AMINE AND MANGA

Ｉ・Я・Ｉ・Ａ ZЁIЯAM THE ANIMATION (イ・リ・ア ゼイラム ジ アニメーション?) is a six episode OVA series featuring Iria, a female bounty hunter. The series serves as a prequel to the original live-action film Zeiram, taking place several years earlier when Iria is still a rookie and detailing the events surrounding her first encounter with the unstoppable Zeiram.

The story begins with Iria as an apprentice to her older brother, Gren, a veteran bounty hunter, and his partner Bob, who work for Ghomvak Security along with a somewhat loutish hunter named Fujikuro. During a rescue mission to a hi-jacked spaceship called the Karma, they discover that the hi-jacker is actually a seemingly indestructible alien called Zeiram that broke out of the cargo hold during transit and began to massacre the crew. Bob is critically wounded by Zeiram while evacuating the survivors, and Gren is lost while attempting to kill Zeiram by destroying the Karma. Returning to Myce, Iria finds herself targeted by assassins working for Tedan Tippedai, the corporation that owned the Karma, and discovers a covered-up plot to control Zeiram in order to use it as a weapon. Iria escapes with the help of Fujikuro and reunites with Bob, who never recovered from his injuries but had his mind downloaded into a computer program. Together they continue to investigate rumours that Zeiram has appeared on Myce, and try to find out what happened to Gren, who also seems to have survived the Karma's destruction...

A manga adaptation by Mari Matsuzawa was serialized in MediaWorks' now-defunct shōnen manga magazine Dengeki Comic Gao! between October 2005 and February 2008. The manga has been licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment for distribution in North America; the first volume was released in November 2008. A twenty-six episode anime adaptation of the series produced by Seven Arcs aired between April and September 2006 on TV Tokyo in Japan. An Internet radio show was also produced, along with a visual novel released by ASCII Media Works, and a twenty-five minute long film released in Japanese theaters in April 2007. Another light novel entitled Inukami Special Edition was only released as a promotional gift for the animated film.
The word inukami (いぬかみ?) appears to be a corruption of the word inugami (いぬがみ?), a type of Japanese spirit that literally means "dog god". The only difference between the two words is the lack of a dakuten in "inukami". A possible reason is that traditional inugami are considered dangerous spirits, more likely to cause harm than help, and are sometimes used to invoke deadly curses.

Inukami! (いぬかみっ!?, lit. Dog Gods!) is a Japanese light novel series written by Mamizu Arisawa, with illustrations by Kanna Wakatsuki. The series originally started serialization in volume seventeen of ASCII Media Works' now-defunct light novel magazine Dengeki hp on April 18, 2002. Four more chapters were published until the first bound novel of the series was released, though more chapters were later serialized in the magazine. Fourteen main novels, plus two additional bonus novels with illustrations by Mari Matsuzawa, were published by ASCII Media Works under their Dengeki Bunko label between January 10, 2003 and December 10, 2008. The series revolves around a dog goddess named Yōko and her master Keita Kawahira as they fight against various troublesome spirits. Several more inukami besides Yōko also play an important role, most notably the inukami of Kaoru Kawahira.

Interlude (インタールード, Intārūdo?) is a science fiction visual novel by Longshot told in parallel novel style that follows the events around three women. Interlude was originally released for the Sega Dreamcast on March 13, 2003, a rare occurrence for visual novels, as most are released for the PC first. Playstation 2 and PC ports were later also released. The PS2 version received a 'The Best' budget price re-release on March 1, 2007.