Jūjika no Rokunin

Jūjika no Rokunin (十字架のろくにん) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Shiryuu Nakatake. It was originally serialized in Kodansha's manga magazine Bessatsu Shōnen Magazine from March to October 2020, and was transferred to Magazine Pocket app and website since November 2020, with its chapters collected into sixteen  volumes as of July 2024.

Setting
Jūjika no Rokunin depicts the vengeance of the main character on his bullies. In order to defeat several non-human monsters, the boy becomes something non-human. Uruma Shun, a sixth-grade student, is named "Experimental body: A" by five of his classmates and is severely bullied. His only peace was with his brother, who loved him, and his parents, who protected him, until the five monsters killed his family. When he finally loses everything and despairs, a dark "wish" is born inside Shun. He is reborn under the training of his grandfather, who served in a secret unit during WWII. Four years later, he appears in front of his enemies, torturing and killing each of them. Upon confronting the leader of the bullies, Kyou Shigoku, he is revealed to be the leader of a cult called The Revolution Club that killed his family before leaving him alone at the crime scene, ultimately getting him him arrested for 5 years. During the time-skip, Uruma loses his memories before joining an organization dedicated to targeting criminals called "Juujika-san."

Main

 * Shun Uruma (漆間 俊)
 * A kind-hearted high-school boy whose parents were killed and younger brother hospitalized by childhood bullies when he was only 12-years-old, leading him down a path of vengeance on the five. Shun Uruma was bullied by five classmates when he was in elementary school. The abuse was so horrific that it left Shun Uruma physically and mentally scarred. Despite this, he vows to avenge his parents' death and younger brother's comatose on the bullies who have made his life horrible during his high school years. He succeeded in killing four of them and planned on taking down Kyou himself, but the mastermind had formed new allies and was revealed to be the leader of a cult called the Revolution Club, shocking Uruma. After his deadly match with Kyou, he failed to kill the leader of the bullies, who had escaped with Andou, Jun, and Momoki from the gym as he is arrested for the murder of Anzai Zenichi for 5 years. Following his imprisonment, 21-year-old Uruma lost his memories due to Jun's assassination attempt before he meets Kitami who recruits him in his organization, "Juujika-san".
 * A kind-hearted high-school boy whose parents were killed and younger brother hospitalized by childhood bullies when he was only 12-years-old, leading him down a path of vengeance on the five. Shun Uruma was bullied by five classmates when he was in elementary school. The abuse was so horrific that it left Shun Uruma physically and mentally scarred. Despite this, he vows to avenge his parents' death and younger brother's comatose on the bullies who have made his life horrible during his high school years. He succeeded in killing four of them and planned on taking down Kyou himself, but the mastermind had formed new allies and was revealed to be the leader of a cult called the Revolution Club, shocking Uruma. After his deadly match with Kyou, he failed to kill the leader of the bullies, who had escaped with Andou, Jun, and Momoki from the gym as he is arrested for the murder of Anzai Zenichi for 5 years. Following his imprisonment, 21-year-old Uruma lost his memories due to Jun's assassination attempt before he meets Kitami who recruits him in his organization, "Juujika-san".


 * Chizuru Azuma (東 千鶴)
 * A normal high-schooler who became involved in Uruma's life after he saved her from a psychotic rapist. This later results in her developing feelings for Uruma while getting rescued by him on several occasions. Despite knowing about Shun's dark past and secret, she still believes in him and wishes to support him by any means necessary. Out of all the major supporting female characters in Part I, Azuma is the only one to have survived. The time skip has her return in a new job with longer hair and reunites with Uruma, who lost his memories while working under Kitami. Shun mostly avoided her feelings due to trying to keep out of her involvement in his revenge, but after the timeskip, he finally seems to reciprocate his feelings for her.

Uruma's Family

 * Shun Uruma Sr. (おじいちゃん)
 * He is an elderly man of average height and average build, as well as short white hair and a scar on his left eye. He once belonged to the Kure Naval District 100th Special Land Squadron (commonly known as Kitayama Squadron) during World War II, which was a group of skilled assassins. Knowing that his grandson Shun Uruma, genuinely wanted revenge on the monsters who made his life a living hell,, Grandpa taught Shun Uruma how to murder and torture people. He was later killed by one of Kyou's henchmen, Andou Midori, in an attempt to save Kakeru.


 * Kakeru Uruma (漆間 翔)
 * He is the younger brother of Shun Uruma. He has a cheerful personality and a gentle side, such as petting abandoned cats. It is said that he felt lightly that his brother was being bullied. After the transfer of his brother Shun Uruma was decided, he was in a car with his parents and suffered a traffic accident by Kyou, and became unconscious as a result. He later dies at the hands of Kyou as the latter stabs the former with a knife protruding from his back.


