#volume 7

His shoulder hands and tail is a separate entity in of itself????

I wanna slow down a little with After the Rain, because as we near the end it's getting really good. So even if I'm reading the omnibus, I'll split them up for the final four proper volumes. We start #7 with a fun excursion. Now, I like this family trip with Tachibana, her mom, and her kickass auntie. It's just a fun diversion from a story that often sticks to the same few locales, hot springs trip and you know...it's not really the type of story that makes that too fanservicey.

But where this segment shines is how it bookends the end of this volume. I always think of this as a high watermark for a manga artist. When they're conscious enough during serialization to construct good volume releases. Eiichiro Oda is great at it when you start paying attention. So from that perspective I like seeing a rare story where Tachibana is still a bit of a confused kid dealing with the pressures of growing up. Bickering with her mom, wanting to toss out her track gear and all. We don't see that a lot. She may be a little weird sometimes but Akira is quite mature for her age and seems as much compared to her peers. But she's not a full-fledged adult quite yet. I've often used the phrase "denouement of childhood." The end is in sight, you're most of the way there...but not quite. So keep that in mind.

I just love these chapter covers. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is one of my all-time favorite classics. From the iconic animated Disney movie to the original novels to all kinds of parodies and homages, I love the saga of the little girl who's always giving herself great advice she never follows. Tachibana as Alice and Kondo as the White Rabbit are just great. Same with the cute lil baker getup. Most of the volume is a breeze. Akira's enjoying working more shifts, helps Kondo set up a nice birthday for his kid, the writer dude's fussing about getting a movie deal...then:

I adore this turning point as a big double page spread. Just four panels of Tachibana's expression. She starts a nice, happy day at the restaurant (fittingly a rainy day) and her vibe is just shot to hell by track friends showing up. Leading to...good guy Kondo catching on quick! He's such a good guy here smoothly telling Tachibana he needs her on making desserts because she's so good at plating them. Which makes it even more of a gut punch when he follows that with:

Look how dark and heavy a scene like that is framed. Beautiful. Wouldn't work if it came earlier because you really need to trust Kondo's not a bad guy who'll take advantage of this young lady at an awkward point in life. He's worried about those feelings. So I cannot wait to see how he handles this well, after the rainy day at the restaurant.

But, this is what I mean by how the volume started. Tachibana being a bit of a bratty teen with her mom. This hits harder because we had that great reminder she's still just a kid. Waaaaaay closer to his kid's age than his.

and then the book straight up being like HERE! ENJOY TWO MO RANS!

that taxian jun’s reanimated corpse was pulled through a rift

into the alternate timeline

and he was still able to harass and get hard for chu wanning

even though his heart isn’t pumping?

what mo ran did to the world and chu wanning in the original timeline (😰)

what mo ran and chu wanning are doing now in this alternate timeline (😏)