Review by Ian Keogh

Maki’s a teenager growing up in world of inexplicable natural phenomena, such as volcanic activity in previously safe cities. Another is meteors falling on them, which occurs as she’s on her way to school, or would be if she weren’t delayed by someone running alongside her. Ryu-ichi Sadamatsu ends the first chapter by revealing Maki should have died, and she’s already revealed she believes her life was saved by an alien when younger. Things become weirder from there.

It takes almost no time for Sadamatsu to set up a viable problem with interesting characters, greatly helped by a sense of scale about his art, which takes no shortcuts. We see from above the power of meteors crashing on Tokyo and the damage that causes, all spectacularly detailed, and while the people are distinctively drawn, this isn’t at the cost of placing them in recognisable environments.

From a captivating start, Sadamatsu only increases the intrigue. The running stranger is Roger, and his business is saving the future, which means involving himself in the past. We see it was him who saved Maki when she was younger, and he intends to save her again as Sadamatsu gradually increases the stakes by feeding in more information about who Roger is and how he operates. There’s also some mech on mech action, and when we see some of Roger’s colleagues there’s no mistaking them being drawn as homages to The Matrix.

Constant shifts prompted by the revelations move Maki’s life into new and dangerous areas, always interesting, and each of them offering a new relevant snippet. We may not know exactly what an Oracle is in the context of Cosmic Censorship, but rapidly assimilate as Maki does that it’s a valuable status in the future, making her life even more complicated.

Maki’s past is revealed along with her future, and Sadamatsu has readers hooked early and never lets go. By the end he’s more or less explained the entire premise of Roger and others, and it’s great. Bring on Vol. 2.