Mao Danta aka Demon Lord Dante is a rough draft of Go Nagai's later work being Devilman. This short series contains some similarities to the Devilman manga, however Mao Dante is a lot more controversial.

The story for this horror manga is centered on Ryo Utsugi, while in the mountains, hears a voice calling out to him being Demon Lord Dante who then devours Ryo. Moments later Dante wreaks havoc on a nearby city where Ryo awakens to discover that he has become Demon Lord Dante. The rest of the series focuses on events similar to The Salem Witch Trials where demons could be masquerading as humans.

Most of the appeal of this story is the atmosphere & its ending being controversial to certain religions, however the point of the story is to express the corruption of sacred ideologies as people shouldn't justify every sin for the sake of the greater good. While most of the story elements are better expressed in Devilman, Mao Dante has its own unique qualities.

For starters, the beginning of this manga is very reminiscent of a Kaiju film (Giant monster) where Dante battles a demon named Xenon in the city. The tone then shifts to a study of human society where the "heroic saviors" act just as cruel as their enemies. Much of the controversy comes from its final chapter as the series revolves around a religious group battling satanists. The last chapter can be misinterpreted as it makes the satanists being in the right side expressing demons are the righteous beings. Personally, I saw it more as an ironic look at human vices as it displays people being arrogant to their crimes of murder while they tend to justify their actions. Main problem with this manga is that it ends on a slight cliffhanger due to the magazine publisher going out of business. If you like this story, then you'll like Devilman a lot more.