Hyouka

Chapter 60

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Our Legendary Volume[edit]1.[edit]

What was the first manga I ever read, I wonder? It happened when I was so young that I"ll never be truly certain, no matter how many possible t.i.tles come to mind. All I warmly remember is how absorbed in it I was.

In my home"s living room stood a single bookshelf, and on that bookshelf sat only dust-covered encyclopedias and literary anthologies that I had never even seen so much as taken out of their cases—there was no manga at all. I had my first experience with it because of my aunt, my mother"s sister. She had a crude house made of steel, as rough as it was ugly, but it contained bookshelves of dizzying heights, filled to the brim with books, around half of which were volumes of manga from all ages.

It became a daily routine of mine. I would drop off my little backpack at home after returning from a day at elementary school and then immediately go on over to my aunt"s house, reading manga until I eventually went home for dinner. Whenever I visited, my aunt, the polar opposite of my mother, would always smile and pat my head, saying, manga maniac Maya-chan"s here again!, before leaving me to my own devices. Thinking back on it now, she probably moved the manga with unsafe scenes to the top shelves, beyond my elementary schooler arm"s reach.

The turning point came when I was in third grade. As far as I can remember... I had just finished reading "Phoenix," by Osamu Tezuka. It might"ve actually been "Wild 7" or "Toward the Terra," but at any rate, I was reading, eyes glued to the pages, like I always had been when my aunt unexpectedly walked in and offered me a snacks. I was a light eater as a child, so she normally refrained from feeding me anything that might make me lose my appet.i.te for dinner, but on that day, she had been given some high-quality watermelon and apparently wanted me to try some as well.

"You should have some watermelon too, Maya-chan," she said to me. I feel bad saying it, but I don"t remember its taste one bit. What did stay with me, though, was something she said as she talked absentmindedly during our snack.

"Books are strange, aren"t they? It doesn"t matter the least bit who you are. To think that anyone can write them..."

I have no clue where that thought of hers came from. It could"ve been that she was talking about how even though driving cars and operating machinery required licenses, it was interesting how writing a book could be done by anyone. With that single phrase, however, something incredible dawned on me.

I see... There"s no reason someone like me couldn"t draw manga.

As I realized this, the floodgates opened, and I immediately started to draw that very evening. I had never disliked drawing itself, and to add to that, I often got the highest scores possible in my art cla.s.s. I was certain of it: even I could draw manga! How long did it take for that confidence of mine to crumble, I wonder. Ten minutes? Fifteen? As I look back now on the terrible drawings I did back then, I can"t help but cry. At the time, it was so frustrating, so miserable... The words, "It wasn"t supposed to be like this," formed behind my clenched teeth. I softly cursed at myself as tears dropped onto the paper below, and then at last, my resolve solidified with a final cry of frustration.

Ever since that day, I"ve continued to draw unrelentingly.

The monthly m
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anga magazine, La Shin, was originally sold as an extra volume to the similarly purposed Shin Soh. The name apparently derived from the j.a.panese onomatopoeia for lots of silence, but the contents ended up being pretty different. Unlike the mainly shounen Shin Soh, La Shin was more neutral, or to put it differently, the kind of magazine that seemed to welcome anyone of any age, as long as they liked manga. There were quite a number of magazines out there that I wouldn"t mind slapping the "For all manga lovers!" label on, but La Shin specifically didn"t really cater to any one niche, I guess, and they generally didn"t publish anything too difficult for the average person to get behind. Even if I didn"t have the pocket change or the time to read every manga magazine as they came out, I would still make sure to buy the latest issue of La Shin every month without fail on its release day, the 18th.

Like many other magazines, La Shin accepted manga submissions and also offered an award for newcomers called the New World Prize. It is handed out four times a year, and in addition to the chosen work—itself published in that month"s issue—the t.i.tles of twenty or so other runner-ups each receives an honorable mentions shout-out with a short comment.

The 18th of February fell on a terribly cold Sunday. As snow fell tirelessly and without rest, continuing to bury the city, I headed, scarf wrapped around my ears and covered head-to-toe in cold-resistant clothes, towards the Kobundo bookstore next to the highway. Even I didn"t really want to be out on an accident-p.r.o.ne day like this one, but it was for the latest issue of La Shin, after all. That said, even though I bought each issue every month, that didn"t necessarily mean I had to get it the very day it came out. The thing was, though, today"s March issue was a different story altogether.

I plodded, step-by-step, through the ankle-deep snow, and after I finally arrived at Kobundo—my journey taking five times longer than it usually did—I took a second to relax and deeply inhale the warm interior air. I carefully went over every inch of my clothes to brush off the snow, and once I was certain I wouldn"t accidentally get any of the books wet, I went over to the magazine shelf.

From a results perspective, all of my efforts were in vain. The latest La Shin issue hadn"t arrived yet. According to the shop employee, the shipments sometimes moved forward or back a day if the official release date fell on a Sunday. There was nothing I could do about that, so I simply had to trudge my way back home.

After school the next day, I managed to get one of my friends to cover for me at the library and left the campus as fast as possible, going to neither the Manga Research Society nor the Cla.s.sics Club. I ran as quickly as I could along the snow-cleared sidewalks and finally burst into Kobundo. I grabbed an issue of La Shin, tied shut with plastic string to prevent anyone from reading before buying, held it close to my pounding chest, and headed towards the cash register. I"d seen the girl behind the counter here before, and in her usual sweet voice, she asked, "Would you like a bag?"

"Yes, please," I replied, nervously swallowing as I did so.

"Would you like me to cut the string for you?"

My cheeks burned up as I wondered what she must"ve been thinking of me. Her expression contained nothing out of the ordinary, however, so I replied, "Yeah," and she went to take out some scissors and did just that.

I went outside with the bag and immediately pulled the magazine out. There probably weren"t that many people who’d start reading their purchase the second they left the shop. Although a bit concerned about being seen by anyone I knew, I shuffled through the pages.

14th New World Prize winner: "Tanuki Counterattack" by Mamoru Mamiana.

I"ve never heard of him before. I hope it"s good.

I went to look at the other notable selections. Each of them had a single panel published in the magazine, but none of them looked familiar... In other words, mine wasn"t chosen.

I looked up at the clear winter sky; the breath that escaped my long sigh turned white.

