To end his eternal suffering, he must slay one thousand enemies! Manji, a ronin warrior of feudal Japan, has been cursed with immortality. To rid himself of this curse and end his life of misery, he must slay one thousand evil men! His quest begins when a young girl seeks his help in taking revenge on her parents' killers...and his quest won't end until the blood of a thousand has been spilled!

An Interview With Hiroaki Samura Samurai stories are as old as the history of manga in Japan. But when Hiroaki Samura released Blade of the Immortal in the pages of Afternoon comics, it sent a shock wave through the industry. Samura's nihilistic-punk sensibility, masterful artwork, and science-fiction edge turns the old chestnut of "the lone swordsman steeped in Bushido" on its head. The immortal Manji is looking for a way to die, and he doesn't much care who gets in the way of his arsenal of exotic weapons. It's the aspiring swordswoman Rin, seeking to avenge her father's murder, who finally leads Manji to the only samurai in Japan who cares even less about Bushido than he does - the road-warrior swordsmen of Itto-ryu. The lesson is life, but it's written in blood. Studio Proteus: Where did Blade of the Immortal come from? Samura: I set out with the idea of trying to create a new genre of manga...But even before that, back when I first started into comics, I told myself that I would make the problem of living in this world my lifelong theme. For that, I figured that jidai-geki (period samurai dramas) would be better than something with a modern setting; death was a bigger part of life in Samurai times. But if I tried to make it totally real, I knew I'd get all kinds of complaints about accuracy from the samurai freaks. So I chose a style right from the beginning that said, "don't obsess about the details. Look at the story." SP: And the characters and storytelling? S: On the visual side, my biggest model has been Tange Sazen. I was blown away by the illustrations Tatsumi Shimura drew of Sazen, so I took the liberty of trying it myself. On the character side, in the protagonist Manji I've drawn a totally straight, unvarnished version of my own ideal hero - a person who never reveals his or her own weaknesses to others but who, at the same time, is not as unassailably powerful as he or she may seem. I didn't have a model for Rin herself, but after I drew her, my family started saying she looks like my younger sister. SP: How did you become a manga artist? S: There's no story to tell, really. After I finished college, I submitted some of my work to Afternoon's new talent contest, and I was in. It's not as if I came up with my pencil work on my own. In my circle of manga friends at school, there was an upperclassman who used pencil, and I learned a lot from him. SP: Blade of the Immortal features all kinds of exotic swords and other weapons ... S: Almost all of the weapons and combat techniques are my own creations. The Itto-ryu school of swordfighting is a play on the name of another, real school of swordsmanship, but the content is totally different. The Itto-ryu swordsmen and swordswomen reject all notions of "schools" of fighting and ritualistic formula. That's where they came up with all those crazy techniques they use. And by the way, I can't do any martial arts myself. SP: Every episode features a climactic duel, which you recreate in an almost mandala-like, full-page illustration. It seems like a lot of work. S: I spend a full day on a two-page spread like that. It's not so much the actual drawing ... What's really hard is finding the right pose. I chose black and white because, frankly, I don't like painting colors over art. I've never once thought I'd like to work in color. SP: Like Masamune Shirow, you refuse to be photographed or to make public appearances. Can you tell us something about your personal life? S: Came into the world on February 17, 1970. Born in Chiba prefecture (near Tokyo), never married. I don't appear in public because I believe there's no reason for readers to know that much about the cartoonist. What matters is the art. As for hobbies, I don't really have one. But I have been drawing some erotic pictures of women, all kinds of variations. If enough of them pile up, I may put out a collection - on my own dime, of course.