Isekai Yakkyoku

[Kraco]

Parallel World Pharmacy
https://i.imgur.com/FEc8zf1.jpg

"In his life-long obsession to develop new medicines to help people, Kanji Yakutani, a Japanese medical researcher, dies from overwork. To his immense surprise, he finds himself reborn in another world with a medieval culture, in which proper medical treatments are an afforable privilege to the wealthy only. In his new life as Pharma de Médicis, he discovers that he has been granted a divine blessing, which is common with that world's nobility, from Panactheos, the God of Medicine. With his divine blessing and his retained knowledge of modern medicine, Pharma decides to revolutionize the other world's medical advancements and make proper treatments affordable for the common folk." -Wikipedia


- - -- - -


One of the above average isekai. It's probably because this does have the element of medicine included, so it's not just adventuring, power leveling, gathering a harem, beating evil nobles/church, exploiting a game system, and the other jazz, which describes 99% of isekai series out there. Here the MC is originally a university researcher, and even after he's isekaied, he will still continue to do what he did previously, with different methods but with the same purpose. The story is decently solid, the production values are quite standard, better than I expected, even if nothing extraordinary.

I think I'll keep watching this.

[DarthEnderX]

Bookworm, but with medicine instead of books?

[Kraco]

Bookworm, but with medicine instead of books?

I'd say with less struggle since the dude was reborn into a noble family, not a commoner family. It's like this show can skip a couple of seasons of content!

[MFauli]

Enjoyable first episode, even though I hate that the main character was an adult and OF COURSE was reborn into a kawaii shouta body, sigh.

One really weak, plothole-y thing, tough: "You have no shadow". Yeah. Except for all the shadows on himself. That's kinda dumb. I know it's because he would look bad artistically if all shadows were removed, but .... think about that before you make it a thing, dear author.

[neflight86]

**Oops. Just realised this is a Dup* Mods, please merge when able!

1978

"* Based on an isekai fantasy light novel series written by Takayama Rizu and illustrated by keepout.

A young pharmacologist and researcher in Japan died from overworking, and was reincarnated in a Medieval Parallel Europe. He was reincarnated as a 10-year-old apprentice to a famous Royal Court pharmacist, had attained an inhuman skills of ability to see through disease, material creation, and material destruction. In a society in which dubious medical practice are rampant, price gouging thru the monopoly of the pharmacist guild, and good medicine aren't available to the commoners. He was recognized by the Emperor at that time and opened a Pharmacy at the corner of the town.

He will wipe out the fraud that has swept the world, and deliver to the commoners a truly effective medicine that was developed using present day pharmacology. Thus the boy pharmacist will cheat by using his previous knowledge to create innovative medicines while helping the people of the parallel world, a story about living his new life to the fullest this time.

Source: M-U"

Genre(s): Isekai, Medicine, drama

________________

1,2

At this point, it's easier to tell you what is non-standard about this reincarnation story. Not much. Self-unbeknownst OP protagonist pharmacist dies from glorious Japanese overwork and is gifted another (noble) life where he advances medicine in a fantasy world that has magic he can use to... summon basic pharmaceutical ingredients. Wouldn't want to waste an arc procuring raw materials, the kids would get bored.

The current tension resides in him not having a shadow? That means he is different, and the light novel default mindset is different = bad, so he must hide this from all but his waifu candidates. As usual, nobles are portrayed as callous and don't even look after their own staff to the point of making the base level kindness of supplying pain medication causing teary eyed reverence. Also, the protagonist has magic eyes that can spot infirmities and tell him if his own treatment will be effective. Strange wish fulfillment. I mean, who's wish could this be?

Not much to see here that you haven't seen dozens of times before.

[shinta|hikari]

The magic eyes are pretty shitty as a writing device. Would've been better if he actually had to struggle to figure out illnesses, and more educational too.

[neflight86]

Agreed. No one watching this within the intended demographic understands anything about medicine, so they might as well have gone whole hog and really geeked out with the medical stuff, like Cells at Work, and have made a play to be something special.

