Kara Dennison
March 16, 2024 
With the winter anime season coming to a close, one of the most beloved anime of last year and this year appears to be ending, too. With 28 episodes planned, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End looks like it will run just long enough to wrap up the exam arc. While we don’t know yet if the anime will continue, the manga is still going strong… and there are plenty more adventures for the mimic-prone mage and her young proteges!
The entire backlog of the manga is available to read on the Viz app, along with new chapters as they’re released. We’ll keep spoilers to a minimum, but here’s a taste of what else the party gets up to beyond the anime’s (current) end:
More About Denken
The mage exam arc of Frieren introduces a bevy of new characters, each powerful in their own way. Among them is Denken, whose combination of calm logic and willingness to take risks makes him a force to be reckoned with. As the manga continues, we actually learn more about his past—including how he got to be the way he is.
The manga’s Golden Land Arc sees the party facing down a massive demonic curse: one that no one yet has figured out how to break. Denken’s own past figures into the history of both the curse and its caster. In flashback, we see his journey from a promising young mage to the man he is today. That includes some unlikely mentorship and a tragedy that weighs heavily on him decades later.
The Goddess Monument
As the party journeys north, Frieren decides to revisit some past curiosities. Among them is one of the Goddess Monuments, which she encountered during her original journey with Himmel almost a century ago. At the time, the discovery didn’t seem to bear fruit. But going back has surprising results.
We won’t go into what those results are, because it’s one of the most delightful (and somewhat heartbreaking) surprises of the series so far. Suffice to say it adds extra context to everything that’s come before, from Frieren’s rivalry with demons to her growth as a mage. Also there’s a certain wedding scene that we’re still not over.
Other Assorted Nonsense
It’s true that the Frieren manga has strong story arcs, but we love its shorter subjects just as much. And even though the story continues with multi-chapter sagas, we still get the occasional single-chapter quest with an uncommon spell as the party’s reward. Old habits die hard, after all.
As the years go by, we get to watch everyone—Fern and Stark included—grow and change as people. But deep down, they stay the characters we’ve grown to love. Those light fetch quests in between longer arcs offer little breathers in between heavier story and maintain the series’s trademark pacing.
At the time of publication, it remains to be seen whether Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End will continue in anime form. Fortunately, it’s easier than ever to keep up with the manga and follow in the party’s footsteps, no matter which way things go.
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