Manga / Zatch Bell! 2

"When we meet again, we'll have grown into adults who can face each other with our heads held high. It's a promise, Kiyomaro."

—Gash Bell

Zatch Bell! 2, or Konjiki no Gash!! 2 (Golden Gash!! 2), is the 2022 sequel to the original manga from 2001, written and illustrated by Makoto Raiku with chapters published online on the 14th of each month in Japan. The compiled volumes are self-published by Birgdin Board Corp.

Once every thousand years, 100 children from the "demon world" are sent to Earth to join forces with humans and fight amongst themselves to determine who'll be the next king of their homeland. In modern times, a certain pair made it to victory after numerous trials, the new king was crowned and ushered in a new era of peace for the demon world... until disaster struck.

The truth behind the demon world is exposed and a new menace seeks to eradicate all of its people, leading a trio of desperate children to make a dangerous gamble: fleeing to the human world in search of the King's partner, the one who can turn despair into hope. The man, the myth, the legend... Kiyomaro Takamine.

Spoilers for the original series will be unmarked.

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This manga contains the following tropes:

• Alien Invasion: The story's premise is the sudden invasion of the demon world by monstrous beings from a third dimension who start destroying and killing everyone indiscriminately while the heroes are unable to fight back due to having their spell powers drained.
• Ambiguously Human: The new villains were first alluded to by the former demon king Dauwan in the final "Gash Café" chapter as "those not of this world". Kiyomaro asks Waig what he is, stating the man doesn't give the same feeling as the demons he's seen before. Waig actually doesn't know what exactly he is, and just explains his name is what's written on his "card". His partner Gill looks like a completely mundane child and calls himself a former human. Something's off about him too and Zahara can tell from his Killing Intent that she shouldn't get anywhere close to him.
• Amusing Injuries:
  • When Kiyomaro is saved from Waig by Mippy and returns to the village he's been taking care of, his face suddenly gets comically disfigured and his hair is disheveled. Hardly the heroic image Zelie was looking for, but he soon regains his composure to look after her and Olmo.
  • Gash likewise gets his face rearranged by Tio for not telling her about the plans for his resurrection. He goes back to normal in a page, but remains all bruised for the rest of Chapter 16.
• Anger Born of Worry: When Tio learns that Gash's sacrifice was a gamble meant to revive him in the human world, she is outraged that she was despairing over nothing. Gash and the giant dragon Ashuron are horrified, with the king babbling that he had confidence in Tio's strength but worried she would spill the beans to the enemy. Tio then grabs Gash by the shoulders and beats the snot out of him like he's a ragdoll.
• Apathetic Citizens:
  • The Egyptian citizens at the beginning of the story barely notice the battle between Kiyomaro and transformed Waig.
  • Averted by the battle between Kanchomé and Levy Zinc in Italy. The civilians actually try to help Folgore and there's enough turmoil for the police to be alerted. They all just poof out of reality once Gash arrives and solves the incident, though.
• The Artifact: Kiyomaro doesn't need to point and shout "Set" as a trigger word every time he wants Gash to focus on a target because the boy doesn't lose consciousness from using his powers anymore. He does it as much as possible anyway just to make sure and because it's freaking cool.
• Attack Its Weak Point: While transformed, Waig is a cyclops with an exposed brain and some human traffickers try shooting him in the eye to no avail. Later, Kiyomaro subconsciously knows the monster's weakness isn't the eye or the brain but rather the mouth area covered by his mask and hacks at it with a pickaxe. With repeated Zakeruga blows, Gash then uncovers some kind of core behind the mask and pierces through it to defeat the villain.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Kanchomé's recollection of escaping from the demon world with Consomme reveals there were skyscraper-sized monsters tearing the whole place apart, on top of the giant dragon who stole everyone's spells.
• Audience Surrogate: The story dramatizes the reunions between the bookkeepers and their grown-up demon partners for all their worth, as readers who come back to the series after the 14 years between installments are as happy to see Gash and Kanchomé again as are Kiyomaro and Folgore.
• Awesomeness by Analysis:
  • During the battles between Gash and Kiyomaro against Waig and Gill, Kiyomaro reads his opponents' moves while taking an active role in the battle. In contrast, Gill sits back while observing and everything he advises Waig to do manages to backfire due to Kiyomaro's manipulations.
  • Kanchomé heavily injures the assassins sent after him by tricking them into the path of a train. The human of the pair has a long-winded monologue about what Kanchomé just did, how much the train weighed and how fast it was going... just to say it hurts a lot, not actually bothering to calculate how much force they were just hit with.
• Back from the Dead:
  • Gash resurrects both Zelie and Olmo, using them as vessels to take his life energy to Kiyomaro. He also preserved the souls of 10 million other demons with this ability and apparently died from the process. Even then, all the victims were left as disembodied souls barely clinging to the physical realm. Gash is then revived from a mummified body, and notes that it isn't his true body even though it seems to work just fine.
  • Beliel's henchmen are all warriors and wizards raised from death and convinced to work for him.
  • Brago is one of the demons who got killed somehow during the war, but Apollo brings his sarcophagus to Sherry at the end of chapter 17.
• Badass Normal:
  • Albeit via Brought Down to Normal after being stripped of his spells. Yet Vincent Bari remains powerful enough to curb-stomp a Blood Knight in Beliel's employ who's armed with spells in a briefcase.
  • Brago has doubled in size and hulked out a lot, so now he can slaughter giant foes with his bare hands. Kiyomaro figures he only asks Sherry to cast spells to show off.
  • The bookkeepers show this as well. Folgore wrestles a spell-enhanced monster off of Kanchomé with his bare hands, and Sherry stands up to three monsters at once to protect her kids, both showing superhuman will to keep fighting even when their bodies are wrecked. And Megumi is just as strong, able to scare one of the monsters with the strength of her conviction.
• Bait-and-Switch: Kanchomé is reintroduced as having survived the invasion because he was among the first to run away, with Kiyomaro unsurprised that of course Kanchomé fled the fight. The story goes on to show Kanchomé's flight was to protect his younger brother at the urging of the rest of their family, including using himself as bait while sending said brother to Folgore and using the last of his spells to lure his pursuers into a trap.
