Manga Appreciations: Seimaden

by Nora

In honor of Higuri You's attendance at Yaoicon, we've decided to take a second look at Seimaden, her most popular (in the West) series---this one aimed at people who are clueless about the manga and don't mind spoilers.

Seimaden is a long-running shoujo series which has fascinated yaoi fans as well, thanks to its prominent inclusion of a male/male plotline and lots and lots of UST. It's beautifully-drawn and dramatically-plotted, with such heart-stopping action that you'll be glad it's complete and you can devour it all at once. The Japanese is relatively easy to translate (furigana!), but for those of you who aren't willing to torture yourselves with kanji, fear not: several fans have translated all 10 volumes (available at http://members.tripod.com/~tae_chan/seimadentranslations.html )

The story starts with deceptive simplicity. Hilda, a pretty young girl who works as a dancer in a tavern (in a world vaguely reminiscent of medieval Europe), seems to have a carefree life, but this is only a mask. In truth, she's amnesiac, unable to remember anything of her childhood other than her name. With the help of the townsfolk and her friend Sherrill, however, she takes it all in stride. It also helps that she has a mysterious admirer---a beautiful young man named Rauresu (could also be romanized as "Lawless"---not sure whether this is deliberate), who appears whenever Hilda's in trouble. From the very beginning, the reader (but not Hilda) notices that There's Something Funny About Rauresu. He seems to be freakishly strong, magically powerful, and his personality becomes much crueler and darker whenever Hilda's not around.

Little do we know. The truth is that this beautiful young man isn't a young man at all. He's a nearly-immortal demon, who left his humanity behind centuries before when he was tricked by the then-King of Demons into becoming his successor. Rauresu agreed to this unholy bargain because it was the only way to save his beloved, Alice, from eternal torment at the Demon King's hands. So he became the next Demon King, and Alice was freed---with death. Rauresu, however, realized that his new inhuman status gave him a rare opportunity: by being the cruelest and best Demon King ever, he could survive long enough to see Alice reincarnated, and then he would effectively be reunited with her. And guess who Alice's reincarnation is?

Thus begins a roller-coaster ride of a saga, which travels from the Human World to the Demon World and back. Along the way, we meet Hilda's old boyfriend Roderick, who happens to be the last surviving member of a clan of demon hunters and Rauresu's archenemy; Asbal, Rod's mysterious (and perverted) older brother who has his own score to settle with Rauresu; Berk, a psychotic nobleman with a taste for torturing beautiful things (and he just *has* to get his hands on Rauresu); and Maruka, a ghost who will stop at nothing to destroy Rauresu.

With all these distractions, it's no wonder it takes ten volumes for Rauresu to win Hilda's love and whisk her off to a happy ever-after in the Demon World. On top of this, however, we're treated to several subplots which are almost as juicy as the main one. Rauresu has a lieutenant---a beautiful winged demon named Teteius. Tetei is all demon despite his angelic appearance, and he's convinced that Rauresu is the greatest Demon King the Demon World has ever had. So it just burns him up that Rauresu, who'd been doing so well, suddenly begins to slip when Hilda comes along. He gets the idea to introduce a new threat, which he hopes will remind Rauresu of his responsibilities and get rid of Hilda at the same time: he releases the former demon general Zadei from prison. Zadei is a wild fellow who thinks he should be king instead of Rauresu. He rebelled against Rauresu once, and Rauresu defeated him soundly, but this time around he thinks he has the advantage of greater intelligence (Teteius) and surprise. Plus he thinks Rauresu must have gone weak between his lovely bat-wing ears, if he's so stuck on a human girl. He begins a campaign of destruction in both the Human World and the Demon World, pushing Rauresu to the limit and putting Hilda's life in severe danger. He is defeated, however, by his own heart: he's fallen in love with Teteius, and when he finds out that Teteius has betrayed him for the sake of Rauresu, it's a terrible blow. What follows is love, demon style---a rape, a murder, a ripped-off wing, a resurrection, an enslavement, and an incredible climax that elevates Zadei's love for Teteius from pathetic to something approaching beautiful.

And this is why Seimaden has captured so many Western fans. Epic in scope, it's got male/female romance for those who like it, male/male romance for fans of that, plus fantasy, horror, pretty boys with wings, demons, action, adventure, a little S&M, comedy, and lots of fun. The artwork is magnificent, too---somewhere between Yun Kouga and CLAMP in style, although a little more free and whimsical than both.

Underlying this, however, is fantastic characterization. Good and evil aren't what you think they are, in Seimaden. Rauresu, who became Demon King for a noble reason, wasn't just picked at random; he was truly evil when he was human, and his love for Alice seems to have been the only spark of good in him long before he ever became a demon. Teteius looks like an angel and spends much of the story as a suffering victim, but it's hard to forget that he betrayed Rauresu, tried to kill Hilda, and deliberately pretended to love Zadei in order to use him. Zadei, who seems to be a cliched, crude, and cruel bad guy, shows a surprising nobility as the story progresses, and he learns to cope with this strange emotion called love. Rod the demon hunter, determined to avenge his people (whom Rauresu destroyed), discovers how easy it is for righteous vengeance to become something far darker. Amid all this, it's Hilda we wind up empathizing with most, as she tries to answer the central questions of the story. Who can be trusted? Are demons really more evil than humans? Who's right and who's wrong? Should love be more important than morality? Not easy questions to answer---and this is what elevates Seimaden beyond just another mindless action-shoujo story.

A definite recommend.