 Hey everybody, welcome back to the channel. Today we got another reading vlog, the third update for this winter season. Pretty exciting. And I probably have the most eclectic mix of books that you'll see on a manga reading vlog. And if you know me, I'm open to reading every type of book out there. And I think it's reflected on today's batch of manga books that I'm going to discuss with you guys. So let's get started. We begin our journey here with the manga in the name of the mermaid princess. This is written by Yoshino Fumikawa, drawn by Mia Tashiro. And this is a shoujo manga published by Vizmedia. And it tells the story of Princess Mio, who happens to be a mermaid. She has mermaid abilities, but she is labeled as an unhuman. These are people born in these kingdoms that have different abilities. They are looked down upon and discriminated, feared and are labeled like the name implies, lower than human. Sadly, they can't cross borders. They will be either detained, forcibly ejected from their country and stuff like that. Our main protagonist is the princess of one of these kingdoms. And she is of a mixed breed, being half mermaid, half human, but displays her mermaid abilities. And as a result, the king of her country has her locked away and trained to be a regular human by stripping those powers away with special medicine that gives her legs and strips her of her powers. But the idea of being a regular human and erasing what they call a curse. Mio is very naive, a sweet young girl. She's 15 at the start of this book and doesn't really see anything past what is being told to her. She doesn't know how bad it is with the people of her country. At the start of the series, she is assigned this tutor to educate her on the matters of the kingdom. And she is also bethrowed to a prince called Chika from another country whom she has not met but exchanges letters on a monthly basis, I would assume. Mio's tutor is called Yudi Ban, who is a 17-year-old that really is the key to the plot of this book as he looks down on her at first, but once he gets to know her and her enthusiasm for learning and how she's really not a naive bad princess, she's a sweet girl. He opens up to her and teaches her about the outside world and actually sneaks her away to the town so that she can experience what life is like for the common folk of her kingdom. As Mio starts to understand the plight of certain individuals in the kingdom, she starts to question things and develop a backbone to her father and wants to bring about peace to this land and unity for all citizens because everybody deserves equal rights and that's sort of, I guess, one of the main conflicts in this book as well as a big metaphor for all the individuals out there that have faced discrimination and I say this with peace and love, I don't want to downgrade the power of storytelling simply because of the range that this book is aiming for with its demographic but if this simple way of reaching out to people and teaching them about the wrongdoings of discrimination, racism and stuff like that, I am all up for it and I will wholeheartedly beat this drum to support a book like this so more people can read it and sometimes it's the simplest of metaphors that reaches people out there for them to at least start the process of thinking differently about life and that is a beautiful and powerful thing so in that regard I think In the Name of the Mermaid Princess is a really fun book with a strong message I absolutely love that. It's a running joke on the Omnibus Collectors Network if you watch those streams where I talk about how lately all we're getting are a mermaid theme manga and how I'm buying them all and of course I had to get this one as well. I am so happy that I really like this book, I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to collecting the series. Thankfully it's only seven volumes so it's not a huge commitment to the shelf but yeah, I really enjoyed it. I'm not going to reveal all the secrets out there but I did enjoy the art. I like Princess Mio, she is super wholesome and cute and the fact that she has mermaid powers is super awesome and I'm envious because I love all things of the sea and the marine life and all that stuff and now for something completely different. It's a total 180 and I know I'm going to raise some eyebrows out there because you're going to think I've gone bad. This is the exact opposite of what I just reviewed on this video. Here is Volume 1 of Tales of Wedding Rings. I was interested in the manga a long time ago because this came out back in 2018 if memory serves me right and I totally forgot about it. Now the anime started and I've been watching it and I guess this is so far the guilty pleasure of 2024 so don't hate me on that. I'm only human. I think this is a fun disposable fantasy romance series with a bit of an edgy side to it. Also worthy to note that even though this book says parental advisory explicit content, it doesn't really have that much of explicit content. There are a couple scenes where characters are taking a bath in this hot spring or whatever but you don't see anything, everything is censored. It just so happens that the art is very detailed. Now the anime on the other hand surprised the heck out of me because that's a TVMA thing and I was not expecting that at all. So what the heck is this book about? Essentially in a net show we follow two characters. One