Koushaku Reijou no Tashinami
Accomplishments of the Duke's Daughter

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Finally, a beautifully drawn manga featuring a strong but feminine MC who makes the story exciting without the elements of the doki-doki romance, magic potions or dragons. This is a story of a young woman thrown away by her fiancé, expelled from high society, learns from her mistakes, and makes the determination to stand on her own two feet, without yearning for a Mr Right to come along.

This is a story of Iris, who uses her knowledge from her past life to make her life succesful, as she no longer has the prospect of getting married.
The manga though, confuses the reader a bit by ... going quickly over the reincarnation part. The novel makes this a bit more clear.
Now what I'm going to say now isn't a spoiler, rather a way to clear up the confusion of those who've read it and make the description of the story more understandable: Iris isn't transported to a life in an otome game - rather, the moment the manga introduces her in her current life is the moment she remembers everything from her past life. A past life in which she had played the otome game that had revealed her downfall in her current life. That's the beginning of the story. Once you understand this, you'll also understand why it's not important to linger on the reincarnation part.
True, the writer could've dwelled on the "why am I reincarnated into this life and why do I suddenly remember everything at this critical moment?" But then I suppose the author would've to come up with a magic-circle-like explanation. Again, this isn't a magical story - this is about a girl making her own life work by using her brains, by working hard and by being focused on her goal, not on love.
The only lucky elements the writer has thrown in is her memory of her past life and her beautiful personality, which altogether makes the story great.

The story in the manga is slow-paced compared to the novel, however, this is necessary in mangas with political and business elements. The excitement that arise from facing obstacles in these areas are, personally better that in Saiunkoku Monogatari. It makes the reader look forward to how Iris will accomplish things.
As it is slow-paced it is still at a part where Iris is reaping success without too much ado. This creates an opportunity to get to know the main cast of the story. Also, this "beginning"-part of the story highlights the message the writer wants to bring over: Success is the result of using your brains, having the right priorities and hard work. Especially hard work.

The characters gets more well-rounded as the story progresses. I love the variety of characters, the good, the evil,... Also, the cast expands as the story progresses. I'm particularly thankful that the author does not limit the cast to only a handful to whom the readers could get attached to. But then again, I'm probably speaking as a novel-reader.

By the way, I love, love, looooove the strong element of loyalty in this story. Not in a romantic way, but in a friendship way. Albeit it's mostly master-servant relationships. Still, it's beautifully portrayed.

Iris Lana Armelia is a refreshing change from the stereotypes of female MCs in manga. She smart and emotionally strong, but not obnoxious. Compassionate and caring, but not dense. Feminine, but not whiny and in constant need for someone to hold her. Wealthy, but willing to work hard. All of this may make it seem she does things a bit too good, but hey, for a change, I don't mind following the story of such an emotionally superwoman. This is a capable female MC, and I love it! Yes, she is adored by many characters and rightly so! I find this way better than the typical moe MCs who are adored for being cute, looking cute and acting cute.

In short, I love this manga. The strong elements of being independent and loyalty and a beautiful well-rounded cast is making this a great read, both in manga and in the novel.
I hope they'll make an anime of this, too.

What if we gave a modern tax collector central control of a feudal economy

Sounds like a disaster in the making? It's also a far more accurate title for this manga.

The goal of this review is to give an overview of the story and especially the economics of the story up until chapter 23 which is where I dropped this.

We follow the footsteps of a reincarnated tax collector lady from 21st century that worked for the Japanese government who is now in the body of a petty villainess duke's daughter from an Otome game. Since she got on board when the original owner did her last ... act of villainy, she's set to be punished for harassing the main love interest at their academy. Since it's a fairly minor thing she did her dad just sends her off to manage a fiefdom he owns as a light punishment. So that's where the story takes place, from this point forward I'll refrain from talking about the characters, which are just generic but decent, the art is also ok, I'll also do my best to also keep politics out of this.

The setting of the world is quite unrealistic, I understand an Otome game wouldn't be very much fleshed out but the mangaka is playing it extremely straight so there's no excuse, for example in the fiefdom they're casually growing cacao in the farms but they don't know what's or how to make chocolate, they also haven't made the revolutionary discovery of banking, which has been with us in the real world for millennia now. So in this very advanced civilization with fully fledged nobility and academies for said nobility they still haven't invented chocolate and banking. That's hard to swallow. I usually let it slide in Isekai types but this is just too much, although only for the banking innovation because this revolves so much about economy.

