Royal mage Lara Bradley and her foul-mouthed apprentice Alistair were tasked with defeating a low-risk monster, but what they found instead was an elder dragon hungry for their magical essence. Out of options and desperate to save her young charge, Lara plays decoy the only way she knows how: by turning herself to stone before she's swallowed whole. Twenty years later, she awakens perfectly preserved in a world that has since moved on--except for Alistair. The troubled youth she once knew has grown into a powerful mage whose boyhood crush on his mentor has festered into an all-consuming obsession. Now, Lara must face the man whose love has become her greatest peril.

The Obsessed Mage and His Beloved Statue Bride: She Cannot Resist His Seductive Voice has story by Crane and art by Sekimori. English translation is done by Molly Lee. Lettering by mono. Published by Seven Seas Entertainment (September 1, 2026). Rated M.

Rebecca Silverman
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If this title sounds familiar to you, that's because its light novel version (the original) was released by Seven Seas a bit ago. You also may remember it as the book that I touted as containing the Unholy Grail of Bad Sex Scene Writing with the gem, “He grunted and filled her like a pastry.” They don't quite get to the pastry-filling in this volume, and I wouldn't expect that descriptive line to make the jump from light novel to manga, but yes, this is the same story.

It's one that sort of hovers on the border of “sweet” and “my god, that's unhealthy.” Twenty years before the book's present day, mage Lara Bradley took in an abused child named Alistair as her apprentice. By the time he was twelve, he'd begun saying things like, “I want to marry you and start a family,” which she gently put off because she raised him from the age of eight, and she told him that she preferred her men over thirty. Well, that backfired, because in a last-ditch bid to save herself from an elder dragon, Lara used a precision petrification spell, turning herself into a statue for twenty years (the remainder of the dragon's lifespan), and when she wakes up two decades later, it's to discover that Alistair killed the dragon when he was fifteen, found her statue in its gut, and brought it home, where he's been…enjoying it. By which I mean dressing it up, cleaning it daily, and, uh, licking it.

If you think you're creeped out, well…okay, you're probably still more upset than Lara. Of course, she's only just come back to life and found things completely changed from when she cast her spell. She certainly never expected Alistair to be waiting for her and ready to jump her the minute she's had a chance to breathe, and he's quick to point out that he is now, in fact, thirty-two, so she can no longer hold that against him. And does it really count as “raising” him if he's been on his own since age twelve? It's a lot for Lara to take in, and Alistair isn't really in the headspace to give her a lot of time to process because he's just so thrilled that she's come back to him. As I said, it's on the border between sweet (he loves her so much!) and creepy (he did what to her?).

Fortunately, whatever else it may be, this is very readable. The chapters basically alternate between the past and the present, and we get a good sense of who both Alistair and Lara are. There are some interesting world-building elements as well, such as the deal with dragons and their very fixed lifespans, as well as how magic in general functions. The art is also very nice, and Alistair grows up in a believable way; you can see his child self in his adult form.

So far, I'd recommend the manga over the novel, if only because it's able to cherry-pick the text, which has served it well in this volume. But either way, this is turn-your-brain-off reading – with or without pastry.

Jean-Karlo Lemus
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Never thought I'd read a fantasy manga that's also a bodice ripper! The Obsessed Mage spends most of its first volume jumping between eras, establishing the relationship between Lara and Alistair. And even if it's front-loading its backstory, it's still rather compelling; the structure is still effective, from Lara's early memories of Alistair as a troubled wunderkind to her surprise at seeing him as an accomplished local lord. As it happens with these old school romances, Lara is a bit of a passive protagonist; while she has plenty of insight into Alistair's mind and her flashbacks to Alistair's youth are rich with introspection, once she's unpetrified there's not much for her to do but be in the palm of Alistair's hand—literally.

Alistair is a fascinating male lead in this story, going from a bluntly practical child with a sharp tongue to a very accomplished and fair lord—who is also painfully obsessed with the object of his affections. And “object” is pretty apt (Alistair is all too eager to point out that he polished and even licked Lara while she was a statue). Far be it from a certain type of bodice ripper to avoid “problematic” themes, since they're part of the fantasy. Alistair as a romantic option for Lara is everything she'd wanted: a despairingly handsome man in his 30s who is all too eager to take care of her. But again, this first volume is a bit light on actual conflict once Lara is freed from her stone prison. There's not much else that can be done in-story but actually address Alistair's obsessiveness. Sure, Alistair would do anything for Lara, but can a relationship survive when one person has built up an impossible image of someone in their head and the other has been a rock for 20 years? There's a bit where Lara points out that, for her, Alistair was just a twelve-year-old. Alistair quickly (and sensually) shuts her up, but that's a line of thought I'd be interested in seeing pursued.

When it comes to the naughty stuff, The Obsessed Mage is fairly light; Alistair is pretty quick to get his hands on Lara, but also respectful enough to just stick to heavy petting at first. One of the bonus chapters even has Lara put Alistair to sleep by singing him a lullaby. Maybe, in a way, he is still that twelve-year-old who isn't sure of where to go and what to do.

Crane's artwork impresses, from the mage uniforms to the elaborate dresses that Lara is dressed in once she's freed. And Alistair's wardrobe is no less impressive. Writer Sekimori notes that they were worried at the notion of Crane having to draw a dragon in the opening chapter of this series; they rose to the occasion.

Other than the “problematic” nature of the relationship between Lara and Alistair, the story also touches a bit on child abuse; we see Alistair as a starved, beaten orphan, and there are implications that Lara went through similar abuse as a child. Readers are duly warned. The Obsessed Mage is an otherwise serviceable introduction to the series. I honestly hope the story picks up a bit, but the foundation here is rock-solid. Recommended.

Bolts
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Age differences are such a tricky topic when it comes to adult stories like this because unless the point is to explore a particular taboo, most of the time it feels like readers are just supposed to ignore those things. One problem is when a story itself constantly draws attention to an established age difference, and the thing about The Obsessed Mage is that this is a plot point that is brought up almost every five pages in the book. It tells the story of a young woman who petrified herself trying to take on a dragon in a fantasy world. She wakes up many years later to discover that her young pupil has now grown older than her and basically looks like the ideal man that she has always wanted. Now she has to navigate the really weird, uncomfortable emotional hurdle of suddenly seeing this person that she raised as a potential sexual partner.

On one hand, I appreciate the fact that the story goes out of its way to really build a relationship between the two leads. The problem is that the more backstory I am giving, the more uncomfortable the narrative progression ends up being. It's sweet watching Lara seemingly adopt this poor boy named Alistair that was tortured and raise him into a very competent mage who is destined for great things. But then the story suddenly cuts to him sucking on her tits on the next page as an adult and I feel like I got smacked in the face. Is the point supposed to be that their age was the only thing that was stopping them from being romantically involved in the first place, despite the fact that one raised the other? The fact that Lara also just seemingly goes along with these physical advances after waking up makes the story just feel rushed and unnatural, especially when Alistair starts exhibiting some really controlling tendencies. I think there could've been good conversations between these two with the tragedy of this premise. But instead, I'm left very confused, wondering what the actual intention of this story is. Until I'm able to figure it out, then I can't confidently recommend this story unless you're also curious about uncomfortable age dynamic plot points.