Dream with Our Eyes Open

The place is China, 3,000 years ago. Modes of existence are fluid: under the proper circumstances, animals and even inanimate objects can become intelligent beings - yokai. And some human beings and some yokai can achieve a level of enlightenment that allows them to aspire to the status of Sennin, masters of the way. Those who seek to become Sennin study under Sennin masters in the spirit world, and are known as doshi. Sennin and doshi, and even some lesser beings, can wield magical artifacts known as paope. Also populating the spirit world are intelligent servant-creatures called reiju, which can serve as magical steeds. Sennin can be either good or evil - or uncommitted ... .

Doshi Taikobo is young (for the Sennin world - he's 75) and rather feckless. Although his master, Genshi Tenson, believes that Taikobo has the potential to become incredibly powerful, he goofs off and won't apply himself diligently to his Sennin studies. When he's called on the carpet for his laziness, he claims that he's disturbed by the fact that King Chu, down in the human world, has fallen under the evil spell of his new wife Dakki, who is actually a yokai Sennin (apparently, she's a fox spirit). Cruel and greedy, Dakki (who seems to get her dialog from Marie Antoinette - "Let them eat sweets!" - and her wardrobe of accessorized cat suits from a bad 1960s sci-fi flick) uses her position to wreak havoc among the humans, and in fact, she's entirely wiped out Taikobo's original human tribe. Genshi Tenson uses Taikobo's supposed interest in Dakki's doings to get him to agree to an important mission: to seek out the 365 Sennin enumerated on the Hoshin list and banish them to an otherworldly prison. Dakki, of course, is one of the 365. As additional sweeteners, Taikobo is given a reiju for transportation and a paope as a weapon. The story line follows Taikobo as he pursues his mission, fighting some enemies, bamboozling others, seeking out and winning allies, and discovering the deeper truth of the Hoshin list and his master's plans.

On my first read-through, this series confused the hell out of me, and I really disliked it. I don't usually have a problem with new vocabulary, and the rather busy, dense drawing style is no worse than that of Samurai Deeper Kyo, so I'm not really sure what the problem was. However, I just re-read the three volumes this past week, and things were a lot smoother this time. It's never going to be a big favorite of mine - the characters seem to have no emotional depth, and the drawings are weirdly ugly (everyone has huge clown feet, for example - even sexy Dakki - and primitive, exaggerated facial expressions) - but I'm getting involved enough with the plot to wonder what's going to happen next.