Anyway MC sees her chance and not only introduces banking to her unsuspecting fiefdom, she goes from 0-100 by introducing commodity backed credit backed by the lord of the land(her dad), so yea, how do you think it would go if you go to the Roman empire who's giving salt to it's legionnaires and suddenly you start talking about commodity backed paper money, I believe you would be lucky to get laughed out of the room. But MC pulls it off of course. I don't remember if she establishes any lending practices though.

Moving on, we get to a point where MC is keeping tabs on the local economy and she sees some medieval times price fluctuations which she immediately confuses with inflation, and the little diagram they show in page 4 of chapter 19 is wrong on so many levels, however I'm not a heartless person I'm willing to cut some slack to a Japanese author, perhaps mal-informed, following mainstream japanese economic dogma, at least to the time of writing this review, so I'll explain, she says bluntly that inflation are price increases which means that the people are getting richer and proceeds to dismiss the phenomenon as a virtuous cycle, not only is she wrong on what's going on but she's wrong on what she said as well, inflation is not a virtuous cycle, in medieval societies is usually a straight line that keeps going up very slowly and steady as you mine the commodity your economy is based on(usually gold and silver) it can also go up if her bank starts expanding credit(printing more cash than gold it has on it's vaults) but we have no indication this is what's going on. So this is not inflation, it's just medieval price fluctuations, a very common occurrence, as season and situations change some commodities become more valuable and scarce than other so their supply/demand graph look radically different from commodities that are abundant at the moment because the demand plummeted and are therefore less valuable. Imagine is like buying winter clothes in the middle of a hot summer compared to buying the same clothes in the middle of a cold winter, you'd expect the price to reflect the clothes are more or less wanted, it is basically the same but more pronounced, but it ultimately balances out.

The straw that really broke the camel's back is chapter 22, a chapter all about taxation... Thrilling I know, in this chapter MC discloses her intention to get rid of the capitation and replace it with a sales tax. Which is a pretty good idea, the main drawback is that is harder to enforce. What's really bad is on top of the sales tax she also wants to impose an income tax on net income for all working adults... Now imposing this on a feudal society is a terrible idea for many reasons, the main one is that you're levying too much abuse on your poor peasants so they would probably just leave, income tax are typically imposed on war time, the enforcement would be a huge nightmare, these peasants are already paying the levy tax(they must respond to a call for war as soldiers) and lease of the land in all likelyhood so it's just cruel, they will cheat, you're milking something that's not there, It'll destroy productivity, increase spending and lowers savings. I believe she mentions is a progressive income tax instead of flat but it's still a terrible idea, and of course since it's net income you're free to do deductions, luckily a support character beats some sense into her by saying that the peasants aren't ready since they're not educated but still has the gall to agree it's a good idea and it'll be great if the peasants would do this voluntarily and without assistance someday lol.

Imagine you're a peasant in this fiefdom, by now you not only have a conscription obligation, you're also paying a lease to plow the land and paying a tax for every item you buy, and now you have to manually keep a ledger all the taxable year to record your income and expenses just so you can "voluntarily" give a portion of it to the rich lady that lives in the big mansion, if that was me I would be packing my bags.

It's obvious to me that the author likes the Japanese economy and wanted to model this new world after it, but some things just don't work if you don't do them properly. For full disclosure I don't have much issues with the Japanese economy either I can just see the flaws of trying to introduce modern tax and economic policies to the world of the past.

A positive of this is that she actually created an academy to drive innovation, that's a good move, even if it's just the author mimicking their own society yet again.

If I had to predict what would happen in this manga it'll be that she will eventually add a VAT for alcohol and whatnot, there's also no point in having a estate and gift tax so we can forget about that, she will introduce welfare and safety nets, perhaps state funded orphanages and she will eventually try to stimulate economic growth and prosperity by increasing overall spending.

Like I said I'm not upset at the author or anything like that but I find this manga extremely hard to read. I might come back in the future once this is finished to see how the non-economic plotlines pan out but in the meantime this is a hard pass for me.

It is incredibly surprising how much this manga has impressed me so far.

The idea of stories starting with a character being magically wooshed away into another world is not new. Many great stories have started with this trope. But the recent boom in these kind of stories in the manga medium, what I call "The Modern Isekai Boom", has left many people exhausted because of the tired, unoriginal and generic plot elements used in them.

