The Fall 2023 Manga Guide

Lullaby of the Dawn

What's It About? 

Night after night, Elva steps forth into the black sea, sword in hand, to drive back the creatures that surge from the waves. Elva is one of the 'kannagi,' warrior priests chosen by the divine to protect the island. With his snow-white hair, unaging youth, and black-stained limbs — proof of the corruption that gradually takes the life of every kannagi — the local people fear and shun him... at least until his path crosses with that of a boy named Alto. Enraptured by Elva's strength and lonely soul, Alto swears to serve him and free him from his cursed fate.

After eight long years, Alto has grown into a capable and fearless young man, unwavering in his devotion to his kannagi. Elva had long ago resigned himself to an early death — but somehow, Alto's presence seems to be gradually healing him of the black sea's corruption...

Lullaby of the Dawn has a story and art by Ichika Yuno. The English translation is by Riley Keenan, with proofreading by Katie Kimura and a quality check by Shingo Nemoto. Lettering and touch-up by Vibrraant Publishing Studio, Published by TokyoPop's LoveLove imprint (November 14, 2023).

Is It Worth Reading?

Christopher Farris

Rating:

Lullaby of the Dawn was an interesting exercise, for me anyway, in integrating elements of a story that wouldn't usually compel me as much as they did here. I'm not normally one for any focus on broad fantasy world-building. But then here comes a book where the boys are cute, and their burgeoning romance is sweet. Ichika Yuno so soundly dragoons the way this world works and unravels its mysteries into the relationship of Elva and Alto. I'm naturally compelled by one simply by following the other. It works because there's a clever sense of how the story leads into this; Elva's isolated status as the Kannagi initially provides purpose to Alto curiously latching onto him. And even if you can guess that the tweens in the opening chapter will be aged up into hot BL dudes for the rest of the book, that time skip still effectively sets up the mechanics and stakes of the relationship.

It gives us just enough time to accept the station of the Kannagi and the Black Sea as normalized until Alto starts poking at it and provoking questions of possible corruption. It's the sort of thing that comes with any unfair system you've become accustomed to. It is another factor that helps the worldbuilding of Lullaby of the Dawn feel meaningful apart from fantasy filled out entirely for its own sake. Alto realizes that he hasn't learned as much about Elva, and thus the world he lives in, as he would have hoped by now, and that drives both him and us to try and acquire more knowledge because it's in service of that compelling central relationship. Similarly, the apparent life-extending mechanics of his connection with Alto let Elva experience some satisfyingly angsty self-inquiry into how genuine or self-serving his love for that adorable golden retriever of a guy might be. You know I love some interrogation of transactional relationships.

The solid ideas and narrative concepts help skip over some of the thinner points of this story. I know the "forbidden" aspect is a big selling point for many BL fans. However, the attempt to tease out any worrying over non-normalized homosexuality between the boys barely feels token at best here. Some of the ways a couple of plot points fall into our characters' laps also come off a bit conveniently clunky, which is an arguable inevitability of just how integral the world-building is to the uncovering of everything going on here. And that's not even getting into Tokyopop's typesetting for this volume, which legit looks just a half-step above a scanlation in some places. So it's imperfect, but like Alto is to Elva in the story, it's still endearing, and its approach to the plot compels me to want to see where it's going.