Reading notes: "The Water Dragon's Bride" vol. 1-6 (manga)
The Water Dragon's Bride by Touma Rei
PLOT: A pond swallows a young girl and spits her out into an unfamiliar world. The villagers revile her for her Other-ness and trick her into becoming a convenient ritual sacrifice. The water dragon picks her up when they drown her, steals her voice when she refuses to be his bride, and then, with the intent of lending her his power, grants her the ability to make it rain when she cries. Asahi, the FMC, survives the trials wrought upon her by cruel adults and unfeeling mortals, and becomes revered as a priestess. Subaru, her only friend, strives to be strong enough to protect her, but knows that all she wants is to return to her original world.
The first few volumes are pretty rough, not in the "children being terrorized by adults and gods" way (though certainly there is that), but in the general writing and pacing way. Not bad, just not particularly compelling when the mangaka obviously does not care much about details that fall outside of the main trio's scenes, ie. Subaru's own home life and relationship with his family, which seems to be resolved offscreen during the timeskip. That said, the tropes remind me a lot of vintage fantasy shoujo anime/manga and the familiarity brings me comfort.
The narrative is largely story-driven with the characterization lacking meat, but I'm enjoying the shape of the story where a god falls in love with a human and becomes himself more human, one unguarded moment at a time. (It also helps that this manga is relatively short and theoretically finishable.)
READING NOTES:
The first chapter introduces her as having blue eyes and "red and curly" hair (on the covers it's pink and wavy) "like her grandmother", but other than that the mangaka simply does not care lol it was a cursory attempt at justifying the aesthetic. It bothers me though!!! She's canonically attractive so I guess grandma was some sort of international model!
Other characters note Asahi's unusually perfect, translucent skin, furthering her Other-ness from everyone else in this world. But if she’s been stuck here for years wouldn’t her skin adapt to the conditions 😭 Imagine the Water Dragon's “protection” extending to UV protection 😂 And I suppose her skin is always hydrated as a natural consequence of being imbued with the power of a water god!
There’s definitely a major love triangle between Subaru, Asahi, and the Water Dragon, but it’s more to compare the feelings of a passionate human VS a dispassionate god—Subaru is quite explicit about challenging the Water Dragon's love and the shape that that takes. As of volume 6, the Water Dragon seems to accept Subaru to the extent that I feel he’d be fine with them being a throuple if it fulfills Asahi's needs. 😂
I'm at the point where Asahi gets hurt and the Water Dragon puts her in a literal bubble of protection, making it so she dreams of a perfectly ordinary school day in her original world with her friends from the other-world. The day loops over and over. It's very Suzumiya Haruhi but in the opposite direction, and again it's pleasantly nostalgic.
The guy whose mother was a transmigrator deserved a longer arc or at least his own spinoff. Since they don't develop his relationship with FMC enough for it to be a nice non-romantic alternative to Subaru's and the Water Dragon's, his entire presence feels extraneous...