Warning: This article contains spoilers from the Vampire Knight manga! Matsuri Hino's Vampire Knight manga began its serialization in 2004 in the LaLa magazine of Hakusensha, a famous publishing company in Japan. The manga even received an anime adaptation in 2008 and released two seasons in the same year before discontinuing. During the 2000s and 2010s, when the Shonen demographic dominated the anime industry, several Shojo series often ended halfway without adapting the full manga. Since the vampire trope was famous in the 2000s, the series got a lot of attention from Shojo fans, with many switching to the manga after the anime was discontinued. However, the series is also controversial, with many voicing complaints about the pseudo-incestuous relationship, melodramatic love triangle, and polarizing plot twists.
The series' tropes were considered dated and melodramatic by many, but that didn't stop the series from gaining popularity over the years. While the original manga ended in 2013, a few months later, in the same year, Hino released a sequel series, Vampire Knight: Memories, that takes place over a thousand years after the main story's conclusion. The sequel also ended in August this year, and now the manga has released the cover image of the final volume, shared by @MangaMoguraRE on X. Since the previous cover featured Yuki Cross and Zero Kiryuu, the final one included Yuki and Kaname Kuran. Volume 11 of Vampire Knight: Memories will be released on December 5th, 2025, in Japan. While Viz Media publishes the English volumes of the manga, it has yet to announce a release date.
The original story ends with Kaname's sacrifice, who cast his heart into the furnace that creates anti-vampire weapons in order to end the conflict between humans and vampires. His final wish was for Yuki to live happily with Zero, without the darkness of the human world. Yuki and Zero were initially separated after the former realized she was a pureblood vampire princess. However, after Kaname's sacrifice, they spend the next 1,000 years together before the latter tragically dies due to an anti-vampire weapon while protecting Yuki and their unborn son, Ren Kiryuu.
Later, when Ai Kuran, the daughter of Kaname and Yuki, and Ren grow up, Yuki decides to sacrifice herself and turn Kaname into a human, who is later preserved in ice by Hanabusa Aidou. Although Kaname wakes up as a human, he has no recollection of his past life and doesn't know anything about the two vampires who were there when he woke from his slumber.
The story continues as Ai and Ren begin to tell him stories about everything he has missed in the past thousand years, including the fates of Yuki and Zero, who were both dear to him. The manga features non-linear stories where the vampire siblings narrate the events that occurred during Kaname's slumber. As Kaname begins to learn about himself and those around him, he finally comes to terms with his feelings about Yuki.