Hyouka (Light Novel)

Chapter 4: Our Legendary Volume

Our Legendary Volume

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 titles 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 appetite 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 class. 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 manga magazine, La Shin, was originally sold as an extra volume to the similarly purposed Shin Soh. The name apparently derived from the Japanese 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.