Gamaran Review: Generic but good shonen

Gamaran tells us the story of Gama who is nothing short of a genius swordsman. At the beginning of the series we are told about Kurogane Jinsuke, a leader of  Ogame school who has killed thousands of martial artists throughout years, he however has disappeared and only one holding the Ogame dojo up is Kurogane Gama, the son of the legendary thousand man slayer. Gama has only one goal to become stronger. To what end? you will have to read to find out..

As the title says, Gamaran is generic but good. It's a traditional growth story which is composed and paced very well. It manages to keep readers interested enough to plow through the next chapter. Obviously battles and the growth story by learning new skills and gaining strength are the main points of this manga and they are done in very good manner. Especially the battles are very well drawn and there are enough twists to keep readers on their toes. One of the great things is absolutely that Gamaran doesn't try to be anything else that it is.

Gamarans art is very good and it is in fact one of the those series that manage to constantly upkeep very good quality of drawing from beginning to the latest chapters. One of the reasons is of course that Gamaran is relatively new. However I'm pleased with the art since it doesn't create any misconceptions when reading of the intense fights that are present in this manga. This series is, unlike shonen usually, very brutal, which only increases the enjoyment in my eyes.

Characters of Gamaran vary from decent to good: The main character thankfully isn't a tryhard or doesn't try to be funny but is often very content. There are also couple of very good side characters which I like very much, in example Sengoku Iori. Villains are interesting, but heavily dependant on their choice of weapon, which isn't a bad thing at all.

 

The story of Gamaran is its weakest point, but it fortunately isn't dependant on it. It's very generic and doesn't offer many or even any incredible plot twists. The whole weight of this manga relies on it's characters, their growth story and on it's amazing battles that are undoubtly interesting stuff to read. I could say that it can be considered a story element that the battles have managed to be interesting and they haven't really never dragged on too long I believe. That's certainly a good quality in manga that focuses mostly on battles against enemies stronger than the last one. I also must say that the author has done very good job in designing the opponents for Gamaran: they are imaginative and often based on real world martial arts which always brings sort of a authenticity feeling to the manga.

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My Top 10 Manga Ranking

Wow, I was so surprised how HARD it was to make up this top 10 list. Only five of these were at the beginning "sure things" that I didn't have to think twice about.
I used mainly 2 kinds of criteria for generating this list: long time quality and short time quality. What I mean by these are that long time quality would mean that the series has been over the years very good and enjoayble, so it should at least get a rank on this list, but if it doesn't succeed in short time quality which basically means my feeling considering what kind of enjoyment the latest arc has provided me it didn't manage to rank high. An excellent example of this are Naruto and Hajime no Ippo, which both were excellent not considering couple of last years. 

Anyways, this Top 10 list revolves around my current feelings of these favorite series considering previously mentioned qualities and is subject to change at some point.

1. One Piece

From my point of view One Piece has it all, except romance which I don't care so much about. I remember that something like a decade ago I started watching some interesting animes that were arriving at that time and One Piece was one of them. However, I recall hating One Piece based on the first couple of episodes which I honestly didn't enjoy much, but thank god I didn't stop there. When the story started progressing very well I was sold and not once have I questioned One Piece's superiority compared to other series I have watched after or before it.

Characters are top notch when considering the enjoyability, they've all got great qualities that I like in one way or another. Oda has managed to put together several kinds of personalities that work extremely well together while forming great relationships between each of them. The only thing that has been somewhat missing from One Piece's character development is the actual development of their personalities, but this also I consider more as a strength than a weakness: why fix something that isn't broken?

But the main characters in my opinion are only half of the characters that truly matter. What matter sometimes even more is the villains and how they are designed and this is where Oda really shines in my opinion. The villains have been interesting, well designed and very likeable almost always. The more important thing than showing good villains is the art of not showing them: by this I mean the subtle hyping of the possible future villains has proved to be excellent tactic for keeping the interest for One Piece piqued.

As for art I have to say that it's top notch. Can't say that it has always been, since in the earlier years it was very much simplified regarding the backgrounds, but after 2010'sthe art quality has been magnificent compared to anything else but Berserk or Vinland Saga.

