I’d like to talk about the “The a-Kira Story”—the one-shot Death Note manga published in Jump Square in 2020 that caused quite a stir!
It’s a whopping 87 pages long! This is intense and substantial! Neither Light nor L appear, but it’s still fascinating! It really lives up to expectations!
So, let’s dive right in with full spoilers!
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- Prologue: The New Protagonist, Minoru Tanaka
- Two years later: decided to “sell” the Death Note
- The Pursuit and Setback of the 3rd-Generation L (Near)
- The U.S. won the bid with 1,000 trillion yen
- The Tragic End of Minoru Tanaka
- Why did it have to be two years later?
- Thoughts: The Balance Between Injustice and Karma
Prologue: The New Protagonist, Minoru Tanaka
The story centers on Minoru Tanaka, a genius middle school student with an IQ over 140.
Unlike Light Yagami, his academic performance is... well, lacking, but the Shinigami Ryuk hands him the Death Note, recognizing his sharp intellect.
Having learned from the C-Kira arc that letting weak people use the Note is boring, Ryuk decides, “I have to give it to someone as capable as Light!” and chooses Minoru.
He intentionally drops the notebook onto Minoru’s head as he stands in the park. Minoru is absolutely terrified of Ryuk.
The scene shifts to Minoru’s room. Ryuk explains the notebook to him, but Minoru shows no interest in murder, exclaiming, “Killing people is out of the question!” He calmly assesses the risks of using the Death Note, taking into account modern society’s surveillance cameras and online tracking technologies.
Tanaka tries to pry as much information as possible out of Ryuk about the previous Kira. There’s a scene where Tanaka admires, “Kira must have been incredibly smart!” which I personally found really satisfying.
By the way, according to Tanaka, Light’s Kira is actually featured in school textbooks. Of course, he’s portrayed as “evil,” but it seems he’s been incorporated into the compulsory education curriculum.
While he’s terrified, thinking, “This is one hell of a notebook…” he falls silent and deeply contemplates what to do with it… So the questions he asked Ryuk were, “Is there anyone else besides me who can see Ryuk?” and “How far can I get away from the notebook’s owner?”! Just like a genius! He must have come up with some amazing plan!
At first, Ryuk said he didn’t know about the distance, but Tanaka-kun told him to just decide. Tanaka-kun is pretty bold! And the result was 14 kilometers. Apparently, Ryuk just decided that on his own. Apparently, it’s okay to just make up the rules on the spot for things that haven’t been decided yet. I don’t mind this laid-back vibe in the Shinigami world lol.
Nothing changed right then and there; the plan was to suggest to Ryuk two years later, “Bring the notebook back!”
The real story begins when Ryuk revisits Minoru Tanaka—who has now become a high school student—after he has once abandoned ownership of the Death Note.
Apparently, the protagonist of this work was given the most common name possible, in contrast to the main character of the original series, Light Yagami, who has a name that’s generally considered impossible. I hear there’s actually someone in Japan with the exact same name.
Two years later: decided to “sell” the Death Note
Minoru Tanaka’s decision was astonishing.
Having no qualms about killing people and feeling no strong indignation toward social evils, he resolved to “sell” the Death Note.
It’s a mindset typical of modern young people who just want to live a carefree life. Through Ryuk, he announced on the TV station—that nostalgic “Sakura TV” that helped us out in the main story—that he would hold an auction for the Death Note.
When instructing Ryuk to move, he tells him to travel underground rather than fly through the air. The fact that he thought this through so thoroughly is genius! If footage or something were captured of Ryuk taking off from his house, there would be no way to deny it.
The auction quickly drove up the price, escalating into a nationwide bidding war.
It’s fascinating to imagine what would happen if the Death Note actually appeared in the modern world…!
Ryuk was supposed to just be watching over things, but he’s actually been pretty active this time around.
The Pursuit and Setback of the 3rd-Generation L (Near)
The one who reacted to this development was Nia, the now-grown-up third-generation L. Her hair has gotten quite long—she probably doesn’t go to the salon, does she?
He’s definitely inherited the eccentric personality.
While Nia showed no interest in C-Kira, she seems to have taken an interest in A-Kira.
She’s deduced that he’s an extremely intelligent person, and Nia has given him high marks, saying she’d personally like to meet him!
That’s Tanaka for you! To get Nia to acknowledge him this much…!
Nia nicknames Minoru Tanaka “A-Kira” (derived from the “A” in the English word “auction”) and attempts to track him down.
However, since the transactions don’t go through the internet, and Ryuk travels underground when heading to the TV station, Nia is completely stumped by the lack of any traces…
That’s Tanaka-kun for you! He’s really thought this through to make sure there’s no way to trace him!
The idea of moving underground is amazing! If people involved at the time saw us, they might have been able to identify us with cameras or something!
The U.S. won the bid with 1,000 trillion yen
The auction heated up, turning into a bidding war between the leaders of the United States and China.
In the end, the U.S. president won the bid for the Death Note for 1,000 trillion yen ($2 trillion), citing “peaceful use” as the justification.
However, the problem was how to pay such a massive sum. If an individual received the money, their trail would be traced, and deciding how to use an amount equivalent to Japan’s national debt was also a challenge.
