Nezumi was raised by the mob to be an emotionless killing machine, but a chance encounter in an arcade leads to a romance at total odds with everything she's known. Equal parts ultraviolence and kawaii, Nezumi's First Love turns both the hitman and love comedy genres on their heads!

Nezumi's First Love has story and art by Riku Ōseto. English translation is done by Riku Ōseto, with lettering by Riku Ōseto. Published by Vertical (October 28, 2025). Rated 16+

Content Warning: murder, assault, torture, threat of sexual assault.

Erica Friedman
Rating:

Nezumi's First Love is a story about a young woman you really want to like and sympathize with who, through a horrific life of violence and threats of sexual violence, has become a contract killer for terrible people. When we meet Nezumi, she is mesmerized by a stuffed animal in a crane game, and we wonder why she's just standing there, not engaging, if she likes the animal so much. And then she commits murder, but we still want to like her a lot. When a young man, Ao, pursues her, they become an item, despite Nezumi continuing to be a murderer; we still root for her because she seems nice. How does that even work inside our heads? Nezumi is objectively not nice. She kills people for a living. She kills people so that a horrible criminal remains free. But somehow, we tell ourselves, she is “nice.” The simple, almost childish art and character designs fuel this feeling.

This cognitive dissonance continues throughout the first volume, as the apparent innocence of Nezumi and Ao's relationship is contrasted with the actual circumstances of their lives, which are filled with blood and more violence. It is hard not to see that betrayal and yet more violence are the actual plot and the likely outcome of any scenario, so those sweet moments feel like a hood being pulled over our heads. We know things aren't going to be okay, but for the moment, we can't do anything about it, so we might as well relax. It's all going to be violence in the end.

The same disassociation that allows Nezumi to live what she considers a normal life is required for us to read this manga successfully. These acts of violence are just…how it is. I almost wish this were the only volume. Leaving the story just where this ends would have really doubled down on the unknowns here.

This cognitive dissonance one must experience and the required disassociation that one must use to navigate this narrative make Nezumi's First Love a deeply intriguing, if not entertaining, tale.

Bolts
Rating:

I'm glad I prepped myself before I started reading this because this is a story that's going to make you feel uncomfortable. The book starts with a young girl getting abused to really hammer home how she broke to the point of becoming an assassin. You really feel for this girl and want her to have a happy ending, which is why it's so rewarding when she finally finds somebody that she is allowed to play house with. So what happens when that happiness is threatened?

What I just described was virtually half the story, with the second half being a bit more unique once we get into the ultimatum between living the life of a deadly assassin and trying to preserve normalcy. I was shocked that I found myself describing the story as genuinely wholesome…but in a messed-up way. Something traumatic happens, and a character reacts to it with a wide-eyed sense of wonder because they are preoccupied with a different thing. It really is a story that fully pushes the “try to look on the bright side” mentality, and while I would normally find that cheesy to an unbelievable degree, I think this story earned that wholesomeness because you do want to see these two happy.

I finished the book still wondering when the twist would happen because, while there is a shift in the status quo, the story still feels like it's building to something. In a lot of ways, that's good because that makes me want to go read the next volume. I want to know what direction this story is heading after it finally finishes setting up its premise with our two main leads. A lot is going on here regarding how far somebody is willing to go to preserve their happiness and how the dangerous elements of the world can tie into a sense of potential sexual satisfaction.

Sex is a surprisingly strong framing device for a lot of the narrative beats and comedy in this story. I do feel like the story may have pushed its attention to the character having sex a bit too much, or rather, the timing of the jokes themselves felt off. Then again, given the context in which sex is used, it's possible that the twisted nature of sex and violence relating to our main characters' happy lives was the point. This is the right amount of twisted for me, but I don't know if it's gonna be the right amount of twisted for other people. If you're interested in a darker story that has an ultimately wholesome undertone, then I think it is worth reading. At the very least, it'll be very quick and easy to get through the given length and a more art-driven presentation.

Kevin Cormack
Rating:

Have you ever wondered what The Dangers in My Heart would be like if adorable female romantic lead Anna Yamada were a dead-eyed contract killer? Wonder no more, because that, essentially, is Nezumi's First Love. It's not unusual for manga to juxtapose the cute and the disturbing – just look at the worldwide phenomenon that is Made in Abyss. Nezumi's First Love's horrors aren't abstracted by fantasy, though. This is set in the real criminal underworld, with frank depictions of child abuse, rape, and torture. It's absolutely not for the faint-hearted, but it's also not as hopelessly bleak (at least not yet) as those content warnings might suggest.

The titular Nezumi, with her huge, soulful eyes and ruby red cheeks, might look like a cherubic young woman, but she's the local mob's secret weapon, and she's killed hundreds of people. Raised in the most horrible way possible as a child killer, she seeks some respite from her dark world in the only person who offers her unconditional love, her new boyfriend, Ao. Sadly, the course of true love rarely runs smoothly when the mob is involved, and to stay together, both Ao and Nezumi may need to sacrifice much more than they could ever have conceived.

At turns treacly sweet and viscerally horrific, Nezumi's First Love could be the poster child for the term “tonal whiplash”. That's by design, however. At this early stage in the story, it's hard to tell the author's intention with this, but I really hope that the sweet central couple can navigate their way out of the criminal underworld without completely sacrificing their humanity.

It's often a difficult read, with some truly brutal twists and upsetting imagery. I worry that, as the story progresses that it could degenerate into pure misery and torture porn, but I'd like to hope that won't be the case. Although I wouldn't normally read stories quite as dark as this, I am intrigued to find out what happens next.