• Battle Butler: Sherry's butler and guardian, Albert, debuts in the story as a sniper who shoots one of Belial's servants in the hand to save one of Sherry's sons.
• BFS: Prince Pola and The Witch cast Earth's powerful Jan Ji Sorudo giant sword spell and further enhance it with some dark chanting. It gets the honor of being the first thing in the sequel to land a solid hit on Gash through his fortified Rashield.
• Big Bad: The "alien" forces who attacked the Demon World are led by a mysterious man named Beliel.
• Big Damn Heroes: This happens in almost every conflict.
  • Kiyomaro confronts Waig and Gill in the end of the first chapter to save Zelie and Olmo.
  • Mippy drags Kiyomaro out of peril when it looks like Waig has killed him with Zakeruga.
  • Kiyomaro manages to summon Gash into the human world via a mummy and the boy covers him from Waig's massive hit, finally turning the odds against the villains.
  • Folgore saves Kanchomé from being devoured by a demonic hound in a most ludicrously badass fashion, pulling its spell-boosted jaws wide open while once again boasting being a hippo-man and a protector of children.
  • When Folgore is cornered by two beasts summoned by Levy, the Yellow Spellbook answers Kanchomé's desire to fight and appears before them to allow the duo to put up a proper fight against the villains.
  • When Kanchomé beats Levy and makes peace by giving Gozer and Hyros back to her, a militarized police squad attempts to kill them all. Luckily, Gash and Kiyomaro arrive on the scene and cast Rashield to deflect all the bullets away.
  • Tio does her damnedest to protect a group of townsfolk from the invaders but is reduced to helplessly trying to cast Saifojio on a child that had been mortally wounded. Megumi, who was just performing at a concert with only a gut feeling of what was happening, breaks through the wall of fire that was cast around the stadium and is warped by her spellbook to Tio's side to help protect everyone, casting Saifojio on the child to save him.
    • Shortly afterward, as soon as the bad guys realize that Tio and Megumi only have defensive spells at their disposal, Gash and Kiyomaro warp via their spellbook and proceed to tag team the entire army that had been sent after Tio.
  • Sherry is about to get killed by a bunch of monsters when she hears the voice of the reportedly dead Brago calling out to her. She runs outside and finds Apollo arriving in a helicopter to deliver a sarcophagus with a backup body for Brago inside.
    • And in the next chapter, when a blank spellbook appears for Brago, Kiyomaro and Gash arrive just in time to stop the bad guys from destroying the helicopter, then steal back the vial with Gravirei and Gigano Reis and give it to Sherry, allowing her to reenergize Brago's book.
    • And then, right as one of the bad guys is about to use the energy boost from Leo's berserker spell to cut the resurrection ritual short and kill Sherry and Brago, Brago emerges from the coffin, blocks the blow with one arm, and murders him with his bare hands.
• Big Good: While Gash is the protagonist, king to the demons, and up-and-coming Hope Bringer, Ashuron is shown to be a vital leader in the war for the demon world. He turns the city of the Dragon Clan into a fortress to protect survivors at the cost of his own health and tasks the king with gathering all the bookkeepers so they can properly combat the invaders.
• Black Comedy: In Brago's introductory scene, he explodes Zillion's arm and effortlessly decapitates him, only pausing right before to ask Sherry to stop being flabbergasted and force the villain to his knees for him. As Kiyomaro watches the severed head flying into orbit, he asks himself what even was the point of the spell.
• Breaking the Cycle of Bad Parenting: Sherry Belmont's first appearance at the end of Chapter 16: she praises her sons and daughter for their excellent performances and says that they never cease to make her proud, a staunch difference from how Sherry's mother was so verbally abusive and hard to please that she drove her to attempt suicide. And while Sherry still encourages them to push themselves, she also tells them it's OK to stop if they need to.
• Break the Haughty: Sherry's son Nicolas has a jaded outlook on life, seeing his mother as weak and foolish and planning to be like his cheating (but wealthy) father. Then Beliel's servants come after him and his siblings, and Sherry goes full Mama Bear to protect her kids. Nicolas is left bawling as he tries throwing stones at the monsters to help his mother.
• Brick Joke:
  • Folgore fends off Gozer while repeatedly asking people to hit the beast with a car or something. After Levy transforms into a giant monster, somebody does hit her with an ambulance, but is unfortunately wrecked for his troubles.
  • The Witch sits by a set of stairs twice with a depressed look on her face twice when she's denied from entering the stadium Megumi is performing on. Later, Gash and Kiyomaro leave The Witch and Pola in the dust by warping into the Demon World to help Tio and Megumi, so a disgruntled Pola joins her at the stairs.
  • While spending the night waiting for Megumi's concert, the Witch is shown watching television. The next day she drops a reference to Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury, confusing Kiyomaro as to when she found time to watch anime.
• Broken Tears: Tio seeing a child she was protecting take a mortal wound leaves her on her knees, desperately trying to invoke her lost Saifojio spell while tears stream down her face. Amusingly, after reuniting with Megumi and saving the child's life, Tio claims she never cried at all and tries to hide her tearstreaked face from Megumi.
• Brought Down to Badass:
  • Even after the demons are robbed of their spells, they are still physically very strong. Waig mentions that Ted and Rein gave him some trouble even without any powers and Barry easily beats a duo of assassins with his bare hands and forces the identity of the invaders out of them.
  • Losing spells has not taken away the demons' innate abilities. Ashuron manages to turn his homeland into a fortress of scales, and Gorm handles teleportation of airships from a pocket dimension to help everyone. They worry that even such innate abilities might be taken away, though.
• Brought Down to Normal:
  • In the original series, everyone learned some pretty Earth-shaking abilities. Too bad a massive wyrm drains the spell abilities out of the demon people and the other villains burn all the spellbooks they can find, rendering all the good guys powerless. It is explained that physically powerful demons like Rein and Ted still held their own for a while until Waig and the other aliens acquired the stolen spells to overwhelm them.
