Magico

As soon as 16-year old country girl Emma arrives at the city of Hawk Eye, every man in the city falls madly in love with her. The king in particular tries to force her into marriage... and then a sorceror kidnaps her.

The sorcerer introduces himself as Shion, one of the youngest and most talented in the nation. He explains to Emma that she is cursed with the Echidna, a mysterious magic that happens every 500 years where a girl is born with her heart packed with such powerful dark magic that it has the potential to destroy the world. With the Echidna, one could rule the world, and Shion explains that people are going to try and hunt her down to get her heart.

However, just when Emma has given up on living a normal life, she is told that there exists a ritual that might rid her of the Echidna curse: the ritual Magico, which consists of many difficult trials... the first of which requires Emma and Shion to marry each other.

Do note that the official spelling of this manga's name is with a lower-case M as "Magico". That is not a typo.


 * Abusive Parents:
 * The Ace: Raven, headmaster of a magical school, brilliant scholar, powerful mage, kind hearted, and in love with Emma just from reading about her and what she had to endure.
 * A Magic Contract Comes with a Kiss: One of the rituals for Magico requires that the married couple kiss each other.
 * In all fairness, it is a wedding ritual.
 * There are many rituals that use kissing in the series. Rosetta is said to be the master of these techniques.
 * An Ice Person: One of the Magi uses ice magic,
 * The Atoner: Shion
 * Attack Reflector:  who abducted Lilly could use tentacles that transferred all the damage they received to their current captive.
 * Aw, Look -- They Really Do Love Each Other: Tomp and Alice of the Lover's competition. Despite her violent out bursts, they love each other and want to win so their marriage will be accepted by his family.
 * Ax Crazy: The Magi. They're
 * The chapter after that the first of the Magi to fight Shion
 * The eldest of the Magi, Gaspar, takes the cake though. He  to "nourish" himself, and it's revealed that the reason they wanted to slaughter everyone was
 * Badass: Gaspar, the oldest of the Magi. Yes he's a Jerkass, Axe Crazy, Complete Monster, but what else do you call a guy that's covered in scars and
 * Badass Adorable: Luu.
 * Berserk Button: Don't harm Emma in front of Shion. Also, don't degrade Luu's family. Neither will repay you kindly.
 * BFS: Gaspar has many swords from his scars,
 * Big Eater: Luu, as well as a Sweet Tooth.
 * Big Brother Attraction/Worship/Mentor: This is either Faust's previous relationship with Shion or just his own perverted memories of those times.
 * Big Brother Bully: This is his current relationship with Shion.
 * Big No: Emmas reaction to.
 * Big Screwed-Up Family: The people Shion comes from. First we have his mother who  And now we have his brother Faust who
 * Birthmark of Destiny: Emma has a heart-shaped birthmark on her chest that signifies she has the Echidna.
 * Blow You Away: Melchior of the Magi's main magic.
 * Book Dumb: Shion can't get the multiplication table right, but he's one of the most powerful mages alive.
 * Born Lucky: Emma has fantastic luck when gambling. Even when the people are cheating via magic, she WILL NOT lose.
 * Captain Ersatz: Luu bears an incredibly strong resemblance to Niche. Strikingly similar appearance, seen as cursed from birth, thrown off a cliff by superstitious villagers, grew up in the wild, obsessed with meat, ridiculously strong for her size, lack of human interaction... if not for her borderline Genki Girl personality, she'd be a complete clone.
 * Casanova Wannabe: Faust tries to approach girls with lines asking to touch their boobies, not realizing this is why every girl generally hits him.
 * Cool Big Sis / Onee-Sama: Rosetta.
 * Cordon Bleugh Chef: Emma, Shion's the only one who can stand her cooking, herself included.
 * Dark Action Girl: Ain.
 * Determinator: Shion gets to show it off the most, but a lot of the named characters in the cast qualify.
 * Dual Age Modes: CINDERELLA FEVER!
 * Eldritch Abomination: The true form of Echidna whenreleased from the woman host.
 * Equivalent Exchange: Magic can only be used by people who've accomplished the accompanying Rituals, which could include kissing a person, reciting specific verses, hunting down monsters and procuring certain artifacts. And even after all that, magic still can't be used indefinitely - it will eventually "run out" and the Ritual for that magic will need to be accomplished again.