In an onslaught of similar sounding stories, those that are indeed original and interesting enough to be recognized, always have a chance of standing out. Koushaku Reijou no Tashinami, known otherwise ... as Accomplishments of the Duke’s Daughter, is one such gem.

While it starts with the same old trope of dying and ending up in a game world, that too as the villain of the game, many elements in this particular manga are noticeably different from what one would expect. From her very first appearance, the protagonist, Iris, charms us with a sharp persona and a witty intellect – a combination born when her original self got mixed with her self from Japan – which is the makings of a strong lead character. From then on, we follow her as she is tasked to act as the Lord of her father’s fiefdom named Armelia, which is an enjoyable journey, even though it sounds like a rather uninteresting topic to deal with.

That said, there are some minor details in storytelling that certainly caught my attention. Throughout the story, moments of exposition tell us current and past events which help build a better foundation for the story to take place. However, they often stand out as noticeable moments which might draw the reader out from a flow while reading certain sections. It’s not the worst way of doing things, but it is avoidable in certain ways and kind of emphasizes that fact that this manga is indeed an adaptation of a novel and adapting a text heavy media to a visual media is surprisingly not an easy task. But a shortcoming like that can be easily ignored in wake of the well-constructed story that maintains a steady pace as it moves forward.

There are some noticeable shortcomings when it comes to writing the characters as well, especially the fact that the writers have made it abundantly clear which side is supposed to be the good side and which side is supposed to be despised by the readers. But there’s a certain charm to all of them which makes for interesting interactions and development, and since character interaction is the main means of progressing the story itself, it makes for an interesting story overall.

Despite the shortcomings, the story grips the readers’ attention quite well, leading us through and interesting and entertaining journey of personal growth, politics and reform throughout the fiefdom of Armelia and beyond, using knowledge of both worlds. The art-style suits the medium well and helps portray the fascinating story as it unfolds.

An isekai manga with a strong female lead, well written characters, a well-constructed story and a generic but decent art-style, Koushaku Reijou no Tashinami is one of those hidden gems that certainly stands out from the rest in its field. Will definitely recommend.

I originally read the first couple chapters ( I think like maybe around 5) I think I ended up dropping it from lack of boredom at the time and me being in the wrong mood to read it.

I originally don't like Female romances. The Male romance leads usually always end up being obnoxious and annoying. They're either completely dislikable or a complete pansy. Thankfully this actually has a nice Male romance lead with the 1st Prince.

The MC I like. She is nice, Realistic ( Mostly) and is much smarter then what you'd find most MC's are.

I kind of dislike how the MC mostly ... forgets about her past life or that she is in the world of a game. Besides the odd mention of her fate was gonna be that of becoming a Nun. It's kind of weird.

Even though she is a bit obnoxious. I do hope that Yuuri ( I think) Doesn't end up with a bad ending. I do kind of like her and she is just so naive I'd like to see more of Yuuri's mother. I think that'd be interesting.

I like the family of the MC also. The mother is my favorite family member with the grandfather being my second. It's honestly interesting and nice seeing a carrying mother that is really badass.

I can defiantly see this as an anime and hope we get one. It's an interesting story either way.

The other world or rather the otome game world has no magic, no mana, not even made up plants. The premise of the manga was interesting, then it became more like a petty or redemption story.

Iris is definitely op, she's backed with amazing lineage, supported by powerful persons, followed by equally skillful staff and she herself is very skillful, too skillful in fact, and she's not even a "mean" girl, she's basically a M**y S*e don't even try to deny it. She was but a mere office lady who works in taxes in Japan and plays otome games in her spare time which isnt her ... spare time because she's staying up late for it, it was unbearable to read how she was able to make beauty products, design clothes etc. The only 'flaw' so far is her trauma from the first 3 chapters, which I don't feel as convincing because I dont know who Iris is as a person.

I don't know why the author decided for this work to be an isekai, as it is practically an untouched topic. Might as well completely taken it out, because it disrupts the story for me, I don't know how I should feel or think about her, the MC, in some situations. Which really ruins it for me to be honest.
It's confusing to appreciate Iris's reactions to things and events because I know that she's from another world.
Though I barely know what she's like before, but the same goes for "past Iris".
Iris said that she from the real world and she "Iris" from the game has combined. But other than her modern world knowledge, nothing of her 'past self' has been shown through Iris, besides the occasional mentioning of it in her monologues.

