Well, of the 2 volumes I have read I've seen nothing but character introduction. Its presented purposely 'out of focus' and while you read through it all, the big picture becomes clearer. Instead of giving you each character's origin, they introduce them as they currently are with one story, show you their personality with the next story, and then give you their backstory after they've done all that.
I like cute stories so I dont have anything to complain about, but to those who feel that a strong story right from the get-go is important, they will be most disappointed. The story is chews on it's own scenery a bit much at times, I'll give it that, and some of the characters seem to have an archetype feel to them. Eh, but what is original these days anyway? Not a whole lot, so some forgiveness is needed here.
By the end of Volume 2 , the mangaka tell you right out in their blurbs at the end that they intend to actually develop a story arc for these characters. So I guess we'll just have to wait and see what they do with it. The only things thats truly a shame is how long its taking to come out. I'm sure this must be a side project for Izumi Rei, so I doubt it's high priority to him. In any case, it gets a 10 from me. Why a perfect score with so many imperfections? Read it and find out, she might be a fictional character, but I'd feel bad for the little mage Hibiki if I scored it any lower. If only such optimism could exist in reality.