Sunday's slow feed of new serials keeps on drippin'. As I write this update, yet another new series began in the magazine. To give context to those new to the site (hi), who may not be familiar with how serializations in magazines work, typically they come in batches of three to five, with each new series starting in the next subsequent issue. Shonen Sunday however does things different and will sometimes have a new serialization round of two series, start a third weeks later, and then randomly months later start a new series with little to no previous notice. Oh right, that's the other thing --usually these things are spelled out an issue in advance, sometimes even a few. Sunday though? Nah, they just drop these things like they're trying to weed out enemies in ambush. It gets me wondering if there's a rhyme to this reason, or if Shogakukan just likes keeping readers on their toes.
That aside, the series up this time is one by two veterans who as far as my research shows haven't worked on a shonen series before, talk less of Shonen Sunday. Heck, I don't think either of them have written anything for Shogakukan before either. It reminds me a bit of Kagurai except there the two creators transitioned from entirely different industries into manga. Okiumi-sensei and Sugiura-sensei have series before this one at least, but they're new to this publisher and this magazine.
The Author
Jiro Sugiura
Sugiura-sensei is a busy guy. He's writing another two series besides Kamibiki no Monarch while simultaneously writing and drawing his own series Boku no tsuma wa kanjou ga nai. (My wife has no emotion) His other series Nisemono no Renkinjutsushi (The Fake Alchemist) and the aforementioned My Wife has no Emotions are both available in English from Seven Seas Entertainment and Yen Press respectively. The former had an anime by TMS and Tezuka Production back in 2024, while an anime adaption of the latter was announced this past June. So not only is he a busy guy, but a rather blessed one. Only time will tell if anime lightening will strike three times for Sugiura-sensei, however. I also found a few series he did under a similar name to his (Ura Jiro, rather than Sugiura Jiro) back in 2007, 2008 and 2012 respectively but I can't find much information on them besides their names: Hyoko no Tamago, Chiisana Koi Gokoro, and Ore no Yome Memorial. Beyond that his proper debut with a well known publisher: Honbunsha came in 2012 with Wanrabu (One love?) which ran in the publisher's magazine Manga Time Kirara Tsubomi Series. Worth noting is that My Wife has No Emotion was originally serialized on Sugiura-sensei's twitter before being picked up by KADOKAWA to run in their Comic Flapper magazine. The Fake Alchemist as well also started off with unofficial releases before it began it's run on KADOKAWA's online platform Kadokomi (formerly Comic Walker) and even Kamibiki no Monarch is an ongoing Pixiv manga before this remixed version began in Sunday (so think ONE's original One Punch Man manga being remuxed into the Shueisha branded version by Yusuke Murata.) so he knows his way around their platforms and magazines. More recently he has started a series with another artist (Hirokazu Mukoura) for HEROS which is a label related to Shogakukan but is sort of it's own thing? (So I only sorta lied!)
Sugiura-sensei's content is...a mixed bag of things. (respectfully.) Like, take My Wife has No Emotions. As it's available in English I'll give a summary of the series rather than the deep dives I do when there are no official translations, but it's essentially about a guy who gets a domestic robot to help him around the house since he's too busy with work. He jokes one day that she'd make a great wife and to his surprise she takes it seriously and a real relationship begins to develop. Just from this it sounds like Sugiura-sensei might walk down a dramatic, heartfelt but seemingly straightforward path in life right? Then taking in the Fake Alchemist, about a man who was reincarnated into another world and seemingly works as an alchemist, but the truth is he has cheat skills that allow him to make people think he can do alchemy. He then goes to s slave trader to find someone who can keep his secret safe and ends up with an amputee elf and a human girl named Nora who's sort of but not really his wife. Wait, maybe there is a connecting circuit in these stories...And last is Mechakucha Tsuihou sareru Hanashi (A crazy story about being exiled) About a boy who wants to be a hero who can save people, and is granted a skill by a goddess that makes him exponentially stronger than most people. Except, the more he uses that ability the more people hate him. Which, I might add is also based on a story he drew as a side gig. Though hey this one doesn't have any wives as far as I can tell.
