Cover of “The Devil Is A Part-Timer! Volume 13” by Satoshi Wagahara.I’m back with another book review, and this time I’m reviewing “The Devil Is A Part-Timer! Vol. 13” by Satoshi Wagahara! I’ve read the past books in this series so far and enjoyed it, so it’s nice to pick it up and continue reading. Here’s a summary so we know what it’s about:
“The Hero and her angelic mother may no longer be at each other’s throats, but that doesn’t mean Emi and Laila are suddenly getting along. The whole situation is a pain for Maou, especially with Laila constantly pestering him for help, claiming the fate of an entire planet is at stake! When the Devil King finally decides (for Emi’s sake) to lend a hand, Chiho can’t help feeling a bit jealous, and she is plagued by the fear that her friends might return to Ente Isla, leaving her behind. As Chiho wrestles with her emotional demons, Rika-fresh off an explosive date with Ashiya-wants to gossip about a totally different sort of demon!”
Plot development: 3.5 out of 5 stars
The main reason I give the plot this rating is due to this book tying up various sideplots as opposed to still following the main plot and/or story. There is some more major worldbuilding information that the story gives in the beginning and end of this volume, however, so it’s not like it’s skippable.
In fact, it’s actually a nice thing that this volume slowed down the pacing of a plot a bit because it allows focus on the developing relationships (not just romance, but also family and friendships) in general, but in turn I think it’ll affect more of the main plot moving forwards. . There’s focus on Laila trying to salvage her relationships with Nord and Emilia (mostly Emilia), focus on Chiho trying to figure out her feelings with Maou and where she stands in their sort-of relationship/love triangle with Emilia. We even get more of Ashiya’s romance subplot in this volume, which was nice given how there was a subplot going on in past books and it hadn’t been touched upon much until now.
Character development: 4 out of 5 stars
Romance development: 4 out of 5 stars
I actually think it was a good thing that the book focused more on developing the characters. We’ve been introduced to quite a few over the past few volumes, and now with Laila dropping in, I’m glad this book took time to develop her a bit more so we know how complicated her relationships with Emilia and Nord are as of the time of this book. Yes, Laila isn’t the best parent, given all that happened in the series so far that she caused or somewhat put into motion in some way, but she’s trying to make things right, and Emilia and Nord are slowly opening up to that. I think it also helps that they now have Alas Ramus involved in the family as well.
In terms of romance, this book expands more on how the relationship between Chiho and Maou is going. They’re not officially romantic, and Maou isn’t with Emilia either, but Chiho did confess her love to Maou a while ago and he hasn’t exactly given her an answer yet. I’m glad Chiho (with some encouragement from Kaori, a friend of hers) finally takes matters into her own hands and tells Maou straight-up that she needs to hear an answer from him soon, because he clearly needs to work on his communication. In my opinion, I don’t know if Maou would end up romancing her or Emilia in the series, given how he’s occupied with the main story and also because he’s not always the best at communication, but he does appear to want to do better with the latter, close to the end of this volume. While on the topic of romance, there was also a few chapters devoted to Ashiya’s romantic subplot. It doesn’t end on a happy note, unfortunately, and I won’t spoil how it ended, but the way it was written makes a lot of sense for both Ashiya and Rika, and I wonder how it will affect them both interacting with each other in the future.
Overall, I’m rating this book 4 out of 5 stars!