~~ SPOILERS WARNING ~~
I like that this series continues to surprise me. The book opens with a scene ordinary enough for this world- Legoshi and his grandfather fighting some aggressive birds of prey in an alley. They have more in common than they’d realized- and Legoshi hits this home in another aspect when he tells his grandfather that he loves a rabbit. Right when a door is closing between them, giving the komodo dragon no time to respond. Just shocked look on his face. Haru has acquired Legoshi’s address but when she goes to pay him a surprise visit, sees him walking and conversing with his female sheep neighbor, and instantly draws all the wrong conclusions. Through his job, Legoshi finds out about the existence of a wholly different animal society- the marine mammals. Their outlook on life, attitudes towards things like wearing clothes and consuming flesh, are shocking to Legoshi. The wolf meets a seal who is actually his upstairs neighbor, they start spending time together and Legoshi later meets more animals that live in his building. His horizons are broadening.
One day he’s with the sheep Seven in a shop and they encounter some of her nasty co-workers. Their interaction with Legoshi emphasizes how unbalanced and unfair the treatment of herbivores and carnivores is. It makes Seven quite angry. We learn more about Yahya the horse beastar, his past connections with Gosha the komodo dragon, and what his position as beastar is like. Not what I had envisioned. He’s more like a glorified vigilante- living in a penthouse with a crew of mouse servants and fighting crime in disguise throughout the city. Regaled as a hero by many. Yahya and Gosha had parted ways for many years, now they meet again and it’s not amicable. Yahya has felt betrayed by Gosha and is very bitter about it, he holds a serious grudge. They fight. Another new development is the introduction of a new illegal drug into the black market, aimed at getting carnivores (especially young ones) addicted to eating meat. Legoshi is approached by a gang pushing this drug on individuals (hidden in a drink). But Legoshi’s not taken in. His altercation with them escalates into a battle which attracts attention, and Legoshi finds himself in police custody. Louis comes to visit him, and Legoshi confesses a recent epiphany he’s had- that he just feels overwhelmingly drawn to herbivores- whether to be near them like Haru, help out in general, or defend and protect them. He seems ready to accept this truth about himself.
The back pages of these manga always have some extra material- character design sheets, little short additional comic panels, descriptions of how the artist works. I thought the inclusion in this volume was a bit odd though- it was about a business trip the author/artist had taken, and the drawings were of fellow passengers (something I myself would have sketched back in the day) but also of her seating space on a luxury flight, and the entire meal served there. Personally I’d find sketches of the environs and cityscape where she ended up more interesting than the food on the airplane . . .
Borrowed from the public library. Completed on 4/13/24.
