The Testament of New Sister Devil, Vol. 1

By Tetsuo Uesu and Miyakokasiwa. Released in Japan as “Shinmai Maou no Keiyakusha” by Kadokawa Shoten Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Shonen Ace. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

First of all, that is one awkward title. I’ve accidentally written it sa “New Sister Devil” at least twice, and it is very much in the genre of ‘random words strung together’ that we’ve seen so often these days. Looking at the title, you’d immediately guess it was based on a light novels, and you’d be correct. As for the manga itself, it shares similarities with a few other titles released over here lately. The premise could be vaguely interesting, some of the characters are promising, and there’s a whole lot of non-consensual sexual assault as fanservice that makes me ultimately rejecting recommending it to others.

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As I said, I did enjoy the basic premise and backstory. Each of the main characters is introduced as a normal person to whom wacky plot points keep happening, only it turns out that they’re actually far from normal and have been hiding secrets of their own. Basara is actually from a village of heroes who are there to fight demons – a fight that he’s run away from after his powers got out of control as a child. His father, who appears to be the one complete dupe in the series, turns out to have also known all along. the one innocent in this, ironically, is Mio, who is the daughter of a demon – a fact she was totally unaware of until her entire family was slaughtered one day. Each of them has a very good reason for wanting nothing whatsoever to do with the war to see who gets to rule Hell, and yet they’re drawn into it anyway, because they’re fundamentally decent people. This is a good premise.

Sadly, we also get fanservice, to the point of near explicitness here, mostly due to Mio’s attendant Maria, who is a succubus, and who uses her powers “accidentally” to bind Mio as Bassara’s underling. This means she has to obey his orders, and if she doesn’t, her body gets more and more aroused. The only way out of this is, of course, to grope and otherwise assault her till she climaxes. Add to this and we have the usual ‘waking up with my fake sister lying on top of me’, ‘bath scene with lots of jiggling and bouncing’, and ‘let’s lick the arm in suck a way that it resembles giving head’. Honestly, half the time I’m amazed this isn’t in Young Ace instead of Shonen Ace. But to be fair, this is exactly the sort of thing that would interest teenage boys.

So if you can put up with the humiliation of the female lead (Maria seems to have no shame, so no worries there) and enjoy fantasy along the lines of Devils and Realist and some of the other ‘war in hell’ titles we’ve seen, this may be for you. As for me, I feel I can resist the call.