Slayers

Slayers (Japanese: スレイヤーズ, Hepburn: Sureiyāzu) is a Japanese comic fantasy media franchise originating in a series of over 52 light novels written by Hajime Kanzaka and illustrated by Rui Araizumi. The novels had been serialized in Dragon Magazine, and were later adapted into several manga titles, televised anime series, anime films, OVA series, role-playing video games, and other media. Slayers follows the adventures of teenage sorceress Lina Inverse and her companions as they journey through their world. Using powerful magic and swordsmanship they battle overreaching wizards, demons seeking to destroy the world, and an occasional hapless gang of bandits. The anime series is considered to be one of the most popular of the 1990s.

Setting and characters

In the Slayers universe, the ultimate being is the Lord of Nightmares, the creator of at least four parallel worlds. An artifact known as the Claire Bible contains information about the Lord of Nightmares' task to regain its "true form", which is only attainable by destroying these worlds and returning them to the chaos that it itself is. For unexplained reasons, though, the Lord of Nightmares has not acted upon this desire by itself so far. On each of these worlds are gods (shinzoku, lit. "godly race") and demons (mazoku, lit. "demon race"), fighting without end. Should the gods win the war in a world, that world will be at peace. Should the demons win, the world will be destroyed and returned to the Sea of Chaos.