Feb 11, 2025
OCCULTIC;NINE is the 5th entry into the SciAdv series, and is also the only incomplete one. Although it tells an amazing supernatural murder mystery, it appears that it never quite caught on to a large enough audience to allow Chiyomaru to ever finish it. That, and he sort of kind of tried to retcon the events of literally every previous entry with O;9, (this was walked back, don't worry) and poorly introduced series mechanics that he did not properly explain until the release of ANONYMOUS;CODE almost a decade later.
The Story: The story starts of pretty slow, but it undeniably has a unique atmosphere to it.
...
Yuta Gamon, the protagonist, is somewhere inbetween Kaito and Takumi in terms of personality. By that, I mean he's undeniably a NEET (he calls himself the "NEET God" after all), but he's NOWHERE near as depraved and unsociable as Takumi, but neither is he as normal and bland as Kaito. To put it simply, he has a mild, yet well defined and engaging personality. More than good enough to lead the story. He runs an aggregator blog called Kirikri Basara where he posts supernatural and occult themed stories with the intent of having his fanbase ruthlessly mock them. Oh yeah, and his old radio will talk to him when nobody else is around.
Or, it would have been if OCCULTIC;NINE didn't flip to a new protagonist every chapter. As the name implies, there are a total of nine characters that the story will flop between from their 1st person perspectives. Yuta, being the main protagonist, will sometimes get a few back to back, but even then it can get irritating when you have to read from all of these perspectives. Especially if you're stuck on someone you don't really like. However, this allows us to experience a cast that, unlike in most SciAdv entries, isn't interacting with eachother constantly and is actually at odds with eachother most of the time.
Going on from that, the rest of the cast can be a little hit or miss. Some are a little bland, while others are far too extreme. Hell, some even feel like rehashed characters from previous entries. Ryoka, Yuta's main friend, just feels like Mayuri from STEINS;GATE dialed up to 11 in every possible fashion. Hell, half of her character is literally that she has comically (and I do mean comically) large breasts. Outside of that she's an airhead to the point where I'm pretty sure she's just autistic as hell. Well, unless she has some sort of bigger reveal which I definitely think is possible, since the LN's are (as of writing this) on an indefinite hiatus and incomplete.
As for the rest of the cast:
Sarai - An abrasive intellectual who refutes anything supernatural
Aria - An incestuous satanist
Ririka - A prophetic shotacon gay porn author
Miyuu - A mostly normal girl who can tell fortunes
Toko - An author in an occult themed tabloid with a strong 6th sense
Shin - A babyfaced otaku detective who feels like he shouldn't be within 1000ft of a playground
Kiryu - A mysterious tall man with frequent out of body experiences
Quite the lively lineup we have going on!
All in all, OCCULTIC;NINE is definitely worth reading. While I believe it doesn't truly come into its own until the end of the 2nd volume, the story is undoubtedly good and will hopefully someday be finished. Well, in this format. The anime is finished (although in true SciAdv fashion paced at lightspeed) and supposedly has a proper ending.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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