The partic.i.p.ation awards went to... Ichitarou Tasaka, MILULU, Kinsuke Shouda, Satou Georgia, Kaoru Yajima, Kazuru Ihara, Enma Haru...

"Wait, wha..."

A strange noise came from my mouth. A man walking into the store glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, but I didn"t feel even a shred of embarra.s.sment.

"No... way..."

Kazuru Ihara! "The Island with the Tower!"

It was published! My story with my drawings was published under my pen name in La Shin!’s March issue.[1]

I closed the magazine and then, trembling, opened it a second time. Maybe it was some kind of mistake, I figured. Maybe, once I opened it again, the contents would change.

But they didn"t.

2.[edit]

It was a sunny Monday in May, and I headed to the school library after homeroom finished. I belonged to the Manga Society, Cla.s.sics Club, and Library Committee, and although I normally only worked there on Friday, Monday was when we were training the new recruits that joined in April, so I figured taking care of the returned books was the least I could do. I finished putting all of them away without a hitch, but there was still some time left in the day. I figured it might be a good idea to drop by the Manga Society, but instead I walked to the very end of the special wing"s fourth floor, towards the Cla.s.sics Club.

Upon sliding open the earth sciences lecture room door, I was instantly greeted by familiar, cheery voices.

"Hey, Mayaka! Perfect timing. Come look at this."

Seeing f.u.ku-chan in the center of the room, beckoning me over with his hand, my mouth subconsciously curved into a smile.

All of the soph.o.m.ores were here, but it looked like the freshman didn"t come today. Satoshi f.u.kube and Eru Chitanda—f.u.ku-chan and Chi-chan—were sitting side-by-side, looking at some kind of pamphlet spread open on their desks. Oreki was in a seat some distance away, staring outside the window with a sour face.

"Yeah? What is it?"

I dropped my bag on a nearby desk and walked over to the two, and Chitanda held up the pamphlet for me to see, her face br.i.m.m.i.n.g with a wide smile. The cover read "Kamiyama City Book Report Contest Results."

"It"s from four years ago, but I happened to come across it as I was cleaning my room yesterday. I opened it up out of curiosity and saw an unexpected name," Chi-chan said. She opened the pages with her slender fingers, and I looked at the contents:

First place: "My Opinions on "Blue Bird," by Ami Kojima"

Second place: "My Opinions on "Salamander," by Jirou Miyama"

Third place: "My Opinions on "Run, Melos!" by Houtarou Oreki"[2]

Four years ago meant we were in 6th grade at the time.

"Mayaka-san, you were in the same cla.s.s as Oreki-san, right?" asked Chi-chan.

Right. As regrettable as it was, I was in the same cla.s.s as him for all of elementary and middle school, so I vaguely remembered he got an award in some book report contest. I never read his submission, though. I had no idea it"d been recorded in the pamphlet.

"Melos, huh. Doesn"t seem like something Oreki would write about."

"Come on, Mayaka. Do you honestly think Oreki would pick a story about friendship like that? It was probably just a topic that was a.s.signed to him," Satoshi said.

Chitanda pondered a little bit and then started to speak.

"When I was in 7th grade, I"m fairly sure I had to read Alex Hacke"s Little King December for the summer vacation book report."

Now that she mentioned it, I feel like I had to read the same one.

The three of us fixated our eyes on Oreki at the same time. He turned away but eventually gave into the silence and let out a small sigh before turning back to face us.

"It was one of the recommended books at the library... Besides, it was short."

Oh. It made sense if that was the reason.

f.u.ku-chan smiled gleefully, clearly having a great time.

"So anyways, Mayaka. This book report is quite the masterpiece, you see. It really brought tears to my eyes; you can definitely imagine it was written by the 7th grade Houtarou."

Chi-chan nodded and also piped in, "I was also very fascinated by it. I could never write something like this."

Hearing them talk about it to that extent made me a little curious as well, but I figured I"d at least ask Oreki about it first.

"Can I?"

Although he looked back with a sullen, dissatisfied expression, he responded, "It"s not like that pamphlet belongs to me."

Instead of replying with a simple "I don"t want you to," he said it that was public information, even though he might"ve not liked that fact, and implied that he couldn"t say no... I swear, he never changes. I thanked Chi-chan and happily took the pamphlet from her hands.

I"m sure the original was handwritten, but it was converted into print for the pamphlet.

My Opinions on "Run, Melos!"

Houtarou Oreki

I read "Run, Melos." It was interesting. I was glad that Melos was able to save Selinuntius. I was also glad that King Dionys had a change of heart. I thought it would be nice if that change lasted for a long time.

Originally, there was no need for Melos to run at all. His village and the castle were only ten Chinese miles apart—or forty kilometers in today"s terms—so even if he walked, it would only take him around ten hours. The reason Melos ran at the start was to force himself to cut ties with his home, so when he was far enough away from the village, he started to walk like normal.

However, there were two reasons why he had to run with everything he had at the end of the story. The first reason being the bridge was washed away due to heavy rains the previous day. The second, and the more pressing reason was he was attacked by bandits. Although he was completely surrounded, he was able to defeat at least four of them and escape. I thought he was very strong. A normal person couldn"t do that. Because Melos became very tired from that and fell asleep, however, he had to run to make it in time.

Melos had nothing valuable on him. Not only did he say from the start, "I have nothing with me save for my life," it was probably obvious just by looking at him. What were the bandits trying to achieve, then? They answered that question themselves. When Melos told them, "I have nothing with me save for my life," the bandits responded, "It"s that very life we"re after!" Essentially, they were less bandits, and more a.s.sa.s.sins. Weak a.s.sa.s.sins, granted. As for who ordered the a.s.sa.s.sination, Melos himself said, "In that case, the king must have demanded it," to which the a.s.sa.s.sins didn"t respond. I thought it was very good of them to not betray their client.

The question is: was Melos correct in a.s.suming it was the king who sent the a.s.sa.s.sins after him?

I don"t think so. No matter who you might think wanted Melos dead, the king was the only person who it absolutely couldn"t be.

King Dionys didn"t have faith in anyone, so he didn"t believe that Melos would return, at all. It was exactly because he thought it wouldn"t happen that the shock in seeing Melos return caused such a change of heart in him. There"s no way that someone who thought Melos wouldn"t return would also send a.s.sa.s.sins to try and prevent that return.