Tanaka’s plan was ingenious. He demanded that the 1,000 trillion yen be distributed equally among 1 million people under the age of 60 living in Tokyo who held ordinary accounts at Yotsuba Bank.
Approximately 1 billion yen was deposited into each person’s account, and Tanaka himself benefited as one of the recipients.
With this method, it was nearly impossible for L to identify him. Near admitted, “This is the first time I’ve been defeated since becoming L,” and Ryuk was impressed, remarking, “To acquire such a vast fortune without using the notebook.”
A billion per person… If a family of four all opened accounts, that’d be 40 billion… Whoa… That might actually ruin your life…
The Tragic End of Minoru Tanaka
At first glance, it seemed like Minoru Tanaka had achieved a perfect victory, but the story takes an unexpected turn.
The King of Death flies into a rage and adds a new rule! It states that “anyone who buys or sells a Death Note will die”… The seller dies the moment they receive the money, and the buyer dies the moment they receive the notebook… What an outrageously harsh rule to impose after the fact!
Ryuk suggests to the U.S. President, “You won’t die if you don’t accept the notebook.”
The President rejected this, publicly declaring, “I will possess the Death Note but will not use it.” He positioned the Death Note as a weapon with deterrent power surpassing that of nuclear weapons. I think this was the wisest choice in this situation. As expected of the President!
Meanwhile, since Maki Tanaka had previously told Ryuk, “No matter what happens, never show your face to me again,” he did not receive the warning about the new rule. He withdrew money from an ATM and died the moment he touched it.
Ryuk smiles and says, “Everyone who uses the Death Note ends up miserable,” and the story comes to a close.
When I first read it, I thought, “This is just too unfair… isn’t this a bit too harsh?” I even wondered if Ryuk could have warned him, given the circumstances… Since it seems he’d be fine as long as he didn’t touch the money himself, I thought, “Why didn’t he just have his mom withdraw the money for him?”
Or maybe have his parents convert it to e-money and send it to him… I end up daydreaming about all sorts of things like that! That’s what makes it fun!
And that’s exactly why that shocking ending is so quintessentially “Death Note.”
I did wonder, “Did he really have to kill Tanaka-kun?” But since Tanaka-kun was selling it knowing full well it was a real murder notebook, I suppose he deserved his punishment (it might have ended up in the hands of some truly terrible villain).
Ryuk probably had no choice but to write his name down—rules are rules, after all.
Come to think of it, in *Death Note*, breaking the rules doesn’t mean you die instantly; instead, a Shinigami who witnesses it writes your name down… like, “Oh, you just broke the rules—here, I’ll write your name down”? If that’s the case, even sending e-money would be game over if Ryuk decided to write his name down. There’s just no way to stop that!
Well, but if Tanaka-kun just takes the money and wins outright, the story wouldn’t really build up much, would it…
Since this was a one-shot story, it might have been a good way to wrap things up, in a way… though it’s a bit sad…
Why did it have to be two years later?
But here’s the question… “Why two years later?”
Back then, I thought he must have been meticulously preparing some outrageous plan over those two years… but if he lost his memory, it would be pointless.
I’ll summarize here what I realized after rereading it
Tanaka asked Ryuk, “Are there other people who can see Ryuk besides me?” right?
As mentioned in the story, unlike when Light was around, the world today is full of surveillance cameras everywhere. With smartphones so widespread, you never know when, where, or by whom you might be filmed, or if you’ve accidentally been caught on camera somewhere.
You might be caught on camera just by casually walking past a convenience store, or you might end up in the footage of some dashcam.
If that footage is investigated and seen by someone who can see Ryuk (like Matsuda), you’re done for in an instant. It would take a lot of patience and persistence to investigate, but… it’s true that even in a Japanese police investigation, if they were told to “thoroughly check all video footage within a radius of X meters of the TV station!”, it would be a huge crisis.
If it’s two years later, even if they manage to track down footage from two years ago, I can just stick to my story—“I returned the notebook! I threw it away!”—and play dumb. And once I’ve discarded the memory, there’s nothing they can do about it.
That’s why Tanaka-kun deliberately specified “two years later”… It’s amazing that he thought that far ahead… As expected of Tanaka-kun—I take my hat off to his intelligence!
I didn't really get it the first time I read it, but I have to say, it's typical of Tanaka-kun to have thought that far ahead! He's a genius!
Thoughts: The Balance Between Injustice and Karma
While this one-shot story didn’t have many dramatic twists, its unexpected ending left a lasting impression.
It highlighted the “absurdity” of Minoru Tanaka’s sudden death, emphasizing the theme of karma.
If you view the Death Note as a weapon, the punishment for the reckless act of buying and selling it makes sense; but I don’t think it’s right to just let the notebook pass into the hands of another country and call it a happy ending…
Even so, this story—which depicts a new way to use the Death Note and Near’s defeat—was a work brimming with the irony and tension characteristic of *Death Note*.
Light may have lost, but I’d like to applaud Tanaka for completely defeating Near…! It feels like he got a little payback against that Nia, and I feel like Light was saved just a little bit.