An old school yakuza, Nagamasa Ryumatsu, ended up losing his life due to certain circumstances. But, when he awakened to a strange sort of scenery he had never seen before, he found that he had somehow changed into a beautiful girl!?
Yakuza Reincarnation is written by Takeshi Natsuhara and Hiroki Miyashita and illustrated by Miyashita. It began serialization in Shogakukan's seinen manga magazine Monthly Sunday Gene-X on July 19, 2019. Shogakukan has collected its chapters into individual tankōbon volumes. The first volume was released on January 17, 2020. As of May 19, 2021, five volumes have been released.
In July 2021, Seven Seas Entertainment announced that they had licensed the manga for English release in North America, to start publishing in March 2022.
Tropes found in Yakuza Reincarnation
- Abdicate the Throne: Princess Ryuu does so informally, despite the protests of her followers. She allows her brother to steal the crown with no resistance and only remains in the capital long enough to say goodbye to her father and rescue one of her brother's victims.
- Action Girl: Nagamasa Ryumatsu (Now as Princess Ryuu) still retains her badass Yakuza skills and personality from her past life.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: The girl who was selected to imposter Ryuu had always dreamed of being a princess. Not everything about being a princess is glamorous, and it doesn't take long until the people using her decide on You Have Outlived Your Usefulness.
- Brought Down to Normal: After pushing herself too hard fighting one of the demon king's fragments, Princess Ryuu temporarily loses her superhuman abilities. Even then, she continues acting like she still has them. Naturally, this gets her in trouble later, since no matter how skilled she is, she's just a weak little girl without them.
- Cain and Abel: Princess Ryuu's father recognized her as his successor due to divination, and asked her brother to be her protector. He agreed, but was privately Driven by Envy and started scheming to take her place and kill her.
- The Chosen One: It is implied that the Goddess chose Princess Ryuu to fight the Demon King. Between the Royalty Superpower inherited from her ancestors, the second guiding tree granted by her status as a Samsara user, and absorbing a dragon's blood, she is the first to be able to destroy the Demon King's fragments for good.
- Does Not Like Men: Nui, to the point she can't even stomach touching her fellow retainer Dimitri.
- Drugs Are Bad: Ryumatsu maintains a low opinion of users and lower still for peddlers. The fact that the local narcotics are apparently made by actual demons doesn't help.
- Evil Is Visceral: The demons all have or inflict some degree of grotesque deformation.
- Faking the Dead: Princess Ryuu's brother gives up on killing her and lies that she's dead, since there is little chance she can still contest the crown and out of guilt for murdering his teacher.
- Fantastic Drug: It's a byproduct of demons. It has corrupting properties and a chance of its users developing Lovecraftian Superpowers.
- Fiery Redhead: Princess Ryuu had pinkish-red hair and she cursed when she sometimes lose her temper.
- Frame-Up: Princess Ryuu's brother arranges for their father's murder in her presence so that he can have his supporters declare her guilty of Patricide and sentence her to death by decapitation.
- Freudian Excuse: Princess Ryuu's brother suffered a traumatic incident while helping their mother resecure the seal on the Demon King's body, watching her and most of the soldiers they brought with them (who he knew by name) die horrific deaths.
- Gender Bender: Ryumatsu is mildly taken aback to see that he reincarnated as the opposite sex.
- Hybrid Discrimination: Races that have been mixed with demon traits, such as dark elves, are distrusted and treated poorly, because their ancestors sided with the invaders, and even innocent descendants are vulnerable to Demonic Possession.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: Princess Ryuu's brother has replaced her with an impostor. Since Princess Ryuu is currently left with her only her Past-Life Memories, and her previous incarnation's personality is a lot more aggressive than her current incarnation's, a lot of people believe her to be a Criminal Doppelgänger of her own self. And while a lot of her actions are popular with the people, she has also annoyed a lot of high ranking officials, resulting in rumors spreading the worst possible interpretation of her deeds.
- Horrible Judge of Character: The personality of Princess Ryuu's current incarnation was very kind, and very trusting of people that didn't deserve that trust.
- Mistaken for an Imposter: While Princess Ryuu inherited enough of Ryumatsu's personality for close servants like Nui and Giovanni to notice the similarities, Ryumatsu's far more aggressive personality makes it easy for her brother to frame her as a Criminal Doppelgänger when Ryumatsu's personality takes over.
