After living a desolate life for as long as she can remember, three “princes” come to save Shinra. With their upbringings being so different, can the boys really understand the difficulties that she has had to overcome just to make it this far?
Check out my review of the newest series by the author of Futarijime Romantic!
Before we start the review…
Who wrote this manga?
This manga was written by Satou Saguri and Mutsumi Yoshida.
Info about the series
- There are currently nine volumes published in Japanese.
Trigger warnings
Click to reveal
- Child abandonment
- Alluded drugging
- Alluded sexual assault
- Sexual harassment
You can check out this series for yourself below.
What’s this series about?
Our protagonist, Shinra, at just 16 has already had an incredibly difficult life. She lives in a tiny apartment all on her own, with next to no money. While she does have a mother, her mother prefers to spend her time moving from man to man, rather than taking care of her own daughter. So, for the majority of her life, Shinra has been all on her own. From paying the house bills to attending her own parent-teacher conferences, she’s become accustomed to this lonely way of living.
Due to this very bleak upbringing, Shinra became jaded at a very young age. She inherently dislikes people who don’t have to work for what they’ve been given (students with rich parents), and sees things like make-up and Starbucks as unaffordable luxuries. She’s determined to one day work her way out of this life through her own efforts, so every day she perseveres. Persevering doesn’t mean that she’s doing all that well though: she ignores her managers sexual harassment as she needs the income she receives from the job, she doesn’t let others close to her as she feels her level of poverty stops her from understanding proper social cues, and she even eats food after its fallen on the ground.
As she is eating food off the ground one day, one of her classmates spots her—Rai. Rai is known as one of the “big three” students at school. He and his two best friends are incredibly handsome, rich, and beloved by all. They’re almost the exact opposite from Shinra, but this difference is what spikes his initial interest in her. Rai seeks out Shinra, and tells her point-blank that he wants to be friends with her because he watched her eat food off the ground. Shinra, of course, takes offence to this and tells him off. This just further peaks his interest in her, and he and his two friends work to fit their way into her heart.
Rai is eventually able to convince Shinra to at least let the three of them stay by her side, as he puts it “is your pride really worth starving over?”. From here, Rai goes about helping Shinra through some of her various difficulties. But as Rai has absolutely no way to comprehend just how difficult Shinra’s life has been up until this point, is his help really going to be helpful?
My thoughts on this volume
I had been seeing this series quite a bit whenever I seeked out a new manga to start, and I was finally able to find a free (legal, of course) copy of volume one through Pixiv! I do have to say that this volume was much darker than I expected it to be, but I ended up really enjoying it.
I find that a lot of the time, shoujo manga tends to display poverty-stricken characters in a comedic light. Think Haruhi and the Ouran Host Club boys—though her level of poverty is not at all comparable to Shinra’s, it’s an example of the pattern. We can see a poor character surrounded by rich boys, all of whom find her poorness charming. They then use their extravagant wealth to show her a good time, and the general mood stays happy and comedic, for the most part. This series is not like that.
From the start, Shinra draws a line between herself and everyone around her. She hates her life, and she hates the fact that some of her classmates have everything she could ever dream of, and they don’t even appreciate it. So, of course she tells Rai off when he makes light of her situation. She doesn’t want to be someone’s charity case, and she doesn’t want to be taken in as a rich boy’s pet. I really respect her for this!
While Rai is clearly only interested in her because of just how different the two of them are, I do think he has some genuinity to him. While he may just have a trifling interest in her, he goes to scary lengths to help her. Like, he’s a rather scary character at times. I really have no idea just how far he’s willing to go to help her, which has me so interested in him! He goes from telling her he wants to be friends because he saw her eat food off the ground and he thinks it was funny, to fully doxing a predator in not that much time. What will he do next? I’m not sure, but I’m ready for it.
While there are two other boys, we don’t know much about them yet. They kind of just feel like Rai’s shadows at this point, but I’m hoping that changes as the volumes go on. I think I actually liked Kanan (the dark-haired one) the most. He’s by far the calmest of all three boys, seems to always try to respect Shinra’s boundaries while still helping her, and just feels overal genuine. I’m hoping we get to see more of him!
My favourite parts of this volume (spoilers)
💛 Kanan giving Shinra his leftover onigiri! He knew she didn’t want a free handout, and someone’s leftovers can hardly feel like a handout.
💚 Shinra point blank calling Hyakkei out for being dumb—he had really been asking for it all volume long, so it was nice to see.
💙 Shinra’s makeover! Even not made over she’s a cutie, but she was extra cute here!
❤️ Shinra calling out Rai for being an asshole during their first meeting. Apparently it was the first time in his life someone didn’t want to be friends with him?
💙 Rai being fully ready to kill Shinra’s manager for her the second he noticed the abuse. This was right after she told him off too, so it shows quite a bit of character in him!
💚 Nagisa being absolutely insane—I wonder what her circumstances are? Is she jealous of Shinra? Does she just hate other women?? I’m more curious about her than anything after reading this volume. Especially after what happened in the computer lab.
💛 Kanan giving Shinra his shirt when he noticed hers was ripped!! Oh my goodness he would make for a perfect male lead…
Maddies Manga 
Leave a comment