Story is absolutely the best part of One Piece. Eiichiro Odas skills lie in the incredible story telling, the most successful hyping of future events and long term commitment which shows as "foreshadowing" that every One Piece fan knows of. The hyping that I talk of is the art of readers getting seriously pissed for not getting enough of One Piece, Oda knows exactly how stimulate the balance between subtle hyping ie. future characters like Kaido and revealing us some important part of the story line at hand.

What One Piece's story also excells at is it's multidimensionality: it has seriously so much characters that are at the same time memorable, interesting and they constantly do things at the same time that we are following our main characters stories. In this way the story could be said that it's a multi layered one and at some point the layers intersect and we have a lot of interesting plot developments at our hands. This is a trait of One Piece that I have not really heard much about, but it's one of the most important things regarding the storys enjoyability and utter uniqueness.
 

2. Hunter X Hunter

The hardships began when I had to choose what to put on this list on positions 2-10 as number 1 was pretty much self explanatory. Hunter X Hunter is also one of my longest series that I've been following and it's been excellent in almost every way. This time it took the second place and I'll try my best to tell you why.

The character development and friendship between Gon and Killua has been very enjoyable to read and they have personalities that fulfill each other very well. Kurapica and Leorio I consider decent or good at the best, but it doesn't really matter since Yoshihiro Togashi seemed to realize this too by showing less of them. But the main characters in this series (even though they are good) are not the best thing, but it's the villains and the side characters that excell in Hunter X Hunter. Villains such as Hisoka (which is one of my all time favorite villains), Genei Ryodan etc. are excellent and Hisoka may easily take the top 1 place in my villain ranking if I decide to make one in the future. As for side characters I have to say that this is where HxH really does it's job well: Hunter Organisation's president Netero, Gon's father Gin, Kaito etc. are characters that aren't shown much but have had a huge impact considering the development of the series.

The story is a very good one and Togashi has managed to make it linear but very varying. When considering the beginning of the series and going through all the nen training finally to the ant arc it's great to see how the characters have developed power wise and that the series had managed to always make itself better, even though ant arc wasn't as excellent as the others. After the ant arc I have to say that Hunter X Hunter managed to make itself so good that it  was truly enjoayble to read it week after week before it going back to hiatus. The cliffhanger that we have been left currently was an excellent one.

The art has been very varying. I remember the art being honestly like crap sometimes when Togashi was (according to the sources) being sick and sometimes it was from decent to even good. It never bothered me too much since the story was so good and interesting to read, but it is as it is.

3. Berserk

Is simply an incredibly totality when considering story, characters and especially the art

Characters are perhaps the third best thing when thinking of Berserk. The main character is extremely memorable, likeable and just plain badass. It's always great to see Guts' determination when going against seemingly undefeatable monsters and overcoming them each time with his bigger than life sword. However the side characters of Berserk are really nothing to mention of, thankfully they don't play too important part of Berserk, but they just aren't good and memorable. The villain side of the story focuses mostly on individual monsters that are to overcome, but Griffith is absolutely one of the good ones. Too bad we haven't seen much of him since he's usually doing his stuff behind the curtains.

Story is naturally the second best thing of Berserk. The development over an indisputable epic story is always a great thing to read through. It has everything that a tragic story needs and the darkness is always present that raises feelings of excitement throughout the darker part of the series that emerges after the eclipse.

Art is obviously the best part of the series. In my opinion the only series that Berserk's magnificent art can be compared to is Vinland Saga and they both share a shared first place on that regard on my list. The greatest thing of the art is how it works with the dark flow of Berserk: while reading you can certainly feel the evilness surrounding the characters from time to time, it's an amazing thing to experience.

4. Toriko

The reason that I like Toriko so much is that it resembles One Piece very much. Potentially huge storylines, sceneries, interesting villains, it's all there.

