Webcomic / Jungle Juice

Only the strong will survive...

"Everyone has secrets. Things they don't want others to see.
Showing these private details to others is risky...
It means revealing your weaknesses to the rest of the world.
This is the story of a certain college student who becomes prey in a vicious concrete jungle.
This is his desperate fight for survival."

— The closing narration of Episode 1

Suchan Jang is riding high at college. He's good-looking, his grades are pretty much perfect, and he's so popular that his classmates bow to him when he passes them in the hallways. For all intents and purposes, he's one of the privileged elite at the top of the social food chain.

But Suchan has a secret.

Back in junior high, he used a new bug spray called "Power Killer" that turned a dragonfly into dust. He inhaled that dust by mistake and soon finds himself with dragonfly wings sprouting from his back. He's spent years keeping them literally under wraps, avoiding any kind of situation that might reveal them to the world. But while visiting the movies with the girl of his dreams, he's attacked by a man with praying mantis claws. He's then forced to use his wings to save his new girlfriend, destroying his perfect image and reducing him to a freakshow to be mocked by passerby.

But when all seems lost, he meets a girl named Huijin Park, who invites him to join the Nest, a secret college city entirely populated by insect humans like him transformed by the "Jungle Juice" they used at some point in their lives. There she offers him a choice: either join the civilian shelter to live his life in peace, or attend the university and become valedictorian for a chance at claiming "Cinderella", a priceless antidote that can be used to remove the insect DNA from his body. With nothing left to lose, Suchan enrolls without a second thought. But life at a college full of insect humans is anything but ordinary. And soon he finds that there are greater forces threatening to blow the lid on insect humans once and for all.

Jungle Juice is a Korean Webtoon written by Hyeong Eun and drawn by JUDER for YLAB Comics. It follows Suchan's efforts to rid himself of his affliction by reaching the top of Nest.

Season 1 ended with a special epilogue chapter after Episode 83, with Season 2 set to begin in early 2023. After many delays due to the reformatting process for the printed edition taking much longer than expected, Episode 1 of Season 2 came out in Korean on August 9th, with the official English translation released on September 7.

It can be read in English for free on Webtoon here.

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Jungle Juice contains examples of:

• Academy of Adventure: Nest functions as a university, home, and safe haven for insect humans away from the prying eyes of the outside world. In addition to more typical coursework, NEST students may also be trained in combat or defense, and there's a pervasive belief that that only the strong will survive, resulting in fierce competition over everything from course registration to who becomes valedictorian.
• Animal-Themed Superbeing: All insect humans have a wide array of powers based on the insect they're merged with. For instance, Suchan was merged with a dragonfly, gaining its wings, powerful compound vision, and incredible speed in flight.
• Antlion Monster: The insect-human in charge of the lab on Black Island turns out to have the Complex of an antlion- both in its adult form and in its nymph form- the latter of which is the Trope Namer.
• Artistic License – Biology: It's a webcomic about insect-humans, so it's necessary that liberties are taken for the sake of having a story:
  • Mixing insect DNA into a person obviously won't make the person manifest bug traits.
  • Standard ignoring of the Square-Cube Law; certain complexes (such as Hyeseong Cha's and Hyeseong Kang's) give the users abilities which have the same effectiveness as the bugs' do, despite being scaled up to human size.
  • Hwanyeong Yu is said to have the complex of a firefly infected with Cordyceps militaris; specifically the Caterpillar fungus, a species prized for its healing powers. However, the Caterpillar fungus is Ophiocordyceps sinensis, and while Ophiocordyceps is related to Cordyceps, they are two different genii. (To be fair, the Caterpillar fungus was thought to be in the genus of Cordyceps until 2007.) While C. militaris can infect fireflies, O. sinensis only infects caterpillars, hence the name. As for the healing abilities; while both fungi contain cordycepin, and the Caterpillar fungus is a folk medicine used for an extremely wide variety of ailments including rejuvenation after a serious injury (and C. militaris can be used as a substitute for O. sinensis), it can't heal giant open wounds in seconds. (Although that's obviously Rule of Cool at work.)
