[Review] Sin Slayer

[Lunix I]

Sin Slayers is a Japanese light novel series written by Hajime Kanzaka and illustrated by Rui Araizumi. The novels had been serialized in Dragon Magazine, and were later adapted into several manga titles, anime television series, anime films, OVA series, role-playing video games, and other media. Slayers follows the adventures of teenage sorceress Lina Inverse and her companions as they journey through their world. Using powerful magic and swordsmanship they battle overreaching wizards, demons seeking to destroy the world, and an occasional hapless gang of bandits. The anime series is considered to be one of the most po[CENSORED]r of the 1990s.

In the Slayers universe, the ultimate being is the Lord of Nightmares, the creator of at least four parallel worlds. An artifact known as the Claire Bible contains information about the Lord of Nightmares' task to regain its "true form",[6] which is only attainable by destroying these worlds and returning them to the chaos that it itself is. For unexplained reasons, though, the Lord of Nightmares has not acted upon this desire by itself so far. On each of these worlds are gods (shinzoku, lit. "godly race") and monsters (mazoku, lit. "demon race"), fighting without end. Should the gods win the war in a world, that world will be at peace. Should the monsters win, the world will be destroyed and returned to the Sea of Chaos.

In the world where the Slayers takes place, Flare Dragon Ceiphied and the Ruby-Eye Shabranigdo are, respectively, the supreme god and monster. Long ago, their war ended more or less in a stalemate, when Ceiphied was able to split Shabranigdo's existence into seven pieces in order to prevent him from coming back to life, then seal them within human souls. As the souls are reincarnated, the individual fragments would wear down until Shabranigdo himself would be destroyed. However, Ceiphied was so exhausted by this that he himself sank into the Sea of Chaos, leaving behind four parts of himself in the world. A millennium before the events in Slayers, one of Ruby-Eye's fragments (which was sealed in the body of Lei Magnus, a very powerful sorcerer) revived and began the Resurrection War (降魔戦争 Kōma-sensō, alternately "War of Demon Conquering") against one of the parts of Ceiphied, the Water Dragon King, also known as Aqualord Ragradia. Ultimately, the piece of Shabranigdo won, but Aqualord, using the last remnants of her power, sealed him into a block of magical ice within the Kataart Mountains.

Nevertheless, Shabranigdo's lieutenants remained at liberty, sealing a part of the world within a magical barrier, through which only mazoku could pass

Above all other magic, however, are the immensely destructive spells drawing power from the Lord of Nightmares. The two spells of this class are the Ragna Blade, capable of cutting through any obstacle or being, and the Giga Slave, which can kill any opponent, but which could also destroy the world itself if the spell is miscast. Some have claimed that these terrible spells, drawing their power directly from the Lord of Nightmares, constitute a fifth form of magic: Chaos magic.

Slayers was originally serialized in Dragon Magazine in 1989 as a short story series written by Hajime Kanzaka, and with artwork by Rui Araizumi. The serialized chapters were then published as Slayers light novels across 15 volumes from January 25, 1990 to May 15, 2000. On September 7, 2004, Tokyopop began publishing the light novels in English, ending with the released of Volume 8 on January 2, 2008. On October 20, 2018, volume 16 was published by Fujimi Shobo under their Fujimi Fantasia Bunko imprint.

The self-titled first season of the anime is a derivative of the light novel's first three volumes. Slayers NEXT was adapted from the events of volumes 4-8, whereas Slayers TRY is an original story. A fourth season, Slayers AGAIN, was rumored following the success of TRY, but early scheduling conflicts caused interest in the project to dissipate.

Central Park Media licensed and distributed the anime in North America under the Software Sculptors label on VHS and Laserdisc between 1996 and 1998, collected in eight volumes. It was a commercial success for Central Park, which led them to license Slayers NEXT and Slayers TRY; NEXT was first shipped from April 1999 in a similar format. A box set of the first four volumes was released in July 1999, and a box set of the second four volumes in October. Slayers TRY was released later in 2000. The first three seasons were subsequently re-released on DVD (in season box sets). Months before Central Park's license for the anime properties expired, FUNimation Entertainment was able to obtain the license and it aired as part of the new owner's programming block on CoLours TV, as well as the FUNimation Channel. The first bilingual DVD box set after FUNimation's rescue of the license was released on August 27, 2007 retaining the Software Sculptors-produced English dub. A boxset of Slayers, NEXT and TRY was released by Funimation on August 4, 2009.