Looks like ship Marus has sailed and ship Cyru has sunk. Maybe. Nothing seems certain in this series where the lead character has this massive harem, but is totally oblivious how many people are in love with her.

Jerod certainly showed a slightly darker and more possessive side this part. Well, he is a Royal, after all, and our girl (plus her harem) has certainly given him a massive amount of frustration.

Now we go into waiting mode for the next part.

The prospect of Jeord winning the succession battle though. Would the country survive Queen Katerina?

So I went ahead and caught myself up on Bakarina and I'm still rather enjoying it. Certainly not one of my favorite series or anything, but it's got plenty of fun and silliness overall. Here's hoping volume 9 starts up soon!

I think you have perfectly encapsulated my views on the series.

We're told many times that obtaining Dark Magic requires the sacrifice of a human life, though. Which brings up even more speculation about whether Original Catarina counts as a sacrifice...

Not necessarily.... Raphael didn't sacrifice anyone. The mage who gave him Sirius's memories did. And that mage is no longer around, yet Raphael still has those powers. That implies that while a sacrifice is required to initially create the powers, they can apparently be passed to another person, perhaps by using the memory transfer magic.

In any case, I'm probably just overanalysing things because I went straight from Bookworm to this...

If you bought it on Amazon, you might need to talk to their support to get the new version; Amazon by default doesn't push out updates to customers.

Part 1:

Katarina and Scott Pilgrim: Bread makes you fat?

So biggest takeaway on this part, Katarina mentions Romeo and Juliet in casual conversation, which catches the interest of Mary and Keith slightly. She explains it's a tragedy. I don't think they have much time before the play, but maybe they'll perform that in the distant future with her direction?

I'm surprised Katarina didn't think Mary and Keith's denial of a relationship was too swift, like a cover-up, and think it confirmed her suspicions, however exhausting that would have been for the reader, and also surprised Mary and Keith didn't take her "I will side with you when the time comes" to mean she would take them both in a harem marriage. Again, any time misunderstandings can be cleared up is good.

I wonder if Katarina knows the recipes for her favorite foods? I forget if she ever brought that up before, but she should really try to create those dishes here.

Edit: Finished the final part, 10.

Ok little volume. We get introduced to Joerd's Bros and their fiancees.

We get more potential harem members (how big is this harem gonna get? I get the feeling the bigger it gets, the less likely we'll get a true harem ending, but either a Joerd ending or a "Friends" ending).

Maria really took a backseat this volume it felt like despite ending strong in the last one, though I suppose Katarina did show interest in being with her by promising to try and join that magical organization after they finish school. Oh, and she made good baked sweets that Katarina gets to gloat about helping sell. All hail marketing queen, villainess actress pro, and future Sherlock, Katarina Claes.

So I'm going back to reread volume 2 at least before going onto 3. So 2 introduces the theme of dark magic, the ability to manipulate ones emotions, consciousness, and memories.

One theory would be that the original Katarina Claes wasn't that villainous, just jealous, but was manipulated by Sirius to do those really evil things to try and knock out a Light Magic user in Maria.

Also, this could help explain how Katarina's memories are combined with her Japanese self, as well as how Sophia is able to share consciousness with Acchan. But I don't know how far they're going to go into explaining how or why the Reincarnation works (like, did god create the video game? Did god make their afterlife a simulation of a game, or did this world already exist?). I feel like we're not supposed to think hard about any of this, that you just accept that it is, but eh. >_>

I had another theory that got shot down which was the fifth secret route wasn't a ship with the student council president, but instead with Katarina herself after resolving his dark magic issue that had a hold on her. But nope, they say in no uncertain terms he is the final route.

Dunno about the intellect of the Katerina from the otome game, but our Katerina sure doesn't have the personality of the game version.

She's honest, open, hasn't an ounce of subterfuge, if she says something you can trust that it's what she really feels...if she thinks something is her fault she'll humble herself before you as she apologizes. And she honestly believes everyone has strengths and weaknesses.
In short, if she says something good about you, believe it.
If she ever grows out of being a knucklehead everyone had better worry because of the alliances she's forming in-kingdom!
And she hasn't meet anyone from outside the kingdom yet...

ETA:
Having now completed Volume 1...
Called it!
Gotta say I loved all the POV sections for the other characters.