 * Mr. and Mrs. Uruma
 * Shun's parents who were killed by the bullies.

Meiseki High (明関高校 Meiseki Kōkō)

 * Kaname Shirakawa (白川 要)
 * The younger twin sister of Jun and childhood friend of Uruma. A classmate of Uruma, she always had a crush on him ever since he save her from the same group of bullies who would switch their target from her to Uruma, causing her to feel indebted to her childhood friend. Although she nearly performed in the play Romeo and Juliet with Uruma, unfortunately she was raped by Hiro Madoka, causing her to be traumatized before Uruma murdered Madoka in retaliation for his attack on Kaname. At some point, she and Uruma had sex after going to an amusement park, causing an unaware Jun to eventually think that Uruma raped his sister, which led to his betrayal of his former childhood friend. During the Rock, Paper, Scissors match, she was kidnapped by the Revolution Club before dying at the hands of Momoki Sanae, the Revolution Club member who sliced off her right arm and her left leg, as a result of her brother having lost two matches to Uruma. Her death would be the catalyst for a series of botched surgeries performed by her brother on multiple women with the same hiragana characters in her name during the Jun arc.


 * Jun Shirakawa (白川 純)
 * The older twin brother of Kaname, he is very protective of her and is also a childhood friend of Shun. At some point in the story, when his younger sister gets raped, he mistakenly believes that Uruma was responsible for his younger sister's rape, causing him to join Kyou's cult just so he could inflict suffering on Uruma before realizing his mistake and later switching sides to make up for the suffering he caused him. His fate regarding the incident involving him, Kyou's cult, and Uruma was left ambiguous until he made a phone call through Andou's phone to Kitami. It was then revealed that he abused multiple girls into donning his late sister's appearances while being in relationships with them. He was eventually revealed to have caused Uruma's memory loss after shooting him with a gun before kidnapping him and tricking him into thinking that Azuma Chizuru died (who in reality is actually in a room watching the confrontation between Jun and Uruma unfold). He later commits suicide via gunshot to his mouth after snapping out of Kyou's trance. His body was later taken away by Momoki and Masashi before the police could even retrieve it.


 * Anna Sugisaki (杉崎 杏奈)
 * Kyou's cousin and Kuga's girlfriend who is later killed by the latter.

Metropolitan Police Department

 * Zen'ichi Anzai (安西 全一)
 * A cop who investigated Shun and the bullies before getting killed by the former due to witnessing his murder of Kuga, becoming the only innocent Uruma killed. His recording of his incident with Uruma would later allow his assistant, Oota, to arrest Uruma and prevent him from committing his final revenge, leading to the second part of the story with his wife taking over the case.


 * Asako Oota (太田 朝子)
 * Anzai's partner involved in the case revolving around the accident that claimed the lives of Shun Uruma's parents. She is described as easy-going and stupid despite her job as a police officer. Furthermore, she is also very kind as she offers accommodation to Uruma when her house was burnt down by Kuga Daichi. After discovering Uruma's true colors and her involvement in Anzai Zenichi's death, she becomes more serious and cold towards Uruma and later arrests him as she is a suspect in the suspicious death of her former mentor. Still, she wanted to help Uruma get his sentence reduced or canceled if she would tell about what happened in the old elementary school and Uruma's family case and know if it was really him who voluntarily eliminated Zenichi. After Uruma is sentenced to prison, Asako wants to investigate further the Uruma family case to find out not only all the mysteries of it but also why it is connected to other cases. Five years later, she becomes a police inspector and begins to investigate the "Juujika-san" case together with Anzai Mizuki, Zenichi's wife.


 * Mizuki Anzai (安西 瑞紀)
 * The wife of the late Anzai Zenichi, who works as a detective for the Metropolitan Police Department. She currently works on the case of Uruma Shun with Oota Asako, in replacement of her husband for the second half of the story. Despite deducting Uruma's sympathetic past and revenge against Kyou, she still struggles to find peace with him due to his murder of her husband.

Juujika-san (十字架さん)

 * Kougo Kitami (北見 高梧)
 * The leader of "Juujika-san" who helps people kill their tormentors as long as they pay him a lot of money. The mysterious leader of the group, he disguises his assassination business as a "clinic" so that he could be able to run it without getting caught by the police. Uruma worked for Kitami ever since the post-timeskip after the two meet following Jun's assassination attempt on Uruma. He, Uruma, and Kawana are very close friends outside their business hours.


 * Mimi Kawana (川奈 美々)
 * Kitami's assistant.

