Nao Iwamoto's The Seven Knights of the Marronnier Kingdom Gets TV Anime in October
The adaptation brings a decade-running manga that topped Kono Manga ga Sugoi! 2018 to NHK's educational channel, a rare broadcast slot for a fantasy romance aimed at a broad audience.
Reporting from 3 sources: Comic Natalie, Denfaminicogamer, Anime Anime.
Nao Iwamoto's manga "The Seven Knights of the Marronnier Kingdom" will be adapted into a TV anime that airs on NHK E-Tele starting October 2026. The announcement was made on June 1 alongside a teaser visual and a special video. The manga has been serialized in Shogakukan's Monthly Flowers since 2016 and has ten volumes released as of June 1. It ranked first in the women's category of Kono Manga ga Sugoi! 2018. The story follows seven brothers who serve as knights and are dispatched as ambassadors to seven different countries from the Marronnier Kingdom, a nation at the center of eight countries. The anime marks the tenth anniversary of the manga's serialization. Seiko Sayama, director of To Your Eternity, is directing the series. Shinzo Fujita handles series composition and script, Yuriko Maeda designs the characters, and J.C.STAFF produces the animation. The teaser visual shows the seven brothers walking on a grassland with marronnier flowers. A special announcement video will be released on the anime's official website.
The manga's 11th volume and a sticker book are both set for release on June 10, the same day as the announcement. The series has been translated and published in France and Spain, according to the press materials.
Director Seiko Sayama said in a statement that she was "a bit intimidated" when she first received the offer, given the image of a "grand fantasy spanning countries." She said she is "not good at themes like 'perfect heroes fighting with heavy missions to save the world'" and worried she could not do it. Reading the original work, she said, the tension "gradually melted away due to the exquisite balance between fantasy and reality." She described the series as a road movie where each character visits different regions, with music using instruments suited to each location so "the atmosphere changes drastically from place to place."
Original author Nao Iwamoto also contributed a handwritten comment. The sound director is Hitoshi Aketagawa and the music composer is Yoshimasa Fujisawa. The teaser visual shows the seven brothers named in the source material: Nemukunai, Hakua, Atsugariya, Samugariya, Kemono Tsukai, Tsurugi Jiman, and Harapeko. The copyright line lists Nao Iwamoto, Shogakukan, NHK, NEP, and Amazon Content Services LLC or its affiliates.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 3 cited sources below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.