[Kraco]

This is a stock isekai series, so he's obviously going to have the usual cheat powers. I said as much in the Overlord thread, but quite often the only struggle is in (demi-)human relationships in these series. I suppose it's some kind of ultimate escapism. This series at least has a little bit more going for it due to the medical stuff. The author had to do that much research. However, this is still an average isekai series, at the end of the day, so it might not fly it tried to be two things at the same time, by going as in-depth as Cells at Work.

He can produce full molecules if he remembers the chemical structure. That's quite a tall step, though. If he could only produce raw materials, he would be often out of luck because more complicated molecules are no joke to produce. It takes more than a few test tubes. In fact, I doubt he would even know how to make them, most of the time. It wouldn't have been really necessary for him in his first life.

[shinta|hikari]

Producing the chemicals is fine. Recreating that from scratch is too complicated and difficult given his circumstances, but diagnosing illnesses is something doctors do all the time. He could've been given X-Ray or MRI vision which helped diagnoses, not some weird power that even tells him if his guess is correct. That just makes no sense.

Since the power can tell him if his diagnosis is correct, then the power ALREADY knows what the disease is. It could've just skipped that step and told him directly what the illness was, instead of playing this pointless guessing game.

[DarthEnderX]

The magic eyes are pretty shitty as a writing device. Would've been better if he actually had to struggle to figure out illnesses, and more educational too.To be fair, the eyes don't tell him anything besides location, and if he's right.

They'd be useless if he didn't know anything about medicine.

[David75]

He is a god incarnation, or a little different: his body is that of a God and he reincarnated into that body with all of his knowledge.
Now he just needs to explore his powers to own that world.

[Kraco]

To be fair, the eyes don't tell him anything besides location, and if he's right.

They'd be useless if he didn't know anything about medicine.

Yeah, it actually is quite a downgrade from the usual appraisal cheat power in isekai. Although he does compensate for a lot with his knowledge, so in his hands it's more powerful than in any random person's.

[shinta|hikari]

That is actually my problem with it. If the skill can tell if his diagnosis is right, that means the skill itself already knows the correct answer. If that is the case, his eye should just straight out TELL HIM what the disease and cure is. The current skill and implementation is extremely convenient for his existing skillset and knowledge as a medical researcher and feels very contrived.

[neflight86]

Agreed. The mechanics of the skill, as we understand it, make a glorified medical guessing game unless there is some limitation to its use. It may as well save the steps of guessing until correct unless the point is that this skill would be useless unless its owner were a medical professional, an unfortunate idea that mixes supernatural wisdom and contemporary Japanese medicine into a frankenskill that is ridiculous under any scrutiny.

[Kraco]

That's a good point. It would have been more interesting if the view changed simply when he made a decision (diagnosis), even if it was the wrong one. So, he would really need to know. It would still be the uber convenient x-ray vision recognising abnormalities, but there would be no exact precognition beyond that, it would just be like ctrl-clicking items in Windows for selection, in case someone had multiple problems. It is dumb that the skill already knows the disease, but he still needs to name it. It's like some training software for med students.

[shinta|hikari]

What the heck, 3 straight replies of agreement from 3 different users in Gotwoot about a criticism.

Now I've seen everything.

[DarthEnderX]

I think the power is the coolest and totally sensical and also ur dumb.

[David75]

Reviving the flame pit ?:cool:

[shinta|hikari]

I was satisfied with 3 hits, so a combo breaker is fine.

[KrayZ33]

I was satisfied with 3 hits, so a combo breaker is fine.

If you would've waited a little bit with your replies I'd have gathered 3 people to agree with Darth. That's basically the same thing then, is it not? I think agreeing on anything is a feat.

[shinta|hikari]

A lot of people agree consecutively when we praise something clearly praiseworthy. Mfauli is the typical detractor to this, but he is but one person.

Criticisms, however, usually get a lot more opposition because users here have extremely varying preferences and standards, and people generally react more when their tastes are attacked, versus other people liking something they dislike.

