What is it about?
There is a legend that tells of how the world was almost destroyed thousands of years ago by the vampire queen after she unleashed her latent powers. Despite their efforts, the humans were unable to defeat her, and thus resorted to sealing her away until the time came that they would be powerful enough to destroy the seal and kill her.
However, the humans are not the only ones after the seal.
Having cast aside his kingdom and betraying his own race and the dhampirs (half-vampires), the vampire king is persistantly searching, even to this day, for where his queen has been sealed away so he may break the seal and free her before the humans do. Fearing that once the king and queen are reunited, they shall continue to destroy the world together, the humans and dhampirs hunt the king, using any method possible.
What is the genre of the story?
Based from various sources, its genres are supernatural, vampire, sci-fi, fantasy, romance and tragedy. Some sites also labeled it as shounen. But from my own understanding of what shounen means, I don’t consider it as one. Feel free to disagree.
But really, if I were to put my own tags in there, it’d be “love”, “vengeance”, and “forgiveness”… and “feels”. Lol.
What is there to love about?
PLOT. PLOT. PLOT.
It’s beautiful. It’s genius.
It’s basically unpopular. What makes it a must-read manga?
As I’ve said above, the plot is the reason why I think a lot of people would definitely love this manga. At the start of the series, you will be led to believe that it’s such a simple story – a vampire king trying to release his queen from a very powerful seal so that they could be reunited again – pretty straightforward, right? Well… NO.
What makes the plot so entertaining is that it releases its mysteries slowly, resulting to anticipation and overwhelming curiosity. By the time you reach the middle, most of what you considered as the “truth” will have turned into a lie. And when you think you finally know what’s really going on, you’d most likely find yourself wrong in the next few chapters.
I saw this review by jiaqianyin on MyAnimeList, and I completely agree with this person. He said:
“I completely LOVE reading this. The main character, Strauss, is so unpredictable, and you can never really tell what’s going on in that HUGE brain of his. The plot is awesome. At first, I thought it was going to be one of those boring romances that have an obvious plot, but in the third volume, the plot changed to a darker mood. Then it changed to something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. And then it changed some more.”
All in all, it’s a story made of elaborate lies, misconceptions, and truths that aren’t exactly true. You might think that stories with too many plot twists could get confusing as hell, but I can assure you that everything transitioned smoothly. A lot of flashbacks were used. And I tell you, it was used so, so well.
You might think that there’s no way a story could be as perfect as what I describe. Well, that’s true. The Record of the Fallen Vampire does have its own downsides. As I was reading other comments and reviews about this, some people disliked the sci-fi element of the story. But for me, it wasn’t exactly a big problem. In fact, it’s the sci-fi element that eventually led everyone to the “truest truth”, if there is such a thing. It did get weird for a few chapters, but not so much that it could affect this masterpiece.
And yeah, don’t even start to think that this will be like stereotypical vampire stories like “Twilight, Vampire Diaries, Vampire Knight” or whatever. It’s not. Basically every single overly-used vampire trope would be thrown out the window right away. And to be honest, I’m glad it did that. I’m not exactly thrilled about another love story of a vampire and a human and the racial obstacle they face as they fight for their love. Nah, I’ll pass.
So what makes it a must-read manga? Everything.
What is the status of the story?
Completed and completely scanlated! (44 chapters)
Spoilers, please?
I can give you spoilers, but I won’t. One of the greatest assets of this manga is the way it slowly reveals itself, like I said from above. I can’t very well spoil that. But if I really have to say something, well it’d be “Get the tissues ready.”
Any rants?
*sobs*
This is what I have to say: I have already read this 4 times. And I freakin’ cried every single freakin’ time!
Qiara’s Note: This manga is STRONGLY and HIGHLY recommended. I COMMAND YOU TO READ IT.
MAY YOU BE BLESSED BY THE MOON!
2DTalk 