James Nicoll Reviews

Masaoki Shindo’s RuriDragon (Japanese: ルリドラゴン, Hepburn: Ruridoragon) is a Japanese modern-day fantasy manga series. Originally a one-shot published in Shueisha’s Jump Giga magazine in December 2020, RuriDragon has been serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump starting in June 2022. Currently, installments appear on the Viz site. For example, issues 19 to 24, which I assume will become volume 4.

The latest revelation confronting half-human, half-dragon Ruri Aoki is that she now secretes a venom not unlike toad venom. Mildly toxic, the venom may also have psychoactive properties… to which only Ruri is exposed.

Having lost another half-day of school she can ill-afford, Ruri returns to class, only to encounter a purely mundane problem: bullying.

Most of Ruri’s classmates are surprisingly nonchalant about sharing class with a horned, fire-breathing, venom-spitting girl. Two classmates see Ruri as a chance to bond with spiteful comments about their peculiar classmate, delivered within earshot of their victim.

While her school has no discernable anti-bullying program (and Ruri would have to be a narc to use one) half-dragon Ruri has so many options open to her. Should she respond by vomiting up psychoactive venom on her bullies? Should she summon lightning? Should she settle for the thematically appropriate fiery breath? On the advice of frenemy Maeda, Ruri chooses a razor-sharp-horn-based strategy.

Having made her point, Ruri is confronted with another challenge. She and her schoolmates have invested considerable time and effort preparing for a festival. The weather conspires against the students. A typhoon is due the day of the event.

Ruri’s ability to summon lightning is only a minor manifestation of the draconic knack for controlling weather. Ruri can save the day by altering the timing of the typhoon’s landfall. Easy-peasy… except that fine control of her new abilities is not one of Ruri’s strengths.

~oOo~

Ruri’s mother claims to be immune to Ruri’s father’s potentially mind-controlling venom. Isn’t that exactly what someone who was not immune to potentially mind-controlling venom would say? Ruri’s mother does caution Ruri to avoid kissing people, which drew my attention to Sir Not Appearing in this Play: there does not appear to be any reason to warn Ruri about that because this does not appear to be a kissing manga.

As hilarious and entirely reasonable as it would be for Ruri to violently dismember bullying classmates, that’s not the option she chooses. There’s more than one way to use her horns and she chooses one that won’t land her in prison.

As her teacher (who clearly knows more about Ruri than he cares to share at this time¹) points out, Ruri finds herself in a legal gray area: not entirely human but also not entirely not-human. Therefore, it’s in her interest to underline the human elements and to use her draconic abilities (AKA dark magic) in ways that her fellow Japanese persons will find laudable. Thus, her reluctance to dismember bullying classmates.

That said, the whole ​“altering the path of typhoons” deal seems like it should get close attention from governments around the world. Imagine if it had been possible to redirect the 2024 Ayr, Ontario, tornedo a few hundred kilometres south, where the Canadian census suggests population density drops off sharply! But that sort of outcome would undermine the cheerful tone the author is adopting.

Instead, the author offers just what I wanted, a sharply executed slice of life comedy about a teenager coming to grips in a very low-key way with powers beyond human ken.

RuriDragon is available to read here.

1: Because she might not manifest all eight draconic traits and there’s no reason to make her stress out about abilities she might never get.