 * Fiery Redhead: Sva Rogue, who may be the best example of this ever, seeing as his hair is literally made of fire...or at least it looks like it. He does have fire powers, though.
 * First Kiss: The second ritual, "Kiss of Oath" is this for Shion and Emma.
 * Five-Man Band:
 * The Hero: Shion
 * The Lancer/The Big Guy: Luu
 * The Smart Guy: Anise
 * The Chick/The Heart: Emma
 * Team Pet: Sieg
 * The Gadfly: For Joshua, mocking people seems to be his standard form of social interaction.
 * Golden Snitch: The quiz show pulls this out for the final question. Played with in that
 * Godzilla Threshold:
 * Luu using
 * Shion using
 * Half-Human Hybrid:
 * Grandpa Garlan is one of the rare bug-men, specifically being half-giant-centipede. He's also the guy who generates the bug monsters for Shion's Broom Magic Ritual.
 * Handicapped Badass:
 * Happily Married: Shion and Emma. Also, Joshua and Rosetta.
 * Heel Face Turn:
 * Heroes Prefer Swords: Shion's next level of broom magic turns his broom into a sword.
 * Heroic Sacrifice:
 * Hero with Bad Publicity: Shion is called "The Great Criminal." His latest criminal escapade involves saving some slaves from a cruel slave trader, which in the news is called "stealing property".
 * High Octane Nightmare Fuel: In-universe example. The Echidna. Those who remember the destruction it caused find Emma equally terrifying. As Layla the water-spirit demonstrates.
 * I Will Protect Her:
 * The entire reason why Shion became so damn powerful is so that he would be able to accomplish the top-level ritual Magico in order to free Emma from her curse.
 * Rogue is also this towards Lily, such that when Lily was kidnapped he didn't even stop to sleep while looking for her.
 * Luu has the same feeling towards her new family, willing to risk her life to protect them.
 * Innocent Fanservice Girl: Emma has no qualms about stripping in front of Shion, much to his distress.
 * Justified in that they're married and Emma feels it's only natural for married couples to be comfortable with each others bodies.
 * Double justified since she was jailed for 16 years without interaction with other people except for the soldier guarding her and Shino.
 * Instant Awesome, Just Add Dragons: Shion lives in one.
 * It's Personal:
 * Jerkass: Joshua.
 * Jerk with a Heart of Gold:
 * Kill It with Fire: Shion's magic broom is weak to fire magic. He knows this, so he has developed plenty of counters if someone tries to exploit it.
 * Laser-Guided Amnesia
 * Lethal Chef: Emma (at first) and Shion... but the latter is technically good at cooking, it's just that his sense of taste is horrible, so anything he thinks is good is disgusting for anyone else.
 * Light Is Good:
 * Light Is Not Good: The Holy Spring Luna will heal a lot of things, but it also hurts a lot.
 * And in chapter 14
 * Lonely At the Top: Zodia.
 * MacGuffin Girl: Emma, but technically it's her heart that's the MacGuffin.
 * Mad Love: This is the shape of Ain's feelings for Faust.
 * Magitek: There is a telecommunications branch of magic, so TV and phones run on magic.
 * Mood Whiplash: At the end of chapter
 * My Dad Can Beat Up Your Dad: During the Love Festival, Luu meets up with the son of Juubee and Ayame. Musashi, their son, promptly starts saying how his mother and father are better than Emma and Shion. Luu replies by beating him up.
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: Shion's older brother's name is Faust.
 * Nightmare Face: First time Faust raged. He was crying, but it looked like his eyes were melting.
 * Nightmare Fetishist: Ain loves Faust precisely because he is such a despicable excuse for a human being.
 * No Celebrities Were Harmed: Going by his name, appearance, and the fact that he's the richest man in the world, Marouni Gate is probably derived from Bill Gates. That said, his personality is nothing like the real thing.
 * Not So Different: Zodia seemed to think he and Shion were this when they were children.
 * Played straight with Rogue and Shion.
 * Not So Stoic: When Ain meets Caph when watching the last event in the couple tournament, they have a little chat and Ain begins to drool when she remembers how much she was paid for developing Faust´s forbidden ritual. Working with such forbidden magic seems to excite her as well.
