Tower Dungeon Volumes 1 & 2 Review

Please note that this review contains spoilers for Tower Dungeon Volumes 1 & 2!

Tower Dungeon is a manga series by Tsutomu Nihei (Blame!, Knights of Sidonia) which takes place in a fantastical Dark Fantasy setting and is brought to us courtesy of Vertical (Kodansha). When an evil necromancer slays the king and carries off his daughter, secreting her in the legendary Dragon Tower, her steadfast Royal Guard approaches the stronghold, but the way is blocked by powerful eldritch creatures… So, to supplement their forces in the face of mounting casualties, they press ordinary folks from the surrounding villages into service, including Yuva, a sturdy young farm boy with a strong back but no experience in battle, and only a battered old helmet and wooden shield to protect him.

In contrast to Nihei’s other works, with settings focused on massive machine-constructed societies and substantial starships with sentience, Tower Dungeon puts its focus into the titular dungeon itself, a vertically superior structure which pierces the heavens like a building of legend, and provides an intimidating piece of world-building as the objective of the story’s narrative, a princess stolen away by an evil Necromancer, awaits at the very top.

Reading through these initial volumes, I was struck by the way the mangaka focuses more on visuals and detailing the setting, with the characters like lead Yuva being rather straightforward so far, agreeing to his duties without pushback despite being rather ill-prepared. On his first expedition, he meets some who have already ventured forth into the Dragon Tower, with injuries of varying severity,  informing both Yuva (and the reader) that the tower is no straightforward fetch quest.

In Volume 1, we meet Captain Minisabelle, Lieutenant Rudeum of the Royal Guard, the bespectacled Calix, and suave Eriquo, plus Fanro and Bazen. As they ascend the levels of the tower, we see the Royal Guard come across various strange beings like skeletal knights, towering sentries and no-longer human white and grotesque monstrosities. The narrative seldom explains them, instead opting to simply avoid stalling and just fighting or pushing on to the next level. Sometimes less is indeed more.

The Guard do eventually take on the equivalent of a boss here as a gigantic shapeshifting slime is taken down to save a friend of Eriquo’s, Lilicen, who had been ensnared by the atrocious beast. Lilicen proves to be rather icy at first with Yuva and his inexperience, but as the group try to train him up, we do get a sense of characterisation which is otherwise fairly minimal throughout the first volume. Atmosphere certainly takes precedence and Nihei’s visual flare certainly lends itself well to this approach.

The first volume concludes with an Emissary from the Royal Parliament, Miligore, arriving near the tower and ordering the Guard to withdraw, to allow Captain Minsabelle to sit on the throne (as sister to the King) as a means of staving off instability within the realm. Lieutenant Rudeum also joins her, leaving Eriquo, Lilicen, and Yuva to continue the main quest of saving Princess Ignelia from her Necromancer captor.

Volume 2 opens with the remaining trio opening up as characters, both to each other and the reader.  Tension swells with some humorous effect, like Yuva treating Eriquo with more authority than Lilicen after she almost torches him during training, or Yuva opting to carry more salt than water after their giant slime encounter in the first volume. The latter leads to the group attempting to source water, resulting in an explosive confrontation with a squid-like monster roaming the waters. Matters become even more complicated when a deformed yokai-esque being steals their belongings including the pendant Lilicen needs to charge her magic. They then discover the being has a family and is actually part of a primeval species with intelligence.

In return for “borrowing” their salt and other belongings, the primeval inhabitants guide the Guards to a stairwell which fortuitously leads all the way to the 80^th level of the Tower. They exit the tower and return to civilisation to find an initially less-than-welcoming greeting at a checkpoint. Here Yuva comes face-to-face for the first time with a member of the Nyabirian race (a cat-like species) Garamuna, members of the Excavator Guild and, more fortunately for Yuva, his sister Funapa.

Funapa is working for the rebuild fortress stronghold alongside other members of her and Yuva’s village, and almost gets eaten by Carache, a Dracomorph (a human-dragon hybrid of sorts) but is saved by Garamuna and ends up becoming her apprentice in the process, a means of self-preservation but also paying back the favour. Carache escapes, having been revealed as a long-time local threat, and I suspect this won’t be the last time he appears in the storyline.

As Volume 2 concludes, Yuva becomes acquainted with the Excavator Guild, who unveil his nickname of the Master Salt-Sprinkler, and the Guard come face-to-face with another less antagonistic member of the Dracomorph race, Countess Ieowa, who declares that she alone will rescue the princess. Her plans to simply fly to the top of the Dragon Tower are quickly thwarted, however, and she is badly injured in the process. Our heroes continue their quest but are attacked by an unlikely threat in former members of the Royal Guard, distraught at the countless deaths of comrades and convinced the trio are aware of a special weapon, threatening the lives of our heroes in the process!

Translation for both volumes of Tower Dungeon reviewed here was carried out for Vertical (Kodansha) by Sam Melissa, whose work here is generally solid. Volume 3 is out this month.

Overall, when looking at both volumes, I think they work better when read together, as the first is too short whilst the second is a more satisfying read and ends on an altogether more engaging cliff-hanger which left me wanting to see how Yuva, Eriquo, and Lilicen will deal with this betrayal from within. Tower Dungeon offers an engaging read with solid visuals and is worth picking up (even if you’re unfamiliar with Tsutomu Nihei’s other works) if you enjoy dark fantasy manga with a dungeon-crawling focus. I certainly have – thus far – enjoyed these initial volumes.

Read a free preview at the publisher’s website here. 

Our review copies from Vertical were supplied by Turnaround Comics (Turnaround Publisher Services).

• Tower Dungeon © Tsutomu Nihei/KODANSHA LTD.