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Kodansha Comics Adds UQ Holder, Seven Deadly Sins Manga
posted on by Crystalyn Hodgkins
North American manga publisher Kodansha Comics announced at its New York Comic Con panel on Friday that it will release Ken Akamatsu's (Love Hina, Negima!) UQ Holder! manga and Nakaba Suzuki's The Seven Deadly Sins (Nanatsu no Taizai) manga.
Akamatsu launched UQ Holder! in Kodansha's Weekly Shōnen Magazine in Japan on August 28. The manga is set in the world of Negima!, and takes place years after the manga. UQ Holder! centers on a boy named Touta who dreams of leaving his small town and moving to the city. However, he must first defeat his teacher, the immortal Evangeline.
Akamatsu had posted on his Twitter account last October that he was in talks with Weekly Shōnen Magazine about serializing a new manga in the magazine. The author ended Negima! Magister Negi Magi in the same magazine last year, but wrote in the last compiled volume that a continuation was a possibility. In an interview with the Nikkei paper, Akamatsu also revealed that he is thinking about retiring when his next manga after Negima! ends.
Kodansha Comics will release the first volume of UQ Holder! in North America in spring 2014.
Tokyopop published Love Hina in North America, and Del Rey and Kodansha Comics have published Negima. Both manga and Akamatsu's Itsudatte My Santa manga inspired various anime projects, and Negima also inspired a live-action television series. The Negima manga has 19 million copies in circulation.
Sakaba launched The Seven Deadly Sins in Kodansha's Shonen Magazine in 2012. Kodansha describes the manga as follows:
The king is dead at the hands of the traitorous Holy Knights! It's up to the Princess Elizabeth to unite seven legendary warriors – the Deadly Sins – to save the kingdom and secure her birthright, starting with Meliodas, the Sin of Wrath!
The manga ranked at #7 on Comic Natalie's first manga rankings last month. Kodansha shipped the fourth compiled volume in Japan in August.
Kodansha Comics will debut the manga in North America in spring 2014.
