The Silver Beast

This fifth novel marks the first story not displayed in anime form. Certain elements and characters were placed into the anime (Zanaffar into "Slayers", Xellos and Mazenda into "Slayers Next") but that's about it. From a story perspective, Lina, Gourry, and Amelia are attacked by a cult who worships the Mazoku Dark Lord -- Ruby Eye Shabranigdu. A powerful female mage named Mazenda manages to seal Lina's power and the only way for Lina to break the seal is to kill Mazenda. With Lina no longer an asset, she is forced to flee a group of beast men with Amelia while Gourry covers their retreat. Lina finds herself trapped again, only to be rescued by a powerful priest named Xellos. Xellos has impressive magical abilities and Lina soon strikes a bargain to obtain some magical amplification "Demon Blood Stones" and an alliance with the priest. He seems a bit distressed when he hears that Mazenda is a leader of the cult that worships the Dark Lord, so he immediately makes it his goal to "dispatch" her as well as obtain a copy of a Clair Bible manuscript (the original, complete Clair Bible recording all Mazoku knowledge, a manuscript being a copy of a section or page of the original). Zelgadiss also rejoins Lina's party with the idea of beating Xellos to the Clair Bible manuscript. However things turn grim when it turns out that the cult has the manuscript and is using it to create a new demon beast known as Zanaffar. Will Lina ever get her powers back? Will Gourry return to the party? Will the group be able to slay Zanaffar if Gourry isn't there with his Sword of Light? For "Slayes" fans, this novel should prove interesting since it is a new story. I was disappointed that the theme from the 4th novel (Lina tracking down why the Mazoku had taken such an interest in her) seems to be missing from this novel. Anime fans will know who Xellos and Mazenda are, but those items are NOT given in this novel. Further, Mazenda's role is very limited and I was rather disappointed in that. Xellos, on the other hand, proves to be more interesting. He's more like his "Slayers Try" self than his "Slayers Next" self. Certainly, his vast powers in casting spells that even Lina had never done before (Blast Bomb for example) come through quite clearly. Lina still is not as impressive as her anime counterpart, but the fact that she can pick up new spells so quickly (including Xellos's Amplification spell and "Blast Bomb) do give her more of a genious flair. I found it interesting how she already knew the spell "Ragna Blade". I found it REALLY interesting when it is revealed how she learned the super-forbidden spell "Giga Slave". Again, TokyoPop drops the Japanese honorifics, so now we get a lot of "Mister", "Miss", and "Master" to cover for this. Also, TP changed "Dark Lord" to "Demon Lord" for some reason. I guess it works, but why change it now? And I still suspect that TP is toning down the translations to appeal to a younger audience. Bottom line: