In brief, Kuroki Yodomi no Hedoro-san (Hedoro The Black Sludge as it’s sometimes unofficially localized) is the story of an artificial girl made from mysterious black ooze from the Sea of Okhotsk. This girl, Kraunessa, is made to be a “white knight”, a helper of people, but she is born into the world with no real experience. She is, in essence, left to follow her instincts and not much else. Kuroki Yodomi no Hedoro-san is the story of where those instincts lead her, for good and for ill.
The manga’s author, Imitation Crystal, is a name rarely brought up even among those in the know about obscure mangaka. Even folks like Dowman Sayman or TSUBANA are comparatively well-known. IC is still a doujinka in spirit, and indeed Hedoro-san seems written first and foremost with an audience of one in mind, IC themselves.
To wit: the story’s winding writing makes the entire thing seem like a series of only loosely-connected stories that simply happen to take place in the same area and to some of the same characters. Kraunessa--the titular Hedoro-san--is the most consistent element. This is even sort of true of one of Imitation Crystal’s other popular (relatively speaking) manga, Game Club. Here though, the major traits of their work: winding in-universe conversations about morality, creeping surges of deep, black emotions, and a general sense of the unfairness of the world, are put to a greater end.
It’s never a wise idea to try to psychoanalyze someone based on their work, so I will phrase lightly and say that if it turned out to be that Imitation Crystal struggles, or had in the past, struggled with, depression or similar issues, I would be unsurprised. A lot of Hedoro-san is surprisingly bleak given the comedic tone it takes early on (this is still a series, mind you, that makes a running gag out of its protagonist munching on soap bars).
Take for example the arc of Ms. Rimon. Rimon is a character introduced comedically, and her story is the kind of thing that a school life 4koma would play for gags. Initially introduced as a teacher with a spunky, can-do attitude who’s popular among the students, she seems like a pretty typical addition to the cast for this sort of thing. However; it’s soon revealed that Rimon does not actually work for the school that Kraunessa and her friends attend. Investigating; they learn that she lives alone in a small house, cluttered with motivational posters on the wall. Even here, you can see the setup for a simple dichotomy--someone who outwardly spends time encouraging others but has a personal life that’s falling apart. Astoundingly, the real reveal is actually even worse.
Cheery Rimon has been living her life in a dream, actively deluded that she became a teacher as her home essentially crumbles around her, seemingly without her really even knowing. Even if the series was operating on as basic a level as trying to be an edgy take on a stock slice-of-life series (which it’s not), that’s pretty damn dark.
At arc’s end, she wakes up. Disappearing from Kraunessa’s life, her school, and the narrative until...well we’ll get to that later.
This is the comic’s general structure, such as it is. Kraunessa attempts to help someone in her life and fails to do so, violating both her designated status as a “white knight” and failing on a personal level. All the while, an occultic subplot about the grimoire that was used to create her--an evil book comically named The Cookie Cutter that can steal and give human nature--whirls in the background.
Kraunessa eventually falls into something of an existential crisis. Unable to figure out how to exist on her own terms. She’s unable to reconcile her desire to help people with her apparent inability to do so. Eventually, she joins the “Bother Club”, a group of three other characters (which, as a minor sidebar, includes a Catholic-raised gyaru named Gomorrah, puzzle that one out) who devote their lives to inconveniencing other people. She tries to spoil the school pool using her ink powers, and when she does so, her classmates are overjoyed (one must assume Gym is an unpopular subject at this particular high school). She can’t be evil correctly either.
Then, in the second half of the Bother Club arc, we’re reunited with Ms. Rimon, under dire circumstance.
Incredibly, she manages to save the suicidal not-teacher, and it’s here that the manga finally reveals its hand and makes plain what the point of all this is. Returning home that evening, Kraunessa asks her creator why she was created out of sludge, instead of a more pure substance like cream or candy.
In response, that character sings a song. It’s quite a long thing, but the core lyric is right here.
Ideals--no matter what they are, selfless or selfish--cannot sustain a person on their own, something we all eventually learn growing up. Much earlier in the comic, a somewhat farcical story about how a “King Burger” survived when his idealistic friend the White Knight did not by prioritizing his own wellbeing as well as that of others, also ties into this theme. The song, to give the manga all the credit it deserves, hits like a flick to the forehead, spelling it all out for idiots like yours truly who benefit from the obvious.
Given Imitation Crystal’s status as a completely independent operation, it’s not even entirely clear if the story of Hedoro-san is complete or not--the most recent chapter at the time of this writing ends on something of an ambiguous, “could go either way” sort of note. Yet, barring some kind of complete 180, it’s an easy recommendation, few works of art use their toolset to convey what’s ultimately a very simple theme so well.
And if you liked this review, why not check out some of my others here on Anilist?