Hot New Shonen Jump Kagurabachi's Sales Figures Prove It's Already the Next Mega-Hit

Summary Kagurabachi is rapidly gaining popularity internationally and in Japan, exceeding sales milestones quickly.

The manga's captivating story, eye-catching character design, and thrilling action sequences generate high interest.

Fans can anticipate an imminent anime adaptation for Kagurabachi, showcasing its potential for future success.

Kagurabachi is shaping up to be Shonen Jump's future as the magazine's biggest series right as My Hero Academia and Jujutsu Kaisen are nearing their grand finales. With approximately 30 chapters released so far, the series has managed to gain a strong fan base both in Japan and overseas, which is very impressive given the short period it has been out.

Published in September 2023 in the Weekly Shonen Jump, Kagurabachi released alongside Mamayuyu and Two On Ice, as part of the NEXTWAVE initiative. Unfortunately, the other two manga were canceled due to a lack of popularity, but Kagurabachi became something of a golden egg for the popular shonen magazine.

Although the manga had a shaky start due to unreal expectations from fans, it seems that the numbers back up the case that Kagurabachi has the potential to become the next big thing for Shonen Jump.

Related 15 Shonen Jump Manga You Need To Be Reading in 2024 It can be difficult to decide which manga from Shonen Jump's large catalog are worth investing time into, but these are the ten best to read in 2024.

Kagurabachi Was Popular Even Before Chapter 1 Dropped

Meme culture catapulted the series into unprecedented virality

As volume #2 of Kagurabachi is about to be released, exciting news was shared that the series currently has 200K copies in circulation, including its digital release. This is extremely impressive and shows that it is very popular in Japan as well. For reference, two other smash-hit SJ manga – Chainsaw Man which sold 89K copies with its first two volumes, and Jujutsu Kaisen, which reached 300K with the first 2 volumes. It also took Blue Lock, which was the best-selling manga of 2023, five print volumes to reach 200K. Kagurabachi's massive achievement is very impressive, and sales will only continue going up.

This feat happened even before the manga's English pr were released to international audiences. outside of Japan that Viz Media announced that Kagurabachi would receive an English publication in Fall 2024, which is one of the fastest manga to do so, with only Kohei Horikoshi's Barrage and Masashi Kishimoto's Samurai 8: The Tale of Hachimaru having faster releases. Fans should expect the sales to go up even higher once the English print version is released.

Related Almost Unheard Of - Breakout Manga Proves It's Shonen Jump's Next Mega Hit With English Release Kagurabachi is one of the biggest Shonen Jump manga of recent years, and its unprecedented physical release schedule goes right along with that.

This dark sorcery manga went viral even before the first chapter was published, and the hype for the series was so extraordinary that even officials at Shonen Jump were surprised. This was mainly due to the eye-catching character design of the main character, Chihiro. His dark attire, scarlet eyes, awesome sword and gloomy appearance made people very interested, and thus began the hype-train that spawned countless memes and put Kagurabachi on a high pedestal.

The story is also very interesting, and the current events give room for the series to go on for a very long time. Chihiro's father is a master blacksmith who forged powerful swords that ended a long war. However, he finds his father murdered and the swords stolen, igniting his quest for revenge and swearing he will avenge his father and reclaim the swords. Years later, he's grown into a powerful swordsman and starts looking for the people responsible, thrusting himself into the midst of a powerful and terrifying sorcerer's organization.

The manga went berserk on Manga Plus, Shueisha's official manga reading website, and it climbed up the ranks very fast all the way to the top 3. It surpassed big series like My Hero Academia, Kaiju No. 8 and Oshi No Ko. It was obvious that it was very popular internationally, and there was hope that Kagurabachi would survive Shonen Jump's bad practice of canceling manga prematurely.

However, there were signs pointing to Kagurabachi's imminent demise, as its popularity in Japan wasn't enough to warrant its continuation. This all changed when volume 1 was released, and the series sold out very fast, and a reprint was promptly announced. It is currently on its second reprint, and with volume 2 releasing soon, Kagurabachi has survived the culling and will have a long and fruitful serialization in the prestigious magazine.

Kagurabachi Has All The Makings Of A Hit Battle Shonen

Exciting Fights And Awesome Story Make It A Must-Read

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It seems that with every passing chapter, Kagurabachi just keeps getting better. The art was already incredible since the beginning, but Takeru Hokazo is always leveling up and treating fans to some epic display of pen mastery. The backgrounds are beautiful, the character designs are impeccable, and the series has managed to add entertaining humor to a pretty gruesome storyline, which makes it all the more enjoyable.

However, Kagurabachi has one thing that it does better than most manga: the action sequences are some of the best. The creator of My Hero Academia praised the series for the amazing fight choreography, and the manga goes viral every week for the electrifying fights. From the absurd perspectives, cool poses and the grey tones Takeru uses in fight scenes, such mastery of action is very rare, especially for someone who has been drawing for a few years.

Based on the Series' Success, an Anime Adaptation Could Be Right Around the Corner

Fans of the hit series want to see it animated as soon as possible

With success as a manga proven, Kagurabachi's anime adaptation will most likely happen sooner or later. Kagurabachi ranked seventh in AnimeJapan's Most Wanted Anime Adaptation poll, which shows that the demand is there. Although it is early, and there isn't much source material to decide on the project, Shonen Jump is definitely watching out for the series' progress. Frieren: Beyond Journey's End's anime adaptation was planned at the beginning stages of the manga, so it isn't out of the question that the same could happen for Kagurabachi, especially since it is a proven product.

Thankfully, the international popularity is extremely high, so I’d like to keep up the popularity in Japan as well. Eventually, our goal is to make it into an anime! -Takuro Imamura, Editor of Kagurabachi.

The dynamic fight scenes and interesting plot make a great case for Kagurabachi's anime. Series like Jujutsu Kaisen and Demon Slayer are similar in this regard, and their anime adaptations catapulted the manga sales of both to unimaginable heights, so one can only wonder how good Kagurabachi will look in video form and how much potential it has.

Source: X account of WSJ_Manga, X account of Jo_suke, Manga Plus editor interview.

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