of them happens to be Sato, this young high schooler. I think they're in high school, I don't know. And his friend Hime. He met her back when they were children toddlers where one specific day, a blinding light appeared and she stepped out of this portal. Sato thinks he remembers but was sort of made to forget by them. She happens to be a princess from an alternate world. Now after several years it is time for her to go back to her original place because she is destined to marry the Ring King. And you're probably wondering what the heck is that? That relates to the title of this manga, Tales of Wedding Rings. The Ring King is essentially the main hero of that world who will bear five rings and with that power each ring has different abilities. He will defeat the resurrected demon lord. So in order to do that he has to marry five different brides each of them having different abilities and all that stuff. So like one ring might have purification powers, the other might have like fire, wind, water, stuff like that. So there's that fun little fantasy RPG aspect to it and of course it's mixing it with the harem tropes and the ecchi stuff and all that. So long story short Sato not wanting to be left behind and not wanting to forget about his best friend who he has a crush on and wants to declare his love. Ventures into said portal where she's leaving and arrives at this alternate world and on impulse he may decides not to marry the prince that she was supposed to marry and declares her love for Sato and the two are now said to wed and he has become the Ring King. So creatures are now going to attack and our main protagonist is destined to marry four other brides as well and gain the rings to have the full magical spectrum ability thing and be able to combat the forces of evil and all that stuff. This honestly is like a harem meets lord of the rings but not as good as you might be thinking. The saving grace for this manga that I really like and I want to keep going back to it because I enjoy it is the art. This is done by the duo of maybe you might know these creators from to the abandoned sacred beast. If you like the art on that I think you'll like it on here. I love the character designs and it's very easy to read. So if you don't want the not safe for work anime maybe try out the manga though I must warn you I have read more than volume one. I just am not featuring the other volumes here. It does get a little bit raunchier as the story progresses but I like the world building aspect because every time we go into a new world or a new town I should say we get an explanation for that lore and the monster designs are pretty cool and the abilities and all that stuff. So yeah I do like that and well nature of the beast I guess you do get some itchy not safe for work ish stuff as a result of the whole marriage thing. But yeah tales of wedding rings certainly a unique spin on the harem manga I think. Let's keep the itchy vibes going I guess that's not something I wanted to say in 2024 but here we are. I have here the 100 girlfriends who really love you volume four. Now I'm not up to date with this series but it's the first time that I'm reading the manga and I wanted to mention it here so I picked volume four. I have up to volume eight. I do not own the first three volumes because I watched the anime really enjoyed it. I thought it was really funny and wanted to read the story so I continued where the show left off and that would be volume four. So eventually I will come back and pick up the three books that I'm missing. If you guys don't know I'll make a quick summary here. The 100 girlfriends series stars the character of Aijo Rentaro who has a horrible track record with love asking a hundred girls out on a date but he was rejected every single time. In a desperate move he prays for guidance only to be told by a commie that his rejections were due to a cosmic error. Now the God is going to set things right by making sure that Rentaro gets 100 dates or soulmates in this case. So it's a harem series but it's also a comedy. It is very self aware. It's very raunchy at times. It has a lot of Nazi for work humor and some visual gags. There is some actually stuff that I know might not be for everybody but do keep an open mind because the focus on this is the humor and the silliness of it all. It makes constant references to pop culture. It makes fun of itself and the tropes. I do really like it for that aspect. There is a goal here as he is destined to meet a hundred girls that will by fate fall in love with him and he will also fall in love and have this connection. Otherwise if this does not happen they will meet a horrible end through some accident and will die and all that stuff. So it's sort of a race against time to save these 100 girls. So having that goal already places it far apart from your typical ecchi series in my opinion. The first three volumes cover five to six of the initial girls and in this volume four we continue that with the introduction of the next character feisty foodie Haraga Kurumi. As it says here on the back of the book she is very hungry and constantly wants to eat which of course is played for gags but there's also some seriousness I guess when we get the heart to heart conversations. But this leads to a very humorous food eating competition that I was really laughing out loud and really enjoyed it. I think this is a really fun book. I'm