Shangri-La Frontier

Shangri-La Frontier is a Japanese web novel series written by Katarina. Its serialization began on the novel publishing website Shōsetsuka ni Narō in May 2017. A manga adaptation, illustrated by Ryosuke Fuji, has been serialized in Kodansha's shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Magazine since July 2020, with its chapters collected in 25 tankōbon volumes as of January 2026.

The series follows Rakuro Hizutome, a teenager who enjoys playing "trash games"—old-fashioned and faulty video games that only appeal to a certain audience. After having mastered these games, despite their difficulty due to their glitches, Rakuro decides to change things up and play the acclaimed best-selling virtual reality game "Shangri-La Frontier"—a full-dive VR game with 30 million registered players. Rakuro enters the game as Sunraku, his bird-masked player character, and all the skills and experience that he acquired playing trash games will serve him in this new game.

An anime television series adaptation produced by C2C aired from October 2023 to March 2024. A second season aired from October 2024 to March 2025. A third season has been announced.

By April 2025, the manga had over 12 million copies in circulation. It won the 47th Kodansha Manga Award in the shōnen category in 2023.