The manga is very thorough with their dialogues about the economy, taxes and whatnot, maybe this is where the isekai comes in because with the age/era that its set in, I find it hard to believe how much progress the company had accomplished in less than 3 years. And how no consequences in relation to the accomplishments seem to arise.

The pacing is unsatisfying...its fast in the economy side, but slow in the politics side, which is where the main relationships that will move the whole manga are.

My overall is a 6.

Edit: I realize that my overall probably doesn't make sense because of not really having any compliment (edit: I changed it, it was a 7). Simply. The art is good. Despite all the characters being one dimensional, I still like them because they look pretty.

The supporting characters are pretty much thrown away after a few, all of that back story about how Iris picked them up, really serves no other purpose than to make their loyalty to Iris seem logical. Its also a one sided politics story, the antagonists is rarely given their own time in the panels, and even if they do its always to make the protagonists look really good. The only good supporting characters for me so far are Iris' mother and brother (surprisingly yeah).

This is the "Girl reborn into an Otome game" story taken pretty seriously, there's romance but not to the point of being silly, it's not a comedy, and it's not just cuteness. This is a real political story with money, religious organizations having power, nobles, enemy countries, and soldiers. It's not a dark or gritty story or anything like that, but this is not an excuse plot either.

My only real question about this story is why is it an Otome game? I get why it's reincarnation, the MC uses her knowledge of things like how to make chocolate and hair-care products to make money and ... start her power-base, along with being a banker letting her really understand taxes and such. Without the reincarnation she'd look like a complete mary-sue, but the game itself never really comes up. The game is already done by the time she remembers her past life, and the other characters like the Heroin and Prince barely exist.

Art is good, not the best but definitely not bad.
Characters are pretty great all around, especially the MC, her mother, and her maid.

Largest negative is the romance> It's telegraphed a mile away, as are it's problems and twists. It's not particularly deep, or engaging, it's just serviceable. Which is fine, it's not BAD, but every time I see it I'm just like "Yeah I already know, moving on please".

But over all it's just a really solid, good story.

This manga has been quite enjoyable so far. Decent art. Wide enough range of characters with depth in them. A not-so-typical story of reverse harem or a real life characters enter game type, here the female lead is neither a tsun nor an innocent, naive girl filled with romantic thoughts, but one with brain, strong will and capabilities, considering the fact she used to work for a tax company. The theories about economy, banking and finance, education, etc. are also enjoyable to read. Plot twists and secrets, multiple layers just make this manga more riveting, e.g. the MC is not the girl loved by everyone, ... but here she was accused publicly and expelled from school right from the first few chapters, or the girl that everyone thought to be so nice and dreamy is actually not that simple-minded after all.

However, the manga is by no means flawless. The MC has came to this otome world for at least 2 years, yet she has never asked herself how did she end up here in the first place. She just adapts so well to the situation and fully embraces her duty as the duke's daughter and the acting fief lord. All the policies that she proposes based on the real policies in Japan seem to be carried out so smoothly. The struggles are only discussed roughly through the subordinate's reports, but I doubt it can be carried out that easily given the high illiteracy rate and poverty at first, so more elaboration on the obstacles and her solution would be much appreciated. Also no light has been shed about her previous life as a salaryman in Japan so far.

Keep waiting to see how the manga progresses.

Overall:
Went in apprehensive but was really surprised. Good read, which got me into otome isekai.

Story:
Otome isekai+conneticut yankee in King Arthur's court. Sprinkles in some great political intrigue and drama too. The plot is not particularly original, but the execution is great. The pacing is perfect and its really gripping. Seeds of Plot points are introduced in advance and the manga does a great job at building up to rewarding payoffs and developments. Something new is always happening and it feels like progress is often made. Hard to put down once you start.

Art:
Good shit. Good detailed character designs, even changing clothes/hair of characters often. Lots ... of expressive face closeups.Paneling is easy to follow but nothing super creative. The colors are nice but obviously most of it is B/W. That said, there were almost no knock your socks off spreads or panels that made me go "wow". Just consistent quality. Could do a better job of showing motion, but excuseable since its not an action manga. Bad background work, uses empty B/W backgrounds often or simple copypasted effects extremely often.

Character:
Really excellent MC. The main character manages to really buck the trend of isekai protags. She is competent and has a real skillset that goes beyond game knowledge/knowledge of the modern world, character traits that make her extremely likeable, and realistic flaws that prevent her from being wish fufillment/self insert material. She makes reasonable mistakes/oversights, but she also manages to beat the odds in novel and interesting ways.