The character designs of Toriko are definitely a good side, at its best excellent. However, I consider the main character one of the less interesting ones; side characters, monster and villains hold the place for interest in my opinion. That's not to say the main character Toriko is bad, he's good but not the main thing that appeals in this series.

Story is getting better and better. At first when I started reading this I was a bit reluctant because of the whole gourmet setup, but it ended up being a lot better than I could have ever imagined. Also the design of the world provides limitless possibilities in which only imagination is the 'limit'.

Art is good, I'd say that it's almost at par with any other main stream manga and that means that it is enjoyable enough. Toriko however deserves a special mention with it's massive sceneries that use high scalability to it's advantage. It's always an amazing thing to see when great sceneries are shown.

5. Naruto

Naruto managed to take the 5th spot because of it's excellent long term value. I always remember watching the first tens of episodes of Naruto and ROCKS playing as it's intro the story started so well that it was the best thing ever. I'd say that Naruto is one of the best series when we are considering the first 100-200 chapters of it which were designed so well that it was almost unbelievable. However what lowers Naruto's ranking on this list are the chapter that we've had to read for the past couple of years. I admit that there's still been good plot developments and great enjoyability nonetheless, it's nothing compared to the first years of Naruto goodness. So basically Naruto is very good long term value, but decent short term value at its best.

Character designs of Naruto are mostly good. This is one of the series that manage to be often very good, but the main character itself is one of those that I hate the most. Naruto himself is in my opinion just too irritating and too tryhard character for me to like when compared to the aloof and carefree characters of OP, HxH and Toriko. However the villains, sidecharacters etc. in Naruto are excellent.

Story of Naruto is a good one, not excellent but a good one in it's entirety. At the beginning of the manga the only motivation for Naruto was to become Hokage and later on Kishimoto had to make some adjustments for long term plot development. The story development and everything in it's path was good and enjoyable, but it has flattened the more closer we are getting to the end.

Art of Naruto is good, sometimes excellent. It's almost on par with One Piece but it seems to depend sometimes on the importance of the developments that happen in the story.

6.. Fairy Tail

I think that Fairy Tail is both decent long term and short term value, but it really doesn't excel at either. What matters in Fairy Tail the most isn't the particular parts of it's characters, story or art, but the entirety combines all the decent parts and makes the entirety into something good.

Fairy Tail has once again only good main characters at best and the side characters also shine in this one. Villains are also often very likeable. There's really not much to say, except that character design are good enough.

Story is also in my opinion only decent or sometimes with good twists it manages to turn good for a while. Some arcs have been a bit boring and tedious, but some have balanced the entirety with being very interesting, so the story quality could be described as varying.

The art is absolutely one of the strong sides of Fairy Tail, it brings the battles which are the most important part of Fairy Tail very well alive. It's good and it compliments the story very well.

7. Tower of God

It hasn't been long since I've read all of the chapters that have been released of Tower Of God. Technically it shouldn't even be on this list since it's a webcomic, but I've never really cared about such things.

 Tower of God has good characters and it relies a lot on character development, which for me was a good breath of freshness. Main character for the first half wasn't one of my favorites, but on the second half that has been released he has risen to the new heights on my rankings. Basically all the characters considering of "villains" and side characters have managed to amuse me.

The Story of Tower of God can be considered as interesting, but what it's best at is it's excellent plot twists that raise the story and it's enjoyability into new heights. The story has lots of potential and it has managed to keep it's quality up: there wasn't any boring moments when I read all of the chapters through.

As for the art of Tower of God it was a new experience for me to read webcomic with colors, but I have to say that all the webcomics that I've read until this day this has had easily the best one. Sometimes the art can be a bit confusing, but mostly it relies it intentions very well to the reader. Sometimes the usage of colors truly bring the fights alive and that I liked very much.

8. Hajime no Ippo

Hajime no Ippo has been a long time on of my favorites. However the only reason that it has dropped to the lower part of my rankings is it's almost crap like story developments and focus on unimportant, uninteresting side characters past couple of years. Maybe the first (very rough estimate!) 500 chapters of Hajime no Ippo were so good that even words can't describe, but the quality of the story has fallen very much behind.