[MFauli]

I'm a detractor because I don't agree with praising your "objectively praisworthy" anime? wat


Episode 2:

HIS SHADOW CAN BE SEEN IN EVERY SINGLE SCENE HE IS IN

My god, I kept thinking about dropping this anime for that alone. It's such a stupid thing and it becomes more stupid with how inconsequentially it is applied. Also, a missing shadow would be noticed by people IMMEDIATELY. Why make this a thing? Just so can have some short-lived moment later in the story where someone notices the lacking shadow and some shallow drama comes from it? ugh.

Also not a fan of the all-powerful hero. Can create anything and at the strongest level of magic, too. It's the quint-generic isekai trash.

[shinta|hikari]

You being a detractor is objective fact, proven by years of posts in this forum.

[MFauli]

You being a detractor is objective fact, proven by years of posts in this forum.


I'm now a criminal because I have a different opinion? Ok.

[shinta|hikari]

Since when are detractors criminals..?

[Kraco]

Episode 3


- -- - -



Farma actually displayed a good amount of patience for waiting as long as he did before intervening. I guess it's not so easy to step forward in front of an absolute ruler to present something contradictory, in room full of lackeys always ready to tell the ruler whatever they imagine is the popular thing to tell the ruler. At least Farma's case was easier since he could at least promise life, instead of death.

Now that Shinta mentioned the plot device with the magic eye, it really was annoying to watch. Dude just kept listing all lung diseases randomly, until he hit a match. At least his photographic memory with chemical compounds is more impressive. Especially keeping in mind that they are 3D structures in reality, even if you usually see them drawn on paper as 2D things.

[MFauli]

Was the best episode so far.

What disappointed me is that Farma wouldn't tell the father that he actually died in another world and woke up as Farma. I know most isekai do this, but the father here seemed like a level-headed, reasonable, good-natured guy, so it felt kinda bad when Farma still pretended to be his son during the speech at the end. It's not like he chose to take over the real Farma's bdoy.

[Kraco]

What disappointed me is that Farma wouldn't tell the father that he actually died in another world and woke up as Farma. I know most isekai do this, but the father here seemed like a level-headed, reasonable, good-natured guy, so it felt kinda bad when Farma still pretended to be his son during the speech at the end. It's not like he chose to take over the real Farma's bdoy.

No, it's absolutely the best thing not to tell. Telling the old man that would be the same as telling him that his only son is dead and a total stranger is controlling the son's body. It would be horrifying, no matter how level-headed someone is. Only an emotionless, loveless, and utterly uncaring person wouldn't mind. Like one of those typical isekai villain nobles, who only cares about his own ambitions and treats everyone like tools and trash, including their own children. Such a monster would actually be glad if their average son was replaced by a genius since it would raise the family's prestige and thus their own status.

What positive could come out of telling? It's not like the Japanese professor would ever be coming back. He's stuck in Farma's body for good, so it's now his only body. He has to live with it. The only price he has to pay by not telling is that his real soul (and Japanese name) won't be acknowledged, but that's a pretty insignificant price to pay compared to being able to live in a decent family, with the best imaginable resources available in that world to do what he loves to do: develop medicine and help sick people. Plus he now even again has a little sister; losing the sister was what drove him into medicine in the first place. If he told, he might become a homeless fugitive if he wasn't executed immediately.

[DarthEnderX]

Agreed. The mechanics of the s kill, as we understand it, make a glorified medical guessing game unless there is some limitation to its use. It may as well save the steps of guessing until correctShown in this episode to be exacly how it works.

[MFauli]

No, it's absolutely the best thing not to tell. Telling the old man that would be the same as telling him that his only son is dead and a total stranger is controlling the son's body. It would be horrifying, no matter how level-headed someone is. Only an emotionless, loveless, and utterly uncaring person wouldn't mind. Like one of those typical isekai villain nobles, who only cares about his own ambitions and treats everyone like tools and trash, including their own children. Such a monster would actually be glad if their average son was replaced by a genius since it would raise the family's prestige and thus their own status.