 * Official Couple: Since the second chapter! (Or in the very first.)
 * Our Dragons Are Different: There are several kinds of dragons.
 * Our Vampires Are Different: Sephirot has a vampire working for them who can apparently
 * Overdrawn At the Blood Bank: Shion, especially when Emma kisses him.
 * People Puppets:
 * Plot-Relevant Age-Up: In chapter 19, with
 * Powered Armor:
 * Shion can make one from his broom.
 * One of the contestants in the Love Festival can use one.
 * Powered by a Forsaken Child:
 * Many of the plans for the power of Echidna within Emma seem to imply this.
 * Then there's
 * And there's Faust's plan
 * The Power of Love:
 * Psychopathic Manchild: Faust.
 * Psychotic Smirk: We see half of one on Faust's face when discussing the ritual he wants to use Shion in. It isn't pretty. See the lowest right image.
 * Raised by Wolves: Luu has lived alone in the wilderness for the vast majority of her life. A wilderness on the edge of a cursed spring with all sorts of man-eating plants and animals. No wonder she's so tough.
 * Really Seven Hundred Years Old: The water spirits in the Lover's Tournament are around that age, but do not show it in the slightest.
 * Rich Bastard: Marouni Gate, the richest man in the world. He actually acknowledges it while stomping on the head of a child slave (who happened to be half-transformed into a dog at the time), saying that while he thought he should be appalled he can't help but enjoy being one.
 * Ritual Magic: Actually, as it was said above, rituals are ways to achieve magic.
 * Rule of Cool: This series practically thrives off this. To serve as an example, within the first few pages we have our heroine being forced into marrying the local king only to be saved by a dragon wearing shades that interrupts the ceremony.
 * The Sages Behind the Thrones: There exists Sephirot, a group of Sages whose power runs above the rulers of any country, and monitor all mages in the world. They are strong enough to.
 * She Is Not My Girlfriend: Averted, Shion and Emma are pretty okay about saying they are husband and wife to people.
 * Shipper on Deck: Anise, Shion's black talking cat enjoys teasing Shion about his feelings for Emma.
 * Shmuck Bait: Joshua turns himself into a piggy so Alice the Werewolf would stop avoiding his and Rosette's attacks and eat him. It works and makes her an easy target.
 * Shut UP, Hannibal:
 * Shion give a spectacular one to
 * Joshua gives one to
 * Spot the Imposter: The Lover's Tournament has one of these as the challenges. The contestants are asked to identify the one difference the mimics had in the categories of Appearance, Thoughts, and Experience.
 * Star-Crossed Lovers: Joshua and Rosetta start out as this. But they subvert it by running away together and getting married.
 * Stuff Blowing Up: Apparently Shion's usual Plan B is "ka-boom".
 * Troubled but Cute:
 * Tsundere: Shion, a rare male example.
 * Unholy Matrimony: Ain and Faust are married.
 * Utopia Justifies the Means: Zodia. To quote him: "It (the Echidna) is a secret treasure with unlimited possibilities. And all that for the price of a single mere life."
 * Villainous Breakdown: Faust doesn't take Shion's refusal to go along with his schemes very well at all.
 * We Can Rule Together: Zodia makes this offer to Shion when they were young.
 * What Do You Mean It's Not Awesome?: Othello Death Match.
 * Words Can Break My Bones: Inverted for Lily, whose words ward off disease and curses.
 * Played straight with Juubee and Ayame, who can materialize words they link with the word game shiritori.
 * The basis of Joshua's magic, which
 * Worthy Opponent: Juubee sees Shion as this and honors him by going all out to finish his 1000-word chant.
 * Would Hit a Girl: Joshua. He holds back more than he'll admit, though.
 * Yamato Nadeshiko: Ayame.
 * You Are Already Dead: Well, not dead, but just when
 * Played straight with Juubee and Ayame, who can materialize words they link with the word game shiritori.
 * The basis of Joshua's magic, which
 * Worthy Opponent: Juubee sees Shion as this and honors him by going all out to finish his 1000-word chant.
 * Would Hit a Girl: Joshua. He holds back more than he'll admit, though.
 * Yamato Nadeshiko: Ayame.
 * You Are Already Dead: Well, not dead, but just when
 * You Are Already Dead: Well, not dead, but just when