Afterword

Hello again, and thank you. I’m Shoutarou Mizuki. It’s the height of summer as I write these words to you, and I’m having cold sweet sake to beat the heat. This is rice juice too.

This has been the third volume of the series. The book’s been popular everywhere, perhaps thanks to Itou’s illustrations, and I was able to advance the story in many ways. I don’t wish to disappoint anyone who grabbed the wrong thing, but the manga will begin in the September 2008 edition of Champion Red. It will be drawn by Souichi himself. Speaking as the original author, I can’t wait to have my illustrator drawing the comic, and I spend my days pacing back and forth in my room waiting or the time to pass. No, if time passes quickly that’s going to make it hard for Itou, so I guess I’ll have to pace slower.

And there are other things going on that I can’t announce right now. Some of them may be announced by the time you read this, so look forward to them.

So, time to talk about something useless.

I wrote this whole thing listening to noise music. This stuff is... incredible. There’s all kinds of screams and electronic beeps that you can’t really describe in words. Of course, it was loud and annoying, but if you put up with it for a while, weirdly enough it makes you sleepy. Come to think of it, most music makes a rhythm inside your head, but noise can’t do that, so basically with any sound the brain can’t process, no matter how noisy it is, the brain has to give up and go to sleep. This is a new discovery I made.

And so I got curious and watched a live performance, and I found out that between the violent movements and the screams, the singers (?) wear themselves out, so the concerts only last five minutes. It was really incredible, the way they twitched and moved. I hurt my neck imitating it. “The noise musicians must be training themselves to avoid injury!” I said, but when I looked up the artist info, he’d hurt himself too. Noise music is dangerous!

Anyway, noise music is so interesting that at some point I’d like to write a noise light novel. One that is five pages long at most. Actually, I can’t think about what that would be at all. And I’m not sure when “someday” will be.

Anyway, back to the story.

I don’t think I need to explain anything. I do, however, need to give a warning for once: Do not copy the behavior of the characters in the story. Particularly the methods used to make rice juice and the perversion. Both of them will get you arrested.

You won’t do the perverted stuff? Well, I’m sure. But well, some types of perverted stuff you want to do outside, I suppose. I saw a little kid wading through a stream yelling indecent words a while ago. He might end up like Mutsugoro someday.

Let’s end with acknowledgments.

Souichi Itou, the illustrator. I’m sure you’re incredibly busy, but let’s fight together. The expression on Korone was amazing this time. I know I came up with this character, but I still said to myself “She’s saying naughty words with that expression?!” Well, there are little kids who wade through streams screaming indecent words, so maybe it’s not so impossible after all?

Ohashi, my editor. Thanks again for your help. Next time I want to finish this in a time period where it’s a little easier for you. If you ask me if I’m going to say that every volume, I’m going to say no, but it’s strange how much time it takes to create something. I keep hoping someday I’ll get faster. Some of you may have noticed this is how I closed out volume 2. I may be an author who never learns, but please don’t give up on me.

Also, I’m grateful to everyone else involved with the project. Thank you for everything.

I think we’ve got a lot more fun to come!

Shoutarou Mizuki / Souichi Itou