  • Downplayed with the revived Gash. He starts out with only Zakeru but also retains his inhuman strength and the Badass Cape that allows him to cover from attacks and fly while Kiyomaro rides on it. The duo soon regains control over Rashield and Zakeruga, and on top of each spell being powered up, Rashield can now be summoned wherever Gash points at.
• Call-Back:
  • The opening page of Volume 1 is a reverse Bookends — it quotes Gash's promise to Kiyomaro from the final pages of the original series, about how they must become exemplary adults and reunite someday.
  • When Levy expresses disbelief that a human like Folgore can overpower her Gozer, he refers to himself as a hippo like he did in his final battle in the previous series and recites his line about hippos being strongest when protecting their children again. Upon encountering Kiyomaro at the end of the battle, they reference their first meeting and Folgore asks that they skip the part where he got shocked several times.
  • Kiyomaro uses Zakeru to shut someone up yet again and even mentions he's doing so for the sake of the joke.
  • Megumi is warped into the Demon World by her spellbook to help a depowered Tio save a dying child, much like Kiyomaro in the "Friend" epilogue to the original series.
• The Cameo: Out of all characters, Hige (Zoboron's former partner) makes a brief appearance in Egypt, working at the village Kiyomaro was living in. Kiyomaro doesn't have the faintest memory of who he is.
• Car Fu: While trying to keep Gozer from attacking a bunch of civilians in a hospital, Folgore keeps shouting at them to crash a car into the beast. Eventually, somebody does hit the transformed Levy with an ambulance but gets tossed aside, much to Folgore's shock.
• Casual Danger Dialogue: In the middle of an otherwise serious reunion between Tio and Megumi, with hostiles all around, the singer still has time to laugh when Tio, who's denying that she had been crying, looks back to scold her for leaving in the middle of a concert to rescue her.
• Chekhov's Gun: The paper with a scribble of Kiyomaro that Ziggy hands out to Zelie is actually the first page of Gash's spellbook. It allows Kiyomaro to summon Gash from a mummified body hidden inside a temple and cast Zakeru at Waig.
• The Chosen Many: Kiyomaro manages to bring life into 27 spellbooks and is asked by Ashuron to gather all the people chosen by them as soon as possible. Thus far, only five have been revealed.
• The Comically Serious: Kiyomaro again. One of the girls at the orphanage loves having him read her a children's book just to see and hear him reciting the silly lines of dialogue with his dead serious face.
• Cowardly Lion:
  • Kanchomé is said to have been the first to flee from the alien invasion, but he is spurred by his family into doing so to protect his little brother Consomme and make it to Folgore. He still has a bottle with his Poruku spell and manages to trick his pursuers into getting hit by a train, only being outplayed because they possess Saifojio, Tio's healing spell.
  • Folgore swerves between being terrified of facing another demonic war with none of Kanchomé's powerful illusionary spells and being highly courageous and reliable, readily throwing himself in the way of danger to protect Kanchomé and any nearby civilians.
• Curb-Stomp Battle:
  • Despite only having the first spell Zakeru, Kiyomaru and Gash run circles around Waig the moment they’re back together. Even when Waig tries using Zakeruga against them, Gash’s Zakeru, which is one level below Zakeruga, easily overpowers it. It doesn’t take long for Kiyomaru and Gash to steal back the vial containing Gash’s Rashield and Zakeruga and when they have them, the battle becomes even easier for the two. Gill then tries to help Waig by empowering the monster with high-level fire spells, but the two are out-maneuvered anyway until Gash destroys Waig's weak point.
  • The fight between the reunited Gash-Kiyomaro and Tio-Megumi pairs and the army attacking the demon refugees is over so easily the story doesn't even bother showing it.
  • In Chapter 18, when Brago emerges ready to fight, he obliterates half of his attacker's arm with a normal punch before Sherry can cast a spell. Kiyomaro blandly notes that Brago doesn't even need his spells; the only reason Brago had Sherry cast Gravirei was so he could punch off his foe's head instead of his other arm.
• Dangerous Forbidden Technique: Waig fights Gash and Kiyomaro to the bitter end by empowering himself with many fire spells, including one that boosts his strength with self-immolation, which would cause him to die in just 45 seconds. Gash and Kiyomaro mortally wound him faster than that.
• Darker and Edgier: The original series ended with an Everybody Lives ending. Despite all the violence and pain everyone went through, aside from two demons that comprised part of Faudo's internal organs, no one actually died. The sequel opens with a demon child getting bisected and killed a few pages in, with a few from the original series shown either dead or at least heavily injured and unconscious, showing that the stakes are much higher than before.
• Deer in the Headlights: Kiyomaro completely freezes in anger and is nearly killed when Waig proclaims he has killed Gash and casts Zakeruga as proof.
• Deus ex Machina:
  • Zelie and Ziggy escape into the human world by using The Device That Once Sent Faudo Back to The Demon World, even though Gash had previously failed to use it to keep contact with Kiyomaro and the others. Kiyomaro wonders whatever happened to the entities behind the spellbooks for that travel method to have been possible.
  • Averted with the destruction of the Demon Kingdom, as it happened without Kiyomaro or any of the book holders knowing, even though the spellbooks' god-like creators had previously summoned humans to help Dauwan's generation against a previous invasion and also Kiyomaro to help a depowered Gash before. This ties to their ominous remark from the final "Gash Café" side chapter that they would eventually be unable to help the Demon World against alien threats.
• Deus Exit Machina: When Gash and Kiyomaro are alerted at night that Megumi is in danger, Kanchomé and Folgore are both in something of a plot-induced coma and don't wake up no matter how much Gash shakes them. This forces the main duo to deal with the situation on their own, and ensures the spotlight will be focused on Tio and Megumi when the time for their reunion comes.
• Did You Actually Believe...?: In chapter 19, Brago mocks Zillion for targeting Sherry believing she would be an easy target. Pointing out that as powerful as he is, the fact that she was partnered with him, was proof of just how capable she was in combat.
  Brago: You should know better than to take Sherry lightly. How could you have gone and made the fatal mistake....OF UNDERESTIMATING MY PARTNER?
