Wistoria: Wand and Sword Volumes 11 and 12 Review

The second season of Wistoria: Wand and Sword’s anime is about to reach its conclusion! But fans have plenty to look forward to as Kodansha continues publishing the manga, and Yen Press recently licensed the first light novel. But how has the manga been developing recently? Let’s take a look!

This review contains spoilers for anime-only viewers. Volume 10 coverage is in our January From Our TBR Pile article.

In the previous volume of Wistoria: Wand and Sword, Elfaria and Zeo battled it out as they each hoped to take Will for themselves, but in the end it was the Thunder Faction that our protagonist ended up joining. And now Will finds himself in the midst of yet another predicament.

The new students expected to join their new factions and get used to life studying under their seniors and master, but instead Will and his comrades were told to investigate their clans and find the traitor from Goetia who aided in the Terminalia attack (the events of Volumes 6-7 and the start of Season 2).

With no idea who they can trust and who could be on the side of evil, this is a high-stress situation which isn’t helped by trying to adjust to their new daily lifestyles and training. And then the worst happens. Will and his friends meet up to discuss the results of their investigation so far, but on the way to their meeting spot, Julius finds himself confronted by the enemy and loses his life because of it. However, his loss isn’t for nothing. He does leave behind a clue for Will, who ends up coming face-to-face with Shade, a mage from Goetia who has been using puppet magic on Will’s allies.

Volume 12 largely deals with the aftermath of Julius’ death. His friends need time to grieve, but they still haven’t found all the traitors so, although Will fought Shade, there’s no real sense that they’ve managed to avenge Julius yet. And they still have no idea who’s trustworthy and who isn’t.

Meanwhile, the Thunder Faction is preparing to dive into the dungeon below the Tower and Will is receiving one-on-one training with Zeo. But naturally he can’t concentrate at all. Surely Zeo, as head of the faction, could be trusted? But what happens if he can’t be?

I admit that I was shocked to see any of the main cast killed off at this point in the story. Not least in an off-screen fashion like this. We see Julius’ body as he passes away, but we aren’t privy to the confrontation that led to it. Having been such a big part of the story since he and Will became something resembling friends, it’s hard to believe that he’d be written out like this! And really because he was so important, I feel disappointed that this is the way his story ends.

And that feeling lingers into Volume 12, where the cast are grieving for their friend, but we readers are still reeling from the shock of how abruptly it happened. Still, if you manage to push those feelings aside, writer Fujino Omori does deserve credit for depicting the emotional state of the cast in a way that’s realistic and doesn’t try to hurry along to the next part of the story.

As is often the case, these two volumes are a good balance of worldbuilding and exciting action scenes brought to life wonderfully by artist Toshi Aoi. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens once we dive into the dungeon; it seems like it’ll be an interesting direction to go. Especially as it seems likely we’ll start to see more of Goetia as a result, which brings the bigger picture together.

As mentioned, Wistoria: Wand and Sword comes to the West thanks to Kodansha, and these two volumes continue to be translated by Alethea and Athena Nibley with lettering credited to AndWorld Design. Sadly no colour pages to speak of, but there are some bonus pages that talk about some aspects of the world-building in greater detail.

The series remains ongoing in Japan, with 15 volumes currently available there. Here in English, our next release is #13 in September with nothing further scheduled, but hopefully there won’t be too large a gap before we get to #14 and beyond.

Overall, given how the death of a pivotal character is handled, I can’t help but feel a little disappointed with how this arc has gone. However, this is still the Wistoria we know and love, so provided you’ve been enjoying it generally, this won’t be a reason to stop following it now.

Our review copies from Kodansha are supplied by Diamond Book Distributors UK.