King’s Proposal Volumes 2 and 3 Review

Back in September, I reviewed Volume 1 of King’s Proposal, a new light novel series from Date a Live duo Koushi Tachibana and Tsunako. Now I’m back with Volumes 2 and 3 to find out if this continues to offer the interesting fantasy series we were introduced to. Let’s take a look! 

Volume 2 opens with the news that Void Garden (the mage school that protagonist Mushiki has been attending) is about to hold an interschool exhibition match against Shadow Tower, another magic school. Mushiki, still being relatively new, believes this will have nothing to do with him as only the top students are chosen to represent the school, but unfortunately for Mushiki, he gets chosen. 

Worse still, headmistress Saika has also been chosen as a representative, which would be wonderful if not for the fact that her body is still merged with Mushiki’s. Now he’s going to have to figure out a way to attend the match as both of them without anyone finding out about Saika’s situation. 

Ultimately the interschool exhibition is the least of Mushiki’s worries when he meets Clara Tokishima, a student at Shadow Tower and a popular MagiTube streamer (YouTube but for mages). Mushiki saves the girl when he catches her falling from the sky and then it’s love at first sight for Clara, who quickly asks Mushiki to become her boyfriend. But we all know Mushiki has eyes for no one but Saika, so upon turning Clara down, rather than accept his decision, Clara chooses to challenge Saika to a duel for the position of Mushiki’s girlfriend! And rather than a contest of strength, they compete in a cooking competition?! 

Needless to say, this contest takes up the majority of Volume 2 and completely overshadows the interschool exhibition. And by the time we get into Volume 3, everything is said and done with Shadow Tower. Instead, Mushiki faces a new crisis when little sister Ruri is called back to the Fuyajoh household having been told she’s now engaged. 

Ruri sends a message back to Void Garden informing them that she’ll be leaving the school, but Mushiki knows she would never willingly leave the place where her idol Saika works. So Mushiki along with Kuroe Karasuma (Saika’s attendant) decide to infiltrate Hollow Ark – the all-girls school Ruri has been transferred into, run by the head of the Fuyajoh family: Ao Fuyajoh. 

After the impressive battle at the end of Volume 1, I was excited to see where the story was taking us next. Both of these new books expand on the world of King’s Proposal by introducing us to other mage schools outside of Void Garden and new characters. However, I have to say the second instalment was disappointing after the events of #1. 

The interschool exhibition being put aside in favour of this contest between Clara and Saika made the book a slog to get through. Clara as a character was excitable and bubbly, befitting of her status as a popular streamer, but I couldn’t help but feel there were more important things to focus on than arguing over who should date our protagonist. It does improve in the last 50~ pages when the focus shifts to that of the antagonist, but that doesn’t make up for the rest of the novel being underwhelming. Nothing of importance happens until the end and it’s so dull to read through, that I had to wonder if it was even the same series. 

Volume 3 is an improvement on the whole. Ruri’s situation is treated seriously and fewer girls are falling all over Mushiki (although as noted in my review of Volume 1, Ruri is in love with her dear brother). The history behind Hollow Ark and the Fuyajoh family is important to the overall plot, which helps too as it feels like the story is progressing as opposed to getting side-tracked along the way. And on the whole, I like how the story concluded and the twists and turns along the way. While Ruri falling all over her brother was a tad annoying, she did get some significant character development of her own and the whole thing was still a lot better than Clara’s antics in #2. 

If I had to describe this series so far, I’d say Volume 1 was half-comedy, half-action/fantasy. #2 turned up the comedy to 100 and then #3 dialled it right back down again. This makes for a difficult reading experience as the quality of the books fluctuates a great deal between all three. 

Ultimately this makes the series hard to recommend at this point. The second instalment burned away most of the excitement I had from the initial entry and while the third book is an improvement I am not particularly confident that it won’t go downhill again after this. And with so many stories like this on the market, there’s not a good argument for why you should give this a chance over those other more consistent books. 

King’s Proposal Volumes 2 & 3 come to the West thanks to Yen Press under the Yen On imprint. Both continue to be translated by Haydn Trowell and read well on the whole with no issues to note. Volume 4 of the series is currently scheduled for an English release in March whereas Japan has just reached Volume 5, so we’re more or less caught up at this point. 

Overall, King’s Proposal’s second and third instalments prove disappointing in a variety of ways, especially after such a promising start. While the third book does improve, I imagine it won’t inspire enough confidence in readers to continue with it. This is a shame, but that’s what happens when you whittle away an entire book on two girls fighting over the protagonist in the most stereotypical way imaginable.