#Medaka Box

[freusan]

It's NISIOISIN's 23rd anniversary!

On Feb 5th, 2002, NISIOISIN debuted with Zaregoto: Kubikiri Cycle, and won the 23rd Mephisto Award. He was 20 at the time

You might know him for the Monogatari Series, but he's written over 100 works that you should check out too

I truly believe that there's something for everyone in Nisio's works. He writes characters in a way that shows he has a deep emotional understanding of what it means to be living through hardships, and he never does so cheaply So, to celebrate, go check out one of his works, or just go read in general! I know he'd be proud I wrote a longer thread on this on Bsky if anyone's interested

[frankencanon]

Happy Birthday to Ogata Megumi!

Ogata Megumi is known for voicing popular characters such as...

Jujutsu Kaisen's Okkotsu Yūta, Yū Yū Hakusho's Kurama, Neon Genesis Evangelion's Ikari Shinji, Danganronpa's Komaeda Nagito and Naegi Makoto, Jibaku Shōnen Hanako-kun's Hanako, Yu-Gi-Oh's Mutō Yūgi, Assassination Classroom's Horibe Itona, Sailor Moon's Tenō Haruka, Bleach's Harribel Tier, Angel Beats' Naoi Ayato, Medaka Box's Kumagawa Misogi, Cardcaptor Sakura's Tsukishiro Yukito, and Nichijō's Narrator.

[tokiro07]

To You, From Me: A Bouquet Toss to the Future May you live a life as full as the Moon

Happy UUniversary, everyone!!!

To celebrate, I've broken my long-standing art hiatus and did a collaboration with my lovely wife, @aly-san! I did the original sketch (which you can find under the cut), which she used as a base to make her fully realized rendition!

I've said repeatedly in my reviews that Medaka Box is my all-time favorite manga, and I've also gone back and forth on whether UU had supplanted it for that title. I'll likely continue to waffle on that for the rest of my life, but I really don't want to quibble about which one is better. They're both my favorites for different reasons, but they also both make me feel the exact same joy for manga as a medium

After Medaka Box ended, I honestly thought I'd never love another manga the same way, but in less than a decade I managed to find something that was more than a match for it. Back then I didn't know what the future held, and I couldn't envision anything topping the past, but now I know better

Now I know that it really is just a matter of time until another series so excites me, inspires me, defines me! I'm sad to see another of my favorites leave, of course, but I'm not going to wallow this time, because I know I'll make it to the next one

Until then, I'm going to enjoy what life has to offer

[randomwar]

[kaibutsushidousha]

Whether it is the mysteries, ideas or characters, how did Nisio Isin inspire Danganronpa?

Isin's debut novel Kubikiri Cycle (volume 1 of the Zaregoto series) is a murder mystery involving an arguably untalented POV character and the best people in their respective fields. Much like Junko, Kubikiri Cycle's culprit fakes her death by disguising a victim as herself.

The novel and all of its sequels also feature a character artificially made to have every talent. Another element present in Kubikiri Cycle and established a lot more clearly in the rest of the Zaregoto series is that luck is a real phenomenon that can be manipulated by people who understand how it works.

Medaka Box is set in a school secretly dedicated to studying talent in order to create the ultimate human being, has the same manipulable luck thing as Zaregoto, and something like V3's relationship with the fourth wall. I already talked about Medaka Box's part here.

[weaselandfriends]

Regarding Medka Box, what're the best scenes in your opinion? Best characters?

Okay so this innocuous ask is actually activating a hidden landmine because to explain my relationship with Medaka Box I would need to go into the battleboarding fanfic competition I was a part of, which is really something I should save for if I ever talk about the making of Chicago, as that story is very much bound up in that period of my life (Clownmuffle was designed to be an anti-battleboarding character). I only watched Medaka Box because I was asked to write Medaka Kurokami for this fanfic competition and otherwise I probably would have never heard of it.

Keeping the focus solely on Medaka Box, I actually did not like it. It is sitting at a 4 out of 10 on MAL, which is a score I usually dole out to stuff I would primarily describe as "boring." Nisio Isin is perhaps the most boring writer in the animangasphere; I also tried to get into Monogatari (multiple times!) and got bounced by the superhuman boredom it is capable of engendering. Medaka Box is billed as a postmodern subversive approach to shounen battle manga but mostly it is just a shounen battle manga. It apparently gets more metafictional and crazy in the manga (to the point that it pings on high-end battleboarding radars, which is a very bad radar to be on unless you're Umineko, though even there the battleboarders have wholesale invented a nonexistent Umineko character called "The Creator" that they hail as the most powerful character in anime) but the anime really had nothing going on that I considered particularly interesting or of note.

[krispyfuntastemaker]

weekly shonen jump

[eeriecode-fgo]

FGO FanServant - Misogi Kumagawa, the Lying Demon

(artwork by ぱるにわ, originally found here)

Ascension Stages

First Stage: Kumagawa looks as he did during his tenure as Student Council President at Hakobune Middle School. He wears the same uniform he commonly wears throughout the manga, but his hair are significantly shorter.

Second Stage: Kumagawa's standard look from the manga, with his middle school uniform and longer hair.

