A set up for the coup de grace... ready the box of tissues!

PTSD portrayal pretty good. It’s funny to see the loopy veteran girl still knows her stuff out on the sea despite her appearance of insanity. It’s almost like there are two sides to the girl: one side is cheerful and charming (so that she wouldn’t scare citizens away), the other side is chillingly realistic and in depression from her experiences.

Pretty freaky to see artist portray school girls playing with grenades given by garrisoned troops as a suicidal, scorched earth tactic. Damned depressing such things happened in WWII with Japanese forces out on the islands.

last edited at Jan 3, 2019 9:29PM

Who are they fighting, the russians, the americans, or is it a totally fictitious war all together?

Who are they fighting, the russians, the americans, or is it a totally fictitious war all together?

No exact dates were given. Although the combat doctrine offered in this latest chapter is between WWI and WWII, the manga didn’t specifically state which side the MC is on; however, the issuance of grenades to the populace of the island(s) did occur with Japanese forces in tail-end of WWII fighting American navy and marines.

AFAIK, the manga is depicting a fictitious war in that setting of pre-computer assisted warfare, but story elements did come from history. I think it’s best for the manga to remain vague about which side she’s on and when.

oh no

War never changes

last edited at Mar 5, 2019 11:56PM

Who are they fighting, the russians, the americans, or is it a totally fictitious war all together?

i think its pretty clear she is Japanese and the enemies are the Americans, at least thats what i've gotten given what the story presents vs what i know of history.

So what just happened? She jumped ship to evacuate residents of the island or was she massacring them too? The ship was sunk too, right?

So what just happened? She jumped ship to evacuate residents of the island or was she massacring them too? The ship was sunk too, right?

Yeah she jumped the ship to evacuate them, but to protect them she had to kill one of the other girls (their enemy since they're all girls in the war) but I guess the island girls got traumatized because they saw her killing another girl, one similar to them. I thought the ship sunk at first but the page after that makes it seem like it didn't sink, but I don't know

EDIT: After reading it again I guess there was a rescue ship to help them, so the ship did sink but they're still alive

last edited at Mar 6, 2019 10:28AM

So did Minami die or was just left on the island?

last edited at Mar 6, 2019 12:05PM

Well that was confusing

I'm assuming that's her spirit still on the island, she never took her bugle with her. Though I'm not sure who is saying they got left behind. Not gonna lie, not saying the art style is bad, but it's really hard to differentiate characters when everyone is in uniform and it's all done in sketch style. Was it the spirit of one of the girls she killed telling her she was left behind?

edit: Oh, I see. O-ne is one of the crew members on the ship. The captain is telling her Minami is gone, then Minami's spirit plays her bugle on the island. Unless her supernatural bird powers actually did fish her out of the water and scavenged her bugle from the wreck, but that would pretty much undermine the point of the story.

Welp. I did say to prep the Spec Ops quotes, didn't I?

The island should have died long ago. We were ordered to abandon these people. Instead, we chose damnation

last edited at Mar 6, 2019 9:19PM

W2f

Can it be more depressing

So did Minami die or was just left on the island?

I think she died after she was left on the island, which is why O-nae said "She was raised by nature, so I'm sure she's returned to it by now."

This looks like it should be good but it's too tough to follow. Either way I'm still left strangely depressed after I finish reading, whether I understand what happened or not. At least they nail that.

Very poetic. A really impressively beautiful translation.

Tragic but beautiful. Personally I didn't have any trouble following the story, which just made it that much more painful.

And I coudn't follow most of it, which just made it that much more painful in more ways than one

i love the art a lot

holy fuck

Oh hey I was just thinking about this series earlier this week while reading Miss Medic's Diary at War

It feels like this re-release was much clearer than the original translation. A great mark of how much the scanlator has improved in that timeframe.

I just finished reading this thoroughly. I can't seem to grasp the idea on why the vast majority of people who read this struggle to understand the story. I think it was harder to understand because of the translations and deeper meanings I suppose. But reading it was a gorgeously beautiful and gut-wrenching piece.

War is really sad, and this story as a whole was very poetic. It spoke out to me in a way. It shows all the hurt and devastation that occurs within the war. --- What a story... Everything about it, the characters, the topics, and the art style too. Beautiful. Truly something. I guess you could say it is a bit odd, but it is definitely one of a kind.

I just finished reading this thoroughly. I can't seem to grasp the idea on why the vast majority of people who read this struggle to understand the story. I think it was harder to understand because of the translations and deeper meanings I suppose. But reading it was a gorgeously beautiful and gut-wrenching piece.

War is really sad, and this story as a whole was very poetic. It spoke out to me in a way. It shows all the hurt and devastation that occurs within the war. --- What a story... Everything about it, the characters, the topics, and the art style too. Beautiful. Truly something. I guess you could say it is a bit odd, but it is definitely one of a kind.

I had no trouble following this either. It's very clearly a story interspersed with what are meant to be photos of events that took place during the story. The juxtaposition of the horrors and tragedy of war with the daily lives of those who take part in it. They are just girls, as they say. Not only that, but the characters have different names and hairstyles. Is it a literacy thing? I did take 2 extra lit courses as electives in college. Maybe that's it.
On a different note, I really think this puts into perspective how wrong the way war is portrayed to recruits is. It doesn't make sense that sending girls to war somehow turns them into women, and it really shouldn't make sense for men either. Men go to war under the impression that it will make them stronger, but they come back broken husks. They don't know what's going to happen to them, and that's by design.

thanks very much friends!

from what i can gather, women really didn't have combat roles in the imperial japanese navy at any point from meiji restoration to the japanese surrender. japanese women on the homefront were nurses when the us army started island-hopping and liberating southeast asia, notably expressed in machiko kyo's cocoon. still barring maybe a few contingencies i feel this concept was pretty realistic. could be talking out my ass, not an expert on this topic by any chance

the issuance of grenades does clearly point to this taking place around the time of the battle for okinawa - the talk about the southern islands and all. also this whole work is slathered in the rising sun flag (coming from an occupied country it is pretty tough to understand on face value but the japanese war machine are pretty clearly the bad guys in this work). but the fact that the survivors of the war are training soldiers pretty much after the war ends is kind of ahistorical like i think the jsdf was formed in the 50s? ultimately it's just historical fancy

anyways my translation is much more horseshit than the previous group, shoutouts to them!