24 April 2012

Nanjun Campaign

With c160 out, that brings v27 to a close. Though I feel sorry for Zhou Yu, a part of me wonders if his failures were due less to Zhuge Liang and more to his possible lack of experience in siege warfare, considering he was noted more for being a great admiral. Also, I should modify the statement I made in my earlier post about Jingzhou having 7 commanderies because on p184, Lu Su asks for 9 commanderies. Basically, what happened was that parts of Nanjun and Nanyang were sectioned off by Cao Cao to create two additional commanderies (Xiangyang and Nanxiang) when he previously conquered Jingzhou's lands. That's all I have to say for now, enjoy the volume folks.

Download:
Sangokushi c160:   Mediafire
Sangokushi v27:   Mediafire

16 April 2012

Tomorrow's Joe v09 (last updated May 22)

Sorry for the short delay in between finishing v8 and starting v9. This volume's a transitional one between parts 1&2, and though it doesn't have any real fights, it's got some real special moments that really make Tomorrow's Joe stand so far apart from your average shounen manga.
And so ends part 1.
Those reporters never cease to annoy me.
American Rikiishi.
For a minor character, Gondou's quite memorable. Something about that character design.

Download:
Tomorrow's Joe v09-1:   Mediafire
Tomorrow's Joe v09-2:   Mediafire
Tomorrow's Joe v09-3:   Mediafire
Tomorrow's Joe v09-4:   Mediafire
Tomorrow's Joe v09-5:   Mediafire

11 April 2012

Sangokushi v27 (last updated April 23)

Time to start up another volume of Sangokushi. For the next couple volumes, the story will focus entirely on Liu Bei and Zhou Yu's efforts to take Jingzhou for themselves. Just for clarification, as the -suffix "zhou" implies, Jingzhou is a province/prefecture, and it's composed of 7 commanderies: Nanyang, Nanjun, Jiangxia, Lingling, Wuling, Guiyan, and Changsha.
Cao Ren. Not the flashiest character in the story, but still a highly competent and reliable general.
Those with good memories will notice that Cao Hong looks a lot differently than he did back in volume 6. Not sure if Yokoyama just forgot or if he wanted to change his face. My guess is the latter, because his previous appearance made him look comparatively older than Cao Cao, even though Cao Hong is the younger cousin.
This brings up a point I'm quite curious about: Military uniforms in ancient warfare, especially for civil wars. It's known that the armies of Han Dynasty had standardized uniform/armour according to rank and basic unit-types like cavalry/infantry. But once the empire fractured, each warlord would have needed to make new uniforms to separate his own troops from enemies. Complicating matters is limited clothing-colours simply due to how expensive or rare certain dyes would be in an age before synthetic dyes. It couldn't have been a good cost-effective decision to have distinctively-coloured cotton/wool clothing worn for your average conscript, especially when the armies are tens of thousands-large. So in my mind, it seems that most of the soldiers would've probably worn some drab-coloured clothes that would be nigh-impossible to distinguish in the midst of a chaotic battle. In such a scenario, the direction someone faced was probably the only way to tell from friend or foe. Maybe that's another reason why formations were so useful, to keep guys facing one way only. Who knows, maybe the richer warlords like Cao Cao had the funds to equip his troops with some fab-looking clothes that made them the effective fighting forces they were? I'm obviously being facetious on this last point, but my point about the problems soldiers would've had in distinguishing allies from enemies during civil war still stands.
That's some eyesight he's got.
Jesus Christ, you might want to get that finger checked out, Cao Ren.
This doctor always makes me laugh because of he doesn't look like he cares one bit about anything.

Download:
Sangokushi c153:   Mediafire
Sangokushi c154:   Mediafire
Sangokushi c155:   Mediafire
Sangokushi c156:   Mediafire
Sangokushi c157:   Mediafire
Sangokushi c158:   Mediafire
Sangokushi c159:   Mediafire

5 April 2012

Jesus Christ, How Horrifying

Chapter 25's finally done so we're caught up to Japan once again. Not for long, however, since the next volume is set to come out some time on May 17. Hope you guys enjoyed the volume and its ending as much as I did.

Download:
Gyanki-Hen c25:   Mediafire
Gyanki-Hen v03:   Mediafire