To Kill the Demon Spirits -- Kekkaishi

I am watching a TV anime series on the Animax channel currently. I think the story is nice and I would like to recommend to you. The anime series is called "Kekkaishi", and it is airing on the Animax channel at 10pm to 10.30pm from Monday to Friday. The anime series is adapted from the same name shonen manga by Yellow Tanabe. It is an ongoing supernatural manga series.


The TV anime series has 52 episodes and the story is  about Yoshimori Sumimura and Tokine Yukimura, heirs to rival families of kekkai (barrier magic) users, who must defend their school from the spirits drawn to the sacred land upon which it is built. Kekkaishi received the 2007 Shogakukan Manga Award for shōnen manga.

Title        : Kekkaishi / 結界師 / Barrier Master
Genre      : Supernatural, Action, Comedy, Fantasy, Romance, Shounen
Episodes : 52
Story       :
According to the legend, five hundred years ago, there was an insignificant lord who possessed a mysterious power; this power draws ayakashi (supernatural creatures) to him. A demon exterminator, Tokimori Hazama, was called upon to protect the lord and the castle. The lord's power stays on the land even when he had died. Thus, Tokimori founded the Hazama clan, who inherits his techniques, to protect the land for centuries to come. This land is Karasumori.
In the present day, Yoshimori Sumimura and Tokine Yukimura, heirs of the Hazama clan, are the kekkaishi that protect Karasumori. They are ability users (people who can use supernatural powers) who use a technique called Kekkai. Kekkai is a form of magical energy barrier which is primarily used to capture and destroy ayakashi that are drawn to this shinyuuchi (sacred land). Yoshimori has used an ingenious alternative to plain barriers by creating boxes of energy which can be used tactically as weapons or for making airborne stair steps. Any ayakashi that stay on the land become stronger. Yoshimori and Tokine are to guard the land from the intrusion of ayakashi who intend to power up there.
Yoshimori and Tokine suffered a lot of hardships in their responsibilities to protect Karasumori. The ayakashi they must fight are becoming more and more powerful, but they managed to protect the land with the help from Yoshimori's older brother, Masamori Sumimura, and the Urakai. Urakai itself is an organization of ability users that is governed by a council of twelve, consisting of high level ability users.


Characters Description :

Yoshimori Sumimura (墨村 良守, Sumimura Yoshimori)
The main male protagonist. A 14-year old middle school boy at the beginning of the story, Yoshimori is the 22nd Kekkaishi of the Sumimura family. Throughout the series, Yoshimori is portrayed as a lazy, stubborn, headstrong individual who strives to protect his family and friends, especially Tokine, who he's had feelings for since childhood. When Yoshimori was much younger he often cried a lot and strongly disliked being a Kekkaishi. Yoshimori's attitude greatly changed, however, after Tokine's arm was injured by an ayakashi that Yoshimori failed to eliminate. At the beginning of the series, he is often seen baking, an activity he often finds more important to him than his duty as a kekkaishi. He dreams of becoming a patissier, but is often chastised by his grandfather for this hobby.
Yoshimori's skills as a Kekkaishi differ from those of his counterpart, Tokine. Due to his rash and headstrong personality, Yoshimori has always fallen behind Tokine in terms of speed and accuracy. However, in terms of sheer power and stamina, Yoshimori excels. He is capable of creating extremely powerful and large kekkai, kekkai which Tokine is either incapable of forming or those which would quickly exhaust her. Throughout the series, observations had been made by Sumimura Shigemori and Sumimura Masamori that Yoshimori has an enormous wellspring of latent abilities in his kekkai. It has also been noted that Yoshimori is able to activate zekkai like technique without any particular training beforehand. It shows as black fire around him. However, his zekkai is a type of protecting type and is really called a shinkai and could only be powered to its full potential in moments when his emotions overflow their boundaries. Only three occasions had been shown with him using his fully powered zekkai in the current running of the series: once while fighting against Kaguro, while saving his brother Masamori from getting hit by a fatal attack, and after hiura is severely injured. This state rejects everything he doesn't like including death. It is later revealed by Hazama that this is actually a different technique entirely, called Shinkai, which up until then he was unable to use unless a powerful being lent him the power to trigger it without the necessary training.

