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12 Beast is a manga by Pixiv artist Takemaru "Okayado" Inui. Originally a one-shot, it later became a full manga series that was serialized from 2013 to 2020 (starting out in Age Premium, but later moving to Monthly Dragon Age in 2015). The manga is licensed in English by Seven Seas Entertainment.

The one-shot follows the adventures of General Eita Touga, his support staff-member Aero, and their army of mercenary monsters as they try to save the world of Live-Earth from the Gigas, massive machines exterminating the inhabitants, the Autana (the series' term for half-human monsters).

With the might of their incredibly diverse troops, strengths complemented and weaknesses covered; the Gigas Slayer, a steel gauntlet that gives Eita superhuman strength and allows him to borrow Aero's power; and his PSP, tablet and a war game for any and all strategic planning, they travel across the land defending the weak and slaying the anti-Autana weapons... provided they don't die of starvation first or stage a mutiny, as said army is perpetually broke, and Eita can't resist helping the needy and poor.

The ongoing tells the story of how they get there: Eita is a high school ninja gamer from Present Day Earth who'd like nothing more than to keep out of danger, until Aero, a harpy from Live-Earth, shows up to convince him to help protect the Autana, a Gigas hot on her trail.

Eita inadvertantly accepts Aero's request after he trashes the Gigas, and so they set out to save Live-Earth, recruiting their army as they go (including Lamiae, Lizard Folk, Centaurs, Satyrs, Minotaurs, Kobolds, Mummies, Dullahan, Golems, Scylla, and Slimes).

... oh yeah, did we mention the abundance of hot monsters and fanservice?

For Okayado's other works, see Monster Musume and Deadline Summoner.


This work provides examples of:

