Black Torch

📖 SYNOPSIS

At just seventeen, Jirou Azuma is already a trained member of a shinobi clan with the rare ability to talk to animals. That's already a pretty specific setup, but it gets wilder — he rescues a black cat that turns out to be a mononoke, a demonic spirit named Ragou, and the two end up bound together in a way that gives Jirou dangerous new powers he barely understands. From there, he gets pulled into a shadow war between humans and demons that his ninja training only halfway prepared him for.

The manga this is based on ran in Shonen Jump and had this tight, no-filler energy — it told its story and didn't drag things out. The dynamic between Jirou and Ragou is the core appeal here. Think of it like a grittier, more compact version of the human-demon symbiosis you get in Jujutsu Kaisen, or if Naruto's jinchuuriki concept got stripped down to its rawest form without 200 episodes of side quests. There's also a Bleach-era vibe to the whole thing — kid discovers a hidden supernatural world, gains power, fights escalating threats — but filtered through a shinobi lens that keeps the combat grounded and sharp.

Studio 100studio is handling the adaptation for 2026, so production details are still light. But if you're into action-packed shounen with a supernatural edge and a protagonist who's more scrappy fighter than chosen one, this is one to keep on your radar.