Tokine Yukimura (雪村 時音, Yukimura Tokine)
Yoshimori's friend and "partner", but most noteably, is also his love interest. Tokine is 16 years old and the 22nd Kekkaishi of the Yukimura family. She bears a scar on her right hand, which she received while protecting Yoshimori in their childhood. Tokine is gifted with great accuracy and precision, however, her kekkai are very weak and can only be maintained for short periods of time; her kekkai lack the "brute power" of Yoshimori's kekkai. At first she attempts to make up for this by copying Masamori's technique of stacking several kekkai's around a target, however effective, this takes too much stamina for her, making the technique ill-suited for her. Later, she learns to refine her kekkai into narrow "spears" that can impale and imprison an enemy, making up for her lack of power. She also has the ability to manipulate kekkai and space, this is seen when she cannot dispel Yoshimori's kekkai and so manipulates it so she is able to pass through it and then again during the time a user kidnaps members of the Yagyou she uses his portal to enter the dimension he created. Tokine is clearly impressed by the power and potential Yoshimori has, but is constantly frustrated by his poor control and lazy attitude. She cares for Yoshimori and often protected him many times when he was younger. She also likes to tease him and isn't aware of his feelings for her, although as the story progresses she begins to shows signs of deeper affection for Yoshimori; she once slapped him so hard that he passed out for going off to fight Kaguro, and she trapped him with neshi and beat him when he left to Okuni without her. In the series, it is stated that whilst she may be the weakest Kekkaishi, she is clearly the most "ruthless", unless she must face her biggest fear: the cockroach. Examples of her ruthless pragmaticism are her disregard for the health of Hachiouji Kemiya when he was possessed by an ayakashi and forbidden metsu of a shinyuuchi god that had invaded Karasumori and attacked its defenders. After training relentlessly with Mikeno, a Nekomata (two-tailed demon cat), Tokine is told that her responsibility is to, alone, convince to lord of Hakuma, Mahora-sama, to hand over his domain so that it may be used in the sealing of Karasumori.

Madarao (斑尾)
A white demon dog that has served the Sumimura family since its founding, passed down to them by the founder, Hazama Tokimori. Madarao is able to detect ayakashi with his amazing sense of smell, which he often brags is far better than Hakubi’s. However, no matter how fast he locates an ayakashi, Yoshimori could never dispatch them fast enough, a fact Madarao often bemoans. Madarao is around 500 years old, and prior to his existence as a demon, was a Mountain dog known as Ginro (銀露), and was at one time friends with Kouya. He wears a 'collar', made of spirit beads and seals strung together with a nenshi, that seals away his true demon form. When not assisting Yoshimori, he resides inside a special stone covered with glyphs, which is humorously located inside a wooden doghouse. When unsealed, Madarao become very large and uses powerful poisons and illusions. Madarao seems to have an unrequited crush on Hazama Tokimori; apparently, the reason he had followed him was because he fell in love with him at first sight. Throughout his service to the Sumimura Family, Madarao had refused to acknowledge anybody as his real master other than Hazama Tokimori; however, after the battle with Kouya, Madarao begins to view Yoshimori as his master.

Hakubi (白尾)
The Yukimura family's demon dog; he detects demons with his sense of smell. He is about 400 years old. He is constantly insulting Yoshimori. Hakubi also enjoys teasing Madarao about having to serve a master (Yoshimori) with such pathetic skills. He constantly flirts with Tokine and likes to call her "honey". In the original Japanese version, he has a habit of using European words and expressions, eventually causing Yoshimori to complain that if he's a Japanese dog, he shouldn't be using European words.He accompanied Tokimori Hazama while he was alive and died when Chushinmaru's power went wild.

Masamori Sumimura (墨村正守, Sumimura Masamori)
The oldest son of the Sumimuras. Although he is the oldest of the three brothers, Masamori was not chosen as the heir, which had always been a source of mystery to him and Yoshimori, the latter stating many times in the series that in terms of skill and power, Masamori should have taken the position of heir. He is 21, though he looks much older. Masamori is the leader of Night Troop, as well as the 7th seat of the board of the Shadow Organization, in which he had struck up a highly uneasy and unpleasant relationship with Ogi Ichirou, the 8th seat, whom clearly despises and hates him. He is a very skilled Kekkaishi; mastering highest defense technique, mastering difficult techniques and able to activate zekkai. However, one noticeable difference about Masamori’s zekkai and Yoshimori’s zekkai was that Masamori was only able to destroy with it. He is not able to create his zekkai in such a way that he can protect the people in it other than himself. Some characters had noted that this was probably the reason why Masamori was not picked as the legitimate successor.

There are more characters are appearing in the series and the above are the main in the series. I found this anime series is interesting, that is why I am watching it. Moreover, in the story, the boy Yoshimori admires Tokine very much as he always wants to protect  her. However, the girl admires his elder brother instead. Therefore, I would like to know if the girl would fell for Yoshimori in later on! :P

Sometimes Yoshimori acts like a bit idiotic, but his intention is to protect the girl always which I think it is very sweet! Haha! Sometimes he looks Cool too! :P Although this story is adapted from the manga series, I do not think I will read the manga series as it is a very long series and it is still ongoing.

OK, let us preview of some the scenes of the Kekkaishi series.

Now, let us take a sneak peek of the manga series.

So, if you are interested to catch the Kekkaishi after the introdcution above, you may click on the links below.

Kekkaishi Anime Series

Kekkaishi Manga Series

Enjoy watching and/or reading!!! :)