Dai’s Big Adventure

 I am currently on book 34 of ダイの大冒険。Dai’s Big Adventure from the Dragon Quest series. There are only 37 books in the series but this one marks the beginning of the final story arc which will cover the last three books.

What is the story? Dai was an orphan boy raised on an island of monsters. There he dreamed of being a hero while being raised to use magic by his adopted father. One day a group of heroes came to the island and befriended Dai. There were there to find a golden metal slime who was incidentally Dai’s best friend, Gome chan. Once they had the slime they betrayed Dai, kidnapped Gome and headed for the reward. Dai headed out on his first adventure and rescued his best friend gaining the respect of the king and exposing the heroes for the frauds they were.

From there he met a princess, several friends (Pop and Maam), a teacher (Aven), a  arch-nemesis (Hadlar), rival (Hyunkeru), a father (Baran) and the Demon King Vearn. That is oversimplifying the story greatly. In the course of his journey his teacher of three days died to save his life. However Aven’s sacrifice was useless. Hadlar, the demon king, survived the destructive spell used and was going to destroy Dai when the young orphan unleashed his hidden inner power and defeated the enemy his teacher couldn’t.

That only covers the first few books. From there Dai sets out on his heroic journey to defeat the Demon King and restore peace to the land. He gains more allies along the way, including some former enemies (Crocodine) and it all comes up to this book. By book 34 all of the side villains have been defeated. All that is left is the complete form of Vearn. This battle will take three more books to complete but we have Dai at his lowest. All his effort to defeat the old form Vearn was useless. His friends are damaged and can’t help him. He is on his own. There will be some resistance as his friends struggle to help him but it will be his and his battle alone. 

Dai is a true hero and will fight to save the day.