The Elusive Samurai vol. 2

Tokiyuki Hojo’s main antagonist may be charismatic (and possibly demonically possessed) warrior Takauji Ashikaga, but he gets an acceptably devious stand-in with Sadamune Ogasawara.  He’s the governor of Shugo Province and has a major beef with Tokiyuki’s benefactor Yorishige Suwa.  So Sadamune decides to crash a dog-shooting competition (it’s not as bad as it sounds…) in order to show Yorishige up, and maybe even find some Hojo traitors in the process.  This may be bad news for Tokiyuki, but the Suwa priest has an audacious plan to counter it.  He’ll just have our titular hero and complete amateur at mounted archery enter the competition and show up experienced veteran Sadamune instead!

That’s only part of this volume as Ogasawara has more tricks up his sleeve, which will necessitate Tokiyuki making a new friend to deal with them.  So if you thought that this series set in Feudal Japan was missing a genuine ninja, “The Elusive Samurai” has you covered in money-grubbing, master of thievery and disguise Genba Kazama.  His rude and amoral nature is a shonen-manga-mandated counter to the idealistic do-gooder nature of Tokyuki and company, and his debut has him sliding into that role about as well as you’d expect.  If anything, the action surrounding his debut is more interesting than the character himself so far.

At least the series does a better job of showcasing what mangaka Yusei Matsui looks to achieve with Tokiyuki’s “winning by running away” approach to battle.  Rather than anything fancy or genre-busting, he’s just going to have the character exploit his min-maxed agility build for all it’s worth.  Which is fine so far and I still appreciate the fact that the series is keeping its focus on period-appropriate action and not the power creep or “I’m gonna be the best at X” ethos so common to the genre.  “The Elusive Samurai” hasn’t caught fire yet, though it still remains a diverting read two volumes in.