  • While it's true that Cantharidin was thought to be a stimulant for sexual desire in ancient times, in reality it's about as a effective as an aphrodisiac, as mercury is as an immortality potion. In other words, it's poisonous and killed people.
• Bathroom Search Excuse: When Suchan finds the lab in Angel Orphanage:
  Suchan: Sorry, I was looking for the bathroom and got lost.
  Orphanage Director: How odd... since this is the second basement level... and it's off limits to visitors.
  Suchan: [beat] I know.
• Beach Bury: Suchan gets buried underneath a sand sculpture of a certain South African penguin, courtesy of Huijin and Dohwa at Black Island Beach.
• Beach Episode: Invoked; Group A and Professor Hyeonbin Ju are undercover when visiting Black Island while searching for the place for Pet Shop's lab. Since the only real tourist location on the island is the beach, and they're disguised as tourists, it'd be suspicious to any Petshop patrols if they didn't go. Also played straight in that everyone, except for Hyeseong, has real fun while at the beach despite being undercover.
• Bland-Name Product: A couple-
  • The video in chapter one was on a platform called "MeTube".
  • Suchan had over 5000 "Stargram" followers before the movie theater incident.
• "Blind Idiot" Translation: While LINE's official English release is perfectly legible 98% of the time, sometimes they can seriously drop the ball.
  • The electives notebook that Huijin hands Suchan in Chapter 3 says that Professor Jun Ji gives "No group assignments", when it should say "Lots of group assignments."
  • There are instances of translating the species names wrong, although these mix-ups are more forgivable due to them being partially due to typical language-barrier confusion as well as translation problems.
    • The narration and Jun Ji's notebook say that Daun has the Complex of a "여섯 뿔 가시 거미", or "Six Horned Spiny Spider", which is localized as "Spiny Orb Weaver". However, despite how Spiny Orb Weaver's are known for their distinguishable six-spines backing, they are not Bolas Spiders, which is what Daun is. Rather, the Korean characters were referring to an Ordgarius sexspinosus (literally meaning six-spinous in Latin), which is a Bolas Spider, and are called "여섯 뿔 가시 거미" in Korean, such as in this title of this video.
    • Changhun being a "Fire Ant" despite fire ants having stingers- the ones that shoot formic acid are Formica ants. Although this is because in Korean, Formica ants are called "Fire Ants" while fire ants are called "Red Fire Ants".
    • Hyeseong's specific genus of predatory katydid is left out (he's a Hexacentrus/Balloon Winged Katydid), because Hexacentrus Katydids in Korean are called "Grasshoppers" (because they look like herbivorous grasshoppers), which would've been really confusing if translated literally. Translating it just as "Katydid" however, gives the weird impression that the story is saying that all katydids are predatory, which they aren't.
  • The end of Chapter 32 has Changhun Yu surprised at how fast Suchan is, with him noting that he managed to snatch his handcuffs away at the "Light of Speed."
  • Calling binoculars a telescope in Chapter 37.
  • Chapter 40 had a sexual assault warning, because due to the way the dialogue from the Pet Shop agent was translated, it sounded like he had tried to rape Dohwa. This did not happen; he was simply stating that he had lost control of his strength when he was fighting her.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall:
  • Dohwa refers to the one-off characters who tried to snag a USB from Suchan last-minute as "background characters" in Chapter 5.
  • In Chapter 7, Suchan says "Come on! We were about to start an awesome action sequence!" after Huijin warns him to back off from the water bug.
  • A more blatant example occurs at the start of Chapter 33, with Daun stating that Huijin has to be stopped from undressing as "This is Webtoon!", or "This is Naver!" in Korean.
• Cannibalism Superpower: Insect humans can strengthen themselves by devouring other insect humans, gaining much greater levels of superhuman strength and durability as well as enhancing or granting new abilities. Doing so is incredibly addictive, so Nest trains the insect humans that attend its college to protect both humans and other insect humans from those who have fallen prey to their primal instincts.
• Clothing Damage: Happens frequently-
  • Professor Ji's shirt gets a sizeable hole in it after he's impaled, and later a sleeve gets burned off when he uses his Complex. In fact, all instances of him using his Complex result in that sleeve getting destroyed.