    open/close all folders 

    The Main Series 
  • Accidental Pervert: Eita attracts dangerous, violent trouble in three ways: being sought after for his heroism and combat prowess, acting on his heroism and combat prowess, or accidentally groping, ogling, and/or offending the various females of both Earth and Live-Earth. Sometimes all three at once.
  • The Ace: Heavily implied with Eita's brother, Kouki.
    • All but confirmed with the second chapter, really.
  • Aloof Big Brother: Eita's brother Kouki left the dojo a year ago. He is the one that sends Aero Eita's way and starts the plot. It's implied that they aren't exactly close.
  • Alternate Dimension: Live-Earth.
  • Amazonian Beauty: Female minotaurs are almost twice as tall as humans and have very prominent muscles, that detract in no way from them having shapely, buxom figures.
  • An Odd Place to Sleep: Steela, being half-octopus, sleeps in a large jar, tentacles coiled around her.
  • Artistic License – Biology: The harpies are clearly based more on what would be cool than what would actually work in real life. Especially obvious, since the author's other work, Monster Musume, goes to a great deal of effort to make sure (almost) everyone's biology makes sense. Here, harpies have arms, wings coming out of their backs (and small ones out of their heads), and the women all have large breasts. Monster Musume harpies have arm-wings and apparently pubescent bodies to cut down on weight in order to be able to fly. Possibly justified in that much more things are explicitly magical/supernatural in the 12Beast setting.
    • The reason behind this is actually much simpler, as explained at the end of Volume 1. Okayado was torn between making Aero busty or keeping the idea of streamlined Harpies as in Monster Musume. Cue the Editor.
    Okayado: "Wouldn't a flying character need to be streamlined? But she's the main heroine, and I don't want to disappoint the readers. I'm thinking I should err on the side of bustiness."
    Editor: "Hey, the bigger the better right?"
    Okayado: "Right! Maximum boobage it is!!"
    And that was that.
  • Asskicking Leads to Leadership: In Live-Earth, "biting and clawing your way up the ranks" takes on literal meaning.
  • Attack! Attack! Attack!: The Harpies' initial plan to defeat the Gigas was essentially this. It did not work as well as they thought.
  • Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Harpies are a curious, highly excitable and very energetic race of Autana that can't really be bothered to—wait, was that--? AWESOME!
    • This is even extended to the entire tribe. Even the elders tend to have bad short-term memories.
  • Awesome Personnel Carrier: Stella's shell house is actually a giant hermit crab.
  • Axe-Crazy: The first two Gigas controllers seen at least - the Gamer views his kills merely as points rather than sapient beings and is aiming for a high score, and the Fisher is a misanthrope who enjoys fishing in part because he doesn't have to deal with other humans meanwhile - but since there are aquatic Autana on Live-Earth, he potentially has to deal with them whenever near water, which makes it "unfair" (somehow), and so want to get rid of them. Neither seem to mind that their goals involve the wholesale genocide of several species.
  • Battle Boomerang: A very large one was used by War Leader Jawea as her weapon-of-choice. She claims that it can slice through metal.
  • Beach Episode: Chapter 10 has the group rest up at a beach.
  • Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism: Male Minotaurus look like traditional Minotaurs, complete with large size, muscled bodies, and a bovine head. Female Minotaurus, on the other hand, have female human heads and are much more slender. But they are still very large, have hoofed feet, horns and a tail, and very, very strong.
  • Black Sheep: Aero had the misfortune of seeking sanctuary with the Harpy tribe just before the Gigas attacks started. War Leader Jawea blames it on her black wings. note 
  • The Blacksmith: The Smith of the Labyrinth.
  • Braids, Beads and Buckskins: The attire of the Harpies looks to be inspired by Native Americans.
  • Chronic Hero Syndrome: Aero mentions this is specifically why Eita's brother sent her to him.
  • Cute Monster Girls and Boys: Unlike his other works, Okayado delivers for both genders. While the focus is still mostly on the girls.
  • Dirty Old Man: Eita's grandfather and sensei. His ninja "dummy" would not look out of place in an H-game, and his interest in Eita's PSP is a visual novel—in which he is trying to achieve the "Harem" ending.
    • He gets very excited upon catching Aero's scent—the "scent of a woman."
  • Dungeon Crawling: The Labyrinth is a classic example, filled with treasure and death traps.
  • Eastern Zodiac: The Twelve Divine Generals leading the Gigas invasion are possibly named after the animals in the Zodiac.
  • Ecchi: Less racy than Okayado's better known work, but is still loaded with fan service.
  • Embarrassing Superpower: Eita can perform a Fusion Dance with a Monster Girl to power up his vambrace... which is usually achieved by groping their breasts. The hunter who catches them in the act as he's preparing to snipe them looks shocked.
  • Evil Counterpart: One of the Gigas' controllers is a gamer scoring points by attacking the Autana.
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin: The Gigas Slayer is one of the few things able to kill a Gigas.
  • Fangirl: Aero's a Ninja fangirl.
  • Fantastic Arousal: Harpy wings are extremely sensitive to touch and stimulation. It comes in handy with Eita's fight with the Harpy War Lord.
  • Fastball Special: Eita manages to defeat the giant octopus by getting on Astoria's hammer, and then having the super strong Minotaurus launch him with it straight at the octopus.
  • Fish out of Water: Eita, who spent much of his time after arriving in Live-Earth curled up in the fetal position and playing his PSP because the shock of being in a new world was too much for him.
  • Foreshadowing: In chapter one's full-colour cover, Eita has Aero and 11 other girls with him, all looking ready for combat. How many generals were there, again?
  • Funbag Airbag: In chapter 5, Asterio the Minotaurus is happy to and able to cushion Eita's fall with her boobs without a hint of discomfort from either despite him falling from at least a hundred feet up.