Then who sent them? Who would"ve been happy to see the a.s.sa.s.sins succeed in killing Melos?

Let"s try to imagine what would"ve happened had the a.s.sa.s.sination gone well. Without Melos arriving before sunset, Selinuntius would"ve been executed, and the king would have exclaimed with a sad expression, "This is exactly why people can"t be trusted."

If Melos" corpse had been discovered after, it would get out that the king executed a man even though the person who was supposed to arrive had been killed by highway robbers. While the king"s subjects may have feared him, deep down, they would also chastise his decision. If Melos" body was carefully hidden and never found as a result, the king would continue to believe that Melos had run away according to his expectations. He would"ve lost his chance to believe in people and continued with the executions, further destroying the country from within.

Essentially, had Melos been a.s.sa.s.sinated, the country would"ve suffered regardless of what happened after. Thinking about it like this, the person who sent the a.s.sa.s.sins must have been someone who didn"t want the king to reform himself against all odds through the arrival of Melos, thus earning the support of the people. When Melos did successfully return, I bet he was yelling on the inside.

On another note, when Melos was running back to the castle, he met a man named Philostratos who was Selinuntius" disciple. Even though Selinuntius hadn"t actually been executed yet, he told Melos, "You"re too late! Please stop running!" Philostratos didn"t sound at all like he wanted to save Selinuntius. Wasn"t he his disciple?

It"s likely that he was sent by the same person who hired the a.s.sa.s.sins to at least try and talk Melos out of it before he ended up reaching the castle.

In the book, it was written that "King Dionys couldn"t trust anyone." I think that distrust was founded. The king had enemies. However now, because of the incident with Melos, it would be even harder for him to figure out who those enemies were. In order to pit the king against his people, the person who targeted Melos would likely continue to go to whatever lengths necessary to prey on his distrust.

I was glad that King Dionys had a change of heart. However, after I finished reading "Run, Melos!" I thought that change may not last for such a long time.

I brought my palm to my forehead.

"Oreki..."

I had no clue he"d submitted a book report like this. I looked back at him and saw he was facing the other direction again. I can imagine how difficult it must"ve been to have something you wrote four years ago read next to you like that.

f.u.ku-chan, who had crept up next to me at some point, excitedly said, "The thing that gets me especially is that it represented Kaburaya Middle School in the contest and even got an award, albeit third place. Honestly speaking, when you"re a.s.signed a book report, I figured everyone just wrote what they thought the teacher would like the best, not what they actually thought. I"ve learned the error of my ways! This kind of thing is pretty good too!"

"I"m pretty sure it usually doesn"t work out like that. Our j.a.panese language teacher in 7th grade was Mr. Hanashima, right? He was a little off," I responded.

I could still remember him pretty clearly. He was always really insistent in saying "There"s no need to think about the author"s intent."

I"m pretty sure he continued like this: "They were probably thinking something unsavory anyways. Even if they were thinking "I just want to get drunk and fall asleep already" when they wrote their sentences, we can still examine those sentences for meaning. That"s what language is. For example, Mats...o...b..sho wrote, "The months and days are eternal travelers, and the years, coming and going, similar wayfarers."[3] If we look at this pa.s.sage honestly and without preconceptions, we can see that Basho considers the years not as something that simply pa.s.ses, but as something that comes and goes. Essentially, this points to Bas...o...b..ing a time traveler."

...Yeah, he really was a strange teacher. If we were talking about Mr. Hanashima, I would have no trouble believing he"d submitted Oreki"s.

"I wonder what happened to King Dionys after that. What do you think, Oreki-san?" asked Chi-chan, to which Oreki briefly responded, his cheeks somewhat flushed, "Who knows."

I flipped the pamphlet over and noticed something.

"Hey, Oreki. Your"s was pretty long, wasn"t it?"

"Hmm?"

Thrown off guard, he glanced over at me.

"The other ones are a bit shorter. Isn"t yours at the max character limit?"

"Oh, that." A small, uneasy smile formed on Oreki"s sullen face. "I thought it said the report had to be more than five pages, so I did exactly five. It turned out that it was actually no more than five pages. It sucks that, even though I tried my best to only do the bare minimum, I actually did more than I needed to. I was thinking about cutting out some parts after."

"Cutting out stuff after finishing it doesn"t really sound like doing "the bare minimum,"" I said, resigned.

Satoshi nodded deeply. "I can understand where you"re coming from, though. If it were me, I might"ve cut out some stuff too."

Not cutting corners in order to cut corners? That makes sense to you? This question showed in my expression as I turned to ask Chi-chan, but she looked equally clueless. Her reaction only made sense. How would anyone have any idea what they were talking about?

Our boys were both all kinds of strange. We exchanged glances and giggled.

Well then... I looked at my watch and then got up from my chair. I couldn"t spend too much time here.

"You going home, Mayaka?" asked Satoshi.

"No, I have to go to the Manga Society. I haven"t really gone much recently."

As I said this, I noticed f.u.ku-chan"s expression seemed to darken a bit. I nodded once, doing my best to show him I"d be alright, and picked up my bag.

Ever since last year"s culture festival, the Kamiyama High School Manga Research Society has been in a state of disrepair.

Thanks to an a.s.sortment of incidents all happening around the time of the culture festival, the two factions in the club—those who wanted to try their hands (experienced or not) at drawing manga and those who didn"t, instead only wanting to read—began to view each other as enemies. I thought it was pretty simple honestly; if you want to draw manga, then draw it, and if you only want to read, do just that. At this point, though, neither side cared about manga anymore. There was no end in sight.

I was partially to blame. Before, the reading faction was much, much larger, and the drawing faction had no choice but to wait in the shadows. During the culture festival, however, a girl from the reading faction spilled dirty water on me, a member of the drawing faction, and that caused the rest of the drawing faction to come out of the woodwork and get angry at the other side, saying they took things too far. Sure, the girl may have disliked me, but I personally think that it was just an accident. Of course, at that point, what I thought didn"t matter at all.

