Mitou Shoukan://Blood-Sign

Volume 5, Afterword

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(Postscript Open ??/?? ??:??)

Afterword

And that’s Volume 5!

This is Kamachi Kazuma.

I must like to do something different when I get to the 4th or 5th book because here we have a flashback story! (Look at Volume 5 of A Certain Magical Index or Heavy Object to see this tendency and how I deal with it. The Zashiki Warashi of Intellectual Village is an exception since I went a little crazy with every single volume, but I did still do a flashback story in Volume 4.)

Here, I focused on the Queen’s Miniature Garden which is heavily related to Kyousuke and the White Queen’s past. Figuring out how to put together a story when the reader knows it ends in destruction was a learning experience for me, so I’m excited and worried to see how you all liked it.

The main characters were of course those two extraordinary ones, but there were also the other 14 siblings, the adults of the Miniature Garden, the hidden leaders of the three major powers, and Shigara Masami. I was trying to gather a solid enough group to show where Kyousuke’s personality came from. I especially tried to show their humanity in Stage 04, but I hope you felt some regret there as you thought, “I know they’re going to lose, but I still don’t want them to lose!!” or “If they had survived, the world wouldn’t have grown so twisted!!”

Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are both known all over the world and the characters in this story said that everyone has probably read it since it’s a simple children’s story, but have you all ever actually read it? To be honest, I hadn’t when I was thinking of starting this series. So I read it for my job. And when I did, I liked it, but it really seemed to mess with my head! Do children see a world that lets them accept it like normal? If so, I’m shocked at how set in our ways we get without even noticing it.

You could call it a masterpiece that everyone has heard of but surprisingly few have actually read. When I think about it, there are an awful lot like that. For example, Frankenstein or Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I know generally what kind of story they are and how they end, but I’ve never tried reading them beginning to end. Wh-what about all of you? Maybe I just had a poor education?

As for the White Queen in this story, I wrote her while hoping that I could give her the kind of charisma that would lead people to have a general idea of how dangerous she was even if they didn’t know the story. That might be presumptuous of me, but I like to dream big.

Your main character can’t shine without a powerful enemy.

That was the idea at the root of this, but which one will you support? Kyousuke who accepted what is right and rejected love, or the Queen who accepted love and rejected what is right? Either way, it is those positions that allow them to glare at each other from the same stage. I would be happy if that was the kind of relationship you imagined.

I give my thanks to my illustrator Ikawa Waki-san and my editors Miki-san, Onodera-san, and Anan-san. Lots of characters, special locations, extreme situations, and everyone is insane! This had to be about the most difficult story from an illustration perspective, so thank you for sticking with me.

And I give my thanks to the readers. I feel like reversing the timeline for a flashback story is something of a selfish move on the author’s part (Because I intentionally omitted a bunch of the basic information that should have already been explained and used it as a separate novel). I am truly thankful you went along with that selfishness. Nothing would please me more than to hear that you enjoyed it.

And I will end this here.

But it is strange how much easier it is to make an insane character look courageous.

-Kamachi Kazuma

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