  • A bit of Huijin's shirt and waistband gets torn after taking a deep cut on her side. Later the stomach area of her shirt gets completely destroyed after she gets impaled even worse than Jun Ji did.
  • One of Junhyeong's coat sleeves gets wrecked after taking a hit from Dohwa, which also broke his arm.
  • Hyeseong's shirt gets torn up while he takes a few cuts facing the Stag Beetle. His long pants become shorts after the serrations on his legs get bigger later in the fight.
• Chainsaw Good: Jun Ji's first class starts with him having all of his students play a game of hide and seek with him as "It"... only he's also swinging around a long red chainsaw in the process.
• Chekhov's Boomerang: The chainsaw, initially brought out by Jun Ji on the first day of class for a test, later gets stolen by Hyeseong in order for Suchan to be able to fight the mantis. Suchan manages to cut off one of his bladed forelimbs with it, only for it to stop running, and the Mantis breaks the chain on it with his one good arm, and that's the last we see of it... Until it reappears over sixty chapters later wielded by Huijin! It turns out that she grabbed it from Jun Ji's office, and uses it to cut off the Exploding Ant Predator's detonator arm.
• Cool Old Guy: Professor Jun Ji is the ripped, imposing teacher of the "Practical Combat for Insects" course. While his methods may be a tad extreme (namely swinging a chainsaw at his students to teach them to run away from danger), it's clear that he dearly values all of their lives and his heartbroken should any of them get injured or even killed under his watch. He's fiercely protective of them and will stake his life to defend his students and any other insect humans.
  • Another example is with the even older Dean of Nest, who first appears as a shriveled old man with a cane who's about half of Jun Ji's size. He then scolds himself for being asleep while Nest was being attacked, confronts the leader of the Predators, and then pulls a sword out of his cane. While he's not fast enough to land a hit on the man, the leader still decides to back off after noticing that one of the Dean's missed strikes split a cloud in half.
• Creepy Centipedes: One insect-human under the Breeder's control is a Scolopendra gigantea: the Amazonian Giant Centipede, who's so big it (they?) might as well be a carnivorous freight-train. It blocks Jun Ji's Bunker Buster and paralyzes all the students in fear with its presence alone.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Huijin vs. Jangjun's goons, Hyeseong vs. Jangjun's goons, Jun Ji vs. Suchan, the Mantis vs. Suchan & Hyeseong, Jun Ji vs. the Mantis, the Earwig vs. Suchan, Suchan after going berserk vs. the Earwig, Dohwa vs. Junhyeong Round 1, Junhyeong vs. Dohwa Round 2, Dohwa after being doped vs. Junhyeong, Huijin vs. Doped Dohwa, Hwang & Jihwan vs. Hyeseong, Dohwa after using her Defense Mechanism vs. Hwang & Jihwan, Hyeseong vs. Mogin, Hyeseong & lab prisoners vs. the Stag Beetle, Huijin vs. numerous feed-trained specimens, Dohwa after upping The Gauntlet to 40% vs. the large feed-trained specimen, Jun Ji vs. Suchan (again), Gayeon Sin vs. the rest of her class, Huijin vs. Hana (for an entire week), the Mantis vs. Suchan (again), Suchan after going berserk vs. the Mantis, two Predators vs. Nest Security, and Maehwa vs. four Guardians.
• Drunk on the Dark Side: Insect humans will become hopelessly addicted to eating the flesh of other insect humans after the first bite, which is described as a pile of fine steak drenched in drugs. The power boost one gets is invigorating and there's no going back once "feed training" begins.
• Early-Bird Cameo: There's a great amount of these to be found-
  • Hyeseong and Huijin get this in Chapter 1, although since Huijin is given some focus near the end of the chapter, it really only applies to Hyeseong.
  • Hanbyeol (the bee-student) can be see standing in the crowd of insect-humans at the Nest at the end of Chapter 2.
  • Hwang Rida (the tussock moth) can be seen sitting on a tree branch in the 4th panel of Chapter 3.
  • Hana Seon (the spotted lanternfly) can be seen in the laptop registration room near the end of Chapter 3.
