Manga Discovery: Reimei no Arcana

Reimei no Arcana
( Dawn of the Arcana )
by Toma Rei
Two neighbor countries on a island. Between the two countries there is a constant war. Nakaba’s destiny was to be married for convenience to keep the peace? (JShoujo)

I first heard about this from Nathaniel. The story's summary seemed like a combination of Zettai Heiwa Daisakusen (because of the royalties between enemy countries thing) and Akagami no Shirayukihime thing (for the red hair thing). Those are my top favorite shoujo manga (heck, Akagami is my numero uno) so I thought that I will be loving this one as well!

Sadly, only the around the first half of the first chapter has been scanlated. I have been very curious on what will happen next so I checked out the available raw chapters. Ohohohoho~

Now that I've seen those . . . too bad . . . it doesn't seem to be as great as the other two series I've mentioned. Maybe it's just because I don't understand much of what was going on, but usually I could already feel if I'll find the series addictive or not even with just the raws~ (I'm psychic in that sense? LOLz~)

Though it wasn't as great as I expected, it's still pretty good. It's not that often for me to encounter a shoujo manga wherein the leading couple are already married. They don't like each other though, since the marriage was just political. But pfft! This is shoujo romance, they will definitely start liking each other little by little and will become canon (like with Zettai Heiwa Daisakusen); and yeah, it's really happening.

The kissing scene was really really early though (it seemed like a forced kiss) . . . .and . . . it's a french kiss?! It really shocked me.

Also, yeah, it's not immune to shoujo cliches. It also seems to have the love triangle thing. I'm not yet that sure if the feelings of the third party had been romantic love, but the leading lady also treasures him a lot.

Okay, honestly, I'm forgetting about what I liked about this series because the things that I didn't like in this series annoyed me too much. One of them is: the leading lady.

For her having red hair made me really anticipate that she will be somewhat like Shirayuki of Akagami no Shirayukihime. I liked it that she had the guts to punch a prince, so I'm hoping there's more to her than that. Unfortunately . . . . oh she had been a pain. She is one of those leading ladies that have some special ability (and in her case, seems that she could see the past, or tell the future or something) and she faints everytime it happens. She faints so often and on such odd timing that it has become really annoying!!! She is also incapable of protecting herself; even if she has a knife with her. So she has the two boys guarding her.

Or maybe I'm just disappointed that she isn't as great as Shirayuki. But . . . . guuuuuhhh . . . . I think I'll still dislike her once I've read the scanlated versions of the other chapters . . . .

As for the leading guy? He's a jerk. But he's a prince, and the leading guy, so of course he's supposed to be cute (not my type though), and can fight somehow, and has some cool and fun sides. And he will turn out to be a nice guy after all. I admit I find him entertaining at times . . . but I still don't like him.

As for the other characters . . . they are either cute/moe material, evil family member material, or tragic family member material; while the rest are props. I don't like them, especially the shota . . . I just hate shotas that act cute and cuddly . . . . I really prefer evil ones.

But . . . I admit . . . I have a guilty pleasure . . . .I freakin' love the leading lady's half-human servant: Loki!!! He's soooooooooooooooo cute, and sweet, can fight, and freakin' loyal to his mistress. He's so lovable I can't hate him even if he does something stupid or becomes too-close-to-the-leading-lady-that-the-scenes-seems-romantic (Yeah, I don't ship them . . . no way). Why am I a sucker for goodlooking loyal servants . . . . . ehehehehe . . . .

Okay, now about the story overall . . . . I like the idea that the humans here are those that appear to be the bad guys. They discriminate those with different form and hair. It's such bias. But well, that's how society sometimes is. And humans aren't always the goody-goody ones. And the leading lady's special ability makes it seem that there's more to the story aside from just a normal life of a married royal couple.

*sigh* but I'm really not that impressed with this. The art had made-up for it . . . . somehow. Because it's really pretty. But I'm not the type who can be biased to art . . . . I'm more of biased towards the characters . . . and it so happened that I like Loki so much that I'll be reading this even though I want to drop this after my dissatisfaction from browsing the raw chapters . . . .

READ: 5 chapters out of a 1-a scanlated chapters of a 1 volume ongoing manga
VERDICT: Following . . . but not prioritized . . . because it's only out of character bias~
It sounded like a combination of two of my favorite shoujo manga (Zettai Heiwa Daisakusen and Akagami no Shirayukihime) but it hadn't been as great nor as fun as the two. *sigh* It got me kinda disappointed, but it's not bad.
And I love Loki~ Wheeee~