Quite a fun way to start the volume with the party being different species as they passed through changelings at the end of Volume 7. Where we have Laios as a dwarf, Marcielle as a half-foot, Chilchuck as a tall-man, Senshi as an elf, and Izutsumi as a kobold. What it really shows is how good each party member is at their own strengths. Laios doesn’t have the stamina now as a dwarf. Marcille lacks the mana supply and maneuvering, as a half-foot is a pain, which is why Chilchuck always gets out of the way near danger. Chilchuck doesn’t have the skills to be effective as a tall-man. Senshi with no skills with mana is pretty uselss as an elf since they lack physical strength.
The big point is that in a party everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses. Sure, those haven’t changed, but now it is distributed differently. I do like the one point, which is very much agreeing with this series, that despite different backgrounds, at the end of the day, eating is the same as always. Eating is the one thing they will always share together.
As they get into the trolley, we get a bit of knowledge on Laios’s past. To put it simply, he really is an adventurer because he had nowhere else he could go with his life. I’m curious what the issue between him and his parents is, as they aren’t on speaking terms. A bit of a sad moment for Marcille to learn that when she was with Falin she simply wanted a friend after her brother left her. Thinking, what if Falin stayed at the school with Marcille? Could things be different? Though it explains why Laios is the way he is. Still, his decision not to leave his sister alone is endearing.
Senshi brought up an interesting point about how meat, once digested, loses its properties. In theory this plan makes sense because if you separate the dragon parts of Falin from her human aspects, you could separate the soul. It is quite the crazy plan to consider, but consider the approach using black magic is dangerous. Instead of separating the souls, which has the risk of losing Falin they just need to fully eliminate and eat the dragon portion. Now the trick will be how they can convince more people to eat the dragon.
We focus back on Kabru and the elves going down in the dungeon, joined by Namari & Shuro. This section showed how cunning elves are. As Kabru cared for the safety of the adventurers, he hoped that his mentor would agree to convince everyone to head back up. Sadly, the greed of the dungeon engulfed their hearts. Which isn’t surprising; greed corrupts mankind.
The play of the elves was very interesting. Lure out the Lunatic Magician to the 1st floor and match him there. It seems curious that those that depend on the dungeon will become weaker on higher floors since the magic is thinner. In fact, this would be checkmate, but it’s interesting that Kabru saves both the Lunatic Magician and Falin for the moment. In his heart, depending on the elves feels wrong because there is a lot they keep hidden from races with shorter lifespans. The big thing is that if the elves conquer the dungeon, there is a case of the rich getting richer. At the very least, Kabru leaves Laios with the opportunity to conquer the dungeon. Curious how things shape up with Kabru & Mithrun falling to a lower floor.
The encounter with the Bicorn was an interesting moment with some interesting characterization for Chilchuck. Despite the comment that he cheated on his wife, that couldn’t be further from the truth. As we have seen, Chilchuck is a more distant person, but he is an extremely kind man at heart. Now how things play out with his wife going forward is difficult to tell, but this really shows us why Chilchuck stayed with Laios & Marcille after Falin was eaten by the Red Dragon. He really cares for them.