魔法先生 ネギま！Volume 25 Chapter 224 (manga)
Mahou Sensei Negima! Manga Chapter 224

Summary/Synopsis: With Fate’s girl Brigitte there, Paru uses her artifact to create a mid-level golem in 2.7 seconds. However, Brigitte is easily able to stop the golem’s attack, which is no surprise to Paru. Nodoka asks Brigitte for her name as Paru summons her “Super-Flexible Armored Donzura-kun,” which looks like a giant toy cat mouth. With this, they escape to a different location. Nodoka has Brigitte’s name thanks to her new artifacts and the group plans to report to Negi on the spot. Brigitte has other ideas since her mission is prevent them from helping Negi. As such, she quietly request they behave and listen to a recital.

Brigitte begins playing her violin, which causes a nearby clock tower to explode thanks to the sound waves emitted. Realizing how truly dangerous the situation is, Nodoka, chibi-Chisame, and Paru get on top of a flying stingray-type creature. Paru tells Nodoka to pilot the critter by placing her hand on it since Nodoka can now read Brigitte’s mind. They leave with Brigitte in pursuit. However, they are able to elude Brigitte’s attacks thanks to Nodoka’s mind reading. Brigitte can’t believe her attacks have been avoided but then understands that the mind reader “Fate-sama” told her about must be there. This causes Brigitte to change her attack to one from all sides, which Nodoka gives warning about.

Paru is able to summon four Shield Maidens just as the massive attack hits, but the girls are in bad shape and injured despite the defenses. Brigitte is impressed with the skills shown by non-magical students from Mundus Vetus (Earth), especially their advancement in such a short period of time. She praises them for having even survived her attack and while leaving these wanted terrorist for the military would seem to be the best solution for the helpless girls, Brigitte feels that leaving Nodoka in one piece would be a mistake. Before she can kill Nodoka, Kotaro shows up and breaks her bow before causing it to go up in flames.

Meanwhile, Nodoka, Chamo, and Jack find themselves in a barrier dimension trap sprung by Koyomi and Tamaki. Jack launches several massive blades out, one which strikes a floating block were Koyomi and Tamaki are standing. Konoka uses a magic arrow (Sagitta Magica Series Lucis) attack, which reveals that the Koyomi they see is merely an illusion. Jack is amused and tells the girls he’s changed his opinion of them, saying they aren’t going pantyless for nothing, which causes Koyomi to get flustered while Chamo and Konoka see Jack still isn’t taking the situation seriously.

Elsewhere, on the Ariadne Magical Knights’ private airship, Emily receives orders to investigate the 17th unauthorized disturbance in the area. Emily arrives to tell her fellow Knights they have a mission, only to discover that Yue, Collet, Beatrix, and the others are busy sampling various cakes and deserts. However, the Knights gear up and set out to handle their first mission.

Thoughts/Review: Well, I decided not to think of the obvious and showed myself too smart by half. Brigitte’s attacks were soley based on sound, which is the obvious attack from an instrument of noise. My thinking had been that since Paru creates golems and Nodoka is a mind reader, Brigitte’s attacks might be illusion-based as a counter to that. Nodoka can’t read the mind of an illusion and a solid illusion would seem to be a nice counter for Paru. That leaves Chisame, who’s not done much.

It is interesting how much Fate and his people fear Nodoka though, or rather her pactio artifact and its ability to allow Nodoka read minds. Thinking back on previous times Nodoka has used her artifact in combat situations, it appears the target has zero defences to prevent Nodoka from pulling every bit of information out of their mind. That truly would be a terrifying weapon though, wouldn’t it? No wonder Brigitte would have killed Nodoka.

I wonder if Brigitte is blind or just has eyes like Kaede (always closed).

Now that Kotaro has entered the frey, I wonder if another of Fate’s babes will emerge to deal with him. Fate seems to have chosen his companions very well and sent them out to deal with just the right problems. I’m still not sure that Jack will ultimately have problems with Koyomi and Tamaki, but it seems that Akamatsu-sensei may have given his Japanese readers some clues in the names of Fate’s girls. This is some thoughts prior to the release of chapter 224 from Negima! fan and Japanese reader, Hata.

if anything, look for Rakan to be in trouble sooner or later, remember Rakan saying he got stuck with alt dimension fight during the Negi training? could Koyomi (calendar) control “time” and Tamaki (ring) control “seal space”? no way Fate only send them two without thinking that they have a good chance at handling him.

Hata went on to talk about some of the other girls as well but the girl’s names is something I’d not considered. So it appears that Hata was spot on, considering the trap they sprang on Jack.

So, an interesting chapter and it appears that Akamatsu-sensei has gone back into a normal storytelling mode (vs. an accelerated one of more recent chapters). For those wondering (and I know that there are a lot of you based on search patterns), Negima! chapter 225 won’t be out for TWO WEEKS! So hold tight, y’all. ^_^