Sora is a wonderful ball of energy and he truly is the best thing about this volume. He is bold and spunky and genuine, and he has his whole future ahead of him, which he is still trying to figure out. Unfortunately, I cannot recommend Sora to Hara to anyone on account of the fact that the entire premise is about a child predator abusing his power to date a child. Despite Hara's insistence that "I have a policy of never touching students" whenever Sora approaches him, anyone who has read Doukyuusei or its sequel can attest to the fact that this is a boldfacedlie. His backstory tries to portray him as a more sympathetic character so we'll root for him in finding love with this child, which is disturbing in how it portrays his supposed guilt as noble. The most tragic thing is the reveal that Hara is just another player in the cycle of abuse and it isn't even addressed.

Once again, the fact that every teacher in this series - and seemingly every adult this man knows - is a pedophile creates an ominous atmosphere where children are brought up to accept that this dirty secret goes hand in hand with homosexuality. After all, it isn't just Sora who mistakenly thinks there's nothing wrong with this situation. Given that this is the plot of the entire story, there is no escaping it, so please keep that in mind when deciding if you want to read this detour in the series.

Unfortunately, if you want to read the later volumes and understand the context for why adults are dating children, you will have to read Sora to Hara. But if you don't mind skipping over those parts, then luckily you won't be missing much here and won't need this knowledge going forward! There is one scene between Hara and Sajou that is supposed to "resolve" the sexual harassment plot established in Doukyuusei, which offers at least some accountability and allows them both to process what happened all those years, but it unfortunately falls flat in the end. Regardless, Sajou and Kusakabe were a delightful breath of fresh air during their cameo, so if that is the only part you're interested in reading you should get something rewarding out of it.

If I had to praise any one feature of this book it would be the art style of the series. It's simple and the characters can be very expressive as a result, but even that wasn't enough to make these chapters enjoyable. The new relationships all felt poorly established and there's very little to get genuinely invested in if you aren't a fan of the premise.