Brave Series ( 黃色 書刊 勇者 系列) is a Taiwanese Manhua series by Yellow Book. It is set in a fantasy world, of RPG Mechanics 'Verse variety, where Brave Kingdom deploys heroes known as Braves to fight demons and dragons. However, the title is deconstructing the hell out of typical tropes associated with this kind of story. Braves are almost all self-serving and bloodthirsty, often caring nothing for villagers they're supposed to be protecting and who pay taxes to support their luxurious lifestyle and have no problems slaughtering monsters, who are just minding their own business and pose no threat to anyone, for loot and XP.
The protagonists of the series are Morewant, former Brave and current king of demons struggling to make ends meet and support his people; Main Brave who wish to become one of the greatest Braves ever and killed demons but later learn the truth about demons and Braves; Goblin of Goblins and Slime of Slimes, a duo of heroic low-level demons who seek to become strong and fight the Braves; and Dragon Girl, daughter of Blue Dragon and Dragon Slayer Brave.
A six-episode animated adaptation Brave Animated Series was released in 2021 and is available on Netflix.
Not to be confused with an anime franchise Brave Series or with Brave
The series provides examples of
- Acrofatic: After the timeskip, Morewant/Fair Brave has grown a noticeable gut, due to him having to take up office work to deal with King of the Brave Kingdom's taxes levied against the Demon Kingdom. It still doesn't affect his skills as a warrior as he dishes out non-lethal Curb-Stomp Battles against newbie Braves for years.
- Action Girl: Dragon Brave can turn into a strong dragon at will and use magic to fight enemies. Bunny is skilled with her carrot daggers and train Goblin and Slime to become stronger.
- All for Nothing: Dragons and their creators had this realization once they discover they've been hiding in a cave, enslaving other people as livestock to eat due to lack of any other food...while a rich, fertile, paradise-like land up for the taking was literally right behind a mountain they never tried to climb.
- Antagonist Title: Braves the series is named after are the bad guys posing as heroes.
- Ascended Extra: Black Brave in the comic is a figure of legend who is long dead. In the show, he plays a very important role in the first episode killing Morewant and pushing Fair Brave to unlock his Heart of Darkness to defeat him and, upon being defeated, committing suicide, framing Fair Brave for it and tell the whole world he is new Morewant, out of spite.
- The Atoner:
- Both Fair Brave and Dragon Slayer Brave were loyal warriors of the Brave Kingdom who had a Heel Realization and now help the demons and dragons up to becoming their leaders. Main Brave eventually realizes Braves are bad guys and joins demons as well.
- In the origin of Dragons the man who lead a group that released human livestock's anger and turned them into Dragons so that humans will no longer eat them was the same man whose accidental murder of their clan's elder lead to others turning to cannibalism and transforming several of their own into livestock.
- Beware the Silly Ones: Morewant is silly in many ways not befit a typical Demon King, but he was a powerful Brave and his Heart of Darkness gives him a huge boost.
- Black Knight: Black Brave, and after his death his son, Chief Brave. Though the latter doesn't care much for the role.
- Blood Knight: The original Brave was a bloodthirsty jerk who wanted a fight and didn't care against who, it just happened to be Dragons. Many Braves follow in his footsteps.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall:
- Main Brave does this to complain after the focus shifts from him to Goblin and Slime, only for Goblin to push him back.
- Post-Credits scene in the final episode of the show's first season has a large number of characters, dead and alive, come out like in theatre after a play ends, and Morewant thank the fans for their support of the series.
- Canon Foreigner: Loyalty Brave has been invented for the show and does not appear in the comic.
- Clothes Make the Superman: Black Brave's armor makes the user near invincible. Chief Brave never kills monsters, gaining no XP, yet wearing it he is so powerful he is under constant surveillance out of fear of what he could do if he turned against the Brave Kingdom.
- Death of a Child: We get to see a Brave impale a young demon child in the show's very first episode.
- Decoy Protagonist: Main Brave in the show. After the time skip, he is introduced seemingly as the new main character, but he only shows how corrupt Braves are and sets off Goblin's storyline.
- Defeating the Undefeatable: Black Brave's armor is supposed to make the wearer invincible, yet Fair Brave managed to best him in combat. Black Brave did not take it well.
