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Webcomic Shows Comiket Fanatic Transported Back to Warring States Era
posted on by Eric Stimson
Massive crowds of young men, a fierce jostle for scarce resources, enduring long, fatiguing marches and waits with low supplies of food and water — Comic Market (Comiket) and other big anime conventions can seem almost like medieval battles. If making it through multiple conventions each year makes you feel hardy and well-seasoned, you might relate to the protagonist of Ryōichi Yokoyama's webcomic "Sengoku Comiket."
Takeshi Konno "lives and dies" for Comiket. While attending the latest edition of the long-running fan gathering, a freak lightning strike zaps him back in time to Japan's violent Warring States (or Sengoku) Era in the 1500s. Tōkichi Hideyoshi Kinoshita's battle with the Asakura army is not going well when the unexpected visitor from the third millennium arrives. Takeshi can dodge enemy thrusts with ease ("Compared to the frenzy at [Tokyo] Big Sight, this means nothing to me"). He can calmly take a sip from a water bottle in the heat of battle. He even stops to give a fallen soldier a handkerchief.
The only thing that really sets him off is when one of his prized manga books is damaged.
Takeshi scoffs at the notion of "over a thousand" soldiers putting him off. "That's really small-scale! I've been tested in a battlefield of 200,000!!"
The first chapter of "Sengoku Comiket" can be read at Pixiv Comic (Japanese only); the next chapter is scheduled for January 27. A poster advertising the comic caters to the attendees of the ongoing Comiket 91 at the International Exhibition Center station, which serves Tokyo Big Sight.
Sources: Comic Natalie and Pixiv Comic
