The Spring 2024 Light Novel Guide

Zilbagias the Demon Prince

What's It About? 

The hero Alexander and his comrades unleash a daring raid on the Demon King's castle, intent on assassinating him and bringing an end to the war against the darkness in one fell swoop. However, the raid goes awry when his party is effortlessly decimated by the Demon King's overwhelming power. But death is not the end of the road for Alexander, as he is reincarnated two years later as that very same Demon King's son. With the memories of his past life still intact, he vows to use his miraculous second chance to continue fighting—this time destroying the demonic kingdom from within as the Demon Prince Zilbagias. It doesn't take long for his mettle to be tested either, as passing as a young demon prince without blowing his cover proves to be quite a bit more challenging than he initially anticipated.

Zilbagias the Demon Prince: How the Seventh Prince Brought Down the Kingdom has a story by Tomoaki Amagi and art by Tsukasa Kiryu. English translation by Nathan Macklem. Published by J-Novel Club; PublishDrive edition. (April 26, 2024)

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Is It Worth Reading?

Rebecca Silverman
Rating:

I'm torn on this one. Some scenes go over the top beyond the realm of good taste, such as when Zilbagias, the reincarnated form of the human hero Alexander, discovers that the night elves are keeping Lilianna, the high elf saint, captive with all of her limbs cut off, eternally tortured so that they can experiment on her. He attempts to rescue her, of course; they were allies before he was killed, and he's only externally a demon prince – inside, he's very much still Alexander, working towards the destruction of the demons who slaughtered his family and eventually himself. But the descriptions are a lot to take, and even the purportedly humorous elements, such as Zilbagias trying his darndest to convince the night elves that he wants to take a limbless elf saint home to screw (even though he's only five), don't quite take the sting out.

But that, I suspect, is at least partially the point. Zilbagias/Alexander lives in a harsh world where being a hero isn't enough to save him or anyone else, and the only way he's going to be successfully taking his revenge is to beat the demons at their own game. There is a real effort made to show that the demons aren't just another race, too – they keep slaves, whereas humans don't appear to. They form compacts with imps and devils to gain unholy powers, and all of their magic is arguably evil; the healing “curse” passed down in Zilbagias' mother's family involves removing a wound from one person and transferring it to another. The most challenging moments for our hero are when he has to act like a demon to fool them, and the danger is that he'll lose his Alexanderness before taking his revenge.

It sometimes gets a bit grimdark and doesn't always know when to pull its punches. The fact that all of Zilbagias' older siblings align with deadly sins and that demon family names are things like “Rath” and “Orgi” are way too on the nose to work. Attempts at lightening the mood also tend to fall flat simply because of the horror surrounding them. And the writing isn't terrific, relying on shifting narrative voices that don't quite work and excessive amounts of descriptive prose. But despite that, it's not a terrible story, and one that's at least a different angle on the old reincarnation game. If you like your fantasy dark, it's worth at least looking at.

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