Characters of Hajime no Ippo are one of it's good sides: Ippo himself is likeable even though being a pussy. The likeability of him however comes from once again the excellent side characters such as Takamura. However as Ippo has great sidecharacter friend he also have previous villains like Vorg who's fight we've been following now unnecessarily long. Fights of Aoki and Kimura have been one of the uninteresting ones also: Author should have kept them more as a humourous side kicks, as they worked extremely well with that role. Villains of the series have managed to keep my interest up, so a plus for them.

Story of the Ippo isn't anything special. It's basically a basic shonen growth story where the most important part are the fights, character development and art. In this kind of series it's understandable that it's almost impossible to make seriously good twists.

Art of Hajime no Ippo is and has been excellent. The art brings the fight very much alive even though I remember the characters having sometimes a bit weird muscles and especially the noses but they are easy to get used to.

9.Vinland Saga

I recognize the trend of lots of mangas having a quality drop considering last couple of years. Vinland Saga is absolutely one of these: it had excellent story until the farmland saga and after that it couldn't be considered even as decent. So once again long time value is great, but short time value bad.

The characters of Vinland Saga in my opinion revolve more once again around the goodness of the side characters. There's nothing wrong with the main character Thorfinn, but he happens to be surrounded (like many other manga series main characters in my toplist) with even more excellent friends and villains around him. In example Askeladd is definitely one of my favorites considering the complexity and wittiness of an character. Truly an unique and great one, who I enjoyed to read of.

The Story of Vinland saga is one of it's weak sides however. I think that I pretty much don't even follow the general flow of the story nowadays, but everything that happened before farmland saga was good. Being historical manga it is somewhat limited in terms of story.

Art is easily the best part of Vinland Saga. All the details and plain excellency of it was just amazing. It is at least at par with Berserk and I usually don't even want to compare the two: it's more suitable just to say that these two series have the best part in all of other manga and compare everything else to these two.

10. Liar Game

Liar Game is one of the mangas that rely almost completely on the psychological aspect of the story.

Characters of Liar Game aren't memorable and there aren't much good to say about them. The main character is a kind that I'm not fond of, but Akiyama managed to keep my interest piqued throughout all the released chapters so far. The series basically relies completely on Akiyama and his wittiness.

The story of Liar Game is complex, but it's general line of progress is very simple. The games that are played are usually more than they seem and the interest that is linked to this series is fully dependant on it's twists. Author has succeeded very well in making the twists very enjoyable throughout the series, but I have to wonder can he keep it up without lowering the quality of his work.

The art of Liar game is one of it's weak sides. It's pretty much simplified and can't be considered even as good, but such a story driven manga as this it doesn't really matter that much, since it makes it's point very clearly to the reader and that is basically all that matters with Liar Game.

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Nanatsu no Taizai Review: Recommended Adventure

Nanatsu no Taizai's preset is about The legendary group of "Seven Deadly Sins", who ten years ago tried to take over the Kingdom of Britannia, but were rumoured to have been killed by the Kingdom's Holy Knights. After ten years of the disappearance of The Seven Deadly Sins the Holy Knights assassinated the king and became the sole tyrants of the kingdom.

The late Kings only daughter, Elizabeth goes on a journey to find the Seven deadly sins to help her pay back to the holy knights. She ends up in a tavern which is kept up by a young boy called Meliodas, who turns out to be something more than just a kid...

The art can be considered good at the best, but honestly it doesn't matter to me that much. When I think about how art scales with the story the most important thing in my opinion is not how good it looks, but how it manages to compliment itself with the story. I think that the art that is used in Nanatsu no Taizai compliments almost perfectly it's intentions and the nature of the story, especially it's fighting scenes So even if the art can't be considered as "excellent", it's still very good since it works so well for me considering adventurous nature of this series.

The characters are one of the strengths of this manga. I realized while reading this that I have a habit to like very carefree characters with not-so-good manners and taking things with humor. The second main character Meliodas for this series is exactly like that and it works very well. The way of displaying great strength along with a usually cosy characteristics is a sure recipe for a good character. The protagonists and the antagonists have ended up being interesting so far and I don't see why that would change in chapters to come.

