Souten Kouro

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Souten Kouro (蒼天航路) is a Japanese manga serialized in publisher Kodansha's Shuukan Morning manga anthology magazine from 1994 to 2005 by Japanese manga artist King Gonta (王欣太), as adapted from an original story by I Hagin (李學仁). After I Hagin died of cancer in September 1998, King Gonta picked up the story himself. A total of 409 chapters were published and compiled into 36 separate books. There are no published English translations of it, but a color compilation book released in 2007 bears the English subtitle "Beyond the Heavens" on its cover, suggesting that it is the accepted English translation of the title. In addition, the last chapter of the series is also titled in English “Beyond the Heavens”.

[edit] Story

Souten Kouro’s story is based loosely on the events taking place in Three Kingdoms period of China during the life of the last Chancellor of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Cao Cao (155 – March 15, 220), who also serves as the main character. The Three Kingdoms period has been a popular theme in Japanese manga for decades, but Souten Kouro differs greatly from most of the others on several points. One significant difference is its highly positive portrayal of its main character, Cao Cao, who is traditionally the antagonist in not only Japanese manga, but also most novel versions of the Three Kingdoms period, including the original 14th century version, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, by Luó Guànzhōng. Another significant difference from others is that the storyline primarily uses the original historical account of the era, Records of Three Kingdoms, by Chen Shou, as a reference rather than the aforementioned Romance of the Three Kingdoms novel. By this, the traditional hero of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Liu Bei, takes on relatively less importance within the story and is portrayed in a less positive light. In Japan, Souten Kouro was advertised by its publisher as "Neo-Sangokushi" (ネオ三国志）, or “Alternative Romance of the Three Kingdoms”.