As the new term rolled around and the new student recruitment period also ended, something happened that affected the situation between the two factions. Kouchi-senpai, the actual leader of the reading faction—despite the fact that she drew wonderful manga herself without letting the others know—quit the club earlier than the other seniors normally would. The drawing faction took this as a sign of victory at first, but it quickly became clear that Kouchi-senpai"s presence was something like a dam; nothing good came about with her being gone. Back when she was still around, there were lots of times when the factions would say mean things indirectly about each other or only suggest their insults, but now, as we entered the month of May, club members hurling spiteful phrases at the other side became a familiar scene. I"d even be fine with this so long as it was still an argument stemming from a discussion about manga itself, but it only ever started with someone saying something like "you"re so annoying" or "stop being so stuck-up."

In the first prep room, the one used by the Manga Society, the reading faction grouped up near the front while the drawing faction gathered at the back. Since there was a door at each side of the room, these were also split up between the factions. I knew everyone saw me as the representative of the drawing faction, but it was all just so ridiculous that I ended up using whichever door was closer. I guess that also came off as me trying to provoke the other side.

That Monday after school, I sat down in my usual seat next to the window and started to jot down some ideas in my notebook for my next manga. Recently, I"ve only been writing stories that take place in modern j.a.pan, so it probably wasn"t a bad idea to switch it up and think of something I don"t normally experience. Keeping that in mind, I wrote down some random words as they popped up into my head—things like "steam computer," "big clock (really big)," "automatic egg cooker used by the entire city," and so on. A shadow suddenly appeared over the page, so I looked up and found myself face-to-face with a soph.o.m.ore, Asanuma-san, standing before me.

"You have a sec?"

I wasn"t shy about the fact that I"m planning a new manga considering I was in the Manga Society clubroom, but I closed the notebook out of habit anyways.

"Sure. What is it?"

"So, here"s the thing. There"s something I wanted to talk with you about." Her voice was a bit hushed.

Asanuma-san had a slim face and narrow eyes, and her voice was a little high-pitched. She also drew manga, probably for a long time now since her strokes were quick and confident like she was really used to it. I got pretty jealous sometimes, because I was so slow in comparison, but on the other hand, part of me imagined the manga itself would probably be happier if she took a little more care with it.

Although I b.u.t.ted heads with Kouchi-senpai during the culture festival, Asanuma-san was the one who took the drawing faction"s reins afterward. If I had to guess, it was probably because she wanted to change the Manga Society—a place where even picking up a pen would attract a bunch of cold stares—into an environment where eventually anyone would be able to draw manga to their heart"s content. It was something I could never do, since I always tried to avoid dealing with people like that and preferred to create manga by my own rules, so I couldn"t help but be impressed by her resolve.

Asanuma-san got straight to the point. "I"m going to self-publish a manga. I wanted to ask you for your help."

I instantly looked around to see if anyone was nearby, but it looked like no one was paying attention. The idea hadn"t even occurred to me. Sure, I"d self-published my own manga before, but I had never once paired up with Asanuma-san in the past.

"A manga... what kind?"

Asanuma-san furtively looked around the preparation room like I had and then responded in a bitter tone. "At this rate, we"re going to end up only having opinion pieces again for this year"s culture festival too. Joining the Manga Society and not being able to write manga is completely stupid, any way you look at it. We might as well just make one ourselves at this point. Don"t you think so too?"

"Do you mean creating a separate club?"

She shook her head. "That"s not it. There"d be no point in doing that... I"m saying we write a volume in secret, using the Kamiyama High School Manga Society label, and then sell it over summer break. With that, we could show that it"s possible to write manga in the— Actually, scratch that. We"ll show how the club is essentially meant for creating manga."

I couldn"t shake off the feeling that she was saying something dangerous. If she were to use this surprise attack to force her opinion on the club, leveraging it into an advantage for the drawing faction, wouldn"t that basically be a coup d"état? Although it"s true that this club"s sad condition went on 24/7. It had never crossed my mind that simply drawing your own manga could be used as an attack against the reading faction. Thinking about it some more, I guess I could understand how the act of creating a manga alone would look like I was trying to make some kind of point in the current Manga Society... Who am I kidding? "I guess I could understand" is the understatement of the century. It"s obvious it"d look like that. Maybe I was being too naive up to this point.

"Who else is going to be in on it?" I asked. She listed some names, folding a finger for every one she mentioned.

"Me, Tai, Nichiyama, Harigaya, and then there’s you. I haven"t asked the others yet, though."

All of them were in the drawing faction, certainly enough, but as far as I was aware, Asanuma-san was the only one who had actually drawn anything substantial. Tai was a new student, so I didn"t know much about her, but I remember her saying she hadn"t drawn manga before and she wanted to practice it in the Manga Society. Nishiyama-san and Harigaya-san were both soph.o.m.ores, and I was pretty sure neither of them had drawn anything outside a panel or two.

"Will they really be able to write something long?" I asked. Asanuma-san lightly chuckled.

"I doubt it, but we don"t have to make it that long. Four or five pages are enough. You know, even a two-page spread is fine. The important thing is that we get as many people as we can involved."

It was pretty rude to a.s.sume Nishiyama-san and Harigaya-san couldn"t draw just because they made next to nothing for the club. I really wanted the answer to be that they would be able to do it. What Asanuma-san said to me showed that she didn"t care whether or not they could. Though, to someone who was only thinking about the results, I guess it wasn"t that surprising...

Asanuma-san"s voice took on a softer tone, maybe noticing how uncomfortable I was getting.

"I"m not going to ask you to do everything yourself. The topic"s already decided, so just throw together whatever you can."

Although it might"ve been too early for an amateur like me to take pride in my work, I wanted to tell her that my manga wasn"t something I just "threw together" like that. For someone like Asanuma-san, who I"m sure understood this, to say it like that, I guess it went to show how desperate she was.

I figured I"d at least ask.

"What"s the topic?"

"It"s going to be be: "Manga Society.""

I couldn"t help but groan a little. Asanuma-san started to speak more strongly.

"If we don"t do something like that, then we won"t be able to release the manga. I won"t lie and say what we"re doing doesn"t have any immediate use, but if we graduate before we can take the chance to represent the Kamiyama High School Manga Society name and communicate that to people, then we"ll never get another chance. I can"t stand thinking about that. Don"t you feel the same way, Ibara?"

I didn"t really feel up for representing the club"s legacy or whatever, but if I was able to get even one or two people to read my work... then I guess I would be happy.