The story really isn't anything original, but I found it enjoyable nonetheless. I think the preset of the story resembles Ubel Blatt very much, but it has much more light heartedness which works for it very well. I think that if you have tendency to like adventure mangas then Nanatsu no Taizai is almost for sure for you. I have always thought that what makes the story interesting is not always what the story sounds like, but how it is relayed as a totality to the reader and this is why Nanatsu no Taizai works for me so well.

Conclusion: If you enjoy a good adventure with good characters then you will most likely enjoy Nanatsu no Taizai. The story progresses in a good pace so that the reader doesn't have time to feel boredness while reading this, but this has a unfortunate side effect also: I feel that the story is progressing so fast that I'm afraid that it will end too quickly. I wish that the author manages to keep it as well paced, but figures out how to prolong it to be so long that it will continue to be enjoyable for years to come.

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Gamaran 173: Tsukikage and Bakufu

Recap of chapter 173

 The chapter begins with a strange man lurking in the shadows, when both Ogame and Muhou schools are fighting against each other. One of theirs have been captured and they know that Kizaki has died and Shinnojou and Nakaizumi can't fight.

Strange man rises up and says that it's time for them to move as well. He says that Jinsuke will be surprised once he finds the name of a traitor hiding in the Muhou School.

Scene changes to a man who's being tortured by Jinsuke: he's being asked about Tsukikage's location and name of the traitor who's hiding among them. One of Jinsuke's underling is bothered by the bloody cough and him being in hurry as of late.

The tortured man is a warrior serving the Bakufu Shogunate, and won't yield information: it seems he was hiding poison in his mouth and decided to intake it now? He provokes Jinsuke about the traitor and dies.

Jinsuke says that he will put an end to everything.

Gama finds out that Bakufu inteds to eliminate them. Gama and Toujou talk a little bit about it and suddenly realize, that they are already surrounded by swords of the Bakufu spies. Toujou says that he will take them on and let Gama go. He says that He's taken a real liking to Gama.

Ranmaru and Naoyoshi are in the southern palace, talking about Jinsuke. After a while on of them feels someone with bloodlust on other side of a door.

Last scene of the chapter consists of Tsukikage / Bakufu shogunate. Tsukikage is making some plans how their first objective is the backbone of Muhou school and the the Ogame school. They even have a special objective: target the leader of Unabara, Naoyoshi Washizu.

Will be continued in Gamaran chapter 174

Comments and Predictions

In chapter 173 we got something new: information about the third party of this war, Bakufu Shogunate and especially Tsukikage, who aims to join the battle as of now. He was most likely waiting for the most possible amount of damage for both sides before joining. Nothing special about this chapter, Gama begins to move towards the castle so that's a good progress. His battle against Toujou didn't happen, but that doesn't concern me much.

I hope that next time we will get some new information about Muhous traitor and hopefully a glimpse of Jinsuke utterly obliterating this traitor. It's interesting to see who the traitor turns out to be. Gamaran going towards the castle implies that his meeting with Jinsuke draws closer. I still don't get what Jinsuke is truly aiming for.

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Magi 170: Magnostadt weapon and Fanalis Corps

Recap of Magi 170: Magic Weapon

The war between Reim and Magnostadt continues, the tragic reality of war is brought before everyone's eyes. We see how magician's especially on the front row are lying down injured.

It seems that Aladdin finally decides to approach the battlefield by flying after seeing all the injured magicians. He thinks whether or not he should fight as well against Reim. He seems from the sky that Magnostadts soldiers are using some kind of magic items, spears that shoot flames forward.

Suddenly we see something huge: something that looks like a Mecha: It looks like a secret weapon of Magnostadt. Magician ahead of it makes a hand gesture and the weapon seems to start glowing. There are tubes going in it and apparently they are charging it with magoi. It shines bright and Lord Magomett says "sweep them away".

