Interesting that the manga decided to use the dark elf girl instead of a random hostess who happened to know where the spirits dwelling is. I think I actually like this better than the LN version of the telling.
@MCX01 If you read the afterward to Vol. 2 (found on other sites), Fuse states that he wants to preserve the feel of the original material in another medium so he lets the adapters do what they want so long as the broad strokes and major events are the same. Rather than recreating the source material, it's like a retelling of a myth.
Why would he bring the children even before he knows if it’s physically possible to return? He could just be walking into a black hole. His intell is from some random slut with a ball that he’s met twice.
@Rozzak
That's exactly the reason to bring the children on your first trip, there's no way to know if you could go get them if you went there. If you can't return they're dead either way, might as well go for the option where they either die, get stuck in the spirit realm but live, or make it back.