• Downer Beginning: The story opens with two demon children named Zelie and Ziggy running in desperation from a being who seeks to eradicate demonkind and who has already killed Ted, Cherish, Rein and even Gash. After escaping to the human world at the cost of Ziggy's life, Zelie stumbles around Egypt hopelessly looking for Kiyomaro and nearly gets caught by human traffickers before Kiyomaro does enter the scene like a savior.
• Dramatic Irony: Beliel prioritizes the assassination of the 10 top fighters of the last demon children war. Even discounting White, as nobody but Gash knows he used to be Clear Note, that includes Papipurio and Lupa, who only made it to 8th place by way of alliances and conflict avoidance. Furthermore, Beliel is largely ignorant of other major threats who had every possibility of reaching the top 10 themselves, particularly Vincent Bari.
• Due to the Dead: Gash and Kiyomaro pay respects at the makeshift grave where Zelie buried Ziggy before leaving Egypt, with Kiyomaro remarking the body should be moved to a graveyard later. This further emphasizes the darker tone of the sequel by confirming Ziggy died for real.
• Eldritch Abomination: The entire population of the demon world had their powers drained and swallowed by a titanic flying draconic serpent with Nested Mouths that's seemingly of alien origin.
• Empowered Badass Normal: Kiyomaro's great athleticism, combat experience, and Answer Talker precognition ability let him face a giant monster like Waig with no fear. He brings a pickaxe for their second fight and actually dishes out damage with a well-aimed stab to the face.
• Everyone Has Standards: An assumed case for Beliel. Pola mentions that Beliel's rule is if any of his pairs of hunters fail to claim their targets, one of them must pay with their lives. He takes that this doesn't happen to himself or the Witch after Gash and Kiyomaro escape them by inexplicably teleporting away as a sign that Beliel acknowledges there was nothing they could do.
• Evil Gloating:
  • As Gash blocks and deflects the weapons on Waig's multiple arms, he asks what was the need to attack an orphanage with such power. Waig replies he had a blast terrorizing all the children and killing those who were protecting them. He then rubs it in by declaring Gash's own Rashield was key in defeating Rein and Ted, who could still fight and injure him while depowered.
  • Prince Pola spends his battle with Gash demoralizing him for failing to save his kingdom and bragging about how Tio is under attack as he and Kiyomaro can't bring the Vermillion Spellbook to Megumi.
• Exotic Eye Designs: Curiously averted with Kiyomaro as of the first volume. He lacks the signature ringed eyes that Answer-Talker users and other paranormal characters in the series have, even though all his actions point to him having diligently trained that ability in the interim between the original series and this sequel.
• Experienced Protagonist: Even before reuniting with Gash, Kiyomaro shows that he hasn't missed a beat in the years since the last series, and can run circles around Waig with little more than his wits and a pickax. The only thing that catches him off-guard is Waig and Gill using Gash's own spells against him.
• Failed Attempt at Drama: When Levy asks Folgore who he is after he slams one of her beasts onto the ground, Folgore declares himself "the hero of Italy" but can barely hide the muscular pain he feels from suddenly exerting so much effort. Kanchomé also boastfully introduces himself... while collapsed on the floor. Levy still takes them seriously, introduces herself and points at her partner... who is also splattered on the ground. After being healed, said partner proudly introduces himself as "Bristly Prickly Nosehair Boo". Both Folgore and Kanchomé can't help but laugh at him.
• Fling a Light into the Future: Egyptians from 3015 years previously foretold a great disaster to the demon world and built a temple containing a blank spellbook and several sarcophagi that resemble the demons Kiyomaro is familiar with. It is implied that Kiyomaro can use them to revive his old allies who got killed by the alien menace.
• Forgot About His Powers: Curiously, the early chapters dance around the issue of whether or not Kiyomaro still has his Answer-Talker power. His evasion skills and accomplishments as a young archeologist point to him having it, but he does not display the associated ringed eyes. He and Gash rescuing Folgore and Kanchomé in Italy is explained as them coincidentally coming across Consomme and tracking Folgore by the GPS of his manager.
• Godzilla Threshold: Megumi sensing Tio needs her prompts her to abandon her ongoing concert, telling her manager if she isn't back briefly to give everyone a full refund, free tickets to another concert, and a promise of autographs and other incentives. Even Tio, who just saved a child's life thanks to Megumi's timely arrival, is shocked and briefly protests Megumi leaving her fans in the lurch.
• Graceful Loser: Waig fights Kiyomaro and Gash with abilities that would burn himself to death in less than a minute. When it doesn't take, and the heroes are about to lethally shoot through his weakness, he silently expresses admiration for Kiyomaro's courage and bids farewell to Gill.
• Gratuitous English:
  • In the original Japanese, Kiyomaro adding the first page of Gash's spellbook has him exclaiming "The Page 1 of the fragment of life called the 'spellbook'!", matching how each chapter is now called a "Page" instead of a "Level" like in the original series.
  • When Kiyomaro and Gash are shown at an airport in chapter 8, there's a cafeteria named "FOOD&COFE" in the background.
• Gratuitous Italian: Folgore speaks in his mother tongue in certain scenes, such as shouting, "Nuova pagina!! Nuovo incantesimo!!" (A new page!! A new spell!!) upon reacquiring his spellbook. That particular scene was also misspelled as "nuova" in both sentences, even though "incantesimo" is a male noun.
• Gratuitous Japanese: Dr. Riddles' hospital shown in Chapter 20 is called "Nazonazo Medical Corporation", in which "nazonazo" is Japanese for "riddle".
• Happy Ending Override:
  • Previously, Gash and Kiyomaro saved their home worlds and parted ways after Gash was declared the new king, hoping to eventually meet again in "a bigger way than saving the world". This sequel starts with the Demon Kingdom in ruins, Gash being presumed dead, and Kiyomaro unable to do much against the new antagonists on his own.
  • Sherry became a proud mother to two boys named Nicolas and Jean and a girl named Flora... but she's stuck in a loveless marriage to an unfaithful businessman to preserve her family's status as nobles. And then monstrous assassins attempt to kidnap her children.