  • Jangjun Kim (giant water bug jerk), Hyeona and Daun (the silk moth and bolas spider), and Junhyeong (tarantula guy) can all be seen in the cuts after Suchan gets Ma's USB in Chapter 4.
  • Every student of Jun Ji's class (besides the ones already mentioned above) that hasn't been properly introduced gets an early cameo by virtue of being in the classroom background, somewhere on the field during the first lesson, and/or getting wasted in the background during the student orientation.
    • Special mention goes to Jihwan Eom (rhinoceros beetle guy)- who can actually be seen standing in the courtyard as early as Chapter 3- he's just so large that he sticks out of whatever scene he's in, making most of his early appearances double as a Funny Background Event. He can be seen being dragged on the ground by Professor Ji in Chapter 8, eating a giant plate of pancakes in Chapter 12, and getting drunk on a single bottle of beer in Chapter 18. He's properly introduced, along with the above Hwang Rida, in Chapter 32.
  • A back-shot of Bidan Lee appears on the projector in class when Jun Ji's talking about victims of Pet Shop that are at Nest in Chapter 18 (alongside shots of Jangjun Kim and Dohwa Cheon). She appears and is introduced in-person in Chapter 47.
• Elemental Baggage: Unlike Shapeshifter Baggage below, this one is generally Averted-
  • Breeder has to turn on an immense amount of sprinklers in order to get enough water to use any of his larger water-based moves, and after his Fishbowl is destroyed, it leaves everyone in the greenhouse standing shoes deep in water.
  • The Antlion Agent can only use his sandstorm move on the ground, and leaves behind massive holes where all the sand was upheaved. This is a rather large problem against opponents who can fly, as Suchan figures out.
  • Hyeonbin Ju has to smoke a ridiculous amount of cigarettes in order to use his smoke tricks- as in, the median lethal dose for adults. (That's up to 30 cigarettes in one sitting!) He actually runs out of cigarettes early into the fight on two occasions, and that was despite carrying an entire pack.
• Evil Orphanage Lady: The lady in charge of Angel Orphanage is a member of Breeder's organization, using the orphaned children that come to her orphanage as test subjects to create new and more dangerous insect humans, such as a giant millipede human.
• Forced Addiction: Insect-humans become addicted to the taste of human flesh from the moment they take a bite out of it. One such Ax-Crazy addict describes it as eating the highest grade of steak with drugs poured on top of it. Breeder trains several insect-humans to do his bidding by making them eat human flesh to get them hooked for life, and his right-hand man Pil Henson forces Suchan to eat a chunk of Gigantea's flesh, making everyone around him smell indescribably delicious. Regular doses of a sensory suppression drug, Pumpkin Carriage, are the only thing keeping Suchan sane and in control of himself.
• Foreshadowing:
  • When Jun Ji describes Pet Shop's usage of Power Killer on regular civilians to turn them into insect humans against their will, and how many victims of Pet Shop are now a part of Nest, the panels that he's talking over are on Hyeseong and Dohwa, hinting how both of them fall into that category.
  • Suchan gets sand buried for fun while Group A is at Black Island Beach, and later on gets trapped in sand in his fight against the Antlion Agent.
  • During Breeder's first appearance at the warehouse after knocking out Suchan, he says that he "never expected to find another specimen as interesting as Gayeon Sin" with no elaboration about what he meant. He's referring to Suchan's berserk state- which is extremely rare- that Gayeon Sin has as well.
  • Before the raid on Pet Shop's safe house, Junhyeong warns the group that they could die or be put through feed-training if things go wrong. Both of those things happen- Huijin dies (multiple times), while Suchan's force-fed insect human meat.
• Fugitive Arc: Season 2 acts as one for Suchan, who is now on the run from NEST.
• Funny Background Event:
  • While Suchan asks about Huijin's Complex, Hyeseong can be seen trying to quickly finish his food as Dohwa approaches the table in Chapter 12.
  • Tons during the student orientation in Chapters 18 and 19-
    • Hana Seon (spotted lanternfly) can be seen spiking the punch.
    • The longhorn beetle from registration can be seen being cheered on while chugging an entire punch bowl.
    • As mentioned above- Jihwan Eom passing out after a single bottle of beer.
