Fans of Demon Slayer who are still recovering from the manga ending in 2020 can rejoice: VIZ Media announced the English localization for a trilogy of light novels that will expand the Demon Slayer world, shining the spotlight on characters that did not find much space in the manga.
Demon Slayer - Kimetsu no Yaiba, is one of the best-selling manga in history, with more than 150 million copies sold. The anime adaptation, launched in 2019, also received praise from the public and critics alike, with its sequel film, The Mugen Train, becoming the highest-grossing Japanese film of all time. With a franchise worth almost 9 billion dollars annually, it was only natural that Demon Slayer expanded to the world of light novels, Japanese short novels primarily targeted at young adults and high or middle school students. The three Demon Slayer light novels are titled The Flower of Happiness, One-Winged Butterfly, and Signs from the Wind. They are written by Aya Yajima, and Demon Slayer's creator Koyoharu Gotouge provided cover art and illustrations.
The books do not continue the manga's story, but are set in different points of its timeline. Each chapter is also self-contained, and focuses on a different character, giving many members of the large Demon Slayer's cast the attention they deserve, but could not get in the manga. This will of course include the popular Hashira, the "pillars" of the Demon Slayer Corps. A few chapters of the light novels are also set in the world of Kimetsu Gakuen, a comedy spin-off mini-series in which Gotouge imagined their characters in a high-school setting rather than in the unforgiving world of demon hunting.
Demon Slayer is recently experiencing yet another surge of popularity thanks to the debut of the second season of the anime, which adapts the Entertainment District Arc of the manga. Young slayers Tanjiro, Inosuke, and Zenitsu have to follow the Sound Hashira Tengen Uzui in a dangerous infiltration mission that puts them on a collision path with the strongest enemies they have faced until then, the Upper Moon Six demon siblings, Daki and Gyutaro.
With season 3 already announced, Demon Slayer remains a hugely popular entertainment icon, in Japan and abroad, and these light novels will be a treat for Western fans of the series. They will be released in the Fall of 2022.