Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku

Fandom
Name:	Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku, 魔法使いの約束, Promise of Wizard
Abbreviation(s):	mahoyaku, mhyk, まほやく
Creator:	coly, Tsushimi Bunta
Date(s):	Released November 2019
Medium:	Mobile game
Country of Origin:	Japan
External Links:	Official site, Fan Wikia, Pixiv Dictionary page
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku (official translation Promise of Wizard) is a Japanese joseimuke video game developed by coly and written by Tsushimi Bunta for mobile platforms. It is primarily a visual novel with gacha elements. It has developed a large shipping-centric fandom.

Synopsis

MahoYaku centers around the Sage, a human from our world who is isekai'd into a fantastical setting where they must unite 21 wizards to battle a natural disaster known as the Great Calamity. The 21 wizards are various varieties of bishounen and ikemen (or both, in the case of the characters Snow and White, who transform between child and adult forms). The wizards have different histories and philosphies on life which make them distant, distrustful, or combative with each other at first, but they gradually learn to depend on the Sage and each other over the course of the story. With many of the characters being hundreds of years old, they often have complex, storied relationships with each other that are incredibly shippable.

Demographic

In a prospectus released by coly in January 2021 ahead of their initial public stock offering, the company described MahoYaku has being targeted towards fujoshi, suggesting that the game has been intended to have a shipping-based fandom from the beginning. Coly later apologized for referring to fans with a fraught term. MahoYaku has fans who are fujoshi, yumejoshi, and neither.

MahoYaku is unique among joseimuke games for having a protagonist whose gender is chosen by the player, rather than either an explicitly female protagonist or one whose gender is unstated. While no art of the player character appears within the story, the first-person pronouns used in the character's dialogue will change between "watashi" and "ore" depending on the selected gender. As in many joseimuke games, the game's characters are often affectionate and flirtatious with the player character. Because it is possible to have an explicitly male player character, this gives many of the interactions a BL slant. The male version of the Sage was portrayed in the manga and stage play adaptations, complete with many fanservice-y moments, suggesting that this is the intended reading of the text. The female version of the Sage is present alongside the male version in the official comic anthology. The female version of the Sage is more common in fanworks posted to pixiv than the male version, as of 21 December 2021.

Fan translation

MahoYaku has no official translation in any form. Instead, all translation of the game's story is done by fans and posted online to be read alongside the game. Until July of 2022, the most prominent translation team was mahoyaku-eng, who had translated the main story, many of the game's event stories, and most of the game's login stories and special home screen lines. The group's translators included minami, berselium, and others. On 23 July 2022, the contents of the mahoyaku-eng twitter were deleted, and on the 24th, they announced that they would be taking all translations down, effective immediately. No explanation was given. Their translations can now only be read in the Wayback Machine.

Another prominent translation group is healingbonds, who have their own translation of the main story and many event stories. The remaining events and card stories are translated by a large variety of fan translators, and then aggregated into the Mahoyaku Resource Masterlist maintained by sailstella using the #mhyktl hashtag on twitter. The #mhykraws hashtag is also used to exchange recordings of game stories in Japanese ("raws") between fans who have the game content unlocked and translators who wish to translate them.

MahoYaku also has a prominent Korean fanbase who also depend on fan translations.

Shipping fandom

Because its characters have long histories, unique perspectives, and clashing personalities, slash shipping is incredible common in the MahoYaku fandom. The MahoYaku BL tag on Pixiv has over 11,000 works as of 20 August 2022. There are also over 1,000 works in the MahoYaku tag on AO3, the majority of which are categorized as m/m.

The 21 wizards of MahoYaku are split into ten "fated pairs", which are duos (or trios, in one case) of characters who are given special pair names by the game. These pairs are listed in the game as unique player badges and on the first anniversary gacha cards. They are:

• The pair with a powerful bond: Oz and Arthur Granvelle
• The childhood friends: Shino Sherwood and Heathcliff Blanchett
• The destined pair: Cain Knightley and Owen
• The mentor and disciple: Rustica Ferch and Chloe Collins
• The pair linked by fate: Mithra and Rutile Flores
• The pair of friends: Riquet Ortiz and Mitile Flores
• The pair with love and hate: Murr Hart and Shylock Bennett
• The former partners: Nero Turner and Bradley Bain
• The lord and retainer: Lennox Ram and Faust Lavinia
• The eldest ones: Figaro Garcia and Snow & White

All of these pairs are at least moderately popular ships. Cain/Owen and Bradley/Nero are the two most popular ships in the fandom. Other popular ships outside of the fated pairs include Faust/Figaro, Figaro/Oz, Mithra/Owen, and Faust/Nero. The same ships are popular in both the Japanese and English-speaking sides of the fandom, although the relative prevalence of the ships may vary.

Because of the complexity of relationships in MahoYaku, many fated pair ships are also common squicks. Oz and Arthur, for example, have an adoptive parent and child relationship, and so many fans read them as having exclusively platonic affection for each other. Age gaps of more than 1,000 years between the characters are common in MahoYaku ships due to the wide range of character ages. A number of the pairs are or have been violent towards each other, such as Owen stealing Cain's eye, or Shylock expressing murderous intent towards Murr, although most fans just find these things hot.

Example fanworks

Zines and events

• Flowerworks
• The Great Calami-zine (PDF on Archive.org)