Those were my only thoughts upon finishing Na mo Naki Tori no Tobu Yoake. Of course I was expecting an interesting, twisted, darkly tragic plot! Doesn't the description make it sound like it has one? But did I find any of those elements here? Nope. Not a one. Sad, but true.
I'm not kidding when I say there are slice-of-life BL with better plots than this!
I'm not Christian or Catholic, nor do I believe in the existence of god, angels, devils and the like, so the religious theme didn't offend me in the slightest. In fact, the twists on various Christian beliefs was the only reason I bothered reading this manga to the end. Perhaps not surprisingly, none of those issues were actually addressed in a satisfactory way. The mangaka did have some good ideas -- but neither the characters, nor the three worlds they were trapped between, went beyond anything other than mere props to lead to the ultimate conclusion; the angel falls in love with the demon and they live happily ever after Sigh of exasperation
And Shirasagi is supposed to be a demon, but I'm sure no one can disagree with me when I say even a human would've fought a 100 times more skilfully in such a situation. He just sits around waiting for Karasu to scoop him up into his arms and carry him off to safety 🤨 It'd be okay if this happened once or twice...but every single time they're attacked!?
[ Yes, yes - I am aware that the "girly uke" stereotype is a feature common to most BL (which often makes me wonder "Why the heck doesn't this woman write shoujo smut instead?") but for some reason, I found it particularly annoying in this manga ]
The Beelzebub x Sariel side couple was infinitely more interesting than the main one, but their relationship got roughly two pages of focus before they
killed each other.
The art is fine, but nothing shockingly pretty. In all honesty I can say that the quality of the art (or its "bishie factor") has never been a good enough reason for me to rate a manga highly - and the same is true in this case.
If you're in the mood for a nice fantasy shounen-ai, I'd recommend Koori no Mamono no Monogatari. Typical and simply-plotted though it may be, Sugiura Shiho knows what she can do and does it quite well. But I'm afraid I can't say the same for Kisaragi Hirotaka.