Kiba (牙-KIBA-, literally fang, or if divided into Ki-Ba, a spiritual place), a fantasy anime by Madhouse, began broadcasting on TV Tokyo on April 5, 2006. The series is directed by Hiroshi Kōjina with Upper Deck Japan, a trading card game company, as the main sponsor. The anime has been licensed by Upper Deck USA and produced by ADV Films for North American distribution.
The series is more violent than other trading-card-game-tie-in animations with many characters being killed. According to an interview with the March 2006 issue of Animage, Hiroshi Kamishina, the show's director, noted that the show "absolutely will not have any plot elements that curry favor to children". While Upper Deck owns the rights to the series, ADV Films is the distributor and their production studio Amusement Park Media is producing the dub. Kiba aired on Toonami Jetstream from July 14, 2008 to January 21, 2009 and is now showing on The Anime Network's Video on Demand service. The producers of the show has also commented that Kiba will not be the type of show to put "human drama" on the back burner while concentrating on promotional tie-ins.
Kiba's main character is Zed, a 15-year-old boy who lives in a place called "Calm". Frustrated by his current situation in life he feels that somewhere out there is a place where he can live more fully. One day, at the invitation of a mysterious wind, Zed dives into a space-time crevasse (portal), seeking the answers that might be there. Riding on the wind, he is transported to a war-torn world where magic users called "Shard Casters" fight endlessly with each other, using spells in the form of marble-like "Shards".
With the power of the Shards, the Shard Casters are able to use spells and control monsters called "Spirits". Fascinated by that power, Zed aims to become a Shard Caster. However, he still doesn't know that residing in his body is "Amil Gaul", a mighty Spirit with the power to influence the world's future. Amil Gaul is one of the "Key Spirits" that, when together with the other Key Spirits, can destroy or save the world. There are a total of six Key Spirits: Amil Gaul, Pronimo, Sachira, Monardi, Jumamis and Shadin.
Zed undergoes countless trials in order to find out who he really is and what is most important to him.