Antagonists

 * Kyou Shigoku (至極 京)
 * The main antagonist of the manga and Uruma's archenemy who is the leader of the group of bullies who tormented him in their childhoods. Kyou sets himself apart as completely apathetic, cruel, and psychopathic compared to the other four. He is a talented person who has passed the prefectural preparatory school with a perfect score and aspires to the medical school, but he continues to bully him by calling him "experiment" how much he should bully Shun Uruma to commit suicide. He is the earliest to notice Shun Uruma's revenge and is said to seem to enjoy his revenge. After the death of the bullies, it is revealed that he amassed a cult called the Revolution Club with many followers. He later had Uruma and Jun play a match that led to the deaths of Kaname, Kakeru, and Shun Uruma Sr. before escaping with Andou, Jun, and Momoki. 5 years later, Kyou has longer hair and his scar is healed with his cult now growing in numbers.

Uruma's Bullies

 * Daichi Kuga (久我 大地)
 * He is one of the five bullies who mistreated Shun Uruma in their childhood. Shun Uruma and Daichi Kuga are the same in high school, and the big monster continues to mistreat his victim even when they are in high school. Daichi Kuga was a fierce man who won the national junior high school judo tournament in the 90 kg class, and when he mistreated Shun Uruma, he used violence and physically damaged him. Later Shun beats him and later kills him as the fourth victim.


 * Hiro Madoka (円 比呂)
 * He is a member of the group that bullied Shun Uruma. He is a fanatic who can lick his shoes without hesitation if he is to be recognized by Kyou. One of his special talents is creating poisonous drinks and forcing people to drink them. He attacks Shun Uruma at the school festival in order to earn Kyou's approval, only to fail and instead raping Kaname as a result of her eavesdropping on his plan to attack Uruma. He later becomes Shun's third victim.


 * Yuuga Ushiro (右代 悠牙)
 * Ushiro Yuuga is a member of the group of children who bullied Shun Uruma back in their childhoods. He is a playboy who is called "Yarichin" in the sixth grade of elementary school. Yuuga is involved in crimes such as prostitution and drug trafficking in high school. In addition, Yuga is a deluded teenager who confined a girl by the name of Karen Sakuraba at his home and sexually assaulted her. Later he is tortured by Shun and Karen, eventually dying as the second victim.


 * Katsumi Senkouji (千光寺 克美)
 * Senkouji Katsumi is also a member of the bullying group. He was originally on good terms with Shun Uruma until he resorted to bullying his former friend by shooting Shun with an air gun. Senkouji later became the first target of his victim's revenge, dying after being tortured severely by Uruma.

The Revolution Club (革命倶楽部 Kakumei Kurabu)

 * Midori Andou (安堂 緑)
 * A member of the Revolutions Club. Being the most loyal cultist out of the four (including Miguel, Momoki, and Nogi) researchers, he is very talented in not only hand-to-hand combat, but also torture methodologies. Ever since Kyou taught him how to properly torture people, he has been loyal to the psychopath as a result. He is responsible for not only kidnapping Shun's younger brother, Kakeru, but also mutilating the young child's leg and later murdering Uruma Shun Sr. After the events revolving around the match, he, Kyou, Jun, and Momoki, all escaped before the police could arrest them. Five years later, he is seen, along with Momoki and two other unidentified researchers, meeting up with Shigoku Kyou during a meeting. He later dies at the hands of Uruma by being burned to death following his torture on a Revolutionary Club island.


 * Sanae Momoki (百木 早苗)
 * A member of the Revolutions Club. Being the quietest member of the Revolutions Club, she was initially a witness to the cult activities of the Revolutions Club. However, she was later revealed to be more involved in the cult's activities as she takes Uruma to his and Kyou's former elementary school for a "match". During the match, she mutilates Kaname twice when Jun lost 2 rounds of "Rock, Paper, Scissors" before wheeling her lifeless body to the older twin brother. She also held Kakeru hostage before Andou attempted to kill the both of them, only for her to drop Kakeru before escaping. She later escapes the gym with Andou, Jun, and Kyou, before they could get arrested by the police. Five years later, she enters a room with Andou and two other unidentified researchers for a meeting with Kyou. Following Andou's death, she plays the most active role as Kyou's remaining right-hand.


 * Takashi Nogi (能義 隆)
 * A member of the Revolutionary Club. Being the shortest member of the Revolutions Club, he is very bad-tempered and prone to using violence towards anyone in general. He was seen holding Kakeru hostage with a knife when threatening Uruma if he didn't participate in the Rock-Paper-Scissors match with Shirakawa Jun. At some point, he repeatedly kicks Uruma in the head while berating him after the latter's remaining family members die before the short man gets his face ripped off by the teeanger and punched on the head, knocking him to the ground as he dies.


 * Miguel (美外留)
 * A member of the Revolutions Club. Being a tall and muscular man, he is very charismatic and well-mannered despite his appearance. However, like the other members of the Revolutions Club, he is just as twisted, cruel, and violent as them during their tortures of their own members. He gets his left eye gouged out by Uruma before attempting to twist his head, only for Shun Uruma Sr. to rip out his vein, instantly killing him.

