My Gently Raised Beast Volumes 8 and 9 Review

Warning: spoilers in the review

After Adellai and Barahan’s descendant, Joseph, attack the imperial palace, the battle is full-on. Humans and divine beasts under the descendant’s influence are fighting each other, and there doesn’t seem to be an end to it.

Briddy and Amon don’t know if or how they can win. The enemy is stronger than them, and Amon is barely able to stand next to Briddy as the divine beasts keep coming for him. Briddy as well has barely any strength left as she needs to face Joseph who is not himself anymore. Barahan has taken full control of him, and he’s the one commanding its forces to defeat Briddy. But he wants to be the one to strike the ultimate blow to Briddy, as revenge against Rafiyan once and for all. Rafiyan being Briddy’s ancestor gives her some power to help her fight back, but it seems to be nothing in comparison to Barahan.

However, she’s not alone. When everything seems almost lost, her brother, Lart, comes to help out. But it might be too late for him to save everyone he holds dear.

The battle ends pretty soon in Volume 8, with the rest of the volume being like an epilogue on how Amon and Briddy get their happy ever after. When they come out as victors from the battle, Briddy is mortally wounded, and only the help of Rafiyan and Amon’s power allow her to heal. But in the process, Amon loses his memories. I found this part pretty confusing as there is no explanation as to how it happens and how Amon affects Briddy’s recovery. Amon brings Briddy to the lake in the forest, which is a special place for magical beasts as that’s the instructions that came from Rafiyan, and then the readers are left mystified. Briddy is ok, but Amon is not himself anymore! He can’t recognise his lover. How did healing Briddy exactly affect Amon’s memory? I think the readers will have to come to their own conclusions for this answer. It’s going to take quite a while for Briddy and Amon to have their happy ending, but it should be sooner rather than later as Briddy is pregnant! Now she just has to wait for Amon to come back to her.

It’s nice to see what happens to the characters after the battle and to find out that the one the readers thought was dead actually isn’t. Adellai betrayed her family and her people, and we thought she paid the price for it with her life during the battle, but apparently her family was able to get her a healer on time. Volume 9 is shorter than the previous volumes and it’s composed of side stories based on the characters we have grown to like (some more than others) in the previous eight volumes: Lucy and Lart, the emperor, and even Adellai.

I think there are still some loose ends in the story which the author didn’t address, such as how will the divine power affect Briddy? Will she pass it on to her and Amon’s children or will they just be divine beasts? Does Amon still have divine power if he gave it to Briddy to heal her somehow? What happened to all of Adellai’s accomplices? I’m a voracious romance reader, and I’m happy that Amon and Briddy got their happy ever after, but I was left somehow disappointed because not all my questions were answered. It seems the last part of the main story is rushed to reach a conclusion and then the author dives straight into the side stories.

As Volume 9 is the last volume, the author and adapter leave the reader a thank-you note followed by a few illustrations done by fans of the series (I assume) congratulating them on reaching the end of the series.

My Gently Raised Beast is written by Early Flower, illustrated by Yeoseulki and adapted by Kim JunJun. It started as a serialised digital comic on Webtoon before being released in print edition by Ize Press. The series is now complete.

Our review copy for Volume 9 was supplied by Ize Press.