    • Several students can be seen passed out in the cut back to the building while Suchan's confronting Junhyeong outside.
  • It's shown that Suchan sleeps on his stomach due to his wings at the start of Chapter 37.
  • Also in Chapter 37, Hyeonbin Ju smokes meat with quite a bit of flare (and references the Salt bae meme).
• Gender-Equal Ensemble:
  • Half of Group A's members are guys, and the other half are girls.
  • Same goes for Group D.
  • Prof. Ji's class as a whole was this, until Jangjun Kim died. It goes back to being equally divided when Junhyeong Lee joins the class.
  • The three main professors and their teaching assistants are also evenly split- Professor Ji and his assistant Hyeonbin Ju are male, Professor Yu and her teaching assistant are female, and Professor Ma is a man while his assistant Seyoung Moon is a woman.
• Giving Up the Ghost: Hana Seon's soul can be seen can be seen above her collapsed body after having to face Huijin in close combat; with said soul still having her insect features. Same goes for Changhun Yu after Dohwa throttles him during the end-of-semester party.
• Good Smoking, Evil Smoking:
  • Professor Hwanyeong Yu can be seen using either a vape-pen or a dab-pen on occasion.
  • Assistant Hyeonbin Ju smokes cigarettes, as his Complex is that of a Tobacco Hawk Moth larvae, which can ingest usually toxic nicotine and and then excrete it from its body to stun attackers. As such, he's safe from the effects of smoking, although he has to be careful as other people are not. This still falls into the Evil Smoking category, as his ability led him to become a chain-smoker, causing other students to distance themselves from him, as nobody wants to risk their health being around someone who's always smoking.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: The Breeder uses a full-body variant on Suchan, who gets tied up in his web and then rammed into Huijin.
• Hair Wings: This is a trait that certain insect humans have (like Hana Seon, who's a spotted lanternfly), with the larger cases even allowing for flight.
• Half-Human Hybrid: Insect humans are created when people use Jungle Juice to kill an insect, reducing it into fine dust that they can then inhale, merging their DNA together and causing the person to manifest insectoid appendages of some kind.
• Hawaiian-Shirted Tourist: While Group A's civilian outfits are relatively plain, albeit quite fashionable, Hyeonbin Ju's disguise goes all in on the "tourist" idea.
  Hyeonbin: We have to blend in as much as we can with normal tourists.
  Group A: [thinking] There's no way you'll blend in...
• Heinz Hybrid:
  • Professor Hwanyeong Yu is another professor in the Practical Entomology department. The bug infused in her was a firefly infected with Cordyceps militarus, specifically the caterpillar fungus. She is able to produce this fungus at will to heal nearly any wound, though she admits she can't bring the dead back to life.
  • All of the Predators can become this via their [Origin of Species] ability, which lets them use traits from another closely related insect.
  • Insect Humans who have been feed-trained but gain [Blackout Mastery] gain the ability to use traits of the insect they've eaten.
• Heroic RRoD: Overusing one's Complex without fully understanding it can lead to injury, such as when Suchan is exhausted and can't muster the strength to flap his wings anymore. These injuries can potentially be permanent, as Jun Ji gave himself a Game-Breaking Injury that results in him hurting himself whenever he uses his Complex, a complication compounded by his advanced age.
• Home Field Advantage: The Giant Water Bug bully drags Huijin into the water to capitalize on his natural advantage in the water while Huijin will struggle not to fight and not drown. Also invoked by Suchan, who drags the bully out of the water and into the open air, which is Suchan's turf.
• In-Series Nickname: Jungle Juice's real name is Power Killer, but it gained its nickname among insect humans for turning them into predators in a concrete jungle.
• Invulnerable Knuckles: Averted on numerous occasions: while insect humans generally have increased strength and durability compared to normal people, those whom have fed on other insect humans are even tougher, to the point that Suchan bloodies his hands from punching one on two occasions- against the Mantis and the Earwig. Huijin wrecks her hands on the latter as well, but can shrug it off thanks to being a cockroach. Fittingly, both of them get some form of knuckle protection later on.
