Ah, young love. It's all drama all the time. Especially when you're a human who has accidentally found their way to the youkai world and fallen in love with a two-tailed cat-girl spirit.Tokimeki Mononoke Gakuen, Volume 2 picks up just at the end of Volume 1. Arare and Kiri are in love, that much is obvious, but they've got something important standing between them and consummation of that love - the fact that if they have sex Arare will cease to be human and will become a youkai herself! Her situation isn't made easier when she meets Akina, a youkai who tells her that she herself made that choice.
As much as they desire one another, this simple fact keeps them apart. And, it is this simple fact that causes them to fight and causes Arare to run off, unaware that Pero has followed her. When Arare ends up back in the human world Pero is somehow dragged along. Awkward, but not unbearable...until the human world starts to make Pero sick. Now Arare has a more pressing problem - if she doesn't get back to the world of the youkai, Pero may die!
I have had a strong belief that I knew what the end of this series was going to be from waayyyyy back in the story. As soon as we heard, in fact, that Arare would become a youkai if she made love to a youkai, I pretty much assumed I knew what the ending was going to be. It seemed so *obvious!* I'm not going to spoil the ending, but I will say this - I could not have been wronger. ^_^;
The ending was cute, the ending was happy...it just didn't do anything like I expected it to. So kudos to creator Nangoku Banana for finding a unique, creative way out of that well. (That phrase has a story behind it. My Dad was telling me a story of a serial he read when he was a kid - one of those adventure things, you know. The hero was bound, at the bottom of a well, no one around for miles, no tools to rescue himself with, etc, etc. End of chapter. Next chapter began, "Once out of the well..." We use that phrase around my house to signify cheating your way out of corners you've written yourself into.)
No doubt Kiri and Arare will live happily ever after.
Ratings:
Art - 7
Story - 8
Characters - 8
Yuri - 9
Loser FanBoy - 7
Overall - 8
This series is still not for the prudish. It's more serious than Volume 1, and slightly less outrageous, but still pretty over-the-top.
On another note, if you are interested in the youkai portrayed in this story and don't want to wade through a lot of tedious academic research or historical stuff, I recommend Hiroko Yoda and Matt Alt's Yokai Attack!, a fun "field guide" to youkai you might encounter and how to deal with them if you do.