- The Lad-ette: Ryuu is a dangerous Yakuza and man in past life so she can be very unladylike so she don’t mind drinking an entire barrel, getting half-naked and beating up enemies that are bigger and stronger than her.
- Little Miss Badass: Ryuu is around 14-15 year old and had a petite figure but can fight and beat guys who is older and taller than her.
- Neighbourhood-Friendly Gangsters: Nagamasa Ryumatsu's type of Yakuza, which ultimately got him betrayed and murdered by less friendly gangsters.
- Noble Fugitive: After an assassination attempt and being framed as a Criminal Doppelgänger, Princess Ryuu and her most loyal servants are on the run in search of a place she can take refuge. After several places reject her, she eventually finds one with the dwarves, but Nui's infection by Demonic Possession forces the group to leave in search of treatment. Not long after, her remaining supporters beg her to come back home for her father's last moments and to deal with The Coup staged by her brother. She ultimately rejects the throne and allows her brother to exile her permanently, with the lie that she was successfully executed for alleged treason and pretending the real her is an imposter.
- Other Me Annoys Me: It is implied that Princess Ryuu's personality has been unconscious since her near death experience, but she is still vaguely aware of what her past life personality has been doing in her place, and she does not approve of his violent methods.
- Our Mages Are Different: Magic in this setting is based on guiding trees. Guiding trees are based on a person's family history, as well as their own training and accomplishments. Some guiding trees specialize in reinforcing one's own body, while others specialize in manipulating the environment. Most people only have one, but those who recover their Past-Life Memories inherit a second tree based on their previous life.
- Reincarnated as the Opposite Sex: Nagamasa Ryumatsu was an elderly male Yakuza in his previous life. After being murdered, the Goddess reincarnated him as Princess Ryuu. Princess Ryuu had no memories of her previous life, but after nearly being assassinated by her brother, her personality effectively fell unconscious while her past life personality woke up. Ryumatsu is mildly taken aback by his current body and only has limited access to his other self's memories, effectively becoming The Lad-ette.
- Reincarnate in Another World: Nagamasa Ryumatsu is a Yakuza from Reiwa Period and end up reincarnated as Princess Ryuu Lundberg in a fantasy land. In this case it's likely quite literal as later in the story, it's heavily implied that he was Princess Ryuu's past life and the incident from the start merely awakened his personality from deep within her.
- It is later revealed that this makes him a Samsara user. Very rarely, the residents of this world will inherit Past-Life Memories from other worlds, allowing them to bring societal and technological revolutions, as well as granting them a second guiding tree.
- Royalty Superpower: Princess Ryuu's family is descended from ancient heroes. However, Princess Ryuu long failed to awaken her inherited power, creating a reputation as an Inadequate Inheritor. Her royal power and her power as a reincarnation wake up at the same time due to an assassination attempt that nearly killed her and woke up her Past-Life Memories.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: The Demon King was immortal beyond even the goddess's ability to kill him, so the ancient heroes had to settle for cutting him into pieces and locking them up. Princess Ryuu turns out to be the first hero capable of destroying the Demon King's fragments for good.
- Self-Made Orphan: In order to claim the throne, Princess Ryuu's brother murders their father and uses a Frame-Up on her.
- Shameless Fanservice Girl: Because she is a man in past life, Ryuu isn’t fazed when she removed her panties to see her genitals and getting topless.
- Split Personality: Princess Ryuu and Ryumatsu are implied to be different incarnations of the same person and share some basic personality traits, but exist as separate personalities with only occasional access to one another's memories.
- Standard Japanese Fantasy Setting: Ryuu's world ticks many boxes, foremost the world-threatening Demon King who was locked up three thousand years back by a coalition of elves, dwarves, and humans.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Ryuu is a badass princess who is a powerful Yakuza in past life and isn’t afraid to fight dirty while Nui is a shy wizard Elf who use her magic to heal and support others.
- Tomboy Princess: Thanks to remembering her past life as a Badass male Yakuza and losing the memories of her current incarnation, Ryuu is very tomboyish and unladylike like drinking an entire barrel, went topless when fishing and beat up powerful enemies using Hand-to-hand Combat or swordsmanship.
- Trademark Favourite Food: Ryuu (Nagamasa Ryumatsu in past life) loved strawberry milk.
- Weakened by the Light: Demons are vulnerable to sunlight.
- When All You Have Is a Hammer…: Ryumatsu has two major skills—underworld politics and fighting. After reincarnating as Princess Ryuu, there has yet to be a situation where these talents aren't applicable.