• Little Bit Beastly: Most of the insect humans aren't visibly monstrous, usually taking on a few traits from the insect they're merged with such as wings or antennae but otherwise remaining completely humanoid. Others subvert this, becoming far more obviously inhuman, such as having a single arm become a tentacle shaped like an earwig's body. Others may have a giant insect-like head in addition to insect limbs.
• Master of Threads: Despite there being three different characters with spider-complexes, none of them exactly fit the bill for this trope. Instead that distinction goes to Hyeona Bang, who is a silk moth, and can quickly use her silk to create clothes, restrain opponents, and create clothes which restrain opponents.
• Mundane Made Awesome: Course selection at Nest is an all-out Battle Royale between all the students vying for the limited number of seats in each class. People will fight tooth and nail for the USB drives needed to enroll, and the professors will broadcast exactly who holds their USBs for the others to fight over.
• My Death Is Just the Beginning: The leader of the M.A.S.K. put into action a plan to drop a gas bomb full of June Bug onto a populated city with the only way to defuse it being a password he knew. He then promptly killed himself to make sure that no one else could do it.
• No Name Given: The praying mantis murderer is never given a name, only getting referred to by the name of the insect he's fused with. Same goes for the tawny earwig at the warehouse, and the Pet Shop agent at Black Island.
• Non-Indicative Name: As noted in-Universe, folks who have been transformed by using Power Killer are often called "Insect-Humans", even though people have been fused with other arthropods besides insects. Also, the names for certain abilities usually make sense for the user's complex- such as "Detonate" for a Bombardier Beetle, but others are less apt and require explanation, and sound weird without it.
  • Junhyeong's a tarantula-human, and his defense mechanism is the same as that as a tarantula and also a Black Mamba: neurotoxic fangs. Later the move itself is just called "Black Mamba", which makes it sound like Junhyeong's part-spider, part-snake. The snake imagery accompanying the attack doesn't help things.
  • More hilariously, Suchan develops a move where he charges at a target full speed, basically making himself a bullet, and so it's called "Hunting Rifle"... But since the name of every move is prefixed with "The Defense Mechanism of X:", it sounds like the webcomic is implying that part of a dragonfly's abilities is pulling out a gun.
• Not What It Looks Like:
  • When Junhyeong begins to kidnap Dohwa, he reaches for her shirt in a suggestive way that has Suchan think he's trying to rape her. Junhyeong denies this when Suchan accuses him, calling Dohwa a friend.
  • Suchan and Dohwa awaken half-dressed and in bed with each other after Junhyeong kidnaps them. Dohwa immediately slaps Suchan silly even though he's just as embarrassed as she is and didn't lay a hand on her.
  • A PG-version occurs while Suchan is out getting tteokbokki with Huijin as a form of repayment for her saving him (twice). Naturally, two other classmates see this and assume they're on a date.
  • Huijin has the misfortune of witnessing Bidan Lee perform the world's most suggestive blood test on Suchan, as his shirt is taken off, he's pressed to the floor, and she opens what appears to be a packet of condoms with her mouth. (It's actually a packet of alcoholic swabs)
• Oh, Crap!: This is the reaction of a bunch of mosquito humans when they realized they picked a fight with Suchan, a dragonfly human and therefore the mosquito's natural predator.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted- Hyeseong Cha and Hyeseong Kang share the same given name. Also plenty of characters share the same surname, due to the small amount of surnames in Korea.
• Power Nullifier: NEST has developed a special material that blocks the use of Complexes when in contact with one. It doesn't work on Blackout, however.
• Psycho Serum: June Bug, happens to be this. It's a variation of the original Cinderella that not only causes a subject to mutate into an Insect Human or increase their strength by augmenting their existing DNA if they were already one, but also gives them murderous aggression and drives them into a frenzy if they don't have specialized equipment.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The denizens of Nest come from all different backgrounds, but one thing they all have in common is how they became ostracized following their transformations into insect humans. So while they don't all get along and are fiercely competitive, it's clear that Nest is home to many of them and there's a strong sense of camaraderie between the people who do socialize with others.