What positive could come out of telling? It's not like the Japanese professor would ever be coming back. He's stuck in Farma's body for good, so it's now his only body. He has to live with it. The only price he has to pay by not telling is that his real soul (and Japanese name) won't be acknowledged, but that's a pretty insignificant price to pay compared to being able to live in a decent family, with the best imaginable resources available in that world to do what he loves to do: develop medicine and help sick people. Plus he now even again has a little sister; losing the sister was what drove him into medicine in the first place. If he told, he might become a homeless fugitive if he wasn't executed immediately.

I couldn't disagree more (m I detracting correctly, shinta?! :P).

The father already noticed something is very different. And to pull your argument around: Only a loveless father wouldn't notice when his son suddenly is a completely different person. It'd be one thing if nobody was suspicious, but in this special case, it would have been the right thing to do. His real son is dead, that's fact. Or at least he's gone for now. While there is some risk to how it'd end, the positives far outweight those: being able to live with this family without guilt and working together. Neo-Farma could talk it all out with the father, even saying that maybe there's a way to restore the original son and that he'll help finding a way, if there is one.

Right now, Neo-Farma is full on lying to the father, but feels as if he's being nice and all, when he's not. There's nothing nice about telling someone his dead son is actually still alive when he's not. You gotta rip the bandaid off.

It's a done deal now, though, I doubt it'll come up again until maybe the end.

[DarthEnderX]

Farma has enough to worry about without his dad trying to kill him for possessing his son's corpse.

[Kraco]

The father already noticed something is very different. And to pull your argument around: Only a loveless father wouldn't notice when his son suddenly is a completely different person.

He did notice, but he also could accept Farma's explanation after the lightning strike and seeing the magic crest. It's a religious and superstitious society and culture. At the end of the day, the old man would obviously have nothing against Farma being divinely inspired to develop medicine by leaps and bounds, theirs being a medicine family, after all.


His real son is dead, that's fact. Or at least he's gone for now. While there is some risk to how it'd end, the positives far outweight those: being able to live with this family without guilt and working together. Neo-Farma could talk it all out with the father, even saying that maybe there's a way to restore the original son and that he'll help finding a way, if there is one.

The family doesn't believe their son is dead. They can keep living happily. This very episode addressed the issue of how to approach patients, and Farma noticed that's where he's lacking. He can't do things considering only his own feelings, ambitions, or goals, the well-being of the patient is the most important thing, and that includes the psychological aspect. There's absolutely no morally right or wrong stance in this question, so the more important question would be what is best for the family. Hearing their son is dead and the should-be-corpse is controlled by some alien entity would hardly be the best thing for them.

It's quite outlandish to think Farma could keep living there with the family if he revealed how things really are. He would have no bond to de Medici family anymore, in fact it should be too painful for them to keep seeing him. "Finding a way" could happen, but why go through all the pain when it doesn't, in the end, serve any purpose?


Right now, Neo-Farma is full on lying to the father, but feels as if he's being nice and all, when he's not. There's nothing nice about telling someone his dead son is actually still alive when he's not. You gotta rip the bandaid off.

No, he actually said he considers himself Bruno's son. There's a technical difference there, if you want to pay attention to it, which means he's not full on lying. It's not like the Japanese dude wanted to be reborn as Farma, so he gotta do nothing at all. Like every single human's, his first priority is to look after himself. It just so happens that by looking after himself, he has a chance to look after millions of people. If you really want to find someone to blame for the situation and accept responsibility, blame the deity Panaceia, or whatever it was.

[shinta|hikari]

The isekai part is way too unbelievable a truth and will only lessen his credibility to not only his father, but everyone else.

If he just rides the wave that the guardian deity has blessed him, he gets to jump over all the trust hurdles since the society genuinely has magic and godly miracles. He even has GLOWING crests on his arms as proof.

There is simply no benefit and too many risks involved with revealing his old life.

