Neon Genesis Evangelion: Campus Apocalypse

"That night started out no differently--I went to the same vending machines I usually frequented, and bought the same juice as always. But that night was different. That day, I said goodbye...to my ordinary nights."

Campus Apocalypse (Japanese title: Gakuen Datenroku, which translates to Academic Record of Heaven's Descent) is a 2007 Alternate Continuity-Neon Genesis Evangelion manga by Ming Ming wherein Shinji Ikari is your average middle school student attending NERV Academy, a Catholic school, and living with his guardian, Kaji, whom the former's father sent to take care of him while he worked overseas. One night, while at the vending machines, Shinji sees his crush, Rei Ayanami, with a boy that he doesn't know and then stumbles upon a small orb. The next day, the very boy Shinji saw, Kaworu Nagisa, transfers to his class. Curious about the relationship the two may have, Shinji decides to investigate and finds himself in the middle of a battle between Rei and Kaworu, and a hideous Angel! Turns out that Rei and Kaworu, along with Shinji's other classmate, Asuka, are working for a secret organization bent on preventing the Angels from taking Cores, small orbs (like the one Shinji found) that help the great tree Yggdrasil keep the universes from intermingling and falling into chaos. Now he too must join him, using his EVA, a device that molds into a weapon based on the user's will.

The manga was licensed by Dark Horse and released in late 2010 under its English title.

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Tropes used in Neon Genesis Evangelion: Campus Apocalypse include:

• Action Girl: Rei and Asuka.
• Adults Are Useless
• Artificial Humans: Kaworu and Rei
• Alternate Continuity: Lighter and Softer. Relatively speaking, of course.
• Bishonen: Kaworu
• Blade on a Stick: Rei's EVA appears to be the Lance of Longinus.
• Cassandra Truth: The website where "the man who received the angel's revelation" predicts the end of the world was widely debunked as an urban legend, but it hints at the truth. In fact, NERV planted it as a hint to flush out Angels.
• Chekhov's Gun: The Core Shinji finds at the very beginning (also a defining moment in his relationship with Asuka, as she isn't pleased he took her "trophy").
  • Rei's notebook is actually Yui's diary, which was given to her to help her become more like Yui.
• Chekhov's Hobby: Kensuke's love of conspiracies.
• Conspiracy Theorist: Instead of a military otaku, this continuity's Kensuke loves him some conspiracy theories.
• Cool Sword: Kaworu uses one.
• Cosmic Keystones: The Cores/the angels: their motivation is not wanting to go back.
• Cyber Cyclops: In a sense; Iruel's nanotech body is a buxom female with a one-eyed helmet.
• Disappeared Dad: Gendo, of course. Turns out that the original Gendo of this universe is dead, and the current Gendo is from an alternate universe, presumably based on an alternate version of canon Evangelion.
• The Dragon: Ritsuko.
• Emotionless Girl: Rei, but not as much as her original universe counterpart.
• Gainax Ending: Naturally, being an Evangelion Spin-Off and All. Kaworu does...something, Gendo says something vague, Shinji talks to a Naked Kaworu and then somehow Shinji ends up walking to school with Asuka and Rei like nothing weird ever happened. Typical Evangelion Ending here, folks.
• Gratuitous English: There's a scene of a nun reciting the Lord's Prayer in English. There aren't any grammatical errors or anything, but the wording is different from the English norm, as if it was a translation of the common Japanese version or something.
• Gratuitous Foreign Language: Two schoolchildren/Angels are Italian-speaking. Also, Hebrew words appear when the Evas are used (and at other times), although the grammar is incorrect.
• Gotta Catch Em All: The cores.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Kaworu.
• High School AU: A Catholic private academy, at that!
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: The sole reason Kaworu is betraying his own kind and helping them, as he reminds Ritsuko when she starts to think that she's the boss of him. If it weren't for Shinji, he'd be struggling to live free and follow his own interests (including gaming and sports) instead of helping NERV save the world. He betrayed his own kind once, and if he had to fight NERV for Shinji's sake it wouldn't count as a betrayal, since he was only on Shinji's side to begin with.
• Intrepid Reporter: Kaji has shades of this when he gets involved with the whole Angels thing.
• Mind Rape: Just a small one when Asuka is pulled into a hole in the game and nearly choked to death by her 'parents'.
• Mirror Match: Iruel pits Asuka against a copy of herself. It is a literal mirror match, too - the other Asuka copies her attacks the moment she makes them. Victory is achieved when Asuka takes a third option, going Back-to-Back Badasses with her copy to doubly attack Iruel.
• Mooks: The students when they become Brainwashed.
• Mysterious Parent
• Mythology Gag: Kaworu's character in an MMO is a Fallen Angel-character class named Tabris. No wait, maybe that was foreshadowing? Also, Misato being a teacher.
  • The three nuns Ooi, Mogami, and Agano come from three Nerv technicians in Ikari Shinji Raising Project.
• Oedipus Rex: "That wasn't Father!" It really isn't; see Disappeared Dad above.
• Ordinary Middle School Student
• Parental Abandonment: This is still Eva, after all.
• Powers Via Possession: Sort of. The host dies first.
• Redheaded Hero: Asuka
• The Reveal: Yui has been revealed to be at the core of Yggdrasil, and the Gendo of this story isn't the real Gendo.
• Self-Made Orphan: Asuka, but only because her parents became possessed by Angels.
• Shadow Archetype: Scary Gendo is scary.
• Shock and Awe: Ramiel can command lightning in this version.
• Strange Girl: Rei is more this than emotionless.
• Tsundere: Asuka.
• Unlucky Everydude: Just like in the original show. Shinji is a very average teen apart from the fact his parents were the Eva's creators...
• Wake Up, Go to School, Save the World
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?
• Whip It Good: Asuka's EVA is a whip.
• White-Haired Pretty Boy: Kaworu.
• Winged Humanoid: Some Angels (like Ramiel) can spawn wings.
• Word Salad Title: As if the original title's direct translation wasn't bad enough (Neon Genesis Evangelion Academy: Records of Heaven's Descent), Dark Horse Comics has released the translated manga as Neon Genesis Evangelion: Campus Apocalypse.
• World of Cardboard Speech / "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Kaworu reminds Ritsuku that he is not one of her flunkies, he is an Eldritch Abomination; he's only here for Shinji, he doesn't care about NERV or humanity in general; and points out that being too afraid of life's pains to enjoy what it has to offer is just cowardly and dispicable, which is especially pointed since that was the motivation of both NERV and SEELE in the original series. It's a Call Back to the original series, where his motivation for letting himself be killed was that Shinji and humanity were the ones who deserved to have the world due to Shinji's ability to keep going after heartbreak and humanity's achievements (especially a certain piece of music).
• The World Tree: NERV is out to kill the Angels because their actions are killing Yggdrasil; should the tree die, every Alternate Universe will be destroyed. At least, that's what Shinji's told at first. Actually, Yggdrasil is a method to travel to alternate universes created by Yui Ikari. However, this puts too much stress on whatever separates the universes, so if they don't fix Yggdrasil then all the AU's will end up colliding into each other.
• X Meets Y: Has been described as "Neon Genesis Evangelion meets Persona."
• You Can't Fight Fate: Oh sure, Kaworu and the others tell Shinji that he can quit at any time, but we all know that he's trapped.
• You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Rei, of course.