By: Peggy Sue Wood | @pswediting

A series I recently picked up was Apocalypse Bringer Mynoghra: World Conquest Starts with the Civilization of Ruin, which might be the most unintentionally Halloween-themed isekai without being outright terrifying that I’ve ever seen. It’s a very subdued, horror-adjacent anime so far. Not as gruesome as Goblin Slayer, but still hype-building enough that I spent my lunch break watching anime at Panera instead of trying to get ahead on the grading I have due this week…

That said, I do want to recommend this series because it’s been one of my favorite new series in a while. The basic idea isn’t exactly new, as is often the case with isekai: an individual transmigrates into a new world and is overpowered. However, this time, our protagonist is an “evil” being, and the world operates more like The Rising of the Shield Hero. It is like The Rising of the Shield Hero in the sense where each person transported into this “game” world is operating under a different set of rules. It makes for some genuinely fascinating world-building, and it feels like a fresh take on several familiar isekai ideas.

I’m especially interested in the concept of being “evil” aligned in this world because of how the protagonist’s power base works. His strength is tied to how happy his citizens are—which would normally be framed as something inherently good. Except it isn’t in this series and that opens up some really interesting questions about what “good” and “evil” actually mean in this particular world.

There’s also a lot of lore surrounding the main character that he doesn’t seem to be fully aware of. By the end of the first season, we, as the audience, can see how he is gradually becoming the King of Ruin foretold in prophecy and he just isn’t fully aware of it yet. To us, the viewer—and presumably to his summoned Units (hero players from the game he played in the life before)—he looks completely normal (see the center figure below, standing among the dark elves/long-eared people.):

However, to the people of this new world, he looks like this:

His miasma is so thick that they can’t even see that he has changed clothes, and this is never discussed by anyone. They just see this terrifying blob creature with glowing eyes and an ominous voice compared to what the viewer hears. Meanwhile, we know he’s actually just an awkward teenager. Also, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know that they see him this way, which makes it even funnier to me. I mean, an awkward teen coming off as a terrifying blob monster to the people of the world?

LOVE. PEAK. NEED MORE.

That said, if you would be so kind, please check this series out! It’s currently available on Crunchyroll and is 13 episodes long. Perfect for an October Weekend binge! Oh, also: a big seller, to me, is that it has freaky bugs that are not totally terrifying to my very bug-phobic self and so, if you hate seeing giant spiders or bugs, this series should not be too bad.

Thank you for reading!

Edited by: Krow Smith | @coffeewithkrow