This article includes spoilers for the previous volume!
How do you prove that you are alive? By interacting with other people? By interacting with the environment around you? Or perhaps, by trying to find your real body? This is just one of the many issues that our cast of main characters has to deal with in the third volume of the Occultic;Nine light novel series.
Similarly to the first volume, volume 3 of the series once again shifts its focus to telling the story from the nine different perspectives of each main character. In the previous volume, the vast majority of chapters were told from Yuta’s perspective, and rarely shifted to another character. While there are more perspective shifts this time around, some characters do seem to have less presence than others.
In this installment, we are introduced to a new character: FBI investigator Asuna Kizaki, an investigator that is looking into the mysterious events of the previous volume. Despite her late introduction into the story, she quickly becomes one of the most fascinating characters in the series, and is a great addition to the already intriguing cast of characters. A good chunk of this volume is told from her perspective, meaning that the reader will spend a lot of time solving the case alongside her.
The ever useful Tips list returns in this volume, as well as another cryptic afterword by the author, Chiyomaru Shikura. In the afterword, Shikura explains that the two year delay between the releases of volume 2 and volume 3 was caused by his need to hide from a secret organization that was out to kill him. Whether or not he was joking about that remains to be seen…
Overall, volume 3 was an awesome read, and some story-related questions were finally answered. Occultic;Nine’s tale is seems to be slowly coming to a close, though neither a Japanese release date, nor an English release date for volume 4 has been announced yet.
Volume 3 is available now on Amazon for $14 USD (13,50 €).
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