A huge explosion happens around Magnostadt: it obliterates Reim soldiers all around the city, a truly powerful magic weapon. Aladdin watches this, terrified.

The weapon shoots again, this time with more focused rays.

Something happens in behind Reim's lines. Scheherazade says "your turn was after all the barriers would be broken" to which this mysterious person answers while holding a huge rock on her that she couldn't bear to watch anymore.

Finally Reim's elite soldiers join the battle as I predicted earlier. Fanalis (Or Finalist) corps begin to move and the chapter ends.

Will be continued in chapter 171.

Comments, Highlights and Predictions

Chapter 170 was a good chapter. It was almost pure action and we got to see the weapon in work. It was almost like I tought, but even better. I though it would only shoot huge lasers, but it seemed to also make a huge "explosion" around the city. It's also great to finally see Fanalis corps in action.

As for predictions, I believe that the fanalis corps will be doing pretty huge damage against Magnostadts forces: they may even be able to take down the "Magnostadt weapon", I think by either destroying the structure of it or slashing the tubes which give energy to it. It may be that Aladdin doesn't stay aside and may start doing something, most likely tries to stop the war. Hopefully he succeeds, but I think it won't be probable.

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Akame ga Kiru 33: A head on the pole

Recap of Akame ga Kiru 33: Kill the Strengthened Human

At the beginning of chapter 33 we get a explanation of the great empire's plan: to forcibly teach Martial Arts and techniques to 100 pure children and raise them as pawns to be used to nip the buds of rebellion.

It was the establishment of government's secret service agency, The Assassination squad.

The children were tested and divided between 7 with superior abilites and the rest. The 7 were sent to a remote region to hone their skills and the rest were sent to a some sort of facility where their abilities would be forcibly heightened through the usage of drugs.

Scene changes to Chelsea and Raba, who are talking near a forest. Chelsea intends to chase after Kurome. Raba says that she already left the bounds of his barrier, but can at least tell Chelsea the direction where she went. They have a small dispute, whether she should go after her, but she still insists.

We get to see the Night Raid after so long, they are recovering from the battle inside some cabin. Leone unfortunately lost her hand, but it can in fact be reattached with her recovery ability "The Undying Lion" and Raba's string Teigu.

It's time to see what's up with Kurome, she takes a break and notices Bors behind here, who actually is Chelsea. She won't attack just yet, but waits for a better opportunity since she doesn't know what Kurome will do when attacked.

Back at the Cabin, Mein is speaking with Boss Najenda - Mein thinks that Kurome may have something else than doping going with her, as she felt when she tried to snipe Kurome. Najenda quickly orders Akame and Tatsumi to chase after Chelsea and cover her: a wise decision in my opinion.

Scene changes back to "Bors" and Kurome, they are walking towards some town. Suddenly Kurome falls to the ground and says that she needs to eat some sweets and she will be fine. Chelsea closes near her and manages to hit Kurome with needle, saying good bye to her.

We get a flashback involving Chelsea and how she got her Teigu and used it to kill a tyrant who terrorized it's citizen.

We get back to "now" and Kurome suddenly raises behind her (I knew it was too easy) and tells her that she is alive because of a strong medicine that strengthens the body even more. This means Kurome is the titles "Strengthened Human". Chelsea is truly in a pinch now: she runs away and immediately loses her left hand fingers. Kurome put her two remaining dolls, Natalya and Doya after her. Chelsea loses her right hand also and it seems that death is near. Finally Natalya shoots through her: and Doya comes on her when she falls down: it seems sure that she dies now.

Before seeing whether or not she died there, we see Tatsumi and Akame, Tatsumi uses invisibility and goes into a town. Tatsumi goes to the town and sees people around something, he goes to look what it is and falls on his knees.

It's Chelseas head on top of a pole.

Night Raid: Seven members remaining.

Comments, Predictions and Highlights

I consider Akame ga Kiru a very good read because of chapters like these. The protagonists are always at danger so reading this manga is very exciting and at times even a little bit nerve wrecking. When Chelsea was around Kurome I was honestly a little bit anxious what would happen. Even though her death is sad and tragic i'm pretty relieved that Akame ga Kiru doesn't sugar coat anything, even though I could sense that Killing Kurome wouldn't be so easy.

