is a Japanese web manga series written and illustrated by Norio Sakurai. It was serialized on the manga website, and its chapters have been collected in 13 volumes. The series follows Kyotaro Ichikawa, a shy middle school boy who initially fantasizes about killing his popular classmate, Anna Yamada, but over time begins to fall in love as he gets to know more about her.
An anime television series adaptation produced by Shin-Ei Animation aired from April to June 2023. A short spin-off original net animation (ONA) for the series was released in December 2023. A second season aired from January to March 2024. A third season is set to premiere in 2027.
Premise Kyotaro Ichikawa is a disgruntled loner student who is often reading a murder encyclopedia and learning about human anatomy. He fantasizes about murdering his popular classmates, with the beautiful class idol, Anna Yamada, being his prime target. However, when he observes that Anna is rather quirky in her own way, and when she becomes increasingly friendly towards Kyotaro, he gradually warms up to her and they start to become closer and eventually fall in love.
Characters Main
A middle school boy who has tendencies. He loves spending time reading books in the library, where he and Anna first met. Initially, Kyotaro had delusions of killing Anna and making her corpse his alone, but they are replaced by romantic affection as he spends more time around her. He can be quite perceptive in social situations but often fails to pick up on other social cues due to his lack of communication skills and low self-esteem. Aside from his macabre interests, he is also a fan of manga and anime such as Baki, Beastars, and Re:Zero. In the latter case, he keeps the character Rem as the profile image for his Line account. Prior to middle school, he won a number of first-place awards for essays, a poster drawing, an independent research project, etc.
A tall middle school girl who is a magazine model and actress, active under the name . She is very popular with both boys and girls but has a clumsy side to her. Anna frequently brings snacks and candy to eat in private at the library, much to Kyotaro's dismay, even though bringing them to school is prohibited. She is very considerate of others, such as eating snacks by herself due to her friend Chihiro having allergies. This consideration is tied to something of a guilt complex, which leads to bouts of anxiety where she feels she is an inconvenience to other people. She is also shown to be very jealous to the point of obsession whenever Kyotaro interacts with other girls. She is usually referred to by her last name by others, with only her family and manager calling her by her first name.
Supporting
Anna's best friend who acts as her . Anna calls her and Sekine calls her . In Kyotaro's mind, she is Anna's "boyfriend" due to how tactile they are. She is a member of the basketball club. She is oblivious to the relationships of the people around her, even not realizing that she was once used as bait by Haruya to get closer to Anna until Moeko and Serina points it out to her, much to her embarrassment. She is also the only one of Anna's friends who is currently unaware that Anna and Kyotaro are dating.
Anna's friend who is a and calls herself . Despite Kyotaro's belief that she is stupid, she is academically capable, once scoring fifth in her entire grade. She claims to be a manga fan while only naming more famous series during the work-study field trip. While exchanging Line with Kyotaro, she recognizes his profile icon as Rem from Re:Zero and prefers Rem's sister Ram. Moeko is also socially adept, often saving Anna and Kyotaro from embarrassing situations. However, her closeness to Kyotaro also means that Moeko is a target of Anna's jealousy. The second person to discover Anna and Kyotaro's mutual feelings for each other, she will sometimes try to subtly help push Kyotaro in the right direction when it comes to getting him to express his feelings for her.
Anna's reserved friend with a sharp gaze and Anna calls her . She is interested in dancing, hair styling, and is a big fan of delinquent manga such Crows and Worst. She has a neutral opinion of Kyotaro but also sees him as unreliable, though later on when she becomes one of the people earliest to discover Yamada and Kyotaro having feelings for each other she grows to support him, even trying to help get the two together. She attended the same elementary school as Rin.
Kyotaro's classmate, who always blurts out perverted thoughts. He reveals to Kyotaro that he has genuinely fallen in love with Anna, and this rivalry culminated during the sports festival in their third year. Despite Kyotaro's defeat, Adachi yielded to Kyotaro and remains his friend.
Kyotaro's elder sister, a musician and a university student at Waseda University. She approves of her brother's relationship and is very close to Anna. She is shown to be sensitive when it comes to her own non-existent love life.
Anna's mother. She appears at first to be strict in public due to Anna's behavior, but is an overall nice woman who dotes on her daughter at home and approves of Anna's crush on Kyotaro.
Anna's father. A tall, quiet man who works as a French chef. He plays video games when off work.
Yamada and Kyotaro's new classmate during their final year. She is a tall and beautiful girl with blonde hair. Her classmates see her as a cool beauty, but in truth, she also has a cute and clumsy side, just like Anna. She is close friends with Kanna.
Anna and Kyotaro's classmate during their final year. Nicknamed , she always wears a black mask and twin tails. Kanna is greatly interested in others' love lives to the point of throwing a flash mob for a new couple, despite their embarrassment.
Other
Kyotaro's classmate, part of the perverted trio with Adachi and Ota, and a member of the baseball club. He is known for having proud yet strange fetishes, such as for chubby or bad-smelling women. Despite this, he is viewed favorably for being nice otherwise. He is romantically interested in Hara, who eventually reciprocates his feelings and goes out with him outside of school.