[DarthEnderX]

The isekai part is way too unbelievable a truth and will only lessen his credibility to not only his father, but everyone else.

If he just rides the wave that the guardian deity has blessed him, he gets to jump over all the trust hurdles since the society genuinely has magic and godly miracles. He even has GLOWING crests on his arms as proof.

There is simply no benefit and too many risks involved with revealing his old life.Agreed. The truth sounds too stupid. The lie is more palatable.

If it even really IS a lie. He probably IS blessed by the healing god. As that's probably who brought him to this world in the first place.

[MFauli]

No, he actually said he considers himself Bruno's son. There's a technical difference there, if you want to pay attention to it, which means he's not full on lying.

I can see that argument, although I'd need to hear the Japanese original line.

Either way, I'm putting myself in Farma's shoes and I don't think I could live on knowing that my entire existence is a lie. Maybe if I was in a worse situation, but he's liked by everyone, he's powerful, and the father is intelligent and caring. And considering Neo-Farma WAS chosen by their deity or whatever, it's still in line with people's belief system.

Worst case, father abandons him, callls him a monster and Farma leaves, living on his own now. No big deal for someone who can create anything. And didn't the synopsis say he builds his own shop anyway?

But this is as far as this discussion goes, it's not that important, especially now that it's settled.I'd only bring it up again if the anime makes it a focus again, that'd be annoying.

[David75]

His power is a little too strong. I know it's magic and it has been stated that his attributes are create and eliminate.
But when you do simple maths when he uses eliminate on a volume of water that large... That's insane.

Somehow I feel like creating an air buble the same size and with the right pressure would be easier. He could even make it smaller and not be seen doing it. But no heretic arc...

[MFauli]

episode 6:

"No shadow" stupidity aside, the way he just followed the girl without guards was dumb, too. But tbh, I completely disregarded this anime when it mentioned the "Nederlands" and stuff. When the author is so devoid of creativity that he cant even come up with random fantasy names, ugh.

[David75]

Marseille too, subers didn't want to know that Fench city, probably because they prefer the PSG (football club, I mean true football... not MMA rugby :D)

[shinta|hikari]

This'll be hilarious. You somehow trap and corner an unknown threat that can erase material, something completely unknown in your world, and think it's a good idea. If this guy isn't such a pussy, he could just erase their bodies from existence.

[DarthEnderX]

he could just erase their bodies from existence.That's a LOT of chemistry to visualize all at once.

[David75]

Just erase their water....

[shinta|hikari]

Or something simpler, like carbon.

[David75]

Why not, my guess is stripping them of water leaves less dangerous chemicals like gazes and other ions you might not want to get to close to if you strip them of their carbon.

[Kraco]

I would say he doesn't quite understand his own power. It's a divine power in the literal sense, but he feels the need to rationalise it like a scientist from the 21st century, so he's actually limiting himself. It's likely he could create chemical substances, even whole proteins with proper 3D folding, simply by knowing the trivial name and what the stuff is used for. Instead of impossibly remembering the whole structure with possibly thousands of atoms.



Episode 7


- - -- -


All the other stuff aside, the stiffness of the society is one of the more believable parts of the story. Falma actually could, probably, oull off a lot more by throwing his family's, and even his own, weight around more, but he's a bit too limited with his former Japanese manners and values. Of course in a fairy tale his good behavior will be rewarded in one way or another.

[Kraco]

Episode 8


- - - - -



The plot of this episode had really textbook vibes, clinically so, with everything happening exceedingly conveniently, but it still worked pretty well. The olden pharmacy guild feels quite believable, all in all, and it's not like the obstinate guild master would have been talking only nonsense. He had a few good arguments. However, again quite believably, his personal trauma made him blind to the changes absolutely needed for his guild to survive the new era. It's possible that if Farma wasn't a noble, the geezer might have been able to see the light, after a lot of frustrating battles of words and convincing arguments. But since Farma is a noble, the old man simply refuses to admit anything due to his hatred of nobles.

[DarthEnderX]

Yeah, it's nice the old guild isn't just motivated by greed, but by totally justified distrust of the nobility.