• Height Angst: Gash is an adult in this series but is shorter than Kiyomaro was as a teen. He explains demons mature at different rates and laments how his brother Zeon has grown much taller than him. The reason for this is probably because, as the Demon King, Gash has a much longer lifespan than others and the rate of his maturity was slowed as a result. ^note Patie explained in Gash Café 7 that a demon's lifespan varies from 100, 500, and 700 years, while the Demon King and anyone they choose can live over 1000 years.
• Heroic Sacrifice:
  • The reason Gash is said to have died in the beginning is because he split his soul between Zelie and Olmo, as well as 10 million other demons, to bring them back from death. Only Zelie and Olmo are properly revived, though, while the others remain as souls hidden away from the invaders. Gash's gamble results in his "fragments of life" being brought out of Zelie and Olmo to revive himself from a mummified body.
  • Kanchomé uses himself as bait to lure his pursuers away from Consomme and runs as far as he can from Folgore's house, expecting to die as he only has a few uses of Poruku left to try to hide or trap his enemies. When he's cornered and on the brink of death, Folgore arrives to rescue him.
  • When Levy is defeated, and it is clear that Kanchomé means no harm to her anymore, Nosehair Boo sacrifices his life to the Doruku spell, and his body is consumed by it in her place.
  • Ashuron overloads his powers to cover the land of the Dragon Clan in his durable scales, which leaves him fused to a throne and takes a heavy toll on his body.
• He's Back!: The story starts with Gash being presumed to have been killed by the villains, and Kiyomaro can't seem to use Answer Talker to figure out his fate. In chapter 4, while Kiyomaro is fighting Waig in a temple featuring some oddly familiar sarcophagi, it is revealed Gash had imbued Zelie and Olmo with his power and given a page of his spellbook to Ziggy. With the page in hand, Kiyomaro is able to summon Gash from one of the mummified bodies and the two get straight to business by hitting Waig head-on with a Zakeru.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Gill and Waig set a last-ditch attack upon Kiyomaro and Gash, holding them between massive claws covered in a sea of flames. Gill believes there is no way the duo will be able to defend for long or retaliate with Gash's cape, all the fire and the debris of Rashield in the way, but in a split-second, they do while he's the one whose vision is fully obscured.
• Hold the Line: In the beginning, Kiyomaro stops Waig from killing Zelie but only avoids his attacks and tries to hold a conversation with the villain with no means of striking back.
• Hope Bringer: Before sacrificing himself, Ziggy asks Zelie to seek out Kiyomaro, "the King's partner who can create hope out of despair."
• How Do I Shot Web?: After unlocking a spell that turns himself into a giant Waddling Head, Kanchomé has to figure out what it actually does. So he ends up swallowing Gozer and realizes he can turn enemies into his clones by munching them, and then instinctively moves his arms to command the beasts he has infected.
• Hyperactive Metabolism: After saving Zelie and Olmo, Kiyomaro hands his spare money out to Zahara and asks her to buy as much food as possible for the orphanage. Not only do Zelie and Olmo eat far too much for their tiny sizes, but they are also completely healed of their injuries. The infant Olmo even suddenly starts walking and talking, much to Zahara's disbelief as Kiyomaro insists it happened because they are demon children.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: The chapters are now called "Pages" instead of "Levels" and lack titles for some reason.
• Instant Expert: Kanchomé uses his Mo Poruku spell to transform and control both Gozer and Hyros, but Nosehair Boo doubts the duck-boy can manipulate the physiology of two entirely different creatures with any effectiveness. And yet, Kanchomé subdues Levy effortlessly with the two beasts, boasting that as the one who mastered the ultimate mind control spell, Shin Poruku, it is a piece of cake to him.
• It Can Think: The spellbooks are shown to be sentient and Tio's book urges Kiyomaro and Gash to come with it to Megumi in order to protect her from assassins. This is a behavior they never displayed in the original series, where they at most were used as mouthpieces by the unseen god who made them.
• Kid Hero All Grown-Up:
  • Kiyomaro has gone from (graduating) middle school student to a highly respected globe-trotting archeologist in the intervening years between the original story and this one.
  • Gash looks like a teenager but is actually a 19-year-old adult. Over the years, Gash has become a responsible and beloved king to the demon world and is determined to save it from the alien invaders.
  • Kanchomé grew taller than Gash but is also as baby-faced as before. He had been leading a normal life with his family before the invasion of the demon world.
  • Tio has grown into something of an Amazonian Beauty. She is rather tall and muscular and is re-introduced to the story lifting weights bigger than she is.
  • Brago has become monstrously powerful. He's still humanoid, but he's now about twice as tall as Sherry with muscles that would make a bodybuilder jealous.
• Kill It with Fire:
  • The demon spellbooks, which are more emphasized to be living beings in this sequel, must naturally be kept as far as possible from fire.
  • As a last resort against Gash, Gill displays the ability to manipulate demon spells without a spellbook and empowers Waig with several fire abilities, from covering his body in flames to firing bursts of meteors. They go as far as to trap Gash and Kiyomaro within a cage of hellfire, but Gash's cape both defends against it and blows the flames away, securing a winning blow on Waig.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: Readers are expected to know that Gash and Kiyomaro were the champions of the latest Demon War.
• Legendary in the Sequel: Kiyomaro is considered a great hero by demonkind due to his and Gash's feats throughout the 100 demon children tournament. To mankind, he is a world-famous professor who's discovered many archaeological sites, presumably thanks to his Answer-Talker superpower.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: While deprived of her shield and barrier spells, Tio protects villagers and fights the invaders at the same time by wielding two huge shields on chains.
• Mama Bear: Sherry Belmont grew up into a dignified woman who perfectly embodies the prestige of her family. But when Beliel's henchmen come after her kids, she easily and relentlessly stands up to them, not hesitating to risk her life for theirs.
• Meaningful Echo:
  • Folgore reunites with Kanchomé by saving him while calling himself a hippo who protects children, calling back to one of his last scenes in the original series, where he once declared himself that while dissuading Kanchomé from abusing the powers of Shin Poruku.
  • The last thing Tio did in the demon children war was entrusting Gash with their "tomorrow." When she's reintroduced in this sequel, she proclaims to the people around her that she'll protect everyone's tomorrow.