• Required Secondary Powers: Insect humans in general seem to possess a degree of superhuman strength, speed, and durability, otherwise they would never be able to handle the strain of their own abilities. Even slim women like Huijin are able to toss their peers across the pavement one-handed. Naturally, predatory insects tend to possess greater raw strength than non-predatory insects.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: After Huijin is fatally injured saving him, Suchan goes on a rampage against the earwig insect human, tearing him apart piece by piece until he's knocked out cold by the mysterious Breeder.
• Sand Necktie: The Antlion-human buries Suchan into the beach from the neck down after he switches to his nymph form, fully intent on letting him drown in the tide. It's implied he also did this to Dohwa in their fight offscreen three times, each time harder than the last, based on the holes that Huijin found.
• Set Swords to "Stun":
  • Jun Ji outright tells the Praying Mantis-human that he'd pay with his life, before punching him with an explosion that leaves the man a charred body lying in scorched earth. Later dialogue says that the Mantis was locked up again with tighter security, meaning that he somehow survived that.
  • An even more ridiculous example occurs with Jun Ji's Final Defense Mechanism. After witnessing another insect human explode right in front of him due to one of the Predator's terror attacks, Jun Ji tells them that they shouldn't even think about getting out of this alive. Later in the fight he unleashes his last move, Nuclear Blast, which creates a column of fire that lights up all of Nest can be seen for miles, which hits the Old Man dead on... and it knocks him unconscious. Keep in mind that right afterwards Jun Ji tells Maehwa that if she was directly hit, she'd be ashes. And beforehand, the Old Man stated that Maehwa was tougher than he was. Yet somehow, the Old Man, who is less durable than Maehwa, is not only still in one piece, but still breathing.
• Shapeshifter Baggage: Played straight-
  • Becoming an insect-human at all can be this depending on how drastic the effect is. While developing some antenna, horns, or hair wings is plausible, the appearance of large body structures like wings, extra arms, or a tail is less so. And then there are those occasional giants in the background...
  • Junhyeong Lee sprays out more barbed hair over of the course of his fights with Suchan and Dohwa, than anyone not named "Bigfoot" should have on their body. Despite this, he isn't even left with so much as a bald spot when it's all over.
  • Dohwa's Defense Mechanism, The Gauntlet, requires impractical to impossible amounts of extra material in order to form depending on the hardness level. It also just breaks off of her arms whenever she turns it off, meaning she should be losing several kilograms of mass with each use.
  • The same goes for Hyeseong's Defense Mechanism, Scythe Kick, given how he basically generates a full sword on his leg.
• Slaying Mantis: The mantis human, appropriately. One of the Predators also counts.
• The Social Darwinist: Nest seems to run on the philosophy that only the strong will survive, resulting in fierce competition and combat over everything. Course registration turns into an all-out brawl over who gets the USB drives necessary to enroll in a course, with failure to secure one resulting in taking an immediate year-long leave of absence. Breeder's philosophy is even further into this trope, as he desires to create a bug-eat-bug world of nothing but insect humans devouring each other for survival.
• Somewhere, an Entomologist Is Crying: Aside from the big general ones already mentioned like how a special bug spray makes insect-human hybrids, and human sized application of bug abilities, Jungle Juice tends to avert this while discussing actual arthropod abilities. With that said:
  • Downplayed case with Breeder's Complex; actual Diving Bell Spiders use their webs to make a bubble of air they keep while hunting in the water, while Breeder uses his web to make a bubble of water around his head while on land. Breeder himself notes that it's a bit different than the actual spiders. Also counts as Artistic License – Arachnids.
  • Downplayed case with Suchan's vision; while his support gear gives the standard kaleidoscopic insect sight (which is wrong), his actual compound sight looks more like a composite image (with Hanbyeol appearing in different places), albeit with human level visual resolution.
  • Averted with the mosquito-humans Suchan fights at the Orphanage Lab; they all attempt to drink his blood, and are correctly all women, as only female mosquitos drink blood.
  • Straight example with Hyeona Bang; while some moths do eat clothing, Silk Moths do not. Additionally, no moth can integrate the fabric they eat into their silk, although that part's obviously Rule of Cool at work.
  • Hwang Rida states that nothing has brawn like a rhinoceros beetle, but in terms of relative size, they actually take the silver medal for strongest insect, with dung beetles being stronger.