- Demon King: Morewant, though he may be the nicest person around. His very existence is actually used by the Brave Kingdom to justify murdering demons.
- Demoted to Extra: In the comic series, Main Brave, while still delusional about his role as the protagonist, serves as a point of view character. In the show, he is a Decoy Protagonist who plays a very minor role, through his Heel–Face Turn arc is kept in.
- Designated Hero: Braves In-Universe. Main Brave in particular is under a delusion he's the main character.
- Forced into Evil
- Dragon Girl is forced to join the Braves and participate in their crimes as a ploy to ensure dragons' sub servitude to the Brave Kingdom.
- Fire Brave was born with fire powers, leading the king to force her to join the Braves or be executed.
- Friendly Enemy: Chief Brave and Morewant are on friendly terms despite being on the opposite sides and Morewant having killed Chief Brave's father, Black Brave. This is because Chief Brave is well aware the Braves are the real villains of this story.
- Gone Horribly Wrong: The origin of Dragons is a huge series of events going wrong, one after another, with worse and worse consequences.
- First a kingdom exiles a group of magic-users they later come back as Dragons to burn the kingdom down.
- The leader of the exiles leads them through the mountains to a rich, fertile land but they do not believe his claims and settle in a cave with nothing to eat. After a young man tries to confront their leader, he accidentally kills him, and starving humans resort to cannibalism. They select several of their own to be turned into giant mutants they can use as livestock.
- This leads to the guilt-stricken man who killed the leader to unleash livestock-humans hatred, turning them into Dragons who promptly attack their oppressors.
- Fleeing from the dragons humans discover their leader's paradise was right behind the next mountain, so their actions and suffering come from it were all for nothing. This lead Dragons to furiously attack the kingdom the people were originally exiled from.
- Dragon attack is then stopped by a powerful Blood Knight, who uses his victory to convince people they need strong warriors. They form the Braves, conquer neighboring kingdoms, and try to genocide Dragons and Demons.
- Green and Mean: Inverted. Fair Brave had green hair and green eyes and his skin turned green when he become the new Morewant. However, he is actually one of the most heroic characters.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Dragon Girl is the daughter of Blue Dragon and Dragon Slayer Brave, her existence being attributed to some sort of forbidden magic though it's more likely possible because Dragons are mutated humans.
- Heroic Sacrifice: First Morewant takes Black Brave's attack meant for Fair Brave and then new Morewant formerly known as Fair Brave lets Goblin and his crew kill him so that the XP boost from it lets them level up and defeat flying sword though he had an item letting him come back from the dead.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: All over the place, with how Braves not only have no problems cruelly massacring even defenseless monsters but civilians outright demand the monsters to be wiped out even if they aren't actually doing anything to them.
- Identical Stranger: Loyalty Brave and Dragon Slayer Brave look very similar, especially before each grows a distinct beard helping differentiate them from one another, yet are completely unrelated. This may come from the fact that Loyalty Brave was made for the show and doesn't exist in the comic.
- I Let Gwen Stacy Die: Fair Brave never forgave himself for leaving his king's side, allowing him to be assassinated. To the point, he believes his insomnia after becoming Morewant is caused by fear he may dream of his king and he refuses to face him until he achieves world peace and atones for his failure.
- I'm a Humanitarian: The Dragons were created by turning humans into docile giants other humans could treat like livestock and eat, until a few appalled by this practice didn't set them free, giving them their current form.
- Improvised Lockpick: Sick Demon's body can reshape itself like goo, including forming the shape of a jail key out of a fingertip.
- Ironic Name:
- The first Brave and nearly all of the other Braves are far from what you would think of "bravery". As they're either coward who would most likely run from particular strong demons (unless properly motivated through EXP or have a high bounty), or just incredibly bloodthirsty and delusional to the point of masking their true intentions by claiming to fight for peace and justice.
- Dragon Slayer Brave was specializing in killing dragons...then he fell in love with one, fathered a dragon child, and now leads Dragons against the Brave Kingdom.
- Loyalty Brave's reasons for refusing to accept the possibility that demons aren't evil, come from the fact it would mean accepting that loyalty he literally named himself after was nothing but blind, unthinking obedience.
