Manga Madness #3: Dead/Four-Laws

Here we go, Manga Madness Week 3! Today's manga is an action thriller that goes by Shi-Housoku, or Dead/Four Laws.

Full Title: Shi-Housoku
Translation: Laws of Death, The Four Laws, Dead/Four-Laws

Synopsis: Ryuusuke Yamanaka, age 28, is the newest rookie in Criminal Investigations at the Ebetsu Police Station. His goal is to become the best investigator in Hokkaido and stop at nothing to bring criminals to justice, as atonement for his late wife who lost her life in an attempted robbery. As the days grind on, Ryuusuke hears various tidbits and tall-tales from his colleagues; apparently, Ebetsu Station is cursed. Every 25 years, an ex-cop known only as the "Policeman's Ghoul", a man who is supposed to be dead, comes to town in late fall and makes people disappear. Ryuusuke barely pays any mind to their stories. However, one day he begins to hear whispers in the streets as he leaves work. And when a man wearing a cop's badge unlike any he's ever seen before begins tailing him in the shadows, Ryuusuke just might become a believer........

Origin:
For the longest time, Gogyouo-Sama was the only story to my name. My entire focus was spent on developing it and nothing else. But when I came up with Hyozan, I realized how fun it was to make up more new worlds and stories - I suddenly was driven to create a bigger library of characters to pull from. I started brainstorming and eventually dreamed up two new stories - the first of which being this one. Both Gogyouo-Sama and Hyozan were shounen action works at heart, so this time I wanted to try something different. I decided to try a horror/mystery action work, and I came up with it from a very simple concept: a pun. In Japanese the character for death (死) is prounced "shi". The character for the number 4 (四) is usually pronounced "yon", but in some instances it can also be pronounced as "shi". The two kanji have similar radicals as well. Because of this, 4 is a very unlucky number in Japan, and is often not even used in certain places since it gives allusions of "death". I challenged myself to create a story based on this, and Shi-Housoku is what came of it. I also give it the fancier English title of Dead/Four-Laws because the actual translation (Death Laws) sounds a bit too much like Death Note.

Character/Plot:
For my past works, I had already utilized a teenager and a child as protagonists. D/4-Laws is a darker story meant for a more adult audience, so I wanted to try out an adult protagonist. Enter Ryuusuke Yamanaka, a spineless wimp aiming to make it big. If I could compare him to any characters from my other works, I would pick Masashi from Gogyou; although he doesn't live in to the "spineless wimp" stereotype quite as strongly. He's a wimp, but he's also quite friendly and social, despite his insecurities (he's had those white streaks in his hair since his adolescence, and is constantly teased about them). He also has drive - in his early 20's as a young married man, he tragically lost his wife when a burglar broke into their home while he was out on the job (working as a night-shift security guard); the two had a struggle that brought about his wife's death. This event drove Ryuusuke to work towards becoming a full-fledged cop so he could actively pursue criminals, and hopefully prevent the same tragedy that befell his wife for others.

This is Ryuusuke's backstory that brings us to the starting point of the series, where he has achieved part of his goal and become a Criminal Investigations officer in Ebetsu. The story begins with its serious tone, but also rather light-hearted, as we see Ryuusuke adjusting to his new position and co-workers at Ebetsu Station. He learns quickly that several of his fellow officers are heavily into the occult and all things supernatural, forming a sort of "occult gang" within the station. It turns out Ryuuske's assigned partner is the president of this so-called gang, and he gets coerced into joining them in their hobby, even though he has no interest in the occult. While taking a weekend excursion to a ghost town, the gang tells Ryuusuke of the supposed "curse" of Ebetsu Station. In the early 1900's, there was a special cop who worked at Ebetsu Station who was sort of a spy; he would infiltrate criminal hideouts and leak information back to the police. He was a sadistic man who loved his work far too much; he would often kill criminals in cold blood without giving them proper trial, which gave the other cops reason to fear him. They called him "The Policeman's Ghoul" because of his pale complexion and sunken-in eyes. The man's corruption became worse and worse over time; he began acting as a spy not only for the police, but also for the criminals he was supposed to be spying on. The final straw was pulled when the Ghoul murdered a fellow officer in broad daylight. No-one knows what caused him to snap, but he went on a rampage, officers left and right, until the remaining police force of Ebetsu pinned him down and shot him dead. The incident became a legend in Ebetsu - and the Occult Gang is convinced that every 25 years, the Ghoul rises from the grave to seek revenge on the Ebetsu police. Ryuusuke, of course, thinks the story is ridiculous and doesn't believe a word of it, especially the '25 years' bit. But as the days go on, Ryuusuke can't help but let his mind wander back to the story; though he did not believe it, the story itself chilled him to the bone. The story continues to haunt him as strange things start occurring wherever he goes in town, and he discovers that someone really is haunting him. One day he is led by strange happenings and whispers to an abandoned subway tunnel, where he finds a man waiting for him. The meeting of Ryuusuke and this man sets forth a series of events that will plunge the town of Ebetsu into chaos once again.

Themes:
The title Dead/Four-Laws refers to a set of cryptic, unwritten rules that are the Ghoul's credo - the way he performed his work and how he balanced his dual nature as a cop and a criminal. In this story, the sides of right and wrong as defined by the "law" is a prevalent theme. Ryuusuke is a moral man - he always follows the rules down to the letter, and he vows to not let any criminals get away with "breaking the rules" after the death of his wife. So, what would happen if Ryuusuke himself were forced to break some of these rules? Or what if he was made to follow a new set of rules that contradicts the old rules? Is he still a moral man because he's "following the rules", regardless of what the rules are? These are the kinds of situations that D/4-Laws examines: satirizing the legal system by presenting its corruption as a supposedly antagonistic entity and a slew of moral dilemmas for those who uphold it. Honestly, the whole "occult ghost story" setup is mostly a backdrop for these bigger themes, but there are still plenty of supernatural themes and events in the story that ultimately drive the plot forward and will truly put Ryuusuke's morality to the test.

That's three down, one to go. Tune in again next week for the finale of Manga Madness, Part 4!

It took me awhile to figure out exactly what kind of image I wanted to represent D/4-Laws. The mood is radically different from my first two stories, so I wanted a mood shift in the imagery as well. After several test images and one re-do, I ended up with this image of Ryuusuke in despair, being towered over by the Ghoul (that's not really what the Ghoul looks like - it's just how I've chosen to depict him here). As for the imagery in the background: the sign on the right is a Japanese stop sign that says "tomare" (止まれ　- imperative of the verb "stop"); the words in the frame on the left say "Ebetsu Station"; the badge is based of the design of an actual Hokkaido policeman's badge; and the gravestone is meant to be a possible image of the Ghoul's grave. I know it seems really weird that they would put "GHOUL" on the grave instead of his actual name, but I haven't given him one yet and I was running out of ideas at this point in the drawing. ^^; Once again, the images for the logo were drawn by hand and then combined and touched up in Photoshop. The shading in the background was also done with Photoshop.