Omega Megaera Volume 6 Review

Mamiya Hanabusa is still pretending to be an alpha to try to keep the failing family fortunes afloat, in partnership with Reiko, a beta who’s also pretending to be an alpha. Their country (currently at war) is becoming much more repressive to omegas – and is now rounding up any stray omegas and omegas aged thirty and over, including barren megaeras, and putting them in labour camps. In this uncertain era, Mamiya’s younger relative Takao (also an omega) is risking being caught by repeatedly disappearing from the family home – and it’s one night, when he’s out searching for him, that Mamiya runs into Iori. Iori, the only true alpha in the Hanabusa household, has been missing for many years, having gone to ground after being forced to take the blame for an atrocity he did not commit at high school. There are complicated and unspoken feelings between the two which have never been openly expressed – although Mamiya is relieved when he discovers that Takao has been hanging out with Iori and learning engineering skills. As a young omega, Takao doesn’t want to be consigned to becoming a baby-producing machine; he has very different ambitions that he wants to pursue.

Mamiya is still managing to maintain his alpha front by taking powerful estrogen suppressants which his mistress Rino, an omega sex worker, gets for him – but they also have powerful side effects. And when Rino tells him that she’s to be sent to one of the omega labour camps, that also means that there won’t be any more suppressants. Mamiya begins to panic.

Meanwhile, Mamiya and Reiko apply to join an elite group of powerful alphas known as The Ecclesia. Their uncle – who still treats them coldly – is already a member (as were their fathers, Seijuro and Zenjiro). But they are in no way prepared for what they encounter at the very first meeting they attend…

And then there’s Reiko’s arranged marriage to Seira, the blind omega daughter of the Tachibana dynasty. There’s a desperate need to produce an alpha child to be the Hanabusa heir but Reiko, a beta, can’t consummate the marriage. So she and Mamiya hatch a desperate plot to substitute Iori in the marital bed, in the hope that Seira won’t notice, as she’ll be in heat… But Iori refuses. As their desperation increases, Reiko and Mamiya cast around for some way to persuade Iori to help them out. However, no one could have foreseen what happens on the wedding night!

Hooked? I am. This manga is seriously addictive. One of the advantages of a longer-running manga series is that the readership can get to know the characters and care about them (or hate them) in much greater depth than the traditional BL one-shot or two-volume title. And that’s certainly the case with Omega Megaera. Yes, the plot leans into the melodramatic but it does so with relish, delivering the plot twists and the big emotions this deliciously twisted family saga demands. (It would make a brilliant musical!) It’s great to see Maki Marukido working on a larger scale than her previous works have allowed because she handles the nefarious goings-on and the considerable angst really well, just managing to stay on the right side of believable to make us empathize with the characters (in spite of their flaws) without going over the top. The only extra is a one-page ‘Omegaverse Baby-Making Page’ in which the mangaka explains how alpha women have sex (an important plot point) and adds an intriguing ‘personal theory’ based on her particular take on how the omegaverse works.

The excellent translation for Kodansha is (as before) by Kevin Steinbach with lettering by Madeleine Jose, resulting in another good reading experience; there are translation notes at the end as well as a one-page preview page. There’s also the very useful family tree and ‘The story so far’ at the beginning in case you’ve lost track between volumes. Up until now, the release rate of the volumes has been very regular – but I’m a little disappointed to report that, even though it says ‘Coming Fall 2026’ at the foot of the preview of Volume 7, it’s now not due out until January 2027, which is quite a long time to wait to find out after the cliffhanger ending at the end of Volume 6!

Omega Megaera © Maki Marukido/KODANSHA LTD.

Our review copy from Kodansha was supplied by Diamond Book Distributors UK.