Third Stage: Kumagawa switches to the formal uniform he wore for barely one chapter as Vice-President of the Hakoniwa Academy Student Council.

Parameters

Class: Pretender

Alternate Classes: Avenger, Assassin

Source: Medaka Box

Region: Japan

Voice Actress: Megumi Ogata

Rarity: 0-star (functionally an SSR)

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

Attribute: Human

Deck: Quick/Arts (Buster: 1 hit; Quick: 3 hits; Arts: 2 hits; Extra: 4 hits)

Traits: Humanoid, Male, Weak to Enuma Elish, Threat to Humanity, Underdog

Passive Skills

Avenger - Rank A

FGO Effect

Increase own NP Gain when taking attacks by 20%

Decrease all other allies' debuff resistance by 10% (including sub-members) (Demerit)

Oblivion Correction - Rank C

FGO Effect

Increase own critical damage by 6%

Presence Concealment - Rank B

FGO Effect

Increase own critical star generation rate by 8%

Hundred Gauntlets - Rank E

A skill that reverses causality. While the original skill has long since been sublimated into All Fiction, remnants on this Minus manifest as a Passive Skill, allowing Kumagawa to subtly manipulate fate to bring misfortune to his enemies: of course, Kumagawa being Kumagawa, this misfortune ends up hindering him as well.

FGO Effect

Increase own Target Focus by 30%

Apply an effect that ignores Debuff Immunity on enemies when inflicting debuffs to self (Debuff Resistance and Success Rate still apply)

Append Skills

Extra Attack Boost

Increase own Extra Attack Card effectiveness (30~50%)

Load Magical Energy

Begin battle with NP gauge charged (10~20%)

NP Gain Boost

Increase own NP Gain (15~25%)

Bond Skill

Decrease Debuff Resistance for all enemies while on field by 20%.

Active Skills

Charisma of the Underdog - Rank (C)

A variant of Charisma focused on the destruction of privileged enemies. Those who are powerless receive a boost that allows them to triumph against enemies stronger than them, with the power increasing the more privileged the enemy is.

FGO Effect

Cooldown: 7~5 turns

Increase ATK for all allies for 3 turns (13~25%)

Apply [High Rarity] Special Damage to all [Underdog] allies for 3 turns (50~100%)

[Innocent Minus] - Rank -A

A skill representing Kumagawa's identity: a tendency to protect those he cares about at great risk for himself, a stubborness that allows him to fight through grievous wounds for his goals, and the repulsive aura of a Minus that wears down on whoever dares to interact with him.

FGO Effect

Cooldown: 6~4 turns

Increase own Target Focus by 500% for 3 turns.

Increase own DEF depending on current HP (20% at max HP, 80% at low HP. Does not scale with Level)

Apply [Minus Aura] buff to self with the following effects (5 times, 3 turns)

-- When attacked, has a 60% chance to apply Curse to the attacker (500~1000)

-- When attacked, has a 60% chance to remove 1 latest buff from the attacker

-- When attacked, has a 60% chance to decrease the attacker's DEF for 3 turns (10~20%)

All Fiction - Rank E(X)

[Great Lying Demon] Rank: E (EX) Type: Anti-Event Range: 1 (unlimited) Max Targets: 1 (unlimited)

A skill developed by Kumagawa through alteration of the skill that reverses causality "Hundred Gauntlets", this Minus allows him to make anything he wishes "nothing": from erasing wounds and scars, to erasing traits such as senses and auras, to even reversing one's own death, this ability has seemingly no limitations, to the point it would qualify as an EX-ranked Noble Phantasm in its own right.

Of course, given this ability could easily erase the world itself and any semblance of game balance if used carelessly, the version Kumagawa can access as a Servant is severely restricted.

FGO Effect

Cooldown: 6~4 turns

Apply Guts to self (1 time, 4 turns) (30~50% HP)

Noble Phantasm

Book Maker - Rank B

[Refusing the Creation of Books] Rank: B Type: Anti-Unit Range: 10 Max Targets: 1

Kumagawa's original skill, the ability to turn someone into a Minus. By stabbing the opponent with a specialized screw, the target's parameters are synchronized with Kumagawa's, reducing them to his level physically and mentally and preventing them from using their abilities. The effects of this skill cannot be negated or cancelled, making this an extremely effective counter to most enemies: depending on the target's personality, however, it is possible to resist the mental effects to some extent.

FGO Effect

Arts Noble Phantasm, 0 hits

Apply Buff Success Rate Up to self for 1 turn (10~20%, scales with Overcharge)

Has a chance to apply an unremovable [Book Maker] debuff to 1 enemy for 7 turns with the following effects (80~100% success rate, scales with NP Level. The effects listed below are not cumulative)

-- 1+: Decrease ATK and DEF by 30%

-- 2+: Decrease Critical Rate by 100%

-- 3+: Decrease Charge by 1 every 3 turns

-- 4+: Apply Skill Seal and NP Seal to self

-- 5+: Decrease damage dealt by 5000

-- 6+: Disable all active buffs on self (permanent buffs are unaffected)

Writer Notes

This fan-Servant was inspired by Xorn's works on SpaceBattles. After reading his Worm/Medaka Box crossover Hundred Gauntlets and his Re:Zero/FGO crossover Save scumming? It's on my character sheet (highly recommended, they're both excellent works), I was inspired to try and work out an implementation of Kumagawa in FGO.

