To say that I didn't enjoy reading it would make me a liar, but I surely did. It's because, well, I'm a sucker for these kind of tropes Nejimaki Kagyu(NK) uses. Although, here's what I have to say.
1) Story: 3
I won't bore you the nonsense with any summaries, and I'll get right into the pork and beans of the review. The story is very, very messy. I frankly don't know where to start with this one. For one, if you really wanted to get right in under NK, you would have to have a understanding knowledge of the world NK is set in. The problem is, you're thrown right under the bus with NO exposition at all. You're given just barely enough to grasp the story, but even then it still doesn't make sense.
There's a few overarching tags the manga falls within, action, comedy, romance, and school life. If you've read a good chunk, you know that school life is a very loose term to describe this manga. To bring up exposition that was never introduced formally; Charaizm is the belief that characters that are stronger than others will excel. It boils down to individuality, strength, and resolve. i.e. natural selection. Why I say school life is a loose term, except the setting is in a school environment is that it doesn't flow like a high school slice of life manga would. It's as if action and romance had a love child, and for the sake of it, was in a school environment that had nothing to do with it. Many readers are confused because of this. Readers get a huge bomb dropped on them, expecting a light hearted school manga, but what they really get is a shonen-esque tournament arc, and we are just expected to go along with it. It's honestly like the author wanted to flesh out the story more than it should've, but really ended up dragging it out and beating it once or twice.
That's just a glimpse of it too. There's alot of asspulls in NK, and sure that may be excused with the "comedy" tag, but NK takes itself too seriously now and then. From here and there, you get light-hearted comedic interactions to then action you'd see in a shonen manga. These types of holes in the plot leave you completely dazed, throwing tropes at you left and right all willy nilly until it all becomes intelligible. Maybe it just be me, but I don't think I'm on that plane of intelligence to grasp NK.
2) Art: 10
The art is the saving grace of this manga. I've haven't read much at all, but out of all I did read, NK has the greatest artwork. It's a very unique style that you can't really describe unless you see it yourself. The greatest part about the art, is the facial expressions, and how they go from 0 to 100 within panels. NK can go from extremely simple, to intricately detailed scenes within the change of mood. Speaking of mood, the art is very much an indicator of mood. Comparing NK's art to the likes of JoJo is a great comparison. In the anime(jojo), whenever the mood changes, the color scheme does too. NK does a terrific job of enforcing mood within it's scene, giving off it's own aura in a way.
3) Characters: 4
The characters are pretty generic. You've got characters from every side of the trope section, to the point where it's not even funny. What's saving the characters tab from being a 2, would be character development. No spoilers of course, but characters do eventually get fleshed out. Although, they're pretty generic character developments, it's still alright. Yet what really breaks the score, is how weak character development can be sometimes. The girls who fall in love with the MC just fall out of interest within the first volume to make room for the plot. It all feels too silly, something you'd see out of fairy tail; where the bad guy makes the transition to good, it happens here too. It's all pretty silly from there out, a character is given their designated trope and that's all they are. It feels plastic and fake, it feels 2D. Yoh, the only outlier to this, is one of the greatest written character NK has got so far. I won't say anything else than that.
4) Enjoyment: 7
It was generally very enjoyable. It was kind of something you turn off your brain and just have fun to, that you laugh at it's ridiculousness. Although NK has it's time where it goes full retard, it is still pretty fun to watch as carnage unfolds. To top, the art is just a great compliment to all that. It's one of those reads that will illicit some sort of audible reaction from you, whether that may be "so bad it's good," or so funny, NK is great at drawing that out. What really killed the enjoyment, is probably knowing that NK has a long history of inactive scans. If you're like me by any chance, you prefer completed stories over ongoing, and NK is a story that's on it's last legs.
5) Overall: 6
To deliver the killing blow, NK has it's highs and it's lows. It's a very flawed story that you keep coming back to. I'd totally recommend NK, but I'm sure it'd be a hit or miss, and because the scans are still ongoing, it may be hard to pickup, and easier to drop. It's similar to a love-hate relationship some may have with another media. I'll end it on a high note, and say that if you are going to read NK then you'll be in for a rollercoaster beginning to end.
