AFTERWORD

How did you enjoy The Irregular at Magic High School, Volume 15, Ancient City Insurrection Arc, Part II? The subtitle may have been more accurate as Ancient City Insurrection Attempt Arc, but subtitles can easily be spoilers, and more importantly, Attempt Arc isn’t a very good name, so I hope you will find it in your heart to understand.

The Yotsuba branch families have appeared at last. They were just side characters in this episode, but it’s a matter of deep importance to me that they finally showed up. Well, sure, they’ll be side characters in the future, too, but they’re an irreplaceable cast of characters that will play a major role during a big turning point in The Irregular at Magic High School, so I’ve been having them wait in the wings for a very long time. The episode in which they appear for real will be one of the climaxes of the story.

The branch families’ actual appearances were all written in from the very beginning, but I only decided on their last names fairly recently. I racked my brains over them, finding a lot of things didn’t quite work for me. Shiiba, Mashiba, Shibata, Kuroba, Mugura, Tsukuba, Shizuka. Among them, I think Shiiba, Mashiba, and Shibata are easy to understand. They’re all variations on the Yotsuba/Shiba shift.

Some may have already realized this about Kuroba, but it comes from “clover,” as in a four-leaf clover.

Mugura comes from a plant called a Yotsuba-mugura in Japanese, or “four-leafed creeper.”

Tsukuba originates in Tsukubane-sou, or “shuttlecock-grass.” It’s a perennial herb in the lily order that has four leaves.

Shizuka I got from a plant called Hitori-shizuka, or “single-man’s quiet.” This is another perennial herb with four leaves.

While looking all sorts of things up to choose the last names, I learned that it’s a struggle to make names follow a regular pattern.

One last thing, and this is a bit of a fictional inside story. In the story, it’s said that Zhuge Liang had mastered the art of Qimen Dunjia (purely a background setting for this series), but the essence of the Qimen Dunjia used in the Yokohama Disturbance Arc and this Ancient City Insurrection Arc is something I created based on my own personal interpretation of the one that appears in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Eiji Yoshikawa’s version, to be precise). In other words, it’s not that Zhuge Liang knew Qimen Dunjia, but that I defined the arts Zhuge Liang used as being Qimen Dunjia—that would be the correct order of things. That’s not to say Eiji Yoshikawa’s Romance of the Three Kingdoms doesn’t depict anything like that with Zhuge Liang, but the essence of Qimen Dunjia in this story is an original creation.

I’d like to sincerely thank again everyone who has stuck with me this far. And if it’s all right with you, I want to ask for your support on Volume 16, the Yotsuba Succession Arc, as well.

Tsutomu Sato