Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-Kun Volume 1 Review

Iruma is a 14-year-old boy. His upbringing has been quite strange, with his parents throwing him into dangerous situations since he was a one-year-old and learned how to walk. Their careless attitude has shaped Iruma to be a person who is incapable of refusing to help anyone, thus developing amazing survival skills. Not even his parents’ last endeavour that ended up with them selling Iruma to a demon could make him say ‘no’. Whisked away to the Netherworld, Iruma is astounded by the demon Sullivan’s request for him to be his grandchild. Neither does he expect to have to attend the demon school Babyls where his new grandfather is the chair-demon.

At the demon school, Iruma is thrown into one weird situation after another: making the school entrance speech instead of the top scorer of his year, Asmodeus, and then getting said demon as his underling. Or having his teacher turn into his familiar. Or meeting green-haired Clara, future classmate in the misfit class, who happens to be weird, even by demons’ standards. But most important of all, Iruma has to keep it a secret that he’s human, unless he wants to be eaten by his new classmates.

What can I say? We are in for a wild ride full of crazy adventures and laughter!

For those of us who have already watched the anime of Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-Kun, we can finally celebrate the release of the manga in the English language. The story of Iruma and the whole misfit class will bring a smile to readers’ faces and make them cheer for the sweet and naïve Iruma. I couldn’t stop smiling from page one of the manga until I reached the end.

Iruma is really unlucky. His parents’ behaviour is not acceptable by any means. They are negligent and shouldn’t have done what they did to Iruma. However, Iruma doesn’t know any better. At least until he’s thrown into Sullivan and his servant Opera’s company. Here he’s spoiled with so much affection, and even material things. School too is weird at the beginning, but he soon gets used to it.

Clara and Asmodeus are my favourite characters (not counting Iruma, of course). They have completely different personalities, but they can’t help vibing with Iruma. It isn’t as instantaneous for Asmodeus as it is for Clara, but from what we’ve read so far, it’s not hard imagining they’ll soon be thick as thieves. Asmodeus came to demon school determined to be the best. The top student, he doesn’t like the fact that a nobody took his place in the entrance ceremony. However, after a fight with Iruma makes Asmodeus (or Azz to his friends) re-evaluate his views, his attitude turns to that of a loyal servant. I wonder how that will impact both Iruma and Azz’s personal growth.

On the other hand, Clara is a wild card. She has an outgoing personality and always wants to play. Some demons stay as far away as they can from her while others take advantage of her bloodline’s special ability. Iruma doesn’t like the other demons taking advantage of her and soon takes her under his wing.

And let’s not forget about the instructor of the misfit class, Mr. Kalego. Iruma’s and Clara’s personalities are what he hates the most, but there is nothing that he can do about it. He takes his role as a teacher seriously, so although he would love to see them expelled, together with a bunch of rowdy students, he won’t go out of his way to make it so. He believes that they’ll be able to get themselves expelled on their own.

Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-Kun was quite a change for me. After reading so many manhwa where the tropes and even the art are different, it was nice to go back to reading manga. The illustrations are in black and white, with a couple of introductory pages in full colour. The comedy style of this series is similar to A Terrified Teacher At Ghoul School and Mashle, so you know you’re in for a load of laughs.

The only slight negative point for this volume for me is the last page of the manga. There’s no preview of what’s going to happen in Volume 2 – and there’s an advert for a Junji Ito manga. A stark comparison, considering that Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-Kun is a comedy manga geared to a younger audience, while Junji Ito’s volumes are horror.

The first three seasons of the anime are available on Crunchyroll, while Volume 2 of the manga is slated for release in June 2023. Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-Kun by Osamu Nishi is published in the English language by Kodansha as a Vertical Book with a translation by Jacqueline Fung.

Our review copy from Kodansha (VERTICAL Books) was supplied by the publisher and Turnaround Comics.