeland, it ends up putting him in some hot water for a change. With each passing volume, the truth about Eizo’s situation comes closer to being revealed, and whilst it’s been interesting watching him try and wangle his way out of explaining, the best thing for the story’s continuance is for an explosive reveal to take place in the near future.

The rest of the volume is concerned with the slice-of-life side of the series’ antics revolving around the creation of a hot spring for the forge.

Having read through nine volumes of the series so far, I’ve come to learn that there’s a bit of give and take necessary when it comes to the day-to-day aspects of the story; it is a slice-of-life, after all! However, with the majority of the volume’s runtime being devoted to this, it’s difficult not to say that it hasn’t overstayed its welcome.

The problem? Everything regarding the slice-of-life side is always the same. The same long-winded explanations, the same one- or two-word character responses, and the same routine unending. This is fine in small amounts, but the balance for it in this volume is off. More time should have been given to fleshing out Karen’s character or, at the very least, offsetting the hot springs story with another interesting part of their daily routine. Unfortunately, that’s not what we got.

Overall, while I found the latest instalment of My Quiet Blacksmith Life to be fine, I think this’ll be the last review I do of the series. I’ll still be reading it in my spare time, but unless something monumental happens, I’m struggling to come up with anything new to write about the series.

I Give My Quiet Blacksmith Life Volume 9: 5/10