• Mercy Kill: Gash is instructed by his father, Dauwan, to fight and kill Beliel's undead henchmen without hesitation or remorse, with the former king stating the best they can do is put them to rest for good.
  Dauwan: What they need is not "mercy"...Bear in mind, these are souls that should have long been put to rest...and they have been coerced into fighting a war that is not their own. As such, we must confront them with our minds fully set on returning those unfortunate souls from whence they came.
• Mood Dissonance: In the bonus pages for volume 1, Kiyomaro reads to an unnamed little girl a picture book about llamas getting swept away by a river. He calls the book depressing for how all the llamas seemingly die, but its visuals are comical, the llamas don't seem to care and he mostly narrates the story with his signature look of apathy because the girl keeps making him read it over and over just for the funny faces he makes.
• My Brain Is Big: The visual gag behind Mo Poruku turning Kanchomé into a giant Waddling Head is that he needs a big brain in order to manipulate multiple kinds of different lifeforms simultaneously.
• Mythology Gag: The volume 1 cover with Gash and Kiyomaro mirrors the volume 1 cover of the third reprinting of the original series.
• Naked on Arrival: Notably averted with Gash, who in the original series was introduced innocently walking around naked and typically wore nothing under his cloak even after becoming king. When he's introduced in this sequel, the full regal costume he's wearing is immediately noticeable. This is due to whoever set up the mummified body that Kiyomaro uses to revive Gash equipping it with a magic brooch that produces his usual cape and clothes.
• Never Found the Body: Zelie assumes Gash has been killed when she sees her pursuer using Rashield, but as Gash isn't shown dead to readers, the stolen spell could be from Zeon or their father instead. Chapter 2 shows a Dead Hat Shot and Kiyomaro does recognize Waig's stolen Zakeruga as the yellow-colored one that Gash could perform, but the next chapter also establishes all the demons had their spells stolen while they were still alive. Chapter 4 then shows Gash might have been killed after all, but he left his essence inside both Zelie and Olmo and this allows Kiyomaro to revive him in a temple that contains sarcophagi matching several of the demon children seen throughout the series.
• New Powers as the Plot Demands: As established in the first series, the demons awaken spells according to their needs and personal growth. When Kanchomé becomes ready to fight and summons his Yellow Spellbook, it comes with the new Mo Poroku spell. It can be used to transform enemies into clones of Kanchomé piece-by-piece to disrupt their movements and this also conveniently prevents Levy from retracting her beasts back to her hair.
• The Nose Knows: Gill smells a random Egyptian woman so he can distinguish between humans and demons while hunting for Zelie.
• Not So Above It All: Waig and Gill are threatening villains with a laid-back and goofy side to them. The latter has a more cold and calculated personality, but while hunting Zelie and Olmo he wastes time sightseeing in Egypt and even picks up a silly pyramid hat. Then Gill drives a motorcycle right off a cliff in their pursuit of Kiyomaro and Zahara who were descending into a cave hidden on its side, to Waig's exasperation and the heroes' complete confusion.
• Older Than They Look:
  • Kiyomaro is an interesting example, as in the first series, he was around 14 years old, but was drawn tall and mature like he was in his late teens. As an adult, his appearance has barely changed, and Gash is two heads shorter than him.
  • Gash turns out to be even shorter than he appears considering his actual age — Kiyomaro expects him to be 14 years old, but the boy is already 19!
  • It's hard not to see adult Kanchomé as just a long baby, too, since his face looks the exact same as it always did.
• One-Winged Angel: Waig appears as a large intimidating man with a transparent body that leaves his innards visible. However, his true form that bursts from within is that of a giant multi-limbed cyclops with an exposed brain and a bondage-like armor.
• Orwellian Retcon: Raiku published chapter 17 after a week-long delay only to immediately announce that he would remake the latter half of the chapter out of personal dissatisfaction and update it in two weeks. It turned out to be only page layout changes with new art, with the plot and dialogue remaining the same.
• Papa Wolf: Folgore learns that his outworldly surrogate duck son whom he hasn't seen in years sent his little brother to him while planning to sacrifice his own life to not let them be found by their enemies. The pop star wastes no time in channeling his inner hippo, locating Kanchomé and saving him.
• Parents as People: Sherry is a mother of three who's clearly taken the lessons of her own childhood to heart. She's lavish with her praise for them instead of being harsh like her mother was, but is still strict and demanding as she feels her harsh upbringing made her a stronger person. She's surprised and a little dismayed to hear two of her children say she's pushing them too hard and tells them they are welcome to stop if they feel overwhelmed, but she hopes they'll stick it out and continue improving. Her relationship with her son Nicolas is also strained due to him being aware she's financially dependent on her unfaithful husband and thus forced to ignore his cheating.
• People Puppets: Kanchomé can use Mo Poruku to control the bodies of those he has transformed.
• Pokémon Speak: Kanchomé shouts his own name to stretch his beak while in Mo Poroku mode and swallow enemies. Once spat out, his victims become more and more transformed into his likeness while also babbling nothing but the word "Kanchomé".
• Police Are Useless: It is only when Kanchomé has finally beaten Levy and is in the middle of talking things out with her that a heavily armed police squad arrives and starts shooting at Gozer and Hyros, almost killing them and risking both Kanchomé and Folgore's lives as well. They only fail because Gash and Kiyomaro show up and defend everyone with Rashield.
• Production Throwback:
  • The invaders from another dimension who must be killed by destroying a small core on their bodies sound a lot like the Spirit Body invaders from Raiku's Vector Ball.
  • The bonus chapter in volume 1 has Kiyomaro reading to a girl a story about the llamas from Raiku's Animal Land manga getting swept away by a river.
  • The control over beasts given by Kanchomé's Mo Poruku spell and his hand gestures as he uses it are based on Tarouza, the protagonist from Animal Land.
• Prolonged Prologue: The first four chapters have Kiyomaro looking for the truth behind Gash's supposed death and a means to fight against Waig and Gill. In chapter 5, when Kiyomaro reunites with Gash and both overwhelm the villains with their spells and tactics, a title card comes up at the end to indicate that the story has started for real.
