BL Library - Designers

Manhwa Review | Master of Master by Shida

Title: Master of Master (Tapas) | Like it Ruff (Lezhin Comics)

Author(s): Shida

Artist(s): Shida

Euncheol has led a lonely life. To stave away the loneliness, he frequently jumps from bedmate to bedmate and from relationship to relationship, hoping to one day feel the unconditional love he so desperately craves. Then, after a particularly messy breakup, his friends suggest he try getting a dog instead. Euncheol doesn't feel all that confident in the prospect of that, but he goes on to a shelter all the same, where he meets Jonggu, a nervous mutt in need of all the care and support Euncheol has to offer.

This starts a beautiful companionship between Euncheol and his dog Jonggu. Euncheol is still looking for his ideal human partner, but at least now he has Jonggu to help comfort and keep him company. Jonggu, on the other hand, desperately longs to be everything to Euncheol. He hates watching his beloved master suffer at the hands of his shitty lovers when he knows he could be everything to Euncheol. Everything comes to a head when, after a night of breaking up with his boyfriend, who hurt Jonggu, Euncheol wakes up to find a naked man in his bed, and Jonggu is nowhere to be found.

As the nude stranger in his bed explains, he is Jonggu, and because of his wish to be with Euncheol, the god of dogs, granted him the opportunity to become human so that he can live with his human for longer. Jonggu still has a chance to return to being a dog, but he doesn't want to. He aims to win Euncheol's heart so he never has to be in pain again. Unfortunately, a coworker is on the prowl for the newly single Euncheol. Can Jonggu win his master's heart, or will he lose him forever?

Title: Adorable And Impossible

Author(s): Owal

Artist(s): Owal

Tatsuya has decided to take a part-time gig teaching graphic design at an art college. He doesn't have a passion for teaching or anything like that, but he needs money to help support the business he wants to start, so he accepts the dreaded task of educating the youth. One such youth he finds himself teaching is a particularly bubbly young adult named Tsumugi. Tsumugi wants to be a fashion designer, but he is often late to class, is quick to play around, and often comes in hungover or buzzed, which doesn't convince Tatsuya that Tsumugi is all that serious about his goals.

That is, until one day, after a class training students on a program that allows people to design things, Tsumugi ends up begging Tatsuya for personal training after hours. While Tatsuya isn't fond of working for free, he can't help being moved by this serious Tsumugi he's never seen before, so they stay after and train on the program together. Once again, Tatsuya is surprised by how serious and diligent Tsumugi is about this. He's really drawn to his student for the first time… until Tsumugi decides to reward him with a sexual favor.

Tatsuya, though he is swept up in the heat of the moment, knows just as well as anybody that this can't happen again, but after the first time, Tsumugi seems to be obsessed with getting him back in bed by any means necessary.

Title: Princess Jellyfish

Author(s): Akiko Higashimura

Artist(s): Akiko Higashimura

Tsukimi Kurashita is obsessed with jellyfish. Her obsession began when she was a child, and her mother took her to the aquarium. While there, her mother promised Tsukimi that she would make her a wedding dress that looked like a lace jellyfish. Not long after that promise, Tsukimi's mother passes away, leaving her with the memories of the lace jellyfish and her mother's unfulfilled promise.

Even as those childhood days grew further and further away, Tsukimi's love and obsession with jellyfish never faded. Instead, it fuels and drives her entire life as she resigns herself to single life at the Amamizukan – a retro building dubbed the “nunnery” where many other like-minded, home-bodied women have congregated to live out their single lives together, obsessing over their own passions (some of which include elderly men, trains, and kimonos, just to name a few). As a result of their obsessions, the women of Amamizukan are all very anti-men and those they dub “stylish” and find themselves unable to interact with the general population as a result.

However, one evening, Tsukimi notices two jellyfish being kept in an aquarium together, and these two species can't be housed together; otherwise, one of them will die. Tsukimi does her best to explain this to the store clerk, but because the clerk is a man and a stylish, Tsukimi struggles to communicate with him. A stylish woman comes by and helps Tsukimi rescue the jellyfish by chance. Though the woman is a stylish, she is allowed into the sacred nunnery because she isn't a man. Throughout the evening, Tsukimi realizes even though her new friend Kuranosuke Koibuchi is a stylish, she is still a good person and even finds herself drawn to her beauty because she looks like a princess – something Tsukimi herself feels she could never be.

The next day, though, it is revealed that Kuranosuke is actually a man who cross-dresses as a way to escape his family's political background. To protect her place in Amamizukan and maintain her new friendship, Tsukimi tells all of her fellow nuns that Kuranosuke is a woman. Even with her own position at Amamizukan protected, the entirety of the building and the neighborhood itself is under threat by large corporations seeking to buy out the land to build hotels and stores in its place. Having fallen in love with Amamizukan and the residents there, Kuranosuke enlists the help of all the women of Amamizukan to create a fashion line based on Tsukimi's jellyfish illustrations so they can make up the funds needed to buy up the building before it is sold.

Title: The Sweetest Man

Author(s): Haejin

Artist(s): Haejin

Minhoon and Hyungwoo have been best friends for 15 years. Minhoon has always been inexplicably drawn to Hyungwoo, but Hyungwoo has always had a wall up that Minhoon has never been able to cross. Yet, for some reason, Minhoon is desperate to do just that. One evening, after heavy drinking, Hyungwoo is in no state to take care of himself, and as he has always done, Minhoon makes it a point to take him and let him sleep at his house. What neither of them expects, though, is Hyungwoo to suddenly attack Minhoon, biting him on the lips in a sudden kiss.

At this point, Hyungwoo is forced to admit to Minhoon that he is actually a vampire, and due to the bite, Hyungwoo is now a kin – a partial vampire created as an immortal food source for their creator. A dark world is soon opened to Minhoon, one that is full of violence and danger, primarily because of Hyungwoo's father, the head vampire, who wants to take control of Minhoon so he can then control his runaway son Hyungwoo.

While Minhoon is struggling to come to terms with his new immortality, the threat of the surrounding vampires, and his daily life, he must also contend with something he has had to figure out for the last 15 years: what are his feelings for Hyungwoo?