Kyotaro's classmate, who is overweight. He is part of the perverted trio along with Kanzaki and Adachi.
Anna and Kyotaro's classmate. A chubby girl who is interested in Kanzaki and eventually starts dating him. She is the first person to find out about Anna and Kyotaro's romantic interest in each other.
An upperclassman one year above the main cast. He is nicknamed by Kyotaro due to his persistence in getting closer to Anna. During his graduation, he confessed to Anna and was rejected.
Haruya's childhood friend and classmate, who is interested in him.
A student and friend of Serina from elementary school. She accidentally hit Anna with a basketball once in her second year, angering Serina. She later apologizes to Anna. She joins Anna and Kyotaro as their classmate in their third year.
Class 2-3's homeroom teacher and a PE teacher.
Kyotaro and Kana's mother.
Kyotaro and Kana's father.
Anna's 19-year-old model colleague, who is also her stalker. She always laments the distance between her and Anna and thus strives to get more information from Anna's friends, much to Kyotaro's dismay. She owns a summer house in Kamakura, Kanagawa, as a means to reduce her tax payment.
Class 3-1's homeroom teacher and also PE teacher. Kyotaro sees her as a stereotypical annoying PE teacher with an overly competitive side to her.
Production Manga Norio Sakurai has stated in an interview that she is a fan of idols, and that she enjoys daydreaming about how she would react if she were in the same class as her favorite idol. She was inspired by these thoughts and decided to create the manga and Anna. She stated that she was thinking about herself when creating Kyotaro. Sakurai decided to call the chapters "karte" to emphasize that Kyotaro's condition improves after his interactions with Anna.
Anime Producer Kazuki Endo found the manga interesting after reading the second and third volumes and sent a proposal to the editors of Akita Shoten for an anime adaptation. Editor Keita Takakashi stated in an interview that Endo's enthusiasm for the project was one of the main factors in his acceptance of the proposal. Endo approached Jukki Hanada for the script, and Hanada, who was already familiar with the manga, immediately accepted the offer. Endo chose Kensuke Ushio as the anime's composer, as he had enjoyed his soundtrack for A Silent Voice. To compose the anime's soundtrack, Ushio traveled to his hometown and recorded the route he used to go to school as a child. Director Hiroaki Akagi focused on the colors to reflect the emotions and changes in the characters. With Sakurai's permission, he slightly changed the seating arrangements in the classroom for the anime.
Shun Horie, Kyotaro's Japanese voice actor, stated that at the audition stage, he thought Kyotaro would be played by a voice actress, so when he was chosen for the role, he was genuinely surprised and confused. To get as close as possible to the voice of a real teenage boy, Horie watched videos of elementary school boys on YouTube.
Media Manga
The series is written and illustrated by Norio Sakurai. It started serialization in Akita Shoten's Weekly Shōnen Champion magazine on March 8, 2018. On April 10, 2018, the series was transferred to the manga website. On July 10, 2018, Akita Shoten merged Champion Cross with to form their newly created manga website, . When the websites merged, the manga was transferred to Manga Cross, which was re-launched as Champion Cross in April 2024. The series ended serialization on September 15, 2026. As of January 2026, 13 volumes have been released.
In December 2020, Seven Seas Entertainment announced they licensed the series for English publication. The series is also licensed by Tong Li Publishing in Taiwan. Individual chapters of the series are called kartes.
A spin-off manga written and illustrated by Haika Nanasaka, titled , began serialization on the same website on July 22, 2025. The series focuses on the character Kana Ichikawa. The chapters have been collected into a single tankōbon volume as of January 2026. In May 2026, Seven Seas Entertainment announced that they had also licensed The Romantic Comedy Won't Start for English publication in January 2027.
Anime
In August 2022, it was announced that the manga would receive an anime television series adaptation. The series is produced by Shin-Ei Animation and directed by Hiroaki Akagi, with scripts written by Jukki Hanada, character designs handled by Masato Katsumata, and music composed by Kensuke Ushio. It aired from April 2 to June 18, 2023, on the NUMAnimation programming block on TV Asahi and its affiliates. The opening theme is performed by Yorushika, while the ending theme is performed by Kohana Lam. At Anime NYC 2022, Sentai Filmworks announced that they licensed the series and is streaming it on Hidive. Plus Media Networks Asia to carried the anime in Southeast Asia, to be premiered on Aniplus Asia. In the United Kingdom and Ireland, Anime Limited released the first season with a collector's edition on January 19, 2026, while a standard edition was released on March 30, 2026.
On December 10, 2023, an animated collection of shorts based on the spin-off series posted on the author's Twitter account, titled "Twi-Yaba", was released in a standalone episode with the official English title of "Bonus Dangers". The shorts within the special last a few minutes each. Each short contains either a standalone gag, view into their daily lives, or a holiday special.The Dangers in my Heart Karte 12.5, "Bonus Dangers"