Unlike a lot of other isekai, the MC isn't wanked by making the other characters incompetent or cardboard cutouts. The side cast is also very competent and recognizeable. The villains feel threatening and the competence of all the characters makes the political intrigue tense and suspenseful.

I've only read 21 chapters of what is currently out but I just had to write a review for this and get more people reading this!!

This is a story about a lady who after being dumped by her betrothed for a lady of lesser birth, returns home to her father's manor and becomes an absolute boss woman in an attempt to make her people prosper. It is laced with politics, business, intellectual intrigue, and a healthy helping of female empowering. An absolute page turner!

What a lovely, intelligent and different heroine we have here! Who is not focused on love but on building her territory! There ... seems to be a budding love story in the horizon so please look forward to it. I am! haha But it is not the focus. It's about the journey of an intelligent woman who is using her knowledge for the betterment of her people and in a smart, warm, light way. It is rare to find such manga heroines among what we have currently in the manga world (so far as I am aware. If you know more do tell! hehe). They are truly hard to come by. So when you find one, you jump into the story with excitement!

The STORY is for a more mature readership as it has many elements of politics, governorship and business. The most fascinating thing for me though is that it is set in a "fairy tale"-like kingdom kind of setting. Which is great because it makes you feel relaxed and makes the mature adulting themes not overbearing.

The ART is absolutely beautiful!! The character designs are just so lovely! Of course this is not surprising considering that the premise is that the origin (and I stress the origin ALONE, while playing no further influence in the story thereafter) is an Otome game. So you will definitely get a feast for your eyes 100%.

The CHARACTERS are all very varied and interesting. The heroine of course shines the brightest and grows and grows with every successive task she takes on. Other characters are mostly supportive and not very fleshed out (thus far in the story anyway, there's still time) as their role is to help the heroine's attributes be more accentuated, but there are other supporting characters whose stories truly intrigue. You cannot wait to see how their development will contribute to the direction the story will take. It truly keeps you glued to the story.

ENJOYMENT is a little choppy at the beginning 2 or so chapters but as the story progresses and finds it's footing enjoyment just soars! I literally started reading this today and I am already at 21 chapters. I truly cannot even tell you where the time went while reading this. I was even at trouble to put it down to go feed my body and do other necessary things! haha

I absolutely recommend this!

Koushaku Reijou no Tashinami initially tries to be different than the standard "overpowered MC in a medieval fantasy world" (which I typically enjoy), but that is quickly dropped in favor of a MC who perfectly does whatever she tries to do and simple characters that defy the interesting set up.


A great example of this is in the synopsis, "Instead, she starts her new life as the antagonist, right at the moment she's being sent to live in a nunnery—for the rest of her life!" Everything that sentence sets up is a lie. All the drama that comes from being reincarnated as a "bad" person doesn't ... exist, the "antagonist" had a hobby of saving orphans when she was younger, so much for being a bad person. And any threat of the nunnery punishment is dropped like a hot potato, and later after learning more about the characters, doesn't make any sense from a story perspective.

I won't go into any details about why I think she is "overpowered", but in general she applies modern ideas to the fantasy world and it always works out perfectly without any real struggle or unintended consequence.

Art is super nice though and bumps up the overall score for me from a 6 to a 7. The story is fun at times, but, if you are looking for something other than a perfect MC who can do no wrong in a black and white world keep looking.

Following the current trend of the villainess manga troupe, x person gets into the mind of the villainess from a game/novel and tries to make the best of the circumstances. The main difference between this manga to the other variants is that it primarily focused on her trying to become a successful businesswoman who maintains her territory. I do enjoy these types of things as my guilty pleasure it deviates from the norm of not making Iris an immediately detestable character since she saved another person while she was just a child without any outside forces.

However, we do follow the standard troupes afterward of ... the antagonists being the love interests of the "protagonist" of the story just because they were told the "villainess" was cruel. Characters like the prince and her brother fall under this idea and although I don't mind these archetypes I do wish there was more depth to their character rather than blinded by love to not being able to have any sense of reason until they are nearly disowned.

I also do not like how near the later ends of the manga there is a love interest being made, because of course we have to have a romance and drama. I don't like this because I enjoyed the idea of Iris being a businesswoman more than any other aspects of the manga, having a love interest and causing issues because of said love interest to give a happily ever after feels forced.

All in all, it will satisfy your thirst for villainess mangas but it is slowly transcribed so probably have to go search for another series soon.