Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End vol. 4

The party gets a new member in this volume!  Sein is a priest who likes to drink, gamble, and smoke.  Between him and Heiter, Frieren and Fern are having to rethink what they believe the qualities of a good priest actually are.  Still, having another healer in the party is always useful and after having some mild parting drama with Sein’s brother, they’re off and it’s anyone’s guess as to whether or not he’ll still be in the party by the end of the volume.  Not when they have to contend with things like finding out what kind of curse put a whole town to sleep, helping an old dwarven warrior protect the town his wife loved, and dealing with a flying monster that steals their wagon (with them inside).  More trying than any of these, however, is the persistent threat of the “Will They or Won’t They” tension between Fern and Stark!

That’s right, if there’s one thing that’s sure to aggravate me in any medium, it’s bog-standard romantic tension.  The business between Fern and Stark rears its head more often than I’d like in this volume, but it doesn’t stop the overall pleasant vibes this series has been exuding from the start.  Neither does Sein’s presence, though he doesn’t really add too much to the stories being told here.  They’re very much a mixed bag, as they generally don’t provide a whole lot of surprises, but a couple of the ones being told here do manage to hit on the series’ main theme about the worthwhileness of the connections we make with more grace than you’d expect.

Then we get to the final chapter and things get more interesting.  It was established in the previous volume that the party would need a First-Class mage to journey further North, which means it’s down to Frieren and Fern to show the Magic Association what they’ve got.  This is a chapter that’s full of worldbuilding, new and old characters, and even hints at a larger story beyond the quest the party is on.  I know the series can do more interesting storytelling than what it usually winds up delivering, and it looks like “Frieren” is setting itself up to show what it’s capable of in the next volume.