The big climax where the anime ended happens in this volume with Kureto Hiragi, Guren Ichinose, and Ferid Bathory’s plans coming to fruition, forcing Yuichirou Hyakuya and Shinoa Hiragi to make fateful choices, along with Mikaela Hyakuya, Makoto Narumi, and all of Shinoa Squad as their wordls, hopes, and dreams shatter around them.
This book contained a huge, epic battle, blanaced beautifull with intense, intimate character-driven scenes. The manga surpasses the anime in this volume, answering many of the questions I had about Guren’s contradictory behaviour and why he, Kureto Hiragi, and the Japanese Imperial Demon Army were in Sanguinem, the vampire city at the end of the anime. Clarity was brough to some of Guren’s actions on the battlefield as to those of Ferid Bathory, even though both of them remain intriguingly enigmatic. Crowley’s attitude while watching Ferid in action with the Progenitors’ Council was hilarious, even while Crowley’s two vampire lady companions, Cross Belle and Horn Skuld groaned at Ferid’s antics. Equally amusing, yet intensely intriguing was the last panel with Ferid and Crowley in a sportscar on a quest to find Yu and Mika. Speaking of Yu and Mika, this book added a measure of tension in having Yu suffer the consequences of embracing both his demonic and angelic sides while Mika struggles to help him, all the while feeling very skittish and mistrustful of the rest of the Shinoa squad, and mistrusting Guren the most of all. I really felt for Shinoa, Kimizuki, Makoto, Youichi, and Shinya in this book.. Shinoa had to make some hard choices to hold her team together, along with welcoming Mika into her family, even though the young vampire doesn’t want anything to do with anyone other than Yu. Kimizuki discovered he’s trusted the worst people possible with his sister’s safety and suffered for it. Makoto lost too many people he cared about along with his faith in a leader he onced trusted. Shinya, oh, poor Shinya, one could just see his heart breaking when he confronted Guren, trying to understand why this person who’d become his emotional center betrayed everything he stood for. I even felt sorry for Krul Tepes, although her intentions were a little clearer in the manga, even while she remains a mystery. One of the most touching emotional arcs emerging in his book was Yu’s steadfast refusal to give up on Guren, even while Guren turned on his own, and how Guren struggled with himself, trying to warn Yu to run. Just whose side was Guren on? He appeared to support Kureto Hiragi’s ruthless plans, yet at times he acted in accord with the schemes of his secret ally, Ferid Bathory. Ferid baffled me in the manga, since I thought one of his plans was a coup against Krul Tepes, but that didn’t appear to be his motive for attacking her. She acted as a scapegoat for some of his actions, a very plausible one, since some of what Ferid accused her of was true. Mika appears to have some loyalty to his maker, even if he doesn’t trust her. Ferid doesn’t appear to have forgotten Mika or Yu as he juggled scheme after scheme, leaving me intrigued as to what he’ll do next. His plans appear to coincide with the needs of the fugitive Shinoa squad, whom are in desperate need of allies. All in all, this was an intense, exquisitely illustrated volume of this ongoing series, leaving me eager for what’s to come next.