Ah! My Goddess Manga/Oh My Goddess! Manga
ああっ女神さまっ Chapter 291

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

The goddess and the bard spend their lives together until one day, the bard is elderly but the goddess has not aged. She is thankful for his songs that have taken her to far realms, though he never took her physically anywhere. She apologizes for tying him down, saying that because she loved him, she should have set him free. He tells her that he has no regrets, and strumming one final time, tells her he’ll take her to the ocean.

With that, the old bard dies. The goddess tells him to sleep well and sets him on the ground. Keiichi, now outside the body, wonders if Belldandy is still in the goddess. The goddess, with tears in her eyes, decides that she will leave and see the ocean. Keiichi protests, but of course, she cannot see nor hear him.

As she attempts to leave the lake area, her clothing has long streamers that tie her to the lake. Despite the pain it causes her, the goddess begins ripping the streamers holding her back in order to get to the ocean her beloved had sung of.

Thoughts/Review:

I wasn’t sure what kind of bad thing would be in store for the bard and the goddess, but although they had many happy years together, in the end, it was the death of the bard that was the bad event.

The fact that Keiichi would age and Belldandy wouldn’t has always been an elephant in the room, but one that kept very still, thus was ignored. However, should Belldandy and Keiichi get together, one could see Belldandy losing it once Keiichi dies. After all, despite her placid nature, Keiichi is the one who can cause the most violent reactions out of Belldandy if she thinks someone’s jacking with her man. Jealousy storms anyone?

So, it is sad to see this goddess in such pain when her human lover passed on. Since she’s obviously tied to the lake, I wonder if she manages to break free, thus killing herself.  That could be something that the deities of Belldandy’s world would be keen on avoiding.

Since I think the manga is still going to end with chapter 300, I am considering going ahead and pulling in the next couple of chapters since I’ve had folks say that they are fine. I am very interested in seeing where this all goes.