saying really a lot so you know it comes with the territory of this being the really really really really long titled Haram comedy manga. But if you're into any of that that I mentioned with the fun art here I think you will enjoy the 100 girlfriends from Seven Seas Entertainment. We do have a bonus manga read that I did not put up on the thumbnail so if you are watching this put a wolf or dog emoji so I'll know that you watch this little segment here. I kept up my reading with which of this little castle this came out I think two months ago now but it got here super late and I finally read it. I really enjoyed this one. Essentially our main character here Theo is with Marie and they're traveling to France and they meet the character of Charles. Charles at first is intrigued by Theo and his fearsome abilities. You think they want to be friends they do but it's also a hidden agenda of wanting to consume that power so he is taking advantage of our main protagonist. Theo being so naive about the world and life in general falls for it and as an end result is hurt by these actions. I don't want to reveal it because I do plan on making a full video on the series once all five volumes are out. I think it's five volumes but it's a lot of fun. I really enjoy the art probably my favorite aspect of this series so far but it's a nice dark fantasy series. The main topic here as you're seeing with the cover that I showed is Theo potentially getting his own familiar. There's a new arc towards the ending of this volume where Theo joins this school for other gifted magical students. So that's going to be a lot of fun and hopefully allows our protagonist to meet more individuals to expand his horizons and potentially make new friends. Marie continues to be a quirky not perfect teacher but she realizes through what happened in France with Charles and Theo that she really does need the main character here to keep her sane and wholesome. And I should have mentioned at the beginning of this little review here this is published by Titan manga or Titan comics. So I do appreciate them going out of their way to pick up things that are different compared to the bigger publishers out there. So shout out to Titan for this one. The last book that we're going to talk about on this video is from Taiomatsumoto Tokyo these days volume one the latest from one of the modern masters of this craft that we call manga. So the story for Tokyo these days tells of a mangaka that has grown tired of the industry and decides to wrap it up and retire leaving his publishing company at a disarray. Everybody is surprised some are upset others are confused now that he's gone. Everybody has to fill in to continue other projects and all that stuff because he worked not only as a creator but also as an editor. So we really do get the day to day lives of people working in the manga industry. So I do like reading about that stuff. I think I've mentioned before when you're able to interject the real metaness of creating manga into a manga story. I love that. And this story goes above and beyond to show us that by highlighting the faults and quirkiness of people in this industry. The fact that Shiozawa the main protagonist is renowned for his work and has chosen to bow out early speaks volumes about the industry with so many people working in that system of creating to please executives and get the highest ratings and numbers and readership and not necessarily caring about the art or the storytelling. That's one of the points discussed in this book through the conversations that Shiozawa has with his former coworkers and other fictitional mangaka that he meets. Because at some point in the story something happens that kind of sparks that interest in coming back and creating one last masterpiece if you will. So he's looking for people that will draw his story and you get different perspectives of the industry. Some have retired because they moved on with their lives. Others have more psychological trauma issues that need help and understanding. So it's a really human story that tells about the things we put up with in the name of creating art as someone that has worked in media with radio. I completely understand the mentality of these people and why they might be tired of certain things while also feeling that grind and having to fight those emotions about not wearing yourself thin and wanting to continue doing what you love. Matsumoto's art is fantastic and this book is not the exception. I really enjoy the character designs here and just the amazing paneling and the way that we see the mundane through the eyes of an expert of a veteran mangaka and how he's able to frame rooms and cityscapes and character expressions to really drive home the point of the different emotions that these characters are feeling. I really enjoyed this book. I think you'll have a really fun time reading a corkier tale compared to everything that I talked about on this video. So there it is, folks. We got five volumes with that surprise edition there. I will be discussing more books real soon, so I hope you stick around for that. Thank you everybody for watching. Of course, everybody that liked the video, all of you that have subscribed. Thank you so very much. I truly do appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. That's going to be it for now. God bless. Stay safe out there. I will catch all of you on our next episode.