I was also surprised by how reasonable the token murderous inquisition was. They went from "He's irregular! Heresy!" to "Oh, no wait, that's actually just our healing god." super easily.

[Kraco]

I was also surprised by how reasonable the token murderous inquisition was. They went from "He's irregular! Heresy!" to "Oh, no wait, that's actually just our healing god." super easily.

It did feel like they were used to dealing with real heretics abusing magic. And they were totally unprepared for the possibility of actually encountering an existence that's not harmful (against their faith and world view). On the other hand, since their actions are dictated by opinions, it does allow them to switch their attitude swiftly. Just like a ruler with absolute power could in a heartbeat decide a person being marched to the gallows for his crimes is in fact a great benefactor to the country and spare him, with nobody being able to second-guess the ruler. Pretty novel in isekai, though.

[David75]

---—---


Plague, and the strong one.
On paper the contermeasures work, in reality we know it doesn't in an ever working society. COVID is a strong ongoing warning that should an epidemic as lethal as that plague (or last century influenza) happen again, we will struggle, a lot.
I wonder how that arc will unfold. Even with godlike powers.

Then a counterbalance evil appears. A good show needs a good evil character. Too bad it feels like that one is caricatural as f... They told us he was a genius. I hope that will prove useful to the story.

[DarthEnderX]

On paper the contermeasures work, in reality we know it doesn't in an ever working society. COVID is a strong ongoing warning that should an epidemic as lethal as that plague (or last century influenza) happen again, we will struggle, a lot.Depends whether their world has the thing we have where half the people think ignoring medicine = winning a political argument.

[David75]

They are similar in their social behaviour... The old pharmacists guild is an example.

[Kraco]

They have a pretty early start, though, since they know the ships potentially carrying the plague are only going to arrive at some point in the future. If there was already a city on the same continent with an outbreak, then things would be really bad. Now it could still go either way. Compared to the modern situation it's also a plus for the fight that the people are used to obeying the higher-ups. If they don't obey, they can be killed on the spot. I don't think even in China the police would have shot quarantine breakers, no guestions asked. In our world we had miscreants who purposefully tried to spread Covid around so that everyone would get the "natural immunity" (or die). If caught, they would have hardly faced any significant punishment, in many countries no punishment whatsoever, so what's stopping them?


Then a counterbalance evil appears. A good show needs a good evil character. Too bad it feels like that one is caricatural as f... They told us he was a genius. I hope that will prove useful to the story.

If we talk about the Black Death, then the villain behind it must look like a skeleton. If you look at medieval art, that's just how it is. Whether he was a genius or not, it's hard not to think that's all in the past, looking at the scenes. He has clearly gone off the deep end a long time ago. A genius spending all of his time on nonsense is not really a genius anymore.

[David75]

I know my hope is vain... let's see how it unfolds, haha

[DarthEnderX]

12

---

It's over! He done blowed up that Nurgle champion.


If we talk about the Black Death, then the villain behind it must look like a skeleton.He was!

[MFauli]

Best anime ever


/s

[Kraco]

This was a pretty standard example of a specific theme isekai, which form a certain bulk of the isekai genre. The most common theme is food/cooking, the rest are more sporadic, like modern guns in a fantasy medieval setting, for example. In a certain sense carrying a particularly, strictly defined theme allows the author some leeway in the actual story because the focus is elsewhere. At least the medicine wasn't at a high school level in this, the author had clearly done as much research as was needed, but otherwise the story is nothing to write blogs about, and the characters are pretty superficial. The MC is OP and thus hardly needs to struggle in any pursuit, which is unfortunately extremely ubiquitous among isekai series. But I guess it's something that attracts the stressed Japanese audience seeking simple escapism.

All in all I find this quite a decent isekai series. The MC is not an idiot, which already makes this watchable. The "educating barbarians" plot device is quite heavily used, but it's more tolerable here than in more regular isekai, where the author is under an impression even soap didn't exist a few centuries ago.