Aka Akatoretachi no Monogatari (Red Blood Red Legacy) is a manga by Kaishaku, also known as the creator of Destiny of the Shrine Maiden and Steel Angel Kurumi. The manga ran in the seinen publication Manga Box from 2014 to 2017, finishing at 103 chapters.
Itsuki and Hayato, two adoptive brothers who grew up in a village nestled deep in the mountains, set out to hunt down a wolf that has been attacking the livestock of the village.
Itsuki is about to go in for the kill when a gigantic beast appears out of nowhere, snatching up the wolf in its jaws and sucking the life out of it.
The beast that stared Itsuki down was a gargantuan, blood-sucking vampire deer…
Provides examples of:
- Achilles' Heel: Every single vampire or vampiric beast will die if their hearts are damaged. Also, even the strongest of vampires can still exhaust their Healing Factor if they overuse it.
- Akashic Records: Shirley became this thanks to Taiga's experiments.
- Artificial Human: Itsuki and Wakana are copies Taiga made of himself and his sister Shizuka.
- Becoming the Mask: Hayato was initially The Mole sent by Hakim to spy on Taiga. However, over time he grows genuinely attached to Itsuki and Wakana to the point of being willing to lose an eye just so he could save them. He also consistently refused to actually kill Itsuki.
- Bittersweet Ending: The memories of Taiga and Shizuka are suppressed, meaning that Itsuki and Wakana are saved. They make peace with the vampires and safely return to the village which has been slowly restored by the survivors who fled to the mountains during Hakim's raid. The two of them eventually get married and have two healthy kids in the epilogue. Additionally, the vampire threat has been dealt with at long last. On the other hand, Hayato is dead for good and Shirley sacrifices herself to seal away Taiga's memories.
- Cat Boy:
- Quon, the most slender of the male characters which also makes him one of the very rare 'traditional' Bishounen in the series.
- Lionel VI.
- Crapsack World: Doesn't seem obvious at first, but it soon becomes evident that the world is controlled by the vampires who feed on humans, and treat them no different from livestock.
- Doomed Hometown: Itsuki's village is razed by vampires and its people hunted to eaten.
- Et Tu, Brute?: Hayato betrays and shoots Itsuki in chapter 19. Subverted later on when it was revealed that deliberately missed the vital organs, knowing that Shirley would be close by to save him. That way, he could keep a close eye on Wakana and spare his Best Friend from dying.
- Evil Is Easy: Taiga is a ruthless Combat Pragmatist who uses any tricks necessary to get what he seeks.
- Explosive Leash: Residents of cities controlled by vampires are forced to wear them, they prevent them from leaving the city borders and leaving.
- Fanservice: This series gives a roughly equal opportunity fanservice for both genders.
- Almost every female character is seen wearing a Stripperific outfit at least once.
- Hayato's first outfit revealed his huge, muscular arms which almost looked as big as Itsuki's head, while still in proportion with the rest of Hayato's body. It also exposed most of his upper body from his chest down to his abdominal. His second outfit has sleeves, but still partly exposes his wide, muscular chest.
- Chrome/ Amu, Lionel VI and Quon, if you are into that kind of thing.
- Itsuki's first outfit was pretty tame, but this goes out of the window after Shirley starts training him. After a lot of off-screen Training from Hell (which, among other things consisted of Itsuki carrying a giant rock with Shirley setting atop of it) and the battles against vampires after said Training from Hell, he gradually develops an extremely muscular build, only further accentuated by his skin-tight, sleeveless outfit. As the battles against the vampires continues and he becomes increasingly reliant of his scarf, his arms, chest and abs become visibly bigger, possibly hinting that Taiga's influence over Itsuki's body is increasing.
- Fanservice Extra: There is a chapter which briefly shows a shot of two almost fully naked Sex Slaves, one female and one male.
- Foreshadowing: Once Rewatch Bonus kicks in, many, many events in the earlier chapters receive a new meaning.
- Shirley frequently compares Itsuki to Taiga. That's because Itsuki is slowly turning into Taiga.
- In the flashbacks, Taiga is seen giving Itsuki and Hayato very detailed instructions on how to beat the enemy and, more notably, to never fail to consider if there's a catch to the opponents attack, such as Poisoned Weapons. This makes his relatively easy defeat against Hakim pretty weird in hindsight. In the final arc, Taiga now possessing Itsuki's body, ultimately dominates Hakim, even with Hakim's most recent trap proving to be only a minor inconvenience. Hakim only survives thanks to Shizuka's intervention.
- Hayato initially suppressing Itsuki from interfering in the battle when Hakim invades their village and acquiring a gun so quickly makes perfect sense after it was revealed that he is a spy sent by Hakim.
- The tankers that make up the first village Itsuki and Shirley visit foreshadow the fact that the setting was Earth All Along.
- Eventually, Shirley really DOES betray Itsuki, but she ends up regretting it and pulls a Heel–Face Turn.
- The very nature of the vampiric beasts subtly hints the real origins of the 'humanoid' vampires.
- Grand Theft Me: In the final arc, Taiga possesses Itsuki in order to get Back from the Dead. Shizuka also briefly possesses her replica Wakana.