• Power Parasite: The villains this time have stolen the spells from most, if not all, the demons in the Demon World, represented as spheres reflecting specific demons and their powers being swallowed up by a gigantic dragonic thing flying through the skies. These powers are further divided up into jars filled with liquid that can hold a few spells at a time, seemingly letting them be used without limit. After Kiyomaro takes back a jar holding Gash's Rashirudo and Zakeruga and pours it over their spell book, they regain the ability to use those spells.
• R-Rated Opening: The first chapter has a surprisingly grim tone, with one demon child getting gruesomely killed in action and then buried on-panel, when previously all combatants were just teleported back to the demon world and reduced to spirits.
• Retcon: The Gash Bell 20th anniversary book had Raiku stating that the duck-man seen taking Kanchomé to school at the ending of the original series was his father and that his name was "Tiger". In this sequel, we're shown a family photo where said man is standing next to Kanchomé while there's an older man sitting next to Kanchomé's mother. Raiku then quietly altered the anniversary book to say "Tiger" is Kanchomé's older brother and also changed his name to "Hansode".
• Right Behind Me: When Tio tells Megumi that Gash sacrificed himself to prevent the extinction of their race, Megumi points at the blonde man in a blue cape who's suddenly appeared right ahead of them. Tio is left speechless as Gash and Kiyomaro greet them and assure the nearby villagers that everything will be fine.
• Sealed Good in a Can:
  • The villains have Gash's Baou Zakeruga spell, a massive evil-devouring lightning dragon, imprisoned within a large yet cramped container instead of a bottle like all the other spells they captured.
  • The dragon Ashuron is one of the strongest good guys in the series, particularly now that he's larger than ever before. But he's found stuck to a throne, turning his homeland into an impregnable fortress of scales. It's pointed out that he won't last another year if this keeps up.
• Sequel Escalation:
  • The story involves a new race of invaders who are mighty enough to have destroyed Gash's homeworld. They can steal the spells of demons for their own use and can be further empowered by humans who learned to cast spells without the need of the spellbooks. Each of those monsters can manipulate at least four kinds of spell families from the bottles carried by their retainers.
  • In the previous series, Clear Note transformed into a massive monster who tried to destroy Earth from space. It took Gash awakening the Golden Book through sheer determination to summon all the defeated contestants, take the fight to Clear Note, and overwhelm him. In this series, the invaders start out deploying a whole squad of giant monsters like that, and among those is a dragon that renders all the demons powerless.
• She Is All Grown Up: Adult Tio has grown much taller and buffer since her last appearance.
• Shout-Out: The Witch watches Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury while staying on a hotel and mentions it to Kiyomaro, saying she's much older than its protagonist.
• Skewed Priorities: The early villains are shown or said to waste time sightseeing on modern Earth when Beliel sends them after the heroes. Gash, on the other hand, is in a hurry to take Kiyomaro with him to the Demon World but is prevented from doing so by the spellbooks, who apparently want him to ensure the safety of Kanchomé, Tio, and their partners first.
• Spoiler Cover: The volume 1 cover, as seen above, immediately shows what adult Gash looks like, but he only makes his dramatic appearance in chapter 4. It also shows a cutified young version of Baou Zakeruga. At the time the cover was revealed, this version of Gash's ultimate spell hadn't even shown up in the story. In fact, even the original Baou was still missing in action!
• Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: Ted, Cherish, and Rein are seen lying dead after being defeated by the new villains. It's explained that Gash sacrificed his life force to preserve the souls of a massive number of demons, likely including those three. It remains to be seen if they'll be revived in mummified backup bodies like Gash and Brago or remain out of the plot as disembodied souls.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • In a departure from the previous series, a demonic battle breaking out within a city causes a response. Bystanders in Milan help Folgore against Levy because they know of Folgore and correctly assume he's fighting a villain. Beliel also forces Levy to end the fight quickly, as the police are mobilizing and the situation is slipping out of control.
  • The Witch visits Megumi's concert venue the day before the show and tries to ask a security guard where Megumi is right now. The guard tells her he doesn't know and even if he did he wouldn't tell a self-admitted witch. The Witch decides to simply come back tomorrow, the day of the concert when she knows Megumi will be there, by she can't get inside because the show is sold out and she can't buy a ticket.
• Sweet Tooth: Folgore is shown a picture of Kanchomé and his entire family stuffing themselves with sweets.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Gash briefly feels sorry about having to kill Waig despite the man's horrible actions because he learned from Dauwan that the invaders are dead people brought back to life just to be forced into a war.
• Talking Is a Free Action: Played for Laughs. The Witch goes on about who she is for long enough that Kiyomaro hits her with a Zakeru. Even Gash thinks it's brutal of him, but Kiyomaro reassures him he cast a low-power version of the spell just for the sake of the Running Gag.
• Tempting Fate: Kiyomaro leaves Zahara in charge of the ruins they found in Egypt before he leaves the country. She's glad that she won't be involved in any more fights against monsters... while unaware that one of the spellbooks they sent out has found its way back to her.
• This Is a Work of Fiction: Each volume has this disclaimer on the chapter index.
• This Is Gonna Suck:
  • Upon starting their new journey, Kiyomaro asks Gash if there are any living demons they can meet as soon as possible. Gash replies there is one — the first who fled from the war. Cue a baffled Kiyomaro muttering "Kanchomé" under his breath.
  • When Folgore learns that Kanchomé lost every spell they ever learned he starts sweating buckets, not that it stops him from confronting Levy and her summoned beasts on his own.
• Title Drop: In chapter 5, as Gill realizes Gash and Kiyomaro together are stronger than he could've ever imagined, he refers to the boy as "Golden Gash" (Konjiki no Gash) and Kiyomaro's casting of Zakeruga to defeat Waig is followed a dramatic title card.
  "I took it for granted... This battle between 100 demon children to decide the king of the demon world. He is the one who survived that battle until the very end... The king of the demon world... Golden Gash... has returned... with the ultimate human partner!!!"'
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • As seen in the epilogue of the first series, Gash learned to perform his spells without losing consciousness, allowing him to follow Kiyomaro's directions much more effectively. Once he regains control over Rashield, he shows he can summon the electrified wall anywhere he points to, and it starts out fortified without the need to boost it with Zaguruzemu.
