AFTERWORD

This book is a work of fiction.

The world in which the story takes place is a different world, but one much like our own. Any and all present or historical figures, organizations, nations, regions, and other unique names mentioned therein have no relation to any real-world counterparts, even if they have the same name.

—The fourth volume made me want to include a proviso, but it should be implied regardless. Anyway, how did you all enjoy the story? Whenever I use a name that happens to be the same as a real one, I always feel indecision somewhere in my mind. And when it happens to be the name of an enemy, I can’t help but be uneasy about it… I understand how shameless I’m being about this, so no witty retorts, please.

Speaking of unique names, I honestly find it difficult to come up with names for foreign characters. I worry especially because this story is set in a world close to the real one. There are plenty of examples of names from western Europe out there, but when you start getting into Southeast Asian, India, Iran, Africa, and South America…what do I do? It’s fine so far, but I think this is going to be a big wall for me eventually. Is there any good way to go about this?

…Anyway, I will leave my griping nonsense at that for now and extend a thanks to everyone involved in this novel. Mr. M, thank you very much for all the appropriate advice you always give me. I think his suggestions have made the siblings into deeper characters. Ms. Ishida, Mr. Stone, I asked a lot of you with this tight, consecutive publishing schedule. I made a lot of requests again…so I truly apologize. Ms. Suenaga as well—I think I’ve put a lot on your shoulders in terms of scheduling, too. Thank you from the bottom of my heart to all the staff involved in the creation of this book.

And I deeply thank you once again, for the second time in two months, for reading the afterword like this. The fifth volume will be published because of all the support everyone has given me. The next volume will be a compilation of short stories. There will be six episodes in it. Two of them are newly written, too. The other works haven’t been serialized commercially, so maybe I should just call them all-new works. Two of the “all-new works” will be slice-of-life episodes. I want you to enjoy peaceful moments before an even more difficult battle begins.

I pray from the bottom of my heart that you will read The Irregular at Magic High School again like this.

And once again, thank you all very much.

Tsutomu Sato