Skyward Sword: the manga inside Hyrule Historia
The Skyward Sword manga is a 32 page prequel one shot by Akira Himekawa, created for the series' 25th anniversary, telling of the first Link and Hylia in the era before the game's sky. It is the most asked after item in this bibliography and the record is a verified absence: there is NO standalone English edition of it. No Viz volume, no Legendary Edition and no separate English ISBN exists, and the census records it formally as NO_EN_EDITION.
The manga's only English publication is inside The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia, the Dark Horse hardcover of January 29, 2013, at 9781616550417, where it appears as the closing Special Comic of the 276 page book. A limited edition hardcover variant of Hyrule Historia also exists from February 12, 2013. Any seller offering a standalone English Skyward Sword manga volume is offering something that is not a publisher's edition of this work.
The Japanese situation matches. No standalone Japanese tankobon exists either; Shogakukan's Himekawa bibliography contains no Skyward Sword volume. The one shot's Japanese appearance is likewise inside the Japanese Hyrule Historia, Shogakukan, December 21, 2011, at 9784092271593. Whether it is also reprinted in the Japanese Hyrule Encyclopedia was NOT verified in the census and is not claimed on this page.
That makes Hyrule Historia the affiliate and reference home of this manga in both languages, which is why this Library gives the absence its own page rather than a footnote: the useful, money saving fact about the Skyward Sword manga is where it actually lives, inside a book many Zelda shelves already own for entirely other reasons.
Collectors completing a Himekawa run should therefore count the one shot as present when Hyrule Historia is present, in either language, and should not leave a gap on the shelf for a volume that was never published. The bibliography's ten original volumes, eleven Twilight Princess volumes and this one shot are the complete Himekawa Zelda manga record as verified.
