UQ Holder Manga Chapter 11 Review (UQ Holder defined.)

ユーキューホルダー!/UQ Holder Chapter 11 Review

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis: 

Kuroumaru and Touta launch an attack on the monster seals. Kuroumaru’s Kenfuka Bakuenheki creates a massive wall of flame, which ends up killing one of the monster seals that ate Touta’s arm. They continue slaughtering the monsters and Jinbee encourages them, telling them that they have to kill all of the monster seals, giant spiders, and bats in order to escape.

Up at the UQ Holder HQ, Karin thinks about how Touta was living with Yukihime and she’s not pleased. Three girls (two beast girls and a human-looking girl) are playing with a ball, which gets away from them and rolls to Karin. They nervously approach her to get the ball back, but she absentmindedly destroys it. The trio flee crying to AMEYA Ikkuu, who scolds Karin for making the kids cry. He rapidly repairs their destroyed ball, then tells Karin that she should smile more. Karin says she has no such orders from Yukihime.

The sealed well leading to the underground labyrinth shows signs of activity, causing great alarm. Karin tells Ikkuu to inform Yukihime while she handles things here, should the magical monsters come forth. Touta and Kuroumaru emerge as Karin whacks Touta hard with her mallet. She’s surprised to discover her mistake. Touta recovers and goes off on Karin, who takes his words as a challenge.

The two charge each other as Kuroumaru tells Touta he shouldn’t fight girls. Touta says that in war, sex doesn’t matter, which is what Yukihime taught him. Touta increases the weight of Gravity Sword, surprising Karin a bit, though she acts like it is nothing. Gengorou breaks up the fight, citing that fighting between UQ Holder members is not allowed. Touta is amazed that Gengorou is holding him up in spite of the massive weight he’s now placed on Gravity Blade.

The commotion causes a lot of people to emerge from the buildings, but when they see Kuroumaru and Touta, they are surprised since only a month and a half had passed since they were dumped underground. Even Ikkuu took four months to escape. Jinbee emerges from the well and vouches for them, so everyone accepts the two, addressing Touta as “Konoe-aniki” and Kuroumaru as “Tokisaka-anesan”. Jinbee flees when Gengorou demands he get back to work after slacking off for two years.

Touta asks what UQ Holder does, amazing Ikkuu since they took the test to join without knowing anything about the group. The people who’d emerge all transform into youkai, surprising Touta and Kuroumaru. Ikkuu calls this group of general UQ Holder members as Hyakki Yakou, and says that UQ Holder is a group of otherworldly beings who help each other out and that they are protectors of that. Touta decides he’s going to take over the place, irritating the youkai, who ask Ikkuu if they can teach Touta a lesson.

Thoughts/Review:

This chapter turned out to be more interesting than I thought it would be, which is a pleasant surprise.

I’m glad that the somewhat tedious mini training arc is over. Although it makes Touta overpowered at the moment, I’d rather the story move to more interesting areas.

Touta still hasn’t learned a blasted thing from his time underground. He lost an arm, but the moment he got it back, everything else was forgotten. I really would love for all of those youkai to teach him a very painful lesson.

That brings me to the youkai. That was the big surprise here as it turns out that all of the yakuza-type folks are actually youkai. The one big dude does appear to be the same youkai that Asuna and Setsuna fought during the Kyoto arc. I hope it is.

The fact that youkai can have human form is not new to the Akamatsu-verse. After all, just prior to the Mahora Budokai arc in Negima!, Negi and Kotaro had to fight Count Herrman, the youkai that petrified Negi’s village. His transformation seemed more illusionary than the youkai in UQH, but maybe we’ll learn more down the road.

The three young girls were quite adorable. Looks like they are all beast girls, with one looking like Konoka (which I’m assuming is part of the Akamatsu-sensei curse of not having a lot of character designs).  It would be cool if they were related to the girls from Negima! on the Magic World.

As to Jinbee, I guess he was slacking off for two years since he could have escaped by cleaning up the place below on his own.

That does lead me to wonder how new recruits normally get through. If there’s no one down there, and the only way out is to defeat the magical monsters, how do they learn that without someone there. Jinbee really gave Touta and Kuroumaru a major leg up.

