Satoko, a runaway ninja with zero street smarts, just wanted a quiet escape from her secretive village. Instead, she ends up crashing at the apartment of Konoha—a high school girl who moonlights as a lethal assassin.

What starts as an awkward roommate situation quickly spirals into a chaotic blend of dodging deadly pursuers, navigating high school drama, and figuring out who's supposed to do the dishes.

A Ninja and an Assassin Under One Roof has story and art by HundredBurger. English translation is done by Alethea & Athena Nibley and lettering by Joseph Barr. Published by Seven Seas Entertainment (December 16, 2025). Rated T.

Erica Friedman
Rating:

Do situation comedies have to be funny? I asked myself this question often as I grew up watching the many, many, many sitcoms of 70s television. I probably laughed out loud once a season, which is once more than I laughed while reading A Ninja and an Assassin Under One Roof's first volume. I did, however, find this volume of manga ever-so-slightly more entertaining than the anime adaptation of the same series.

So, is this funny? The story has a rough start. The art is very far from polished, which is fine, but it does make me wonder how it was serialized so quickly. The art definitely improves as the volume goes on, but the story…. story is supposed to be “haha”-funny. On the best pages, it manages “heh”-funny. It is never laugh-out-loud funny.

Ninja Satoko is supposed to be sincere and clueless, my least favorite character type. We will watch her flail as she learns about life in the 21 st century, ahaha. Konoha is meant to be cold and cool, while I.ADORE cruel women generally, her treatment of Satoko is not kind or nice, and sure, we can accept that an assassin is not a trusting type, it's not fun, much less funny, especially at the beginning. This all settles down as the story develops.

Like many gag and sit-com manga, instead of a plot, the story is driven by the addition of new characters. In this case, we encounter Satoko's ninja leader, a gambling addict, and her lover, the symbolically named Yuriko. We also encounter a series of ninja hunters after Satoko, so Konoha can drop the façade for a bit and save her new roommate. This will eventually be played for a little light yuri-ish-ness and humor. The reality is that it's less of a story and more of a story idea, serialized in a way that reading it in bits and bobs makes it much more entertaining than if you read it all in one sitting.

Kevin Cormack
Rating:

I.ADORE Studio Shaft's 2025 TV anime adaptation of this manga, so I was keen to read the original. What I particularly enjoy about the show is the utterly black, matter-of-fact humor that arises from a taciturn assassin with a flat affect interacting with a peppy ninja of uncertain morals whose special ninjutsu powers involve disposing of bodies by turning them into leaves. The source manga is essentially identical, suggesting Shaft's adaptation is extremely faithful.

Assassin Konoha reminds me a lot of Dungeon People's Clay, though more ruthless. Her understated personality is complemented by runaway ninja Satoko's sunny, easygoing disposition. Satoko's head is mostly empty of conscious thought – she generally goes with the flow, which is how she's ended up a fugitive from her ninja village peers. She was unwittingly dragged along on a desertion attempt by other runaway ninjas without any comprehension of what was happening. She's equally clueless regarding how to survive in the world outside of her tiny, closed community, so she becomes reliant on Konoha for everything.

Together they make an unlikely couple – though Konoha treats Satoko as a combination between co-worker and freeloader, Satoko clearly wants friendship. She's coached by her ex-leader Kuro (who is shacked up with a buxom woman in a lesbian cohabitating relationship) to try and woo Konoha to bring her and Satoko together, despite minimal (initial) romantic intention on Satoko's end. This leads to a hilarious moment where Satoko cooks and serves dinner naked except for an apron, and she gets covered in burns. Bemused Konoha has no idea where to look.

Satoko is continually hounded by ninjas from her village sent to kill the deserter, though they rarely pose any challenge to Konoha's skilled knife-wielding hands. She needs to keep Satoko around, mainly to dispose of the bodies from her regular assassin gig. If this means giving Satoko a roof over her head, so be it, even if it means Satoko's made to sleep on the kitchen floor. (It's an upgrade from sleeping on the veranda, apparently.)

The art is extremely simplistic, but that only adds to the cutesy charm that's offset by the often extremely morbid humor. I love this kind of weird juxtaposition of two seemingly stylistically opposed aspects. Although the manga lacks the anime's bright colors and surprisingly smooth animation, it's still a decent way to experience the fun story and characters. I like this one a lot.