For his class, I chose to make him a Pretender because of one line in the Sixth Lostbelt, where the involved Pretender's Saint Graph is described as "having no verifiable information": in Kumagawa's case, his fake personality is enough to cause the same effect and force him into the Pretender class. Considering his personality has caused people to faint with a single sentence in the manga, I figured "his personality can distort his Saint Graph" to be perfectly reasonable. Were that not the case, I'd probably put him as an Avenger, given how much of his motivation is connected to hatred. Assassin is also a possibility, since he canonically used All Fiction to erase his ability to be sensed (which is why this version has Presence Concealment as a skill).

As usual, I'm not doing the calculations for a precise stat line: if I were to add some stats, though, his HP and ATK would likely be close to Angra Mainyu's, to reflect Kumagawa's weakness. I'd make them identical as a reference, but Angra is basically the Reverse Blue-Eyes White Dragon of Fate, lore-wise we aren't allowed to have an Heroic Spirit weaker than him, so let's just say Kumagawa is barely above him.

Originally, I wasn't planning to add Hundred Gauntlets as a separate skill: his Noble Phantasm would still have been able to bypass immunities, but only that. I eventually decided to throw him a bone and made it a full-blown passive, just to make him a little stronger.

As for why the NP could bypass immunities, that's mostly for lore reasons. In the manga, Kumagawa's Book Maker was virtually unstoppable, able to affect both Ajimu and Medaka and unable to be erased by the Wrong Conversion Style. To reflect that, I made it so that the debuff inflicted by the NP is unremovable and bypasses immunities, with the only ways to stop it being debuff resistance (both for balance, and as a reference to how Medaka managed to still fight under the Minus's influence). Speaking of lore reasons, it's implied multiple times in the manga (both by Ajimu requiring multiple screws and the fight with Shiranui) that the number of screws influences the strength of the Minus: to reflect on that, the effect of the NP varies depending on the number of stacks, with the values being cumulative and independent from NP Level to avoid issues with double Kumagawas at different NP Levels.

As for All Fiction, obviously it couldn't be left at full power like it was in the manga, it would have been too broken (sidenote, that's the reason why I will not make fan-Servant versions of Ajimu or Medaka. Like, how do you turn someone as overpowered as them into a Servant without nerfing them to hell and back!?). I'm going with the lore reason that the skill is severely restricted by the Counter Force to avoid massive damage, and so it's closer in power to its degraded version from before the Iihiko arc.

[taruchiz]

LOSER!

[manekinekocake]

[freusan]

NISIOISIN & Akira Akatsuki's Medaka Box is getting a pop-up shop in May!!!!! Open from May 23rd to June 8th at Volks Akihabara Hobby Heaven. A new Kumagawa & Medaka were illustrated by Akira Akatsuki for it!

It's nice to see the series getting some love. Especially in May because its 16th anniversary is on May 11th! Now if only we could get a season 3 that'd be amazing

[benthic-girl]

Oh I've reached The Fucking Page

[tokiro07]

Still thinking about Medaka Box and how the Skills are a direct reflection of the user's Mentality

Specifically, how Kumagawa's Bookmaker is a perfect inversion of Medaka's The End in both theory and application

Medaka has The End because she's trying to be the best person that she can be, but barely understands what it means to be human. She observes how other people behave and she mimics them perfectly, so perfectly that she removes the flaws in their behavior and reaches the Uncanny Valley

Everything good that Medaka sees in other people, she tries to bring out from within herself, because she thinks she's a monster and wants to be one of the humans she loves so much

Furthermore, because Medaka is always looking at the best qualities in others to emulate, she's also keenly aware of the ways that others can improve themselves - she's not simply trying to be the best human, she's trying to help others be the best they can be

On the other hand, Kumagawa has Bookmaker because he's trying to make other people be as bad as him. He observes himself, sees his own flaws, and projects them onto other people

Everything bad that Kumagawa sees in himself, he tries to bring out from within others, because he thinks he's subhuman and wants to drag down all of the humans he hates so much

Because Kumagawa is always looking at the worst parts of himself, he's keenly aware of the ways that others are better than him - he's not simply trying to make others worse, he's trying to make himself into the worst person he can be

But just like The End polishes out the flaws, potentially to the point of detriment such as when Medaka's music comes out robotic and soulless, Bookmaker fails to account for Kumagawa's merits, such as his unshakeable determination, and allows others to embody that same fortitude

[therealmofamorus]

Muse Suggestion: Medaka Kurokami from Medaka Box.

You mean this chick?

[kaibutsushidousha]

Were we supposed to see Medaka as inhuman?

You're meant to agree with Zenkichi, not with the villains. There's even a whole arc where Zenkichi antagonizes Medaka because he takes issue with the way she passively allows others to see her as inhuman, and in this arc, it's Zenkichi who is framed as the hero despite Medaka being the title character.

[randomwar]

dibujo de hoy