Title: Black Clover Vol. 28
Author: Yuki Tabata
Publisher: Viz Media
Language: English
Format: Paperback
Pages: 192
Genre: Shounen, Battle
Publication Date: February 1, 2022
The Story
Asta has gotten so far along in his training that Nacht is ready to head into battle!!
…by himself.
While Asta and his devil have performed union, it is clear that Asta hasn’t mastered it at all yet. Nacht orders him to stay behind to work on that while he goes on ahead to begin the operation to take out the Dark Triad.
After a bit of a pep talk and from braggadocious comments by the other magic knights, we head off to battle which encompasses the entirety of the remainder of the volume. Despite that, we learn of a new character by the name of Morris… a magic scholar that has defected from the Spade Kingdom and is now assisting the Dark Triad.
The fights against Dante, Zenon, and Vanica are simply just displays to show how our characters have powered up as of late. With the Dark Triad reeling, Morris unveils his trump card and all hell ends up breaking loose. So much so that Julius, the Wizard King himself ends up showing up to the battle but he’s not alone!
In the moment that we all predicted, Asta in his newly mastered Union form shows up and now the tide of the battle has turned… which will probably conclude in volume 29!
Characters
The name of the game here as far as development goes is power-ups. Once again, Black Clover ends up taking the typical shonen battle manga cycle of introducing a powerful enemy that seems near impossible to defeat and then powering up the characters so that they can defeat them. Everyone here shows impressive growth and, of course, Asta does as well with being able to master the union ability with his devil, Liebe.
Outside of that, we have our new character Morris who was the chief researcher of mana for the Spade Kingdom who has found a new and better home with the Dark Triad. He’s sort of their mad scientist and has been helping with preparing for the opening of the gate. In fact, it was revealed that he was kind of a catalyst for speeding up the entire process. His introduction came a bit out of left field; however, it does add an unpredictable dynamic and breaks up the whole “beat the strong guys and win” mentality. I mean… that mentality is still there but the goal isn’t as straightforward as it was before.
Final Thoughts
There really isn’t much to say about this volume. It’s an action-packed battle volume and if you’re this far into the series, you know what to expect. Strong enemies, strong attacks, power-ups, everyone calling out their attack so they can announce it to the world, and a late appearance by the main character to even up the odds when things take a turn for the worst.
Morris was a decent addition to add a new dynamic to the fight but when the arrival of Asta, we’re right back to the typical “get stronger and beat the strong guy” phase of the battle. If the history of this series teaches us anything, it’s that the battle will conclude and we’ll get the epilogue and the setup up for the next story arc next volume… or… option 2… something will happen that will cause the battle to escalate even further and we’ll end up dealing with quick, action-packed reads for the next couple of books.
Either way, it promises to be a fun ride!
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This item was provided for review by Viz Media
