Eijun Sawamura and his middle school baseball team fail to win their championship game based on a wild pitch from Eijun. After he recovers from his disappointment, he’s content to head to the local high school with his friends and continue to play baseball with them. Then, Rei Takashima turns up, scouting Eijun for Seido High, a top baseball high school in the country. Eijun feels guilty for leaving his friends behind, but a trip to watch the team practice mostly solidifies Eijun’s decision. He doesn’t make a great first impression on the Coach, however, after showing up late for the first day of practice. The coach gives him an ultimatum to be able to throw a ball over 300 feet or give up pitching all together, and Eijun of course can’t back down from a challenge.
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Moon Knight (2014) Vol 2: Dead Will Rise, illustrated by Greg Smallwood
Wood takes over the series from Ellis, and it starts off similarly to Ellis’ volume 1 short story-type narrative. However, Wood weaves threads throughout each chapters that have payoff in the end. Moon Knight stops a well-armed sniper from killing a foreign dignitary, but it’s clear the man is a mercenary paid by someone very powerful. He then foils a terrorist plot at One World Trade Center, but the whole encounter is recorded on a cell phone camera and released to the world. The doctor from volume 1 is back - she tries to convince Marc to help her take down the foreign dignitary, and she gets Khonshu for her efforts. She infiltrates a security detail that is supposed to be protecting him, and without Khonshu, Marc finds himself detained yet again in something like a mental facility. Now, he’ll have to make it out without the powers of his god behind him, and stop the doctor before she ignites a civil war in an African country. 
Kaori signs Arima up for his first piano competition in two years, and she coaches/berates him into practicing and getting back to the level he was once at. She tries to get him to put his own emotion into the pieces, but this is something Arima has always struggled with. Similarly, it's time for all the sports tournaments, with Tsubaki competing in softball and Watari competing in soccer. Tsubaki becomes jealous of how close Kaori is to Arima, and she relives some of their childhood memories when she supported him through physical and mental anguish, including carrying him home after he hurt his ankle. She's pleasantly surprised to see Arima come out to support her in her tournament, and even more pleased when he carries her home after she hurts her ankle.
This volume follows the three very different storylines of our leading ladies on the cover. Asa and Keiichi, the research assistant, took off in her plane at the end of volume 4, and now they're trying to figure out how to take out the giant monster before it makes landfall off the coast of Kamakura. Keiichi is frantically trying to decipher the professor's notes that potentially have a weakness identified, but the professor's handwriting is too illegible to figure out. Yone was scouted by a talent agent in the last volume and he brings her back to his office, but someone claiming to be her guardian comes to "rescue" her from the scout taking advantage of her, but also "advocate" for her with outfits that accentuate all of her assets. Miyako is cornered in a warehouse by hooligans who want to have their way with her, but she's saved by members of a clandestine women's fighting ring. Asa and Keiichi get themselves into trouble when Asa flies too far out to sea in a plane that isn't rated for night flights.
Kanade and Munechika have been friends for their entire life. Kanade has feelings for Munechika that he'll never express because Chika is an Alpha, and Kanade is a Beta. In this world of the Omegaverse, Alphas and Omegas most often become mates for the procreation of the human race, but it's very rare an Alpha and a Beta would. One day, Kanade becomes suddenly very ill with a fever, fatigue, and weakness. A trip to the doctor's office reveals he's in heat - he's actually an omega! The doctor gives him some suppressants, but the only thing that can truly make him feel better is by coupling with an Alpha, and Chika is there to support his friend. The two move in together and their moms hope they become mates, but neither can bring himself to admin their true feelings for fear of trapping the other into a mated couple they don't wish to be part of.
Mao comes across yet another of his fellow apprentices who should not be alive after 900 years. It seems no one remembers every detail of what happened so long ago between all of the apprentices and their master, so Mao keeps searching for answers. Mao and fellow apprentice Hakka take out several water shikigami with the help of Nanoka, who has an affinity for earth spells and can take on water monsters with ease. Many bad guys are looking for the “taizanfukun” spell that Mao's master was guarding, the most powerful onmyoji spell said to grant long life. The last Mao saw of it, Byoki was devouring it, so now everyone's sending shikigami after Mao to see if his connection to Byoki can restore the taizanfukun spell.
Yotsuba is an extremely energetic four year old who has just moved to a new town with her dad. As soon as they pull up to the new house, she immediately wanders off to explore. Her neighbor finds her in a park and tells her to come home with her, but Yotsuba remembers her stranger-danger training and runs off. Another time, Yotsuba goes over to the neighbor’s house and discovers A/C units, but Ena, the youngest daughter, tells Yotsuba the dangers of running it too much and contributing to “glowball warning.” Then, Yotsuba and her dad go shopping, and she discovers all kinds of things at the giant department store. They finish up with some ramen and a fierce competition to the top of the stairs at their town’s shrine.
Vol 1: From the Dead, illustrated by Declan Shalvey, colored by Jordie Bellaire
Mr. Knight is back consulting with the New York Police Department, but don’t identify him as the vigilante Moon Knight, or they might be obligated to arrest him. Moon Knight helps take care of bzd guys in situations that would endanger the members of the NYPD - he tracks one to a secret lair in the underground and another to a (mostly) abandoned building where human trafficking victims are stashed. Steven Grant's therapist tells him that he doesn’t have Dissociative Identity Disorder, but instead that he has experienced trauma, both in his childhood and as in his adulthood as a mercenary, and that he has come up with other personas as a way to justify his crime fighting and need to save people. 
Get ready for a double-dose of world-building. After surviving the ordeal with the spider-demons, Tanjiro and Nezuko are taken to the council of the Hashira - the 12 strongest demon slayers who serve Master Ubuyashiki, the head of the organization. Most of the twelve want to kill Nezuko for being a demon, Tanjiro for not doing it himself, and they also want to punish Tomioka, who happens to be one of the Hashira, for aiding Tanjiro instead of killing Nezuko. Later, Shinobu, who is also a member of the Hashira, offers to host Tanjiro and his associates at her home to help them recover and train to get their strength back. Elsewhere, Kibutsuji, the demon king and leader of the Twelve Kizuki, interrogates the remaining Lower 6 demons on their lack of lethal force against the Hashira. Kibutsuji strengthens one of the demon and sends him on a quest to kill the Hashira and Tanjiro.
Illustrated by Werther Dell'Edera, colored by Miquel Muerto
Erica hones in on the source of the monsters, which is actually a person who willed them into existence. She brings James to where Bian is staying and asks them about the first time they knew about the monster. Meanwhile, the Order of St. George sends another team to Archer’s Peak to contain the spiraling situation. As they try to figure out what to do with all the witnesses at the school gym, Tommy comes up with a story that will potentially keep everyone safe and hopefully stop the bloodshed. |
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