Since the artists for these works are all different people it's hard to judge based on that, but as a writer Sugiura-sensei has a wide breadth of talent. I'm no stranger to prolific creators, however there's usually one unmistakable "vibe" between their works that is unmistakably them. Be it the way they draw characters or the types of settings they use there's a connecting fiber somewhere and while there might be with Sugiura-sensei it's not something that's readily apparent. Which, no lie? Has me more intrigued as to what he'd cook up for his first shonen series.
From Mechakucha tsuihou sareru hanashi
The artist
Rei Okiumi
Okiumi-sensei on the other hand has only two other series beside Kamibiki no Monarch to their name. One is a remake to an apparently very popular light novel entitled Ubau Mono, Ubawareru Mono (Bereave or Bereaved) <--This is the Japanese subtitle, though in my opinion a closer translation would be closer to "To Steal or be Stolen From." which from the admittedly sparse description sounds like a typical power fantasy work where a boy who is gifted but abused by his family is transported to another world and given the tools to seek revenge against those who'd wrong him. The manga version ran on Kodansha's Magazine Pocket in 2024 and ended with three volumes. As the original novel is still going today with more than ten volumes, I get the idea that the manga version wasn't exactly well received.
Meanwhile the other (written under the pen name of just "Rei") is a three volume series entitled
Imōto no Tomodachi ga Nani Kangaeteru no ka Wakaranai (I don't Understand What My Little Sister's Friend is Thinking" which ran on
Ganma! from April 29 2020 to April 16, 2022.
Mangamo has the English license for the series.
Now this one has a little more artwork to go on, and it's mostly very cute, almost diametrically opposed from Kamibiki no Monarch. Between the two of these series, Okiumi-sensei's got a great handle on coloring and character designs as the colors pop and the cute characters stand out.
The title gives away what the premise is a guy ends up hanging with a girl who's his little sister's friend. He can't quite tell what's on her mind, but at the very least she doesn't seem to hate him? The art is mostly in service of the plot which is, again, cute. I'd like to think that Okiumi-sensei's artwork is multifaceted and can serve whatever story it needs to as that'd explain Kamibiki looking so different from these other two series, but I could just be overthinking it and they're just improving through each successive serialization. Anyway we've done the preamble, let's go for a God-tier pull.
The serial
Kamibiki no Monarch.
Starting in combined issues 22/23 is Jiro Sugiura and Rei Okiumi's first Shonen serial Kamibiki no Monarch. The title translates to "The God-tier pull Monarch." The blurb on the color page says "Use Gacha to become King."
The Premise
Takemoto is a normal 20 year old guy working part time to make ends meet. Unfortunately the only thing he gets for his troubles is an appointment with Truck-kun, which leads to his early demise. He awakens in a strange chamber where a large old man reveals he's been isekai'd and can start a new life in another world with two cheat skills. Takemoto being a bit of a gamer himself meanders on what his abilities should be for a moment before picking two and starting off on his adventure. One of his abilities is something akin to a gacha pull box, where he pulls a scholar named Professor First, who then instructs him how to survive in and hopefully thrive in this new world.
This series wears it's inspirations on it's sleeves which is strangely....refreshing? Out of the gate it knows exactly what it is, who it's for and what it'll be going forward. Takemoto takes his death in stride and sets out to gather allies in what is essentially a gamefied gacha system in another world. Monarch at least at first doesn't have huge ambitions to reinvent the genre, or even be unique, right down to it's cheat skill power system. Rather, it leans more into being a loving tribute to the genres that birthed it and a happy medium of poking fun at it's conventions while being in awe that it's on the same stage. There's even a moment where Takemoto nearly gives in to his baser desires and wishes for a harem, but that's pretty brief (and he doesn't get it anyway) as he settles for what he pulls which is a hodge podge of people of different types.
As expected from a Sunday series, the pacing is on the better side of leisurely. The villain of the plot and higher stakes don't come by the end of the first chapter, rather it ends when Takemoto pulls Amber a huntress from his gacha machine and she turns out to be the strongest in his party by far. (As a side note, I've become used to Japanese media featuring bizarre renditions of westernized names, but this series avoids it for the most part and even has unusual while still common given names for characters. Like, I can't remember the time I encountered an "Amber" in an anime, and later there's even a Megan!)