    • Happens again in chapter 14, this time with Asterio cushioning the fall of Eita and his fish-girl companion.
  • Genki Girl: Aero is highly excitable and cheerful. The first thing she does when she arrives at Touga dojo? Examine the weapons and geek out.
    • Later it is shown that she has a room in her house dedicated to all the Ninja merchandise she owns. If you haven't guessed it by now, she's very passionate about things.
  • Giant Squid: The group are attacked at the beach by a giant octopus....who like most cephalopods that appear in manga captures Aero and Jawea and starts groping them.
  • Harping on About Harpies: Chapter 2 introduces a large tribe of harpies. Most of the members were refugees from other (destroyed) villages.
  • Heel–Face Turn: After his defeat, the Hunter abandons the Twelve Divine Generals and becomes a more neutral party, striking up a trade deal to sell off his hunts to the Werewolves in exchange for bullets taken during their raids. If an Omake from the end of the same chapter is to be believed he even helped them learn how to use offal to help curb their food shortage by avoiding waste.
  • Honor Before Reason: Lampshaded and Subverted. War Leader Jawea claims that the Harpy tribe will fend off the Gigas to protect their clan's honour. Eita advocates running away, to which War Leader Jawea (eventually) replies that doing so will leave over half of their tribe—the young, the elderly, and flightless— behind.
  • Hot Springs Episode: The setting of the mini-chapter 4.5, with Aero and Jawea bathing while Eita tries his best to hide from the two of them (especially Jawea).
  • Humongous Mecha: The Gigas are composed entirely of these. The anti-personnel models are large as a house. The ones made for conquering villages? Well...
  • Iron Butt Monkey: Eita just cannot catch a break.
  • Japanese Ranguage: The name of the setting is written as "Live Earth", but pronounced similarly to "reverse".
  • Know When to Fold 'Em: Rather then run into the middle of a battle and show how much stronger he is after the Gigas Slayer is repaired, Eita's first action is to grab Aero and run, since he still has no idea how to use it properly.
  • Light 'em Up: The third Gigas has light powers, meaning both Wave-Motion Gun lasers and an invisibility cloak.
  • Ninja: It's a Touga family tradition.
  • Not What It Looks Like: Hunter sees Flake and Eita in his scope just before their Fusion Dance... meaning he's groping her.
  • The Nudifier: One of the attack of the Gigas is releasing a conductive liquid on a crowd and then coursing some kind of electrical weapon though the afflicted targets. A side affect of the liquid is that is dissolves clothing.
  • Obfuscating Stupidity: Eita in spades. In our world he was actually training in ninja arts, though apparently reluctantly. This makes him far more dangerous and skilled then his outward otaku personality might imply. Then he got an army to back him up.
  • Organic Technology: The Gigas look like giant robots, but aren't made of metal and have disturbing organic traits (like eating prey).
  • Orphaned Series: The manga was cancelled in 2020 before the story could be finished. Okayado has stated that this was for several reasons, but mainly because he had reached a point where he simply wasn't mentally equipped to keep it going.
  • Our Minotaurs Are Different: The Minotaurus of the Labyrinth. Jawea describes them as savage blood-thirsty monsters, although reality proves this is not the case...
  • Pervert Revenge Mode: Like Okayado's other male protagonists, Kimihito Kurusu and Mamoru Onodera, Eita's hands have an almost magnetic attraction to all the wrong places on a woman's body, and the victims do not hesitate to set him straight.
  • Power Fist: Eita has a magical gauntlet that gives him super-strength. It also allows him to borrow the powers of his lieutenants for particularly strong attacks, one of the few things that can destroy a Gigas. Appropriately, it is christened the Gigas Slayer.
    • Eita brought the original version of the gauntlet from Earth. With the help of his ninja training, it could deflect a projectile specifically made to destroy the metal it was made out of.
      • However, during his first battle against a full-sized Gigas, it was destroyed. This prompts him to go to the Minotaurus to have it fixed.
    • These are also the Golem girls' weapons of choice.
  • Schizo Tech: Justified and explained, as Autana (Cute Monster Girls/Boys) and Ausuna (Real World Humans) have been traveling between worlds for a while, so pieces of technology (i.e. a VHS) will get leaked into Live-Earth.
    • Magitek: Chapter 2 explains that, with the technology exchange that happens time to time, magical versions of real-world items were developed. Examples include the crystal ball television and alchemically-powered generators.
    • Chapter 4 reveals that smartphones have made it into Live-Earth, with working reception.
  • Thanks for the Mammary: See Pervert Revenge Mode above. However, Eita is required to grope a monster girl’s breasts in order to transform them into a powered gauntlet for him to use. (More specifically, he has to touch someone's heart. The problem is there's something between him and the heart.)
  • Trapped in Another World: While there is a way to get back to Earth, Aero mentioned that it would take a large amount of magical power to do so and a large amount of time to gather said power. In short, Eita's stuck until he finishes his quest.
  • World of Buxom: So far every female in the story has at least large breasts.
    • No female minotaur shown has breasts smaller than their head.
    • Exceptions: Marina, the merfolk princess (chapter 12) and the golem Theta 0038 (the very end of chapter 23).
  • Why Did It Have To Be Darkness: Harpies in general do not like the dark, and would freak out if someone turns out the lights.
  • Youre Drinking Breastmilk: Subverted. The female Minotaurus have a tendency of serving their guests raw milk. While it is implied that they made it, judging from the dialogue, the focus on their very large breasts, and the other characters' reactions, a cutaway to a picture of cows show that they milked the cows instead.

