Manga 82281 Majo No Geboku To Maou No Tsuno

As you might be able to glean from the title, The Witch's Servant and the Demon Lord's Horns (henceforth Witch & Horns), this manga is about a witch’s servant and their quest to obtain the Demon Lord’s horns. At the same time, Witch & Horns also explores gender identity and tolerance among different cultures.

The way Witch & Horns best explores these themes is through the characters. In the beginning of the manga, the reader is introduced to characters who are from different countries, may or may not practice religion, and are of different species. But, the main thing Witch & Horns focuses on is gender, ... which has multiple characters change their gender through magic. It’s such a relevant theme that it isn’t much of an exaggeration to say that one of the characters practically faces the reader when describing their own gender fluidity. Similarly, Witch & Horns also deals with romance between characters who can magically change their sexes, which is explored with the protagonist, Arsenio, and their potential suitors. Questions like “What gender should Arsenio be?” or “Which love interest will they pick?” end up being just as much as an important driving force for Arsenio along with still needing to obtain the Demon Lord’s horns.

And that is to say nothing about the world building! The ealry world building in Witch & Horns is done subtly, as it is effectively a magic version of Earth with countries that all have different views on the magic system, while basing it off of the same framework. The countries each have their own sets of tradition, such as Hispania being more theocratic compared to Eriland or Hyperborea. This goes a long way in making the setting of the manga feel lived in, and gives a lot of charm to the backgrounds.

On that note, the art of the series is something that’s difficult to segue naturally to. Over the course of the series, the mangaka makes many improvements in their art (which you could see by looking at the manga covers), but the early portion is undeniably stiff. For instance, side profiles always have an ‘off’ look to them, but it improves over time. This manga also has instances of going a little bit too horny with the art; which I didn’t enjoy, but I realize your mileage may vary.

Overall, Witch & Horns is a manga that is worth reading. While the initial premise and early chapters may be pretty rough to get through, once the manga gets going it becomes something special. The moral of accepting yourself and not putting others down is something that resonated with me, so if this sounds like something you might enjoy I recommend you give it a try!

While this manga is lacking a narrative 'umph', and instead meanders around mundane dramas, events and character interactions, I'm all about that slice-of-life stuff, so this was in my alley. There can't be a good slice of life work without great characters, and the characters here are really great, they are well developed and rather complex.

Now here's my warning. This work deals heavily with gender-blender narratives. While I really don't mind it all too much usually and I'm up for interesting works that depict different gender and sexual identities, this work kind of went beyond what I could stomach and I had to drop ... this about 70 chapters in. Now it's not anything too screwed up visually or thematically, but this manga will certainly attempt to confuse your personal ideas on the boundaries between male-female gender (as it did with me) through characters that frequently change their genders and admitting their birth and changed genders frequently.

My issue isn't the gender-switching or the fact a girl is actually a boy but acts like a girl. In fact, I think this manga deals with gender identity in a very interesting and rather nuanced manner, allowing the gender-changed characters to be as... people who chase their goals of friendship or romance rather than as superficial mouthpieces for pride identity. My main issue here is with how casually the manga and the characters treat gender change. Now, gender change in real life is a really big thing that requires surgical and hormonal medication/therapy. So while it certainly is liberating in terms of gender construction, it is quite odd for me to see the transformation pushed in such a casual and perhaps oversimplified manner.

I don't know... Maybe I'm thinking too hard about this, this is just a fantasy story after all. Still. I guess there is a societal barrier of sorts I must overcome before I can truly enjoy this.

The first few chapters were pretty weird and silly and made me kind of unsure about continuing this manga, but now I've gotten really into it. It's one of those mostly-comedy series that are also able to hit you with emotional parts and a developing storyline. Similar format to Gintama, I guess? I'm having a lot of fun reading it. There's also a prequel manga if you want more of the seriousness and less comedy, although that will completely spoil this one.

The characters have dimensions! They each have personal character arcs that actually hold weight and affect each other and the overall story. Their ... interactions and decisions are natural and believable and it doesn't feel like I'm being sold something, which I'm so thankful for.

I'm also a sucker for worldbuilding, and that's here as well. The characters come from different places, which each have their own flavor and history that tie into characterization and story. Basically, the locations feel alive. It's nice.

It is a genderbend manga. What really surprised me was that though there were some eye-rolling jokes near the beginning, the author later starts to actually address LGBT+ topics as part of the natural progression of the story. I'm not going to say that it's perfect or in-depth or anything, but it was really nice and unexpected that this silly comedy manga started saying flat out that gay people and trans people exist and are normal.