Finally, I did not Touta reflecting on the fact that even though he is a vampire, he still enjoyed the sun. It would be interesting to see if Akamatsu-sensei actually provides more information on vampires in his universe.

So, a better chapter than expected. I hope things continue to improve.

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7 Responses to “UQ Holder Manga Chapter 11 Review (UQ Holder defined.)”

  1. NullApostle says:

    What the hell is that PENGUIN doing there? Seriously wtf kind of youkai is that supposed to be?. lol

    On a more serious note:
    Part of me tells me I should hate, scratch that, strongly dislike this series, but I just can’t. I discovered myself not minding Touta’s stupidity and am actually (still) quite amused by Kuroumaru’s femaleness-denying antics. The only real beef I have is with Akamatsu’s sudden mood-break when the group’s journey was interrupted and they were fetched by UQ Holder members. Other than that I find myself to seriously like this series. A lot.

    I guess my feelings toward UQH are some equivalent of this:
    http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1718

    Well, whatever. I’m eagerly awaiting the next chapter, and hope more UQH members are introduced soon. ‘Til next review.

    • Lol dude , You`re not the only one holding himself / herself down.

      Im still pissed too , But yet i force myself to like this series because it`s a Sequel to a Series that I Loved so much , I Just can`t help it , Even though i throw out middle fingers around , Shout as much as i can , Cannot do anything about it =\

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      >What the hell is that PENGUIN doing there? Seriously wtf kind of youkai is that supposed to be?. lol

      *lol* No clue, but considering how almost anything can become a youkai in Japanese culture…^_^;

      >I discovered myself not minding Touta’s stupidity and am actually (still) quite amused by Kuroumaru’s femaleness-denying antics.

      I could be in the minority with my negativity on those topics. And I’ll admit that some of the jokes regarding Kuroumaru’s gender can still make me smile.

      >The only real beef I have is with Akamatsu’s sudden mood-break when the group’s journey was interrupted and they were fetched by UQ Holder members.

      Yeah, that was a jarring change. I was cool with them walking all the way to their final destination and having adventures along the way, by which we got to know the trio better.

      >I guess my feelings toward UQH are some equivalent of this:
      http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1718

      *lol* For the record, I do like the Star Trek reboot, flaws and all.

      >But yet i force myself to like this series because it`s a Sequel to a Series that I Loved so much

      The sequel aspect is why I’ll give UQH a MUCH longer trial period than I probably would otherwise.

  2. NoLastName says:

    I’m not really sure if I like this series, although if I loved Negima and if I just judged Negima on its first 11 chapters I wouldn’t like it either.
    Now that the training is over with I hope we get into the first full arc with a bad guy who’ll be fought and then return 100 chapters later, minions to defeat and relationships to forge.

  3. I Think the Chapter was pretty good , Even though I Wasn`t really expecting them to get out that quick since i was expecting them to learn a thing or two for a Couple more chapters.

    But other than that , We did get Karin to punch touta , So gotta give props to Karin for doing that.

    As for the UQ Holder Members being a bunch of Demons , I clearly wasn`t expecting that ( LOL ) ! Those Blob-mobs reminded me of Zazie`s ” Pets ” and I Didn`t notice that some of those Demons were the one that Asuna and Setsuna faced during the Kyoto arc ( Thanks for pointing that out ! ) , Also the three girls , At first , I was like ” Please tell me these kids are the descendant`s of Ala Alba ” And i was wrong.

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      >But other than that , We did get Karin to punch touta , So gotta give props to Karin for doing that.

      Excellent point, and one I had completely overlooked. ^_^

      >Those Blob-mobs reminded me of Zazie`s ” Pets “

      And they may well be. Sadly, although youkai and mazoku are known entities in Japanese culture, Akamatsu-sensei never really explored his versions of these creatures in Negima, even though they played their roles. So Zazie, as a mazoku, appeared to have youkai as pets. I wish the youkai/mazoku thing could have been better explained. Maybe, the UQH manga will do that. ^_^

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