Act II is everything I hoped and feared it would be.
It´s painful in all the best and worst ways. There were a couple of parts where I felt like I needed to stop reading for a while and process everything, but couldn´t because the game immediately threw me into the next life-threatening situation and I just had to find out what happened next.
I was never prepared. For anything. Not even for the introduction of the final main character. This series doesn´t just have an unusual setting for an otome game, its whole way of unfolding its story is unconventional.
Now that the cast is "complete" I certainly do have my favourites, but there isn´t a single character I don´t care about, which made for an especially intense read.
The recurring characters from Act I change with more exposure to the war, including Elfriede herself. Most of them not for the better. Which was to be expected, but it also made me wonder: Where will these people end up physically and emotionally once the war is over? If they even survive? Am I just setting myself and Elfriede up for (even more) heartbreak if I pick this route?
At this point I can´t imagine a happy ending for the cast. Too much has happened already, and too much will keep happening. But I need to see it through to the end.