Hataraku Maou-sama!
The Devil Is a Part-Timer!

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Hataraku Maou-sama! is an amazing series. Nearly all of it's aspects are amazing, and those that aren't don't detract from the series too much. If you are reading the story purely for the comedic factor, or the plot, and not the relationships between the characters, then I would recommend reading it. However, if you read it for the relationship between Maou and Emi, then I recommend stopping at around Volume 17, as opposed to completing the entire thing. So, to make it brief, the series has an amazing story, and, despite me personally finding the ending to be less than favorable, I'd still recommend it ... to anyone interested in something like this, if for nothing else than the story leading up to the ending.

This light novel. Jesus Christ, how can I go about it?

Spoilers ahead.

I picked up the series when the anime first aired back in 2013. The premise was interesting and I liked the characters. It was the first light novel series I picked up. As years went by, I kept buying the novels after reading fan translations. The writing was fine and the character interactions were great. I especially liked the development of Emi, the main heroine, as she questioned everything she knew and became a different person as the series progressed. It was hard and still is, to find stories where the female lead is ... developed so well.

For the past 20 novels, there's an obvious way that the story is probably going to end up. Characters were developed and expected to do certain actions because it just made sense and any good author would follow up with what they wrote in a logical way. Hataraku Maou Sama was a good read and I hoped it would continue that way. That was until news broke out about Light Novel 21, the last one, and its ending. Instead what we got was complete shit. The "Final Battle" was very anticlimactic and poorly written. Maou ends up dying and becoming human and officially dating Chiho after sidelining her for the past 20 books. He basically comes full circle and is back where we first found him in LN 1. You would hope something interesting would happen to him but nope, a subverted expectation, I suppose. Not a good one, though.

Maou's sudden relationship with Chiho over is the biggest travesty of this book. The author had so much development with Maou, Emi, and Alas=Ramus' relationship with a lot of it going towards Emi falling for Maou. As I mentioned before this came with a lot of internal debate with Emi questioning her beliefs in the Church and everything she has known and realizing she slowly fell in love with Maou. Yet none of this mattered because Chiho confessed her feelings to Maou first.

Chiho is someone I don't like but it was a gradual dislike. She's the middleman character that lost her purpose several light novels in and the author kept inserting her out of nowhere and forcing her to appear in every major event to keep her relevant. It's aggravating. She's not even the glue that keeps everyone together because that's Alas=Ramus. Chiho was fine when the novels were mainly a comedy and a bit of fantasy but as the series progressed to more Ente Isla plots, it became more fantasy and Chiho really wasn't needed.

But to make her relevant, the author gives her power that saves all of Ente Isla because why the heck not? :)

There was so much going for this light novel only for it to be thrown away at the last minute, leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.

Imagine being served a perfect steak. Just before you're about to dig in, the chef comes to your table and tells you he forgot to add the final touch and proceeds to dump an entire cup of salt and ketchup over your steak, walking away with a smirk of satisfaction after announcing "There, now it's perfect!".

The ending completely ruins the entire series; yes it's that bad. It invalidates 20 volumes of wonderful character development, shoving down your throat an abysmal relationship that makes absolutely no sense in the story.

How can the author be so tone deaf/unable to read the room? It's absolutely disgusting what ... the author's done to this series. It was one of my top 3 light novels, and now I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I regret giving the author my time, attention, and money. He should be ashamed and apologize for ruining the series.