Sōten Kōro

Sōten Kōro
Cover art for the first volume of the Sōten Kōro manga, as released by Kodansha
蒼天航路
Genre	Action, Adventure, Historical
Manga
Written by	Hagin Yi
Illustrated by	King Gonta
Published by	Kodansha
Demographic	Seinen
Magazine	Morning
Original run	October 1994 – November 2005
Volumes	36 (List of volumes)
Anime television series
Directed by	Toyoo Ashida Tsuneo Tominaga
Written by	Hideo Takayashiki
Studio	Madhouse
Original network	NTV
Original run	April 7, 2009 – September 30, 2009
Episodes	26

Sōten Kōro (Japanese: 蒼天航路^?), also known as Beyond the Heavens, is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by King Gonta, adapted from an original story by Hagin Yi. It was serialized by Kodansha in the manga anthology magazine Weekly Morning from 1994 to 2005. After Hagin Yi died of cancer in September 1998, King Gonta picked up the story himself. A total of 409 chapters were published and compiled into 36 separate books. In 1998, it won the 22nd Kodansha Manga Award in the general category.

In Japan, Sōten Kōro was advertised by its publisher as "Neo-Sangokushi" (ネオ三国志^?), which may be translated as "Neo Romance of the Three Kingdoms".

Sōten Kōro's story is based loosely on the events taking place in Three Kingdoms period of China during the life of the last Chancellor of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Cao Cao (155 – March 15, 220), who also serves as the main character.

The Three Kingdoms period has been a popular theme in Japanese manga for decades, but Sōten Kōro differs greatly from most of the others on several points. One significant difference is its highly positive portrayal of its main character, Cao Cao, who is traditionally the antagonist in not only Japanese manga, but also most novel versions of the Three Kingdoms period, including the original 14th-century version, Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong. Another significant difference from others is that the storyline primarily uses the original historical account of the era, Records of Three Kingdoms by Chen Shou, as a reference rather than the aforementioned Romance of the Three Kingdoms novel. By this, the traditional hero of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Liu Bei, takes on relatively less importance within the story and is portrayed in a less positive light. Yet, several aspects of the story are in fact based on the novel version, including the employment of its original characters such as Diao Chan, as well as anachronistic weapons such as Guan Yu’s Green Dragon Crescent Blade and Zhang Fei’s Viper Spear.