The latest Weekly Shonen Jump issue joins in on the New Year’s festivities as it unveils a traditionally themed cover with One Piece‘s Monkey D. Luffy in the center, as always. For several years now, Luffy has been the face of Shonen Jump as a testament to the series’ legacy and massive popularity. Since One Piece is the best-selling manga of all time, almost everyone is familiar with Luffy’s face, even those who haven’t caught up with the manga. However, WSJ covers always include characters from ongoing series, and since One Piece is in its Final Saga, Luffy will eventually stop being the face of the magazine. While there are still a few years left before that happens, there’s no doubt it will be the end of an era, as other ongoing series will have to fill in the shoes.
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Although Shonen Jump doesn’t have a definite replacement yet, we could end up seeing Ichi the Witch‘s Ichi and Kagurabachi‘s Chihiro Rokuhira in the spotlight if they are still ongoing after One Piece ends. Manga series in recent times are considerably shorter compared to before, which is one of the reasons why One Piece outlived so many of them. While the latest cover highlights Luffy in the middle, we also see Ichi and Chihiro on either side of him, since they are the protagonists of the two hottest new series in Jump right now.
Weekly Shonen Jump Kicks Off 2026 With Kagurabachi and Ichi the Witch in The Spotlight
The 2026 issues started being released in December 2025, and the very first issue of the year had Ichi and Chihiro on the cover. Only two series appearing on the same cover of an issue is rare and has only happened a handful of times in decades. However, Shueisha’s decision to start the 2026 issues with these two manga at the center just confirms that they have high expectations for both series. Among the manga that have yet to announce anime adaptations, Kagurabachi and Ichi the Witch are the most popular in the magazine, outselling even some of the older ongoing series.
Takeru Hokazono’s Kagurabachi, which debuted in September 2023, is a modern fantasy centered around Chihiro, who embarks on a journey to avenge his father’s murder and retrieve the legendary Enchanted Swords forged by him. The manga has over three million copies in circulation, and the numbers keep rising at a massive rate. Additionally, Ichi the Witch, a magic fantasy written by Osamu Nishi and illustrated by Shiro Usazaki, debuted exactly a year after Kagurabachi in September 2024 and immediately became a major hit among readers.
The series centers around Ichi, a hunter who suddenly gains the power of a witch, even though only women are supposed to wield magic in the world. The manga currently has over one million copies in circulation, even though not a single volume has been available in English or any language except Japanese. Ichi the Witch will release the English version of its first volume in February 2026, which is guaranteed to boost overall sales even further.
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