"So? How about it?"

My heart was drawn in two directions. I really didn"t like the thought of my manga becoming a tool in the club"s faction warfare, but it did boil down to me simply wanting to draw manga and have it be read by others. If I had to say it, I might not even care about the circ.u.mstances leading up to it as long as it was read in the end.

Possibly seeing a glimmer of hope in my hesitation, Asanuma-san continued in a more relaxed tone. "If you do accept, tell me how many pages you"ll draw beforehand."

"Huh? You want me to decide on the number of pages before I tell you my answer?"

I wasn"t expecting that. I didn"t have much experience teaming up with others, but it was much more common for groups to first decide on the number of partic.i.p.ating members before they decided on a page count, and sometimes they didn"t even bother going to the trouble of establishing a page count in the first place. It was the first time, for me at least, to hear about a group that wanted to decide on the number of pages first and foremost.

"Yeah. I need to get an estimate for the club expense form, after all."

"Club expenses? Aren"t we going to pay for it ourselves?"

"There"d be no point if we paid out-of-pocket. I"ll go talk with the general committee about it and get what we need from the club"s budget, even if push comes to shove. I"ll need accurate numbers at that point, right?"

Was it really okay to do that, though? The club budget was for the entire club, so everyone—or at the very least, the president, Yuasa-senpai— would have to be on board, or else we"d be basically embezzling the funds. I don"t even think the general committee was the group responsible for club fund distribution in the first place.

"You"re going to talk to the president, of course. Right?"

Yuasa-senpai had almost nothing to do with any of the antagonism happening in the Manga Research Society, instead flawlessly taking care of the mundane tasks required in running the club, like filling out the club recruitment and expenses forms. Not only did Asanuma-san"s plan feel unstable at best, but it"d be a good idea if the president was also involved so we won"t make the club"s situation even worse.

"Yeah... I guess. I guess I have to tell her," she murmured dissatisfied, her mouth almost completely shut.

This whole thing was a bit scary, but I"ll just leave it to her. I had to start thinking about my own manga.

"Yeah, I can"t really decide right away on the page number. I"m happy for the opportunity, but I don"t know where to go with the topic "Manga Society" let alone how many pages it would end up being. I"ll start by making a rough draft and then use that as the basis for the page count, so would you mind waiting?"

A small frown formed on her lips. "Well, that makes sense, I suppose. How long do you need?"

Today was the 14th, and I still needed to brainstorm some ideas and formulate the plot. If I only needed to gauge the page count, then the rough draft didn"t have to be very detailed, which meant...

"Friday, maybe?"

"Got it. Until then, I"ll be searching for more girls who"re willing to draw." She then made sure to add, "Keep this between us, yeah?"

3.[edit]

My parents didn"t say much to me about my drawing manga. They were neither disapproving nor supportive of it; as long as I studied hard, they gave me the leeway to do whatever I wanted in my free time. The "as long as I studied hard" part implied that I was free to draw manga only on weekends and holidays. My mom and dad always looked a little worried when they saw me drawing manga on the weekdays, so I stopped doing it. I of course had other plans as well on my days-off, so I often ended up being really pressed for time.

Asanuma-san told me about her plans on Monday, and I needed to get back to her on my decision by Friday. Although it was true I hadn"t drawn anything yet, I didn"t want to break the unspoken promise with my parents to not draw anything at home on the weekdays, so I decided to work on it at school.

The problem was where. I had to keep Asanuma"s scheme a secret, so there was no way I could do anything related to it in the Manga Society clubroom. I wish I could"ve used the earth sciences lecture room—where the Cla.s.sics Club met—but I didn"t want to drag them into the utter mess that was the Manga Society"s problems. I was similarly uncomfortable with using the library room as a member of its staff for something completely unrelated, so with all of those crossed off the list, I had only one more option. I decided to open my notebook in my homeroom, Cla.s.s 2-C.

I can"t speak for others, but at least personally, it"s really difficult for me to draw manga with people around. Especially doing so at school, surrounded by cla.s.smates, was out of the question. All I was doing at this point was jotting down ideas, so it couldn"t have looked like I was doing anything more than studying hard from the side. To add to that, I even had a textbook open to further camouflage my manga brainstorming. It was a disguise so perfect that not even G.o.d or Oreki would be able to see through it.

After school on Tuesday, I sat up straight at my desk in cla.s.sroom 2-C, opened my world history textbook, and started to write down some ideas.

This was my first time ever using a theme from someone else, so I guess I was a bit unsure about what I was doing, but I"m confident it wasn"t impossible. While Asanuma-san did say the theme was "the Manga Society," she never specified that it had to take place in Kamiyama High School"s Manga Research Society. A group that researches manga... I see. How about a story set in the future? In a world where civilization has collapsed, a group of people come across the ruins of a Manga Research Society and try to figure out what exactly it was. Would that be too convoluted?

I scribbled down ideas like these into my notebook with a mechanical pencil, but my thoughts started to get scattered and I found myself unable to concentrate, the reason being a couple of girls still in the cla.s.sroom. One of them was Maki Hani, a girl with a name that rolled off the tongue so well that it made me always want to say the entire thing when I called out to her. She looked mellow, despite her bold cosplay choices during the culture festival, and she seemed pretty smart. To top it all off, she was a member of the Manga Society. At the moment, she was happily chatting away with some other girls about their summer vacations.

I usually don"t really try to learn every little detail involving the club conflict, but I could tell just by watching that Hani-san was technically with the so-called reading faction. That said, it was pretty clear that she never actively supported them, and when the two sides started to insult each other, she always stayed quiet, even though she sat with the reading faction. It could be that she was like me, and got wrapped up in one of the sides while thinking the whole thing was stupid at the same time. I never talked with her in the clubroom, but our conversations in cla.s.s were pretty normal.

I was pretty sure Hani-san wouldn"t tell anyone anything, even if she did somehow find out about Asanuma-san"s plan, but she might be able to figure out I was outlining the plot to a manga by looking at my notes. That would be more embarra.s.sing than anything, so I stayed in constant alert.

I might"ve just been paranoid, but who was to say for certain? I labored over my notes, constantly writing and rewriting, and then suddenly looked up. Hani-san was facing away from me, talking as carefree as she had been when I"d started.