  • It's worth noting that the degree of how closely arthropod biology translates to insect-human biology varies a bit between individuals, which makes determining instances of Artistic License difficult. For example, Hyeseong Kang has the full head of an ant, and properly has five insect eyes- two big ones and three minor ones- but others who are less insectoid only have two eyes like a human being.
• Speed Blitz: Once Suchan puts on his glasses or some goggles, he's able to fully utilize his speed to constantly hit his opponent faster than they can react, darting out of sight before they even finish processing the first hit.
• Strong Ants: Zigzagged; it depends on the person. While Changhun Yu has the complex of a fire-ant, this only gave him the ability to emit formic acid. On the other hand, Hyeseong Kang does have the relative strength of an ant, although it doesn't specify what kind of ant he is. Then there's the Old Man, who's an exploding ant colony, but like Jun Ji in Tough Beetles below, his strength is his firepower rather than his physical abilities.
• Superpower Lottery: There are several insects referred to as the "apex predators" of their species, boasting incredible power relative to other insects. Dohwa is one of these insect humans, having been merged with an emperor scorpion. This grants her enough strength and durability to stop a car dead in its tracks as well as keep up with it to an extent by cutting through the forest. She becomes even stronger while under the effects of Gayeon Sin's mind control, developing armor plating and claws that even Junhyeong fails to penetrate.
• Sweet and Sour Grapes: In saving the honeybee student, Suchan loses his chance to enroll in Professor Ma's class and is nearly expelled as a result. But his compassion moves Professor Jun Ji enough to give Suchan the last USB drive to his class, giving Suchan a chance to enroll after all as a member of his practical combat class.
• They Would Cut You Up: One of the reasons Suchan is so terrified of letting anyone see his wings at the start of the story is his fear of being kidnapped by the government and experimented on.
• This Is Reality: When discussing the plausibility of human-sized bugs in the first chapter, a background character says "This is real life, not a Webcomic."
• Tough Beetles: There's been a handful of beetle-humans to be seen, much to the expense of any nearby shrubbery.
  • One of the first students to go after Suchan for Professor Ma's USB is a Longhorn Beetle, whose punch brings down a tree. He can also be seen earlier in class-registration fighting five other students at once, and later during student orientation drinking an entire punch-bowl.
  • Jihwan Eom is a student in Jun Ji's class, and is a Rhinoceros Beetle. In the first round of the Group Tournament he beats Hyeseong offscreen, brings down a tree charging at Dohwa (she dodged it), and then manages to briefly overpower her in a clash before her Defense Mechanism Superpower activates.
  • Later Hyeseong encounters a Stag Beetle having gone through feed training at Black Island, who shrugs off all of his initial attacks with barely a scratch. He also cuts down a tree while charging at Hyeseong. (Sensing a pattern here?)
  • Professor Ji himself is a Bombardier Beetle, as mentioned above, though his strength lies more in his firepower than physical abilities. Even without using his Complex though, he's still a very buff old man who can swing a chainsaw around with just one hand. Also, the first two times he demonstrates his Complex, he ends up leaving a handful of trees scorched and/or set on fire.
  • One exception is sophomore Bidan Lee, who's a specific kind of Jewel Beetle that's a natural monument in Korea. She's not in Professor Ji's combat class, but rather Professor Yu's "Study of Genetically Modified Humans" course, and her expertise is in the labs.
  • Nest's Beetle Club is almost entirely composed of Tough Beetles from what's shown, being introduced with several members- guys and girls alike- flexing their muscles. The two exception being the mascot Jihwan Eom mentioned above, and his five year old younger brother.
• Two-Teacher School: There have only been three professors shown at Nest- Dohyeon Ma, Jun Ji, and Hwanyeong Yu. There's four if Teaching Assistant Hyeonbin Ju is included.
  • Subverted, as several other members of faculty are shown in Chapter 49. While Professors Ma, Ji, and Yu are the teachers of the three main courses, there are several other side courses with their own dedicated instructors. Additionally, a liberal arts course taught by an unseen "Professor Cho" was actually mentioned way back in Chapter 3.
• V-Sign: Suchan gives one of these while Dohwa takes a group-selfie at the beach. Either that or he was trying to give Hyeseong bunny ears.

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