(Seven Seas 2012)

Story & Art by Okayado

Storyline Ongoing

Summary: It’s every day life with Monster Girls in this ecchi comedy, telling the harrowing tale of a young man named Kimihito Kurusu who builds a harem of young, attractive girls with animalistic features. From a Lamia (half-snake, half human) to a Centaur (half-horse, half-human) and more.

In this world, a new law has passed allowing for the co-habitation of these “monster races” and humans, and but some races are still in need of human contact before things become truly normal. Thus Kimihito is unwillingly thrown into the role of “host family” for these girls – sort of like exchange students; whether he likes it or not.

 [SPOILER WARNING!!]

 Review: And suddenly, three new chapters popped up out of nowhere. But that’s a-okay, because more monster girls is always a good thing! What a lot of fun these new chapters were as well, each one offered a wholly new and complete story, and one of them also gave us a huge revelation that I will discuss in just a bit. Let me go over each chapter and what I thought, starting with a Nine-Tailed Fox Shrine Maiden who loves tokusatsu or live action shows, but are generally referenced in anime or manga for live stage shows.

Chapters 32 introduced to us Luz Ninetei, a young nine-tailed fox shrine maiden who is down on her luck with a less than successful shrine that she’s taking care of while her master is away. To make the business more profitable, she is putting on scare acts in hopes people will visit more often if there’s a legendary demon roaming around.

It doesn’t necessarily work out that well, so our heroes, who are still staying in the town where the Onsen from last chapter is located, get the bright idea to put on a tokusatsu with Ninetei as a shape-shifting do-gooder who fights evil. Miia gets an opportunity to shine as a villain and it’s incredibly satisfying to see her get so engrossed in the role.

To be honest, I didn’t fine much wrong with this chapter, I like seeing these guys on vacation and just exploring the area. This is mostly a Miia and Rachnera chapter, and it was fun seeing these two play off of one another with no interference from the other girls.

Sadly, Ninetei just doesn’t come across as that interesting of a character, sure she’s a playful little thing that enjoys entertaining people, but where as most side-character stories have featured the main side character going through an arc, this one really didn’t and I ultimately found her to be fun, but 1-D as well. So yeah, that was the worst thing about this chapter.

Moving on to chapter 33, this ladies and gentlemonsters, was the strangest chapter in the whole series so far. It’s also the closest the series has gotten to hentai. Last time that happened, it was when Miia explained how her specific tribe reproduces. This chapter introduced us to Cathyl, Merino, Ton and Cott, a few monster girls working on a farm. Cathyl is a Minotaur having a love affair with her human master, and the other three are Pan Faun’s who just work there.

The gist of this storyline is that Cathyl thinks her master is cheating on her with many different women, but doesn’t have the courage to confront him. The main monster girls in this chapter are Centorea, who’s my favorite, and Papi. But both don’t get much to do in this chapter as we focus more on the side characters.

Now, as strange as this chapter was, and I’ll get to why that is in a moment, it does do one of the key things I just mentioned earlier about what makes most of these chapters so good, the side characters get an arc. Now, while Ton and Cott get virtually nothing to do, the stars here are Cathyl and Merino, the latter of these two having now become my second favorite monster girl in this series.

Seeing them interact with Kimihito was really funny, because Merino seemed to become the first monster girl that he actually, basically fell for. While the girls he currently lives with constantly vie for his intention, really Merino has ended up being the first real monster girl that I can remember that he’s shown true interest in. And she’s an innocently sweet girl, so I can understand why. I hope she comes back, and that this wasn’t just a one off for her character.

Cathyl is the main star in this chapter though, due to the aforementioned affair, but also for one other big reason – or a couple actually – in which I will spoil here and now. Things got really strange when Cathyl, who sports the biggest breasts in the series now, demanded Kimihito “milk” her. Being a Minotaur… that does make sense, and sense she can’t talk to her partner… who else is there to do it really? – Well, this chapter dedicated a couple of pages to the straight up lactation storm of milk spewing from Cathyl’s breasts. I can take this because I’ve seen a lot of weird stuff, but I can see why for a lot of fans this may have ended up being too much.

It was a bold move on Okayado’s part but other than pushing the envelope I’m not really sure what it was meant to accomplish. It wasn’t sexy, it was just kind of there… and sadly that takes this chapter down in my book. But I do respect Okayado for at least trying to see what he can and can’t get away with.

Finally, with chapter 34 we get introduced to a couple of less than genius extraspecies operatives who are tasked with protecting “XO” who they take to be Suu, the slime girl of this harem. These two are named are Liz and Kinu, one of which is a “guy” which you know how that really goes. The two monster girls from the main harem this chapter, are Suu and Mero, who’ve ridden back with Kimihito to their hometown.

Overall, I felt like this was the weakest of the chapters on a story level, but it did have a redeeming revelation in it, which I will also discuss in a moment. The reason I believe this was the weakest chapter is because Liz and Kino just weren’t that much fun, like Ninetei from earlier they’re pretty 1-D characters. Now, we do learn a bit about them, but I think if we ever see them again they’ll only serve as comedy relief. They’re incredibly incompetent in their job, and mistaken Suu for their real target: Mero.

Speaking of Mero, this is where things get interesting. It’s been hinted at several times throughout the manga, but it’s in this chapter that we finally get confirmation that Mero is in fact a princess of a royal kingdom. And her mother has summoned her back home, so I’m really excited to see where this storyline takes us. I hope we get to explore it in the next few chapters and Okayado doesn’t draw it out. - Which, from recent track record I don’t think he will.

Finally, we get more slight continuation of the subplot involving Lala the Shinigami who originally showed up to warn everyone of Kimihito’s impending death. I believe the lead up to Lala’s entrance was my least favorite storyline of this series so far, but I’m really curious to see how Okayado goes about displaying Kimihito’s death.

Will he actually die and Lala or one of the other monster girls will save him? Will he be saved in the last minute? Will it actually be a storyline worth waiting out for? Only time will tell… but I’m very curious about it indeed.

We’re still 15 or so chapters away from chapter 50, but I’m curious if that storyline will be a big event for the 50 chapter…? I kind of hope!

For now though, I’m more than happy to go exploring wherever Mero is from, and that has me really looking forward to the upcoming chapters. They’re all mermaids, of course.

Final Score: 4 Secret Princesses out of 5

Derrick is a born and raised otaku with a love for comics, anime, manga and movies. The full list is pretty long, but that’s just the basics. Stories set in space are his bread and butter.

You can find more of his writing at IndieComix.net

@KazekunForever