In chapter 34 the Night Raid are going to of course reminisce over Chelsea, Tatsumi will surely promise to kill Kurome himself. I think and even hope that we'll see some Esdese in next chapter and maybe some recap from enemy's side about what happened, casualties etc.

Update

There was also Akame ga Kiru chapter 33.5 released, which consisted of Tatsumi dreaming and basically reminisceing all the dead Night Raid members. It was a great chapter and it should definitely be read by everyone. Also in this chapter they reveal Night Raid's next destination: Stronghold of the religious organization Kyoroch.

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Onepunch-man 22: Rumored monster Kombu Infinity

Recap:

The chapter starts with couple of A-class heroes fighting against mysterious Kombu Infinity in Z-city. First goes Golden Ball who uses a slingshot with special ammunition: 5mm thick iron blades which are made from golden smart memory. Kombu Infinity repels it easily. Golden Ball is quickly defeated in the next moment.

Next is Rapier man, who looks like a gentleman and is actually a bit skilled. He deflects all the tentacles of Kombu and makes powerful thrust attack, which misses.

Rapier man realizes his situation and asks help from the organization. After that we get couple of moments from the hero headquarters, but nothing special there. We get back to the fight between Kombu and Rapier dude and we see that the gentleman didn't last long and died.

This monster is very bad news: he sees another prey coming.

It's Saitama, coming from grocery store, wearing a sweatsuit and looking bored as ever. Unfortunately we don't get to see the fight between Saitama and Kombu Infinity, but instead we get a report which says that the monster has apparently disappeared.

Also we get a scene where heroes who were dispatched to kill the monster wondering before a building which has a huge hole in it. They conclude that some kind of fight happened there.

And finally, we have a scene a Saitamas house where they are making food: fortunate for Saitama that he managed to actually get some Kombu. He didn't even kill the monster, only pulled off all his hair (/tentacles) :(.

Comments

It's great to have a new Onepunch-man chapter. Art is once again top notch and a true pleasure to read. It was a good chapter, but not one of the best: I would have like to see the Saitama vs. Kombu Infinity fight, but this works as well for increased humor value. Not much to say about this one, I enjoyed it and that's that.

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Historys Strongest Disciple Kenichi 506: Takeda vs. Lugh

Recap of HSDK 506: Devouring each other

Takeda vs. Lugh fight finally heats up.

Lugh says that he recently realized that as a martial artist becoming stronger means to devour other martial artists' chances. He intends to devour Takeda's future

Lugh finally begins to attack and this time he solely focuses on Takedas joints moving them out of place. He attacks with Ogata school dappa kyokushi literally meaning "Hitting wave of extreme control" thus dislocating Takedas knee and shoulder.

Takeda asks whether Lugh's stance is of the satsujinken users. Lugh's resolve is clear, but Takeda now gets his own: he as a katsujinken user will devour Lugh because he doesn't want people like him roam this world.

Takeda suddenly runs away - he realises that he can't beat Lugh as of now. He gets inside some place only to realise that he has run into a mirror house, the worst place to fight against blind man.

Lugh seems to overpower Takeda who only manages to break mirrors while getting his joints dislocated.

At the end of chapter 506 Takeda almost hits Lugh, sees some pieces of mirrors in the ground and realizes something. He punches air and got some sort of epiphany.

Takeda vs. Lugh will continue in chapter 507.

Comments and predictions:

I honestly don't have much to say about this one. Some basic fighting going on, but what's funny is how Takeda managed to run into only place where he's in complete disadvantage: mirror house. I wonder what Takeda realized with his punches, it's most likely got something to do that will help him win over Lugh. I think we will see him prevailing over the blind submission man in History's strongest disciple Kenichi: 507.

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Fairy Tail 315: Village of Rosemary

Recap of Fairy Tail chapter 315: Rosemary

Kagura attacks and the whole town splits because of this, last time we saw a splash of blood and it indeed was of Erzas, but se managed to block it only receiving a minor would to her shoulder. She says thanks to Simon and Thanks to Grandpa Rob, and begins to fight back.