- Graying Morality: At first, it as if the conflict is strictly between the oppressed humans and evil vampires. After Chrome's arc, however, Itsuki starts wondering whether or not are all vampires evil. From that point onward, many characters become much more morally ambiguous: Hayato was Becoming the Mask and actually wanted to PROTECT Itsuki and Wakana during Hakim's raid on the village, Taiga is far from the cool, caring dad he presented himself as and Hakim actually wants to save humanity.
- What makes it even more complicated is that even when released from the vampire control, humans still sided with them against Itsuki, as vampires still poses strength that most people cannot overcome.
- The Heavy: Hakim, until the final arc.
- Heroic Build: Under Shirley's guidance, Itsuki develops an extremely well-built body. When Taiga takes control of Itsuki's body, he lampshades this fact when he praised Shirley for training Itsuki's body so well, all while delightedly flexing both of his new body's sizable biceps.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Itsuki and Hayato are this, due to being each other's Best Friend. The bromance was so strong that many viewers thought that Hayato will end up as the Gay Option for Itsuki.
- During Hayato's final moments, they spent the entire scene hugging, with added Manly Tears and some flowers in the background.
- Hidden Villain: The real root of all the misery in the series is actually Taiga.
- Hypocrite: During his 2nd battle against Hakim, Taiga calls him out on his experiments on humans. This, despite of his own horrific treatment of both Itsuki and Shirley.
- In Touch with His Feminine Side: Downplayed, but still visible. Itsuki has shown himself to be a good cook, and demonstrated a degree of skill with craftsmanship when he made the bell for Amu and another pendant for Shirley.
- Love Martyr: Shirley spent most her life as an ultimately lonely being. She spent most of her life loving Taiga who ultimately seen her as a little more than an accomplice, at most Friends with Benefits.
- Motive Decay: Subverted with Hakim. The truth is, he is a broken man who has been through a lot of Sanity Slippage, but his surprisingly noble motives remained unchanged, even if his methods became considerably more demented.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Aside from usual humanoid vampires that drink blood and are weak to sunlight, there are also vampiric beasts, Itsuki and Hayato encounter a vampiric deer at the start of the story.
- Power Copying: The red scarf can copy the movements and even the memories and appearance of whatever life form it comes in contact with, which makes it extremely dangerous in battle. At the time, this was most definitively Not the Intended Use, but rather to preserve humanity's intelligence and memories of before The Virus from being lost for good.
- Pragmatic Hero: See Revenge Before Reason below.
- Revenge Before Reason: Eventually defied at the very end of the story. Itsuki decides that it would be for the best if he let Hakim and the rest of the vampires go, as they are needed to eradicate The Virus that turned the setting into a Crapsack World in the first place.
- Rose-Haired Sweetie: Zig-Zagged with Hayato. He is shown to have pink hair in colored art spread, yet he is actually a rather anti-heroic character.
- Small Role, Big Impact: Amu has a very short role until she dies, but her influence kick-starts Itsuki's Character Development as he becomes aware that vampires are not the Always Chaotic Evil he initially thought them to be, greatly contributing to him choosing to not kill off Hakim and the other vampires, as they are needed to help free humanity from the vampirism virus that started the whole conflict in the first place. Her arc also starts the Graying Morality in the series.
- Supernatural Gold Eyes: They seem characteristic for all vampires.
- Tragic Bromance: Itsuki and Hayato, with a good dose of
Ho Yay. - Well-Intentioned Extremist: Hakim and the other Pure blood Vampires were actually trying to SAVE mankind by removing the threat of vampirism, which is actually a virus that had resulted mass Laser-Guided Amnesia, save for a few. Hakim and most of the other high-tier vampires are researchers who tried to and failed in preventing The Virus from spreading further, which - among other symptoms - causes memory loss and has a degenerative effect on intelligence, with only a few exceptions. Now they seek alternate methods to counter it.
- The Extremist Was Right: Hakim eventually manages to finally put an end to The Virus in The Epilogue.
- Wham Episode: Has two major ones.
- Chapter 89: Taiga is the Big Bad and Shirley has been helping his Grand Theft Me plan since the beginning.
- Chapter 96: Hakim's goal is to save mankind by finally dealing with The Virus that spread the vampirism in the first place, by using clones of Wakana which carry the same antibody. Shirley, Taiga and most of the Pure blood Vampires were all humans, until they gradually lost they humanity either by The Virus or by artificial means.
- World of Muscle Men: Almost every single male adult (young or old) is built like a brick wall. The most notable ones among the vampires are The Captain and Lionel VI, while among humans there are Hayato, Taiga and eventually Itsuki.
- Yandere: Taiga went to great lengths just so he could have his sister become 'his woman'. This includes dooming the world out of fear that she wouldn't survive the needed research to extract the antibodies needed to suppress vampirism, as well as killing her when she refused him and then trying it again in new, artificial bodies.
- You Can't Go Home Again: Since Itsuki's whole village has been destroyed he can no longer go back to life he had before. Subverted at the very end, thanks to some of the villagers barely surviving and rebuilding it.