"What, no way! Our baseball team totally sucks."

Hearing her say this, among other things, meant that she was at least partic.i.p.ating in the conversation, I guess, but then why couldn"t I shake the feeling that someone was watching me? Even if she did somehow figure out that I was putting together the plot to a manga, what was the point in watching from a distance?

...Though, there was something about Hani-san that bugged me.

She was on really good terms with Kouchi-senpai, who had quit the club. It wasn"t the typical senior-junior relationship you"d see in most clubs. I"d noticed them talking really naturally, like they were old friends, tons of times before. Kouchi-senpai was really popular with the other girls as well, so their relationship was a pretty common topic. From the bits that I picked up on, it looked like the two of them lived close by, and they played together a lot as kids. Maybe she was observing me, the possible instigator of a drawing faction coup d"état, as a friend of the reading faction"s leader? Well, I guess I couldn"t rule out the possibility completely, but it really did sound like something straight out of a manga. But if that wasn"t the case, then I really was at a loss. Why would she be watching me?

As these thoughts crossed my mind, Hani-san looked at her cellphone and then stood right up to leave the cla.s.sroom. I guess it really was in my head after all, I thought, embarra.s.sed.

The next day, however, Hani-san stayed again in the cla.s.sroom after school ended, and just as I started to wonder about it, she began to look at me. The only ones in the cla.s.srooms were three boys talking about soccer, Hani-san, and I, and I concentrated on my notes as she silently read a book. It was getting tough, but I had to finish the rough draft quickly or else I wouldn"t make the deadline.

It might be a little different from how others do it, but when I draw manga, I write the dialogue first. I end up having to do it first in order to get a good feel for how everyone talks and what they would say in each situation. I"m not really sure if this way is efficient—actually, I usually have to shorten the lines when I try to put them in the speech bubbles for the first time, so it"s probably safe to say it isn"t... There"s really nothing that can be done about that, though. Drawing the rough draft at school would be way too embarra.s.sing if I added the dialogue at that point, so I had to resort to desperate measures.

I wrote the first line of the dialogue I had carefully thought about over the past two days into my notes. I wasn"t too thrilled about the chosen theme, but as I wrote more and more, the story started to move surprisingly well.

I thought back to the criticism I got in La Shin. A professional manga author partic.i.p.ates in the selection process for the New World Prize and even writes short comments for the winners of the partic.i.p.ation awards and up. The one who did it this time was Yutaka Niiro, and his comments to me were this:

"Great point: climax pacing. Okay point: art. (You can do it!) Bad point: the lines were too long. You"re getting better and better, so good luck on your next submission!"

I"d never actually heard of Niiro when I first read his comments, but the day after I did, I used up all of my spending money to go out and buy tons of his volumes. Even before he mentioned it, I knew vaguely that long lines were my Achilles heel, so I took painstaking care to figure out what words I should cut and which ones were effective as I filled up the notebook.

As I was completely engrossed in this, a voice suddenly called out to me.

"Maya-cchi"

It was Hani-san. I looked up and noticed that the boys had disappeared at some point, leaving her and I the only people left in the room. She wasn"t looking at me, but down at the phone in her hand. I responded, nonchalantly closing the notebook.

"What"s wrong?"

She looked up and faced me, not a trace of emotion in her expression.

"They found out about Asanuma"s plan."

There was no reason to play dumb, and it wasn"t really that surprising either. Asanuma-san said it was a secret, but it looked like she was going to ask anyone who looked promising to help with the project, so I figured it was just a matter of time before the truth got out. With this in mind, I guess Hani-san really was observing me after all.

"I see."

With us being exposed, there was probably no way we could continue drawing the manga using our club"s budget. Even from the get-go, however, there was a problem with our plan of talking to the club president to get our funds that way. Releasing the manga by pooling together money from the people involved was probably a more clear-headed approach, and it might"ve been a good idea to stick with that from the start.

Hani-san sighed with a look of resignation as she watched me.

"Maya-cchi, you"re a little calm, don"t you think? It"s looking like it"ll get pretty nasty."

I glanced down at the phone in her hands. I"m guessing someone sent her some kind of message. Something nasty... I had an idea of what she was talking about.

"Did something happen in the Manga Society?"

She nodded, and her face turned into an exhausted grimace.

"It looks like they"re giving Asanuma a lot of h.e.l.l. Well, it"s pretty obvious they would..."

When she said "obvious," was she talking about that being the obvious result for someone who tried to do something so shady behind everyone"s backs, or was she sympathetic of Asanuna"s determination even though she knew the reading faction would definitely get angry? I had no way of knowing. I didn"t even know where I stood on the issue.

"Yeah, I guess," I agreed as I started to put away the notebook on top of my desk. Hani-san looked a little shocked.

"You"re going? You"d be better off if you stayed clear..."

I was happy to see Hani-san that worried about me, considering we didn"t really talk much, but you know... What can you do?

"It"s not like I decided to help her with her book yet, but I can"t bring myself to ignore it either."

Hani-san chuckled slightly and responded, "Gotcha. Sorry, but I"m going to go with you."

The fact that Hani-san, member of the reading faction, was going meant that she didn"t want me to add myself to the side under fire and upset the current balance. She probably said sorry with this in mind.

"Maya-cchi, let"s give each other our phone numbers. If anything happens, I"ll send you a message."

I nodded and pulled my phone from my bag.

The Manga Society clubroom was on the second floor of the main building, in the first prep room, and my 2-C cla.s.sroom was in the same building on the third floor. The walk wasn"t very long, but to tell the truth, I took my time in getting there. Was it even possible for me to hurry to a place where I knew I"d be yelled at? Hani-san followed right behind me in that state.

We finally arrived at the clubroom, and as I slid open the sliding door, I started to regret not running. It became clear with a single glance that everything had already ended. Asanuma-san, Harigaya-san, and Tai were all surrounded by a crowd of girls in a semicircle around them. Tai was sobbing pitifully and Asanuma-san stared at her feet, silently taking it all. Directly in front of the three was the soph.o.m.ore, Shinohara-san. Her arms were crossed, and as I entered the room, she looked at me and sneered.

"Ibara, huh? Were you waiting for us to finish up before you came? Pretty sneaky, aren"t you."

