And with Kaguya's route and the small "New Game+" segment, I completed the Mirai Radio to Jinkou-bato visual novel. It ends with a happy ending for everyone involved, clearing the last hurdles of issues that were remaining at the end of the Asami route we discussed in a previous post.

In this route, Sora recovers the memories from his other self in the other routes. Knowing what is going to happen allows him to stop Kaguya before she does what she was planning to do. This, however, doesn't solve the core issue and creates a rift between him and the other members of the group.

He starts going out with Kaguya and living all the time with her while thinking about what to do. In the end, after consulting with Asami, he decides the best way forward is to use part of his brain as a support system for Kaguya and sleep indefinitely. Asami agrees, but only on the condition that Kaguya herself says she wants to go ahead with this plan.

Kaguya initially refuses as she doesn't want to lose Sora forever. However, after listening to her future self (in one transmission captured by the pigeons), she accepts reluctantly. There is a very touching scene where she is crying, saying she wants to live and experience the world (see the screenshot below).

The new device works and Kaguya is now free of the Artificial Pigeon's influence, as they won't eat waves anymore. Sora falls asleep and... well, apparently he can still listen to everything and talk with Kaguya telepathically. Basically, he can experience life through Kaguya's eyes.

Kaguya then starts working with Asami and other scientists around the world to analyze the pigeons' structure. They try to find a way to replicate the system without the need for blocking the waves like they were doing before. With this proposition, the route ends... or so I thought.

Apparently, the last route is not really a route, but an extremely small append on top of the Kaguya route that unlocks afterward. An out-of-setting character (probably from some other Laplacian series) appears and tells the player that it will take two years for the solution to make Sora awaken to appear, so there will be an ecchi scene in the meantime to waste time. After the scene, we get another small epilogue with Kaguya and Sora happily living together and... that is it.

Overall, I still would recommend this visual novel, but I feel there was a lot of missed potential in it. It didn't hit me as hard as other visual novels because of the little time we had to get attached to Kaguya. This left me unable to feel that sad when she disappears in the specific routes.

Another fault I can see with it is how the whole scientific setting (pigeons eating waves, radio killing pigeons, etc.) ends up being very "wishy-washy." It feels forced to try and make the plot work instead of blending well within the world building. I kept hoping that "the next route will make it more grounded", but this never really happened.

A positive note is definitely Mizuki. Her cheerfulness and personality really helped me get through the series. Plus, her voice when imitating Chankon-kun was absolutely hilarious. She is my favorite character at large as I didn't manage to bond that much with the other characters.

Now, what to read next? I have a few other visual novels I started and never finished, and I am wondering if I should go and try to finish those or start something new altogether. I guess I will decide over the next few days...