Kaze no Stigma

i have not been coming here recently, and well today, as usual to give myself an excuse to waste another few more minutes of my life, i am going to write this post which i had been dragging for months.

Follow up:

kaze no stigma, to those who already knew, orginally came from the light novel series, which later turned into an anime and manga adaptation. having seen both the anime and book, but not the manga, as usual, you would expect the book to be much better.

one difference between the anime and the book, is that the anime is the toned down version of the story. well, children watch animes but they don't read books with nothing but words for a few hundred pages, except for a few insert pictures here and there.

for today, i am just going to talk about the book.

the story goes like this: yagami kazuma, orginally known as kannagi kazuma, had returned to japan from overseas, and from there a ton of things happened which will later reveal his past and his character. well this is a crappy introduction i am giving.

well if you think i am going to spoil you, then don't read the below section.

kannagi kazuma was originally born in the family specialized with the control of fire. but him, being an untalented person in that area, lost to a girl few years younger in a fight for the next head of the family when he was a teen (and when the girl was 12). because of that he was kicked out of the family, and he changed his family name to yagami. don't ask me why of all names he chose yagami.

in the story, kazuma was protrayed as a cold-blooded person who would not hesitate in the slightest to kill those who stood in his way, whether they are innocent or not (compared to the anime). it was later revealed that he had lost the woman most important to him while he could not do anything. it's the usual thing of because people had not shown him any mercy when he needed it, so he did not show it to those who needed it.

he returned to his home, well not return, but to make an appearance there, as the most powerful wind mage in the world. i don't know what the author is trying to say, but the story was that he left as a failure in fire magic, but came back being the most successful wind mage, being born in a family of fire mages.

the story, generally is darker. definitely it is not the kind of light hearted stories meant for children, nor is it the kind that you will smile as you read. overall, you can say the mood is created to be on the side of heavy.

all sorts of negative emotions you could think of appeared in the book: sadistic behavior, cruelty, despair, grief, anger (of the extreme kind), hatred... all of them appeared many times. on the other hand, positive emotions and behavior appeared much lesser, and tend to be concentrated on 2 people, kannagi ren and kannagi ayano. with the appearance of the 2 of them, the mood became more balanced, having more positive as well as negative. but i need to emphasize, the overall mood is still overwhemlingly on the side of negative. it is not a sad story that you would cry over it though, so don't worry if you don't like that kind of stories.

if you want to compare it to kara no kyoukai, although it is also a dark story, there is a very obvious difference. the negative moods from kaze no stigma came from the situations and circumstances, meaning people became the way they are because they are forced to. for kara no kyoukai, everything came from inside oneself. hence, the despair, the grief, the anger, the sadistic behaviors, all hold much different meanings.

i would say the story is very captivating, to me. perhaps i like this kind of stories much more, and i was able to take in 5 books in mere weeks. note that i only read when i am travelling on buses and trains, so there was not much time for me to read.

another spoiler: i don't like it the way how the 'madness' of kazuma ended. he had gone crazy after seeing someone (i won't spoil you) and went on an unstoppable rampage (since he was already the world's most powerful) until another feller came to stop him. the reason given on how the fight concluded was a little... lame in my opinion. but well, the series is still worth a read.

crap, i have not completed my haruhi series. it is darn long. i am already on the 7th, or is it 8th book? well 10 books in total now, last i checked. but i had already bought the whole set available for zero no tsukaima. lolx.

someone introduce me a series which had a darker mood.