"That"s not it. I didn"t know about it is all."

"Sure you didn"t," she jeered, and then proudly turned to point at the three silent girls in front of her. "Then I"ll spell it out for you because you"re so late. We know everything. You were planning on stealing our club funds to make your book, and then you were going to chase out everyone who couldn"t draw manga. Seriously, how dirty can you get?"

After Kouchi-senpai left the club, Shinohara-san was the one who stepped up more or less to be the reading faction"s leader. That might"ve been how she saw the plan, but she was going way overboard.

"You"re completely wrong. Asanuma-san just wanted to create a manga without the Manga Society giving her a hard time. She said she was going to get permission to use the club funds from the president, Yuasa-senpai. Please don"t call it stealing."

"The president?" Shinohara-san muttered and a huge smile grew across her face. "She already left the club. Needed to concentrate on her college exams, apparently. Didn"t you hear?"

"What...?"

I looked around, scanning the clubroom for Yuasa-senpai"s presence. She was nowhere to be seen. Not only her, but all of the seniors were missing.

"So that"s what it was," I quietly said to n.o.body but myself.

Just as Asanuma-san was planning on taking the initiative by creating this manga, Shinohara-san and the others were set on getting the neutral Yuasa-senpai to quit the club, leaving the position of president open for them to fill. It was reaching the time of year when most seniors quit their clubs, so there was nothing strange about it happening now. Sometime yesterday or today, without a doubt, the president had stepped down without me realizing it. Look at me, getting all worried about whether or not I"d draw manga in the Manga Society while this was going on... What the heck was I doing?!

Seeing my expression grow conflicted, Shinohara-san continued without a second thought. "What do you even mean "giving her a hard time" anyways? You might as well be describing yourself at that point. You act all high and mighty, laughing at people who can"t draw manga but want to join the club, and then get such a victim complex when we ask you to not do stuff like that on your own. Cut the c.r.a.p. We just want to enjoy what we think is fun. Just by saying we like manga, our parents and teachers treat us like we"re idiots, so why do we have to go through the same c.r.a.p in our club, too?!"

The club members surrounding Asanuma-san all had their eyes fixated on me by this point. All of their gazes were so cold and bitter. In the silence that followed, I could tell that they all agreed with Shinohara-san"s words, resenting both Asanuma-san and I.

I hadn"t ever treated them like idiots. All I wanted was to draw manga. Sure, it"s not like I ever apologized for being able to, but I never once looked down on those who couldn"t.

—Was that really true?

Was it possible that, without realizing it, some nasty part of me surfaced and did something to them—like a strongly worded sentence or annoyed att.i.tude?

No, get a grip. I"ve never thought anything like that. Being able to draw manga is just another talent. It"s no different than being able to swing around on a high bar or remembering all the periods in j.a.pan"s history. It might be important to the person herself, but I"ve always thought that bragging about something like that to others was completely dumb. You can"t be doubting yourself, Mayaka.

I had to stop myself from getting worked up by those cold stares. For now, I needed to take things slowly and figure out what was going to happen.

"So? Who"s the new president?"

Shinohara"s eyes opened wide in surprise. "You don"t know?"

I guess that response meant it was someone I knew. There"s no way it"d be Asanuma-san, right? Shinohara-san raised her arm and pointed at me.

"Me?"

"Yeah right. Behind you."

I turned around.

Standing there was my cla.s.smate, a girl who looked timid despite not being so, who had entered the clubroom after me. It was Hani-san. She held up a hand in slight apology as I stood there dumbfounded.

"Sorry, Maya-cchi. It wasn"t easy to tell you." She then walked next to Shinohara-san and asked, "Did they accept?"

"All of it."

"Good. Tell Maya-cchi, then."

They were probably talking about something like the terms of surrender. With a calmer att.i.tude than before, Shinohara-san started her explanation.

"We decided on it before you got here."

"We"re not allowed to draw manga, I"m guessing," I said.

"If you want to do it, we won"t stop you."

Taken aback by her response, I turned to Asanuma-san without thinking. However, her expression remained listless. It looked like there was more to her terms.

"The manga in question is probably going to fall flat anyways. Although you guys think you"re all that, Ibara"s the only one who"s even made anything in the first place. Do whatever you want, though. How about we even help you fill out the club expense form too? If you can"t manage to finish it in the end, we"ll all have a good laugh at you. You"ll also have to take responsibility for wasting the club"s budget and quit."

She then retracted her index finger and placed her palm on her chest.

"In the one-in-a-million chance you do make something worthwhile... well then, good for you! We"ll let you guys do whatever you want with the club. We"ll make our own club so we can do what we want as well."

So that"s what it was. The time finally came.

I"d had the feeling for some time now, but it looked like the rift between the two factions had already become too deep to repair. By taking out money to make her manga, the club would be split into two.

Hani-san clapped her hands together to bring me out of my daze.

"I"m sure you understand where this is going, Maya-cchi. Sorry about all this. Let"s do what we have to, now."

Shinohara-san brought out a piece of paper and waved it in front of Asanuma-san.

"As for the club expense form, we"ve actually already filled one out. We"ve even got our signature down and talked with the club adviser. It"s up to you to write the amount and purpose, Asanuma-san."

Hearing her name, Asanuma-san finally looked up and stared wearily at the form, but in the end, she shook her head slowly.

"I don"t know how much it"ll cost. We haven"t even decided on the page count..."

"Oh, come on! Don"t worry about that! If it"s not enough, we"ll just submit another one. Let"s go for 10,000 yen. Starting is the most important part!" Hani-san replied.

As if being lured in by her cheery voice, Asanuma-san shakily approached the two of them and took the form. Shinohara-san even had a pen at the ready, and she handed it over as well. Asanuma-san looked at the pen cautiously, but just as she was about to start writing, her entire body froze up as if being held back by something.

"What"s wrong? Too scared?" provoked Shinohara-san, and I felt like I could see something like a flash of anger run through Asanuma-san"s eyes and she immediately started to write.

I only watched as this happened, unable to come to my senses. I knew something was off about all this, but I couldn"t think straight at all. Maybe too much had happened for me to process. Finally, a single question started to take form in my consciousness: why was Hani-san in such a hurry to fill out the club expense form? What would change if we filled it out? We"d be able to work on our manga? No, that wasn"t the issue...