  • Kanchomé is spoken of like he's still a coward when in truth he, with only a few uses of a Poruku bottle left, manages to nearly kill the team that pursues him by tricking them into the path of a train and stands his ground until Folgore arrives to save him. They're both serious and determined about taking on the whole freaking world by themselves to save Kanchomé's homeland — an astronomical difference from how pathetic the two goofballs were all the way back when they tried to ambush Gash and Kiyomaro at their house.
  • Tio has compensated for losing her spells by bulking up on muscle and fights a small army of attackers with a massive metal shield. When she gets her spells back, she demonstrates that she has developed the ability to move her Ma Seshirudo and swiftly enough to repel a barrage of attacks coming from different angles.
• Tranquil Fury: The whole time Gash fights Waig and Gill, he remains composed and doesn't even glare at them with his signature sparkly eyes but is clearly seething with anger for how their kind massacred his people. He bothers asking why Waig would demolish an orphanage and thinks back to all the civilian corpses he saw scattered during the incident to motivate himself as the battle hits its climax.
• Transhuman: Right before their final fight alongside Waig, Gill admits to Gash and Kiyomaro that he was also once a human known as The Sorcerer.
• Uncanny Valley: Adult Kanchomé has the appearance of his unchanged baby face plastered on top of a very tall and lanky body. This makes him look ridiculous even to Folgore, and yet it is precisely what an adult Kanchomé should look like. Furthermore, he gets an spell that inflicts Body Horror on his enemies by transforming them into his clones one body part at a time!
• Uncertain Doom:
  • Gash mentions that Zeon disappeared after he stormed the enemy stronghold during the alien invasion.
  • Kanchomé fled from the demon world with only his brother Consomme and has no idea of what happened to his parents or his older brother, though he seems to believe they're already dead.
• Underestimating Badassery:
  • Kiyomaro is rather disappointed to hear that he and Gash are first going to look for Kanchomé, who's "the first who ran away from the war". Then Kanchomé is revealed to have fled to protect his younger brother, and he defeats both Levy and Nosehair Boo with Folgore's support before Kiyomaro and Gash arrive to help them.
  • Beliel makes a point of quickly sending powerful assassins to kill the top ten fighters from the last 100 demon children tournament, but carelessly assigns weak spells to a pair of henchmen he sends after some guy called Barry who had been taken out by a magic wall or something.
• Unstoppable Rage: Tio is mildly upset Gash kept the fact that he planned to be revived from her, terrifying not only Gash, but Ashuron and proceeds to pummel Gash senseless. Kiyomaro and Ashuron desperately try to hold their own conversation to avoid being drawn in, even as they have to shout to hear each other over the sounds of Gash's vicious beating.
• Villains Out Shopping: The various henchmen sent into Earth to kill the heroes have just been brought back from death, so they get distracted with enjoying the sights of modern society while they can. Gill wastes time driving a bike around Egypt and purchasing silly merchandise. Nosehair Boo scolds him in a side chapter, only to be forced to admit he and Levy also spent time in a zoo instead of hunting Kanchomé. Then when the Witch fails to access the stadium where Megumi is performing, she looks more upset that everyone but her is able to enjoy the show, and vents her depression by writing a poem:
  "On the blackest night, bereft of light and darkness, the darkness is me. Their joy is found over there, yet I am left over here... as the cold wind blows... on this most dreary of days. The Witch."
• The Virus: Kanchomé's initial spell in the story, Mo Poroku, turns him into a giant Kirby-like Waddling Head. He can chomp his enemies and spit them back out with parts of their bodies transformed into his own appearance, compromising their ability to fight. Furthermore, he can impose his will on those he infects and make use of the traits he hasn't converted, such as making Hyros fly him out of Levy's reach.
• Waddling Head: Once the Yellow Spellbook arrives to help Kanchomé and Folgore against Levy, Kanchomé learns the Mo Poroku spell which transforms himself into a giant head with arms and feet.
• Wham Shot: Waig's usage of Gash's spells and the boy's broken crown lying in the ruins of his castle are grim signs that Gash really is dead until it turns out that's not quite the case.
• The Worf Barrage:
  • Ziggy uses a bottle containing a Kofaru spell from Cherish, which is easily blocked and reflected when Waig uses Gash's Rashield. Of course, Rashield, the poster child for this trope, works like a charm when it's a bad guy using it... but Gash himself doesn't disappoint and shows his mastery over Rashield by casting it over long distances at a high power output without the need for Zaguruzemu! Even when it does get broken for dramatic effect, Gash seems way more skilled at evading or using his cape for additional protection than in the original series.
  • Waig casts Zakeruga, a condensed beam of lightning, against Gash but the boy blocks it with a basic Zakeru burst, leading Gill to wonder if he's able to do it because of those being his natural spells or because of Kiyomaro's heart power boosting the Zakeru.
  • Even a sentient and extremely powerful spell like Baou Zakeruga was stolen by the villains. It is seen held captive in a giant fishbowl.
• The Worf Effect: Brago has become ludicrously strong even without his spells, but he starts out dead and in need of resurrection from a sarcophagus. It is mentioned that Beliel sent several of the strongest henchmen in his army after him from the start, and we see one of them is Goren, an infamous threat from the generation of the former king Dauwan.
• You Have Failed Me:
  • Gill still attempts to fight Gash and Kiyomaro after Waig is killed, but is teleported away by Beliel to not waste away any more spell powers. The frustrated boy has the gall to ask Beliel for Baou Zakeruga of all things to fight the heroes, so the villain forces him to stand down with a powerful hit from an invisible force.
  • When Pola and The Witch fail to pursue Gash and Kiyomaro, Pola mentions Beliel should have wiped him out of existence for it but likely didn't out of consideration for how the heroes were unexpectedly warped into the Demon World.
  • Out of spite for Beliel, an unnamed barbarian who's easily defeated by Barry informs him about how the invaders are all undead from other worlds being forced to fight for the villain in exchange for another chance of life. He's then remotely executed from having his core shattered, to Barry's further disgust.

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