Bingo 11: Rings
Thanks to a fellow Cannonballer whose name I don’t remember (sorry! and thank you), I requested and got 4/5 of the romantasy manga The Savior’s Book Café Story in Another World. There are two ring connections here, one of the marriage-relevant sort, and second of the spell-casting visual sort. She has to use her great magic twice, which results in a glowing circular (ring) symbol appearing on her person as well as on the location she’s aiming at (the sky in both cases).
The thing I think I liked best is that the slightly older than standard protagonist Tsukina (she’s 30-ish, not teen/early 20) does not get involved in the stupid romantic or even general drama created by her teen counterpart in the first half, or her probably early 20-something counterpart in the second half in a way that lets said drama take over the story. In the first half, her bratty teen fellow Savior tries to cause all the drama around the palace because she can, and Tsukina tries to stay out of it, until the realm is in danger, and maybe then she’ll actually do something.
Similarly, when “God” decides to take her, he/it offers her wishes that will be in place once she arrives in the alternate world; our heroine is more adult and practical about this than your average teen, and even God is surprised. But it turns out that said attention to basic living concerns results in a slightly less ridiculous set of struggles to get settled.
I’m not even trying to suggest there’s much actual realism; why she thinks a book café in a world she’s never been to and not know the concept (and they don’t really as it turns out) is kind of beyond me. But then again, that’s not the point. It’s a handy place to live, and it also facilitates our girl meeting her fellow book-nerd (but also pretty hot) soldier guy, whose is roughly her age, which is another factor that helps make the obviously fluffy romance that follows a little more entertaining to follow. No dumb teen misunderstandings here, although the almost total lack of couple trouble is (again) not realistic, but also kind of refreshing. There’s a (brief?) time skip, and suddenly, our couple is wearing matching rings.
I don’t have the final book in the series, but I can guess what happens roughly with about 99% confidence. Still might look it up anyways.