Erza exquips to which looks like to be plain clothes, but most likely has a very powerful sword attacks. Erza blocks Kagure and overpowers her in the next attack in style, Kagura falls to the ground. Kagura's team mates make a remark of her losing even using fugutaiten.

Unfortunately one of the pillars crashes and there falls a big rocks right where Kagura is. The rocks don't hit Kagura, because Erza pushed her away and got stuck herself.

Erza begins talking to Kagura about Rosemary village, how they both lived there as a kids. We get a flashback showing pillaging of Rosemary village and Erza puts Kagura to hiding.

Finally Kagura admits loss and instantly at that moment Minerva stabs her, not fatally of course.

Now it's Erza vs. Minerva, unfortunately Erzas leg got crushed bad under the rocks so we'll see how she's going to fight in next chapter, Fairy Tail 316: The Future runs toward despair.

Comments and Predictions (Review):

Chapter 315 was a semigood one. I really liked Erza's attack where she overpowered Kagura.

Erza vs. Kagura went pretty much as I thought earlier, although the Rosemary "twist" was a bit surprising one. I really like Kagura as a character and she is very much like Erza. I wouldn't have guessed that Erza would be so injured when starting this fight, but if I have to guess I'd se her leg isn't completely fine but she can still stand and fight but the leg will be obvious hindrance.

As for predictions I think that either Erza wins with some super move and takes more injuries, maybe falls into coma or something like that, obviously straining herself completely fighting Minerva. There could of course be a chance for someone coming to aid for her just when Minerva is about to make the finishing blow to her.

Third option is that Erza actually loses, but the main story plot of begins to move in hastier pace and Daimatou Enbu gets disrupted!

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Hungry Joker 9: Combined powers!

Recap of Hungry Joker chapter 9:
Now Haiji + Alan versus Ragins truly begins. Ragins shows that he can be either with or without the Amber of Thales very swift and damages Haiji without him even having a chance to react. Haiji tries to hit him with gravity press but is unsuccessful hitting Ragins due to him being too fast.

Ragins is seen bouncing everywhere and he's damaging Alan and Haiji consecutively. Ragins says that they can't escape his electrical discharges - he still hasn't show how he uses his Eureka usually.

Haiji and Alan are aware of their bad situation, as their attacks don't hit. Haiji suggests they try combining their powers: Newton's apple + Pythagorean hammer. As they draw closer the Eureka's seem attracted to each other. When the come in touch they whiten some. They both get some damage using their Eurekas for third time and cough some blood.

Their combined attack is incredible: it combines the sound spreading and gravity crushing destroying literally everything around them. Ragins is also caught in this destruction. Just before Ragins is dying he sees something before Haiji, someone from the past that he knows, but doesn't get chance to explain who he is.

Ragins dies by  getting his body molecules destroyed by vibrations + gravity and Amber of Thales drops to the ground.

We get a small scene bact at Mavro headquarters, where Rosalie and Kild are speaking and watching the happenings at White Joker hq. Chapter 9 ends in Kild saying that he'll be meeting with Haiji-kun very soon.

Will be continued in Hungry Joker 10.

Comments and Predictions


It was a great Hungry Joker chapter, if not even the best so far. I'm pleased to see that this Ragins battle wasn't dragged on too long. Unfortunately we apparently didn't get to see how he uses The Amber of Thales usually, but it doesn't bother me too much.

The consept of combining Eureka powers seems very viable, though it causes some unnecessary destruction to be used too often. Combining the powers presents basically unlimited possibilities in this manga and I like that.

And about the character that Ragins noticed "in" Haiji, it will be interesting how that will be unveiled. I think it has something to do with someone from Mavro, most likely it's someone very powerful who has connection to Haiji. He may even be Haiji's father and that's why Ragins noticed some kind of resemblence between them.

I think that next chapter the Hungry Jokers will have to seek for new headquarters for themselves.

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