- Meaningful Name: Braves seem to take names and titles that are supposed to correspond to who they are. After being forced to join their ranks, Dragon Girl invokes this, taking the name Dragon Brave to show she won't abandon her draconic heritage.
- Mirror Character: Considering Morewant the root of all evil and cause of Demon threat, Fair Brave, Loyalty Brave, and Black Brave set off in secret to kill him, leaving the king of Brave kingdom unguarded when an assassin came. Later Fair Brave learns the assassin was acting without Morewant's knowledge and believed the king of Brave Kingdom to be the root of all evil availing demons.
- Moral Myopia: The morality of Brave Kingdom is warped to basically worship Braves at their feet. How inherently hypocritical that makes them is best illustrated in a scene of a mother telling her son he needs to work and study hard or he will have to become good for nothing thief robbing people...while Main Brave is robbing them blind. And when the kid points that out, she says Braves can take whatever they want, even all of a family's means to live, and encourages her son to be like them.
- Nameless Narrative: Downplayed. Aside from Morewant, every character is referred to as what they are (King, Goblin, Blue Dragon) or by a title (Braves).
- Non-Standard Character Design: Interview Girl had Black Dot Pupils instead of eyes for dots like humans.
- No Place for a Warrior: The first Brave was a powerful warrior in a peaceful kingdom that saw him as useless. He was delighted when the dragons showed up.
- Older Than They Look: Despair Brave can be seen as one of the original Brave's first followers in a flashback. She does not seem to have aged a day since then.
- Only in It for the Money: Current king of Brave Kingdom cares not for wiping the demons like King of War or fighting for the sake of it like the original Brave. He just wants money. This makes him a far more effective villain than his predecessor because of it.
- Our Demons Are Different: Demon seems to be an umbrella term for all non-dragon monsters.
- Our Dragons Are Different: Dragons are separate species from demons but they can cross-breed with humans. Turns out they once were humans, part of a community exiled from their homeland, that turned to cannibalism to survive. They were transformed into gigantic livestock monsters to be consumed by remaining members of said community, until a group appalled by this practice didn't release their hatred, turning them into dragons they are now.
- Our Elves Are Different: If Bunny is any indicator, Elves are rabbit-like people, with colorful fur and bunny ears.
- Our Goblins Are Different: Goblin of Goblins believes Goblins were once towering over humans and dominating them with superior physical prowess, with Fierce King leading an unstoppable army of them. He believes humans cursed Goblins so that their descendants will be too small and weak to fight back. In reality, Goblins always were small and weak but they still were fierce warriors feared by humans. The current generation is so weak because they had their spirits crushed and will to fight beaten out of them by humans.
- Pragmatic Villainy: Being motivated by profit, the current king is a much more dangerous enemy to Demons and Dragons than kings who came before him.
- Punch-Clock Villain: Chief Brave clearly is thoroughly disillusioned with his job as a Brave.
- Righteous Rabbit: Bunny is a heroic Elf who kills braves to protect other monsters and takes Goblin and Slime under her wings out of goodness of her heart. She is also a humanoid rabbit.
- Sore Loser: Upon being defeated Black Brave decides he would rather kill himself, frame it like the one who defeated him is his murderer and proclaim said person the new Morewant, king of all demons and source of all evil than live with his reputation as invincible shattered.
- Token Heroic Orc: Invoked in-universe by the Brave Kingdom but in reality inverted and deconstructed with Dragon Girl, who is forced to publically renounce her heritage and parents and proclaim herself a human and join the Braves as a part of Brave's propaganda machine. Played straight with Fair Brave, Dragon Slayer Brave, and eventually, Main Brave, who joins Goblin.
- Van Helsing Hate Crimes: Humans are disturbingly eager to kill all demons, even if they're children or just living near them, simply because they are demons.
- Was Once a Man:
- This seems to be what happened to Fair Brave after the time skip, with his body becoming green and gaining sharp teeth. It is implied that he is slowly transforming into a demon after becoming the new Morewant.
- It is also the origin of the Dragons.
- Won the War, Lost the Peace: Morewant/Fair Brave had no trouble defeating and killing the King of War...only for his successor to defeat him with evidence he owns the land demons live in and Morewant is legally obligated to pay him rent.