    One-shot related 
  • Adam Smith Hates Your Guts: Despite saving Live-Earth from the world-destroying threat of the Gigas, Eita's army STILL needs money to function properly. Food doesn't pay for itself, unfortunately.
  • Chronic Hero Syndrome: Much to the detriment of his army, Eita cannot refuse even a broke tribe in the middle of nowhere. It wouldn't be so bad if this weren't the majority of their jobs, though...
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?: The Gigas seems very intent on savouring his meal.
  • Harping on About Harpies:
    • Aero, Eita's assistant. Not to be confused with Aero of Deadline Summoner, who is also a harpy and the protagonist's assistant.
    • A large number of them are also present in Eita's army.
  • Headless Horseman: A female Dullahan shows up riding a centaur.
  • Humongous Mecha: Piloted by the positively adorable golem girls.
  • Mundane Made Awesome: A war game in Eita's PSP and tablet allows him to plan strategies against the Gigas. It translates shockingly well into actual battles.
  • Our Centaurs Are Different: The Centaurs here are similar to ones found in Okayado's other two works. They are more like English knights of a royal court instead of a barbarian horde. They also wear full suits of armor to battle in the one-shot. They also have horse ears instead of human ears.
  • Perpetual Poverty: While Eita's army is powerful in their extreme-coordination, making the best of the different species' strengths, and covering their weaknesses, it is not the best funded. It is not helped by Eita's compulsion to help anyone and everyone suffering from the Gigas, regardless of their ability to compensate them.
  • The Power of Friendship: Eita specifically fights for the sake of saving the Autana and his troops. It's implied that his army stays with and is loyal to him out of a sense of honour and personal debt more than anything else. Which is a very good thing, considering the army is almost always broke.
  • Snake People: Lamiae are another part of Eita's army.
  • The Strategist: Eita plays this role as the general of his army in the One-shot. He also does it again when the Gigas attack the harpies.
  • Stripperiffic: As with Okayado's other works, this is to be expected whenever Cute Monster Girls (and Boys!) are around. For specific examples:
    • Harpy fashion is designed with mobility and flight in mind, keeping materials light and coverage at a minimum.
    • The Lizardmen are highly mobile, and thus wear only a few pieces of armour like steel shoulder pads, gauntlets, and boots.
    • Lamiae are half-snake, and shockingly fast for their size. If anything, armour is superfluous and clothing just a fashion statement.
    • Slimes can't really fit into most conventional clothes, being semi-liquid and naturally slippery.
    • Merfolk and Scylla spend the majority of their time underwater; anything larger and more flowing than a bikini will prove problematic when swimming, unless you specifically design it for hydrodynamics.
    • Kobolds, like Lamiae and Harpies, are a more feral breed of Autana, and use their speed and strength beside, requiring maximum mobility. What little items they don are to look more menacing.
    • Minotaurs are walking tanks. Armour is kept to a minimum, and they enjoy the freedom.
    • It would be problematic for Mummies to keep re-wrapping themselves, magically or not. When their bandages come undone, most just choose to keep it that way.

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