The hero Erdrick's hard-won victory over Zoma brought peace to the land...but a century later that time of prosperity is coming to an end. When an agent of the Dragonlord infiltrates the Kingdom of Carmen, Lunafrea, the daughter of a commander in Carmen's army, is forced to flee with the infant prince Arus. They find a safe haven with friends, and Arus grows and trains alongside Kira, son of a sandsailor. Years after the fall of Carmen, the Dragonlord finally tracks down the hiding place of Arus and his companions. The group seeks safety again, but a fearsome dragon appears! Arus and Kira soon find themselves training under a powerful mentor, but can the prince become a true hero?!

Dragon Quest: The Mark of Erdrick has art by Chiaki Kawamata and story by Kamui Fujiwara. English translation is done by Christina Rose, and lettering by Steve Dutro. Published by Square Enix Manga & Books (September 23, 2025). Rated T.

Erica Friedman
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This series is a magnificent helping of '90s nostalgia. A timeless tale of two (actually three) young boys, searching for their destiny and their inner strength. A classic bildungsroman, complete with tragic loss of parents, a world at risk of destruction, you know…FATE.

Because this is a 1990s manga, the art feels like a throwback, which technically it is not. This is the original stuff, the stuff we grew up on. In 2025, you're not reading this to be surprised at the original plot; you're reading it to relive some of the fun from your early days of fantasy reading and Dragon Quest playing. This is the kind of story you settle in with while eating a bowl of cereal with marshmallows in it. If you approach Mark of Erdrick in this carefree emotional state, you'll find a rollicking tale of good and evil, powerful magic, and good people making the best decisions they can under difficult circumstances. Of course, a couple of kids who will, undoubtedly, save the world.

Arus' guardians are an elderly, wise priest and a woman, Lunafrea, who is shown to be a formidable warrior. Lunafrea is never objectified and, in fact, the few women who are given named roles in this volume are all strong and on the side of good. I imagine that future volumes will also supply us with some evil women, as well. The art style demands it.

One of the most delightful things about this translation is the literalness of the spells. “Kazam” is an attack, “Woosh” is a slashing attack, and so on. It's the kind of goofy seriousness that plays incredibly well here. By the end of Volume 1, Arus and Kira graduate out of this first “power-building” phase of the story, and they are searching for their companions before they take on Janga and the Dragonlord.

If you're looking for some late 20th-century fantasy nostalgia, with spiders, snakes, and dragons, oh my, Dragon Quest Mark of Erdrick will scratch that itch thoroughly.

Jean-Karlo Lemus
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One of the most beloved Dragon Quest manga has finally arrived in America, and it's completely worth the wait.

Let's assuage some concerns: if you've never played a Dragon Quest game, you'll be fine. The Mark of Erdrick gets you up to speed fast enough. Telling the dubiously-canon tale of the descendants of the eternal Dragon Quest hero, Erdrick, after the events of the third game (long story), we join the young Arus as he is chosen by fate to reclaim his birthright, save the world from the Archfiend Imagine—and do battle with his evil counterpart, the Fiendlord Jagan.

Immediately, Fujiwara's artwork impresses. On the one hand, he manages to capture the tone of Akira Toriyama's original artwork for the Dragon Quest games. Monsters are an equal balance of charming and grotesque, and Arus has what I can only describe as Toriyama proportions. But on the other hand, Fujiwara doesn't depend on just imitating Toriyama; the full-color pages in The Mark of Erdrick are a sumptuous treat, vistas of rolling green hills and dappled sunlight breaking through the boughs of trees. If you have no emotional connection to Dragon Quest, it's simply a gorgeous early-90s fantasy manga. If you're like me and you love Dragon Quest, it captures your imagination, breathing life into the land of Alefguard like nothing else. You even get galleries of old promotional art from The Mark of Erdrick's anthology releases.

Chiaki's writing is the other major part of this formula, giving weight to the horrid ranks of demons as they nip at Arus' heels. Even the lowly mooks are humanized; there is no truer tribute to Dragon Quest's storytelling than a minor sub-plot involving a minidemon and his tragic tale of friendship. Arus himself is also given plenty of room to be humanized: a child of destiny, he might be, but he's a child all the same, and what child could ever bear the absence of the love of their parents? Even Arus' scrappy friend, Kira, displays heroism beyond his years. They're heroes you'd love to cheer for, facing off against villains you're biting your nails to see defeated.

A few reservations keep this from being a full-throated recommendation. There's a bit of gore in a later fight, which parents might find inappropriate for younger readers. Also, there's no getting away from the trolls looking like Minstrel caricatures, what with their puffy lips and flat noses. (There's a reason the recent video game releases recolor their lips!) Beyond that, Dragon Quest: The Mark of Erdrick gets a strong recommendation from me. This is easily one of the best manga expansions on a video game ever.