Will a greater power keep Kuro from confronting her brother, and possibly destroy the world in this series ending volume?!? Creative Staff
Story: Dall-Young Lim
Art: Sung-Woo Park
Translation/Adaptation: Christine Dashiell
What They Say
In the Pure Home of the Shishigami Clan, Kuro and Keita prepare to face Reishin Shishigami and stop him before his terrible vision for the future is realized. Despite what Kuro and Keita know about the shared history of humans and the Mototsumitama and the events that led to the Mototsumitama dominance, Reishin’s plot to downsize the human population is too cruel to bear! But in the heart of the Shishigami’s territory, an unexpected enemy arises to decisively correct the imbalance of the world–The ancient Genuine Ones themselves! With such mighty foes before them, do Keita and Kuro have the strength to change the fate of all mankind?!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Having entered the Mototsumitama’s Pure Home, Keita and Kuro find no shortage of enemies. There is not only Reishin’s goons to deal with, but also men from the organization that Excel and Steiner belonged to. Keita and Kuro have to get past them before they can even test their mettle against Reishin. Luckily for them, they have plenty of backup. Not only did Mana accompany them, but Excel and her new contract partner, Mikami, have just arrived and are ready to lay down their lives to help Keita and Kuro. It is doubtful that they can defeat Reishin’s goons, but at the very least it gives Keita and Kuro a chance to track down Reishin.
The battle Keita and Kuro are leaving behind may be super awesome, but the real story is taking place where Reishin has prepared his judgment day for the world. Kuro has the chance to seek her revenge on her brother and save the humans of the world all in one go. All this time Reishin has been using he influence and money of his contractee, Yuki Kainoji, to create an interconnected system of soul stones around the world that will initiate the Doppleliner system and kill all the humans that are not the Root (essentially two-thirds of mankind). In other words, initiate Thousand’s system to keep humans in check. Reishin hopes this will appease the Genuine Ones that Thousand locked away all those eons ago.
Through all this, Reishin promised Yuki that he would tweak the system so she could take Akane’s place as the Root. But Yuki knows it was a lie and confronts Reishin. Once he admits it, Yuki initiates her own secret plan and releases the Genuine Ones in the hopes she can control them. Really? As a human she thinks she can control the closest things to gods that the world has ever seen?
Needless to say, it backfires on her and creates an even bigger problem. The Genuine Ones are super pissed to awaken to the current state of the world; the humans are slowly but surely destroying the world and it’s Tera. The Genuine Ones believe they must kill all the humans to save the planet. But before they can do that, Kuro wants to confront her brother and make him pay for all the crimes he committed against their family. A single-minded passion to say the least.
Everything quickly descends into complete chaos; Battle Genes unlocked, a gift of power form Thousand left to her daughter Kuro, and the unstoppable power of the Genuine Ones. Bodies are flying everywhere, the humans of the world are being threatened by the release of immense power through the Doppleliner system, and Keita begins to loose his indomitable will.
Will Reishin admit and repent to his crimes? Will Yuki figure out a way to survive the Doppleliner system? Will Kuro get her revenge? Or will the Genuine Ones just be done with it all and kill all the humans and all the Mototsumitamas?
In Summary
I never did watch the anime adaptation of ‘Black God’, but it certainly didn’t get very flattering reviews. Despite how that turned out, people really should give the original manga series a chance. The Black God series has great artwork, flawed characters that travel a tough road making them better as people or just plain making them dead, a wonderful production from Yen Press that is clean and full of color pages, and a good and interesting storyline over all. Add to that, the fact that this series is only 19 books in total and actually got completed (somewhat of a rarity in the US), and readers should really give this a chance.
As for this final volume, what can I say without spoiling it? Well, without spoiling, I’ll just say that I didn’t see certain aspects coming and I was pleasantly surprised with some of the directions the last battle took. And I can honestly say that I was totally happy with the way it ended and wrapped up the love triangle between Kuro/Keita/Akane. Good storyline and good execution; Highly Recommended!
Content Grade: A++
Art Grade: A
Packaging Grade: A++
Text/Translation Grade: A-
Age Rating: 17+
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: May 28th, 2013
MSRP: $12.99
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