Page by Page

Chapter 10

August 1, 2019

Shizuka was reading the newly-published chapter of Break The Ice, which was the sex chapter that she had originally planned. Just in the nick of time, she had pulled it off, and as she read the chapter while sipping in a cup of tea, she nodded and said to herself, "Not bad for someone working in a rush to fix it and get it out there."

As she finished reading the chapter, she heard a knock at her door. Knowing it was Chieko coming in to work for the day, she got up and raced to the door, opening it as her assistant said with a smile, "Good morning, Hiratai-sensei."

"Good morning. Come on in. I was just reading the latest published chapter of Break The Ice."

"I'm glad we were able to get it finished in time," Chieko said to her as she walked in. "I was getting a bit worried there by the end."

"I knew we would pull it off. With me, you, and Kunugi-san, anything is possible."

As Chieko set her work bag down at her desk, she asked Shizuka, "So, what's the agenda for today?"

"Today, we're gonna start up the storyboard for the October chapter and finish the storyboard for the September chapter. Once you're all set to go home, Kunugi-san and I will get work started on a page or two of the September chapter."

"Sounds good to me." Chieko then pulled out her pens, pencils, and markers, laying them out on her desk.

Shizuka then passed her an unfinished page from the September storyboard. "Finish the backgrounds and shading for me on this one." Chieko took the page and went right to work. Overall, the mood in the office was much better than it had been in July, with seemingly everything going to plan and nothing going wrong anymore.

...

Meanwhile, Akari and Kazu were having lunch together at school, with Akari sketching out an original character she had created. Kazu looked over from his lunch and noticed, asking her, "Kunugi-san, who is that?"

Akari immediately stopped and flipped a page to cover up what she had been drawing. "Uh, n- nothing..."

"Come on, it has to be something. It looks pretty good."

Knowing she could not hide it from him forever, she sighed and flipped back the page to reveal the character, who was a teenage girl with sharp teeth, claw-like nails, cat-like eyes, and carried a revolver in her right hand while also carrying a sheathed sword on her belt. "Here."

"Hmmm... Interesting. What series is she from?"

"She's not from any series," Akari explained. "I, uh... I have an idea of my own, actually."

"Do you want to make your own manga like Hiratai-sensei?"

"Well, yeah." She then flipped to another page to reveal a logo for something that she had been designing, which was in both Japanese and English. "The title I've settled on is Kaiho."

"Kaiho... Hmmm, like a sort of release or liberation."

Akari further explained as she flipped back to the page with the main character, "The rough idea is that it's about an oni girl who is raised by humans after his family is massacred by the Tokugawa Shogunate. She is told of what happened to her biological family one day, so she goes out and kills the samurai who killed them, only for his retainers to hunt down and kill her adoptive family. After this, she finds the other oni, who are all in hiding, and joins them in a war against the Shogunate. It's basically a battle manga."

"Sounds like it would do pretty well," Kazu replied. "Everyone loves battle manga."

"I don't know if I would ever get it published. I mean... I'm still pretty young."