The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master Season 2: Reading Guide

The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master season 2 has been out in English since January 15, 2026, and WEBTOON had reached Ep. 90 by October 22. Start at the prologue and read straight through. The episode numbers carry over from one season to the next, nothing needs skipping, and the only long pause was the break between seasons.

It's the English title of the Naver webtoon 사시미 한 자루로 아카데미를 씹어먹음 (Sashimi Han Jaruro Academy-reul Ssipeomeokeum, roughly "chewing up the academy with one sashimi knife"). GMAN draws and writes it, adapting a web novel by tangahuru. WEBTOON's blurb sets it up in a sentence: Chef Kim, "Korea's legendary sashimi master", wakes up inside Blessing M, a mobile game he once played, as "a mere background extra" named Geomma Kang. His one advantage is the Blessing of the Blade God. The Korean blurb adds the catch that makes the title a joke: for one minute a day, he becomes a sword saint, and the only blade he gets to swing is a sashimi knife.

The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master at a glance

Naver rates it 15+. The two editions use the same episode numbers, which makes cross-checking easy. As of October 23, Korea's free list sits five episodes ahead of the English one, and WEBTOON's app offers six episodes ahead, so paying for those puts you one episode past Korean readers who don't.

The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master English series poster. Image: WEBTOON.

Season 1 and season 2: where each one starts

So if you searched for a season 2 release date, it came out months ago. Korea took about four months off between seasons, and English readers waited three. Anyone who looked in late 2025 found a series on break; it has been weekly since.

Arcs by episode, from the official episode titles

Neither platform labels arcs, so this map is built from the episode titles on the official English list. Multi-part titles ("Midterms (1)" to "(5)") mark where an arc begins and ends.

Lord of the Dead ends with its fifth part at Ep. 89, which is also where the Korean arc stops. As of October 23, the latest English episode is Ep. 90 "Return", the one Korea titles 귀가 ("going home"). From there the Korean titles run through the end of the vacation and 2학기의 시작 ("start of the second semester"). The paid previews reach 회장 선거 ("the president election"), so the next stretch moves the story back to school.

Readers on r/manhwa pair this one with The Extra's Academy Survival Guide (one ). Our Extra's Academy Survival Guide reading guide maps that series episode by episode.

thread asks for more like the two of them

Step-by-Step: how to read The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master

1. Open the official WEBTOON page and start at "Ep. 1 - Prologue". The English launch dropped the prologue and the first seven episodes on the same day, so the first sitting is a big one by design.
2. Read season 1 to Ep. 49. Treat Ep. 49.1, the summer vacation special, as optional cast time. Ep. 49.2 is the season 1 afterword, the creator's wrap-up rather than story.
3. Go straight into Ep. 50. There's no reboot or new numbering; season 2 opens with Siegfried the Blade Emperor.
4. Decide on the app. As of October 23, free readers are at Ep. 90, the trip home after Lord of the Dead. If the English app follows the Korean order, the six paid episodes (Ep. 91 to 96) take you through the end of the vacation and into the start of the second semester, one episode past where Korean free readers are.

Is it on hiatus, and is it a harem?

Hiatus: no. Naver lists it as an active Thursday title with no rest flag, and the English list has had an episode every week since the season 2 premiere. The Korean side has skipped the odd week (nothing went up between July 15 and July 29 this year), which is normal for a weekly webtoon and not a break.

Harem: mostly yes, and the readers will tell you so. AniList's top tag for the series is Female Harem, ahead of Isekai and School. On r/manhwa, the threads are full of new heroines, one titled "another love interest to this walking door". If you want a single romance with a clear endgame, this isn't it.

Current Korean series thumbnail. Image: Naver Webtoon.

Is there a novel, and is it finished?

Yes to the first, no to the second. tangahuru's web novel runs on Naver Series, where the serial edition had 619 episodes and was still being published when we checked. The ebook edition is marked complete at 14 volumes from the publisher J Plus (제이플러스). NovelUpdates lists a first part of 300 chapters as completed and a second part as ongoing.

There's no official English novel. NovelUpdates marks it as not licensed, with no English publisher. Unofficial translations exist; we don't link them. If you want to read ahead, the comic's paid previews are the legal way to do it.

What readers say

Readers on r/manhwa argue about the writing more than anything else. A thread asking whether it's "very childish" drew plenty of agreement, and one reply made the fairest case for the defense. "It's definitely a simplistic" power fantasy with a "psuedo-harem", that reader admits, "but it's still fun because it's well executed for what it is." Another gave it credit for the obvious hook: "sashimi knife instead of sword is a bonus points for using rather "unusual" weapon".

Want more stories where the rules of a game do the heavy lifting? Our picks seven where the system matters to the plot, not just to the stat screens.

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Our Take

We'd start it if a loud, fast academy power fantasy sounds like a good week. The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master gets its identity from the joke in the title, a master chef whose only blade is a fish knife, and that's what separates it from the other extras stuck in a game. Readers who praise it mention the action and the art; the ones who dropped it point at the writing. Both camps are describing the same comic, so you'll know which one you're in within the first sitting.

If you liked Academy's Genius Swordsman for its sword school setting, this is, by its own readers' account, the sillier and flashier cousin. If you'd rather follow an extra who survives on what he knows instead of a magic knife, our manhwa like The Extra's Academy Survival Guide list is the better next stop. And read it on WEBTOON, not on the scan sites that come up first in search; our guide to where to read manhwa legally covers why.

Updated October 23, 2026: WEBTOON posted Ep. 90 "Return" on October 22, so the latest free episode, the gap to Korea, the arc table and the app step now count from Ep. 90.

How we checked this: on October 22, 2026 we went through the full episode lists on WEBTOON and Naver Webtoon, the Naver Series novel pages, AniList and NovelUpdates, and read the r/manhwa threads quoted above; on October 23 we re-checked both episode lists. The arc map comes from official episode titles, not from a read-through, and we haven't read the novel. Last reviewed: October 23, 2026.

References

• The Academy's Sashimi Sword Master on WEBTOON: official English episode list and schedule
• 사시미 한 자루로 아카데미를 씹어먹음 on Naver Webtoon: Korean original, episode list
• Naver Series: web novel, serial edition and ebook edition
• AniList entry: credits, start date, tags
• NovelUpdates entry: novel parts and licensing status

Related Reading

• The Extra's Academy Survival Guide Reading Guide: the academy-extra webtoon r/manhwa readers pair with this one, mapped episode by episode.
• Academy's Genius Swordsman Reading Guide: a sword academy story with a much heavier tone, explained season by season.
• Manhwa Like The Extra's Academy Survival Guide: four picks sorted by premise, academy foreknowledge and tone.
• Best Game Manhwa: seven series where the game's rules actually drive the story.