What was Shinohara-san saying earlier? I desperately racked my head, mind full of muddled thoughts, for the words. I"m pretty sure it went something like this.

—We"re going to have you take responsibility for the funds you wasted and make you leave the club.

"Wait!"

I quickly blurted that out to stop Asanuma-san, but she"d already finished filling out the form like she"d been asked by that point. She turned around, fl.u.s.tered, when she heard me say that, but Hani-san immediately pulled the form out from under her palm.

There was only way to prevent the Manga Society from splitting into two. We would have to give up on our plans to create the manga, still in its developmental stages, and promise the others we wouldn"t go off on our own to do something like this in the future, making up with them in the process. Now that there was a club expense form involved, however, we wouldn"t be able to use the excuse that the manga wasn"t even started yet. Even if we didn"t touch a single yen, they could still accuse us of "wasting club funds" and prevent reconciliation.

I"ve never genuinely hated the reading faction. I mean, I didn"t even really consider myself a proper member of the drawing faction, after all. Yet, their tactics this time around were just so cruel. If they wanted to split the club from the start, they should"ve just quietly left themselves or even told Asanuma-san and I to quit outright. And yet, they were doing all this to purposely try and humiliate us as much as possible. I glared at Hani-san, but she was no longer facing my direction. She carefully placed the form in her bag and left the room with a simple, "Alright then, good luck with everything, okay? I"m going to get the teacher"s signature now."

If I were to chase after her right now, slap her across the cheek, and grab the form from her bag, would I be able save the club then?

...It would only make things worse, I guess. In the freshly silent cla.s.sroom, all I could hear were the silent sobs of the freshman, Tai, until she finally started to speak, forgetting who was around her.

"I"m so sorry, senpai. I"m so sorry!"

4.[edit]

Why did I draw manga in the first place, again?

After school on Wednesday, even though Asanuma-san was cornered by Shinohara-san and the others and looked almost lifeless, when I asked her if she wanted to abandon the project, she responded with a clear "No."

"If we finish the manga, Shinohara-san will quit. That"s okay with you?"

There was no point in asking her that. If we didn"t finish it, we"d be the ones forced to quit instead. It was a lose-lose situation. As she listened, Asanuma-san started to smile stiffly, and she responded, "Sounds perfect to me. If she"s willing to kick us out, then I"m fine with returning the favor."

I didn"t draw manga to kick Shinohara-san out of the Manga Society. Though, if you did ask me why I did it, I wouldn"t be able to give a good answer.

It"s so strange. Up until yesterday, I thought I knew why.

Even then, the preparations for the manga continued as planned.

The story was all but finished, and for the most part, the dialogue was complete as well, and yet no matter how many times I looked it over, I couldn"t be satisfied by what I had. I got a weird sense of déjà vu from it—probably because the story was basically about me—but I feel like I didn"t enjoy the process of creating it. Of course, if I refused to draw the manga until I perfected the ultimate story, then I"d probably be at this for another ten years. My only option was to play the cards dealt to me.

I started the manga"s rough draft on Thursday after school. Though the budget was pretty much decided already, you couldn"t really make a book with only 10,000 yen, so the original plan to settle the page count ahead of time didn"t change. More accurately, Asanuma-san hated the idea of changing her original plan to match the situation forced onto her by Hani-san. Also, I honestly wasn"t even sure if I"d be able to write something good enough to publish in Asanuma-san"s book until I made the rough draft.

Though it was a little messy, the preparations for the rough draft included splitting the pages into panels and then adding speech bubbles before I started to draw the images. Now that I was at this step, both my cla.s.sroom and the library were out of the question, and I didn"t want to worry my parents by doing it at home, either. Drawing it in the Manga Society clubroom would almost definitely be seen as me challenging the reading faction, so the only option left to me was the Cla.s.sics Club"s earth sciences lecture room. I really wanted to leave the Cla.s.sics Club out of the Manga Society"s drama as much as I could, but, well, it wasn"t like it was the first time I used the lecture room to draw manga.

f.u.ku-chan was the only one who showed up this time. Normally I"d be over the moon at this, but I had a mission today, and it looked like he was busy with his own work as well.

"Hey!"

"Hi."

This smiling exchange was all that really took place, and I sat at a desk a little far away and took out my notebook. Doing the rough draft on manga ma.n.u.script paper was normally the ideal option because it made doing the actual thing much easier, but because the paper itself was really bulky, difficult to carry around discreetly, and—above all—expensive, I settled on doing it in a normal notebook.

It was time to begin.

Almost as if each stroke was a prayer, I carefully started to draw the panels. Please turn out interesting. I know I"m still an amateur, but I"m trying as hard as I can. So much of the manga I read before you was so very interesting. You should be able to become the same. Please...

The seasons continued its slow transition from the spring into summer. A peaceful breeze wafted in from the wide-open window. The lines I drew without a ruler were straight, and the circles I drew without a compa.s.s were smooth. With the simple appearance of the story"s cast, each one of them with only circular eyes the shape of a rain doll, I would now decide how everything would unfold.

I did mess up a bit. Without thinking, I started the rough draft in the same notebook that contained the dialogue I planned earlier. I tend to do everything in one notebook, as I hate having to carry a bunch of them around school with me. It didn"t affect me much at first, because I had a clear idea of how I wanted to start the story, but as I got to the third and fourth pages, I started needing to flip back and forth through the notebook more and more to check the dialogue. It really was becoming a ha.s.sle; I"ll make sure I definitely split the drafting and planning into separate notebooks next time.

While my mistake did slow things down, I continued to make progress. Unfortunately, as I did, the sense of unease that I felt when Asanuma-san first gave me the vague "Manga Society" theme slowly grew larger and more tangible with every page. Yet, the thought that this story might be used to oust Shinohara-san from the club never crossed my mind. When I reach this point, I forget about everything aside from manga. It"d probably all come rushing back the second my hand stopped moving, though.I continued to draw, flipped through my notes to check the dialogue and flipped even more to check the story, and then continued to draw some more—how long was I at this, I wonder. My hand stopped as I heard a slight vibration.

Someone had messaged me. I opened my bag and took a look at my phone. It was from Hani-san, surprisingly, and her message was only one short sentence:

Come as fast as you can.

If H

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