Even chapter two has the singular focus of Takemoto learning his abilities (beyond the gacha ones) to hunt a rabbit. That's to say this series is not in a hurry to make a point or wow the readers with twists and turns. I took a peek at the original series which while it is done by "chapters" each one is a page long, and while there are some changes here and there probably to make for a better sense of flow when compiled into a weekly serialization, it does seem to mostly stick with Sugiura-sensei's original ideas.
It's here that it's easier to get a grasp on Okiura's artwork. As I mentioned before it's much better than in Ubau Mono Ubawareru Mono. The paneling is slick lending well to action set pieces and the character designs are less cutesy and more defined (except for one character, Mia who's supposed to be a cute character) Okiura's pages are easy to navigate and artwork clean without too much clutter. One might argue that perhaps it's too straightforward but considering Sugura-sensei's art for this series is literally sketches, and we don't know how involved he is with this remux, it's impressive that Okiura-sensei keeps the pacing of the original intact while expanding on it in a way that makes the serial stand out.
Circling back to the pacing, this does leave me with a not-so-unique-to-Sunday issue in that with only ten chapters out at the time of writing there's not too much for me to comment on as far as the story. Don't get me wrong, things are happening, and there are little elements that suggest Takemoto's fun and fancy free adventure won't stay that way, Professor First is acting kind of shady, there just might be another dude out there with fancy gacha powers, and of course the old man at the start of the series also has an air of suspicion around him (he sends Takemoto off cheerily enough but adds in a "make things entertaining for me." as he leaves). So there's something there to latch onto, but fans of isekai adventures who expect to have everything lined up immediately might find themselves bored at first.
The Japanese Connection
Through reading the comment sections on this, I learned that this series is in fact a spin off of The Fake Alchemist or put another way they take place in the same universe! (And they say reading the comment sections is a bad idea. It is, but once in a while it helps immensely.) That might explain the pacing a bit, but it does explain a lot of the Japanese commentary which seems to boil down to "If you like Jiro Sugiura, you'll like this." There are many who praise Sugiura-sensei's storytelling in these comments, and even hope this version of the work will add depth missing from the original. Overall the comment section is filled with people who really like the original story and are sending good vibes to this one which surprises me. There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of press around this (perhaps because the original is so well received?) and I personally thought the pacing was maybe too slow for even Shonen Sunday so I had thought perhaps this might run into issues down the line. We'll have to wait until the first volume drops in August to really know but maybe this'll do well after all? While a lot of that goes to The Fake Alchemist's pedigree, aka Jiro Sugiura, we've seen all too well what a good remux can do (Hi again, Saitama!) I do see the point of some people who say this feels like a light novel in manga form than a proper manga, and some of Sugiura-sensei's explanations do get to be long winded. However, overall the commentary is positive on the series so I'm keen to see whether that'll turn into sales when the volume version releases.
The Verdict
I try to stay unbiased when reviewing these, but I'd be lying if the positive impressions of the Japanese comment section haven't swayed me a little in my thoughts on the series. I read the entire magazine week to week and admittedly this is one of the series I tend to skim rather than read properly (until this review) but maybe now that I'm caught up I'll pay closer attention to it.
Kamibiki no Monarch is a series that has a heavy crown upon it's head. Both with a prolific and well received writer at the helm, and being serialized in a highly visible magazine almost neutralizes the good will naturally baked in with it being based on another work. Yet, the particularities and quirks of the writer stand firm. Perhaps, no, it's because this is a series born of Sugiura's doodles and thus free from the normal criticism that'd come from being published in a larger magazine from either the audience or editors that the vibe of this comes off as more personal than other manga of it's ilk. People come here for love of the game, and I think that'll be what keeps the pulls coming. As it does share a world with another of Sugiura's series there might be a little extra homework needed from readers, but so far? The world of Kamibiki no Monarch is like a watching a treasure chest opening slowly. Is it gold, or calamity that awaits inside? Even knowing exactly what makes up the prizes, the thrill of pulling and waiting for that drop is, well, God-tier. That will keep readers on their toes to see what'll be in that treasure chest when it finally completely opens. That my friends is the magic of this series. (and ironically. Or not, gacha too.)
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