Others

 * Daki Kawashima
 * A servant of Ushiro.


 * Karen Sakuraba (桜庭 花蓮)
 * A girl who was kidnapped and abused by Ushiro, she later gets her revenge on her abusive boyfriend before committing suicide.


 * Ganno (雁野)
 * A minion of Ushiro who was sent by the psychopath to rape Azuma Chizuru. Being gigantic for a teenager himself, he is also very abusive and misogynistic as he views women as sex objects and even threatens to beat those who dare resist his sexual advances. At some point, when he attempts to attack Azuma, he is confronted by "Bikerman" (who is actually Shun Uruma wearing a bicycle helmet to cover up his identity) and the bigger man seems to have gained the upper hand in their fight only for the tables to turn once Uruma dislocates the bigger monster's joints, temporarily. He later joins the Revolution Club, attempting to assault Kawana until Uruma intervened, leaving them to finish off what they started.After clashing with Uruma he realises that Uruma is the "Bikerman" (as Uruma wears a helmet during the fight), but instead of killing uruma he expresses his gratitude as for , he realised true consent in jail due to Uruma and then kills all the rest of Revolutionary group memebers hunting uruma in the hospital.He was beheaded by the Hands of Uruma Grandfather's comrade, Kibe Juutarou.


 * Maki
 * A prostitute who works under Ushiro.


 * Kibe Juutarou
 * Uruma Shun Grandfather's comrade, a former member of the Kitayama corps, a man whose performance was acknowledged by Uruma Shun Grandfather .He was a homicidal psychopath from his younger age and resorted to WWI when he was 15 year old in order to quench his bloodthirst, his achievements were acknowledged and thus he was admitted into the kitayama corps.after WWII he resorted to be a part of Yakuza and Government in order to further quench his bloodthirst and murdered a lot of peoples.He became a part of Revolutionary group on 2 conditions : 1. He asks Kyou for soldier who would abide by him and 2.he wants Kyou to make a perfect place to torture Uruma and kill him. He also created a group of highly skilled soldier who possess same techniques as of Kityama corps and named it "Neo Kityama Corps".

Manga
Jūjika no Rokunin, written and illustrated by Shiryuu Nakatake, began serialization in Kodansha's monthly manga magazine Bessatsu Shōnen Magazine on March 9, 2020. The manga was serialized in the magazine until October 9 of the same year, and was then transferred to the publisher's Magazine Pocket online platform starting on November 5 of the same year. Kodansha has collected its chapters into individual volumes. The first volume was released on August 7, 2020. As of May 9, 2024, fifteen volumes have been released.

In France, the manga is licensed by Delcourt/Tonkam, and in Italy by Star Comics.

Chapters not yet in tankōbon format

 * Special Chapter 1: Have you Heard of "Juujika-san"? (”ジュージカさん”って知ってる？)
 * Chapter 168: Aha... (アハっ...)
 * Chapter 169: Slash'Em, Stab'Em, Carve'Em (切って刺して刻める)
 * Chapter 170: It's Rather Tasty (なかなか美味いぞ?)
 * Chapter 171: Kitayama Special Trap (北山部隊特製の罠)

Reception
As of March 2022, the manga had over 1 million copies in circulation. It had over 3.5 million copies in circulation by May 2024.

Manga Sanctuary called the manga first volume exciting and excellent with a quest for revenge in Dexter Morgan's background, stating the manga is captivating from start to finish and downright dark at times. AnimeClick felt that the manga is extreme and bloody and similar to Dexter with the brutality of Saw and Hostel, said: "Its story is full of disturbing and shocking moments, wildly weird and clearly entertaining," They describe the manga design style as "aggressive," adding: "The characters emotions are often distorted, with antagonists who seem to be the idealized embodiment of pure evil and a protagonist who is brutally violent and seeks revenge."

Popularity
The manga Jūjika no Rokunin is said to be popular for its themes revolving around bullying and revenge, and was not very popular when it first serialized in Bessatsu Shōnen Magazine in March 2020. The manga was discontinued in the magazine's November issue of that same year due to poor sales of first volume. Later, the manga was transferred to the Magazine Pocket online platform, and Jūjika no Rokunin quickly became one of the most popular manga of the app, and its popularity led to the first three volumes being reprinted. In March 2021, the manga had over 13 million views on Magazine Pocket app "Magapoke". In June 2021, Due to the popularity of the electronic version of the manga, volume sales were 6.6 times higher than paper sales. In May 2022, in first popularity poll of the series, Shun Uruma Sr. ranks first with 50% of votes, in June 2022 popularity poll of the series, Shun Uruma Sr. acquiring the first position with 8633 votes, with Kaname Shirakawa and Shun Uruma acquiring second and third place.