Rokujouma no Shinryakusha!? - Volume 32 - Chapter Aft

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Afterword

Long time no see. Takehaya here. This was Invaders of the Rokujouma!? volume 32. I hope you all enjoyed it.

(Warning: Everything from here on contains spoilers for this volume and the next.)

This year marks Invaders of the Rokujouma!?’s tenth anniversary. In celebration of that, BOOK☆WALKER hosted a popularity poll for the main girls of the series, the winner of which will be the heroine of the drama CD shipped with the special edition of volume 33. Now, I know some of you will say that all the girls are heroines, but the winner in particular will get the spotlight and a special story revolving around her. That said, Alaia and Harumi already had their special episodes in volume 31 and the corresponding drama CD, so volume 33 won’t be about either of them even if they rank first in the poll. The honor will instead be passed on to second or third place.

The winner, however, was none other than Maki! Exceeding my expectations, she held a firm lead from start to finish. As such, Maki will be the featured character in the next volume. I believe Maki’s voice actress predicted as much on the last drama CD... If you let your guard down just because she’s a former enemy, she’ll end up sweeping first place. And no joke, that’s exactly what happened. I believe it will be a lot of work for Kitou Akari-san, Maki’s voice actress, but this is all for the sake of the readers eagerly awaiting it (or, at least, that’s my excuse). I’m really looking forward to it myself.

Second place was another surprise—Clan. I thought that votes from the fans of her voice actress, Tamura Yukari-san, might push her up in the rankings... But based on the ratio of voters, that doesn’t seem to be the case. Perhaps this is because she and Maki didn’t get to team up with Koutarou in the anime and people just want to see and hear more from them? As such, I’ve decided to include more Clan in the next drama CD too. In addition, Clan will be the next featured character in the “going out with X” series, which I hope will please all you Clan fans out there.

In third place, with the support of her fans from the anime, was Yurika. Her ditzy act was really pronounced in the anime, and she’s been consistently popular since then. I was sure she’d be the big winner after Harumi/Alaia, yet she finished third. I guess that’s just like her.

Fourth was Kiriha, who’s been in about that slot ever since volume 10. Since she’s the smart type, the anime adaptation didn’t really do anything for her character, but she’s still been consistently popular for six or seven years now. She particularly enjoys the support of you fans from the early days. Perhaps you could say she’s the real favorite behind the scenes. I honestly find it surprising, as she doesn’t even really have a special power. Maybe giving her that foil Kabutonga card helped her out? (Haha.)

Fifth place goes to Ruth. She ranked below Alaia for a large part of the vote, but her following really picked up at the end, landing her in fifth place. Like Kiriha, she has no special abilities. Instead, she relies on computers and information as her weapons of choice. Perhaps it’s because of the importance of information these days, or maybe her deep hatred of beetles is the reason. Granted, I’m sure her unwavering loyalty is a big part of her popularity too.

The rankings after fifth place are all pretty close together. In fact, fifth place only had 1.5 times as many votes as last place. There was no one single character who managed to double anybody else’s votes. This tells me that there’s no clear favorite; I think it’s just up to who readers are feeling that day. I think we got the results we did this time because Alaia and Harumi were off the table and people really do just want to see more of Maki and Clan after switching sides. It’s not like people didn’t vote for certain characters because they hated them or anything.

And so I’m going to keep treasuring all the girls as I always have. I fear everyone would get angry at me if I didn’t. At least, that’s what the voting results tell me.

Just the other day on June 6th, Hobby Japan celebrated its fiftieth anniversary with a half-a-century festival, and I was there holding an autograph session. It was a very sudden thing, but 48 readers showed up! I would like to thank each and every one of you who came by. It’s always nice to talk to you guys.

Incidentally, I also asked everyone who their favorite character was, and the top two contenders were Yurika and Kiriha. This only supports my theory about Clan and Maki.

For the autograph event, readers were free to bring whichever volume they liked for signing, so I decided to count and see which volume got the most attention. As expected, the most popular was volume 31 (the latest at the time). There were almost as many volume 1s, which also makes sense. But any volume that was a major turning point in the series, like volumes 26 and 29, was also popular. Some people also brought volumes that featured their favorite character, like volumes 10 and 16 for Kiriha or volume 9 for Ruth. And, to my surprise, the side story volumes also had a fan following. So overall, aside from the first and latest volumes, people’s favorites vary greatly. A lot like the character poll, actually.

Now, I have some unfortunate news. Invaders of the Rokujouma?! Hercules! will be ending, at least for now. There are mainly two reasons for this.

The first is a pacing issue on my part. I’ve been writing Hercules! free of charge up until now. Back when I was doing it alongside other work for the anime, it wasn’t really a problem. But as time passed, not enough material was making its way into the volumes... And now it’s fifteen volumes’ worth of content! Converting that all would take us well past volume 50, meaning it would take six or seven years for us to get through it all. Now, as some of you might have guessed, missing six or seven years’ worth of income is a bit of an issue. In short, as I was happily writing away, I really outdid myself.

That brings us to the second problem, which is the workload itself. Hercules! is updated every two months, so six times a year total. That’s an entire volume’s worth of material. In other words, that means I’ve been writing three volumes of the main story plus one Hercules! volume per year. So why not just release it as its own volume annually, right? The editorial department and I both asked ourselves this. That way, the problem would be addressed and the readers would still get to enjoy things at the same pace. We’re currently considering if it’s feasible or not. I wouldn’t mind it simply being released as its own volume, or maybe I could squeeze in something new. We’re thinking it over.

However, Hobby Japan is looking to launch a new site, so Hercules! might make its return sooner rather than later. That said, keeping up as I have been at the same furious pace will only cause the same problems all over again, so I’ll have to come up with a strict schedule for submissions. Anyways, those fifteen volumes of Hercules! stories need to be dealt with somehow. A word of warning to the wise for the future: proceeding without a plan can be dangerous!

That’s about all for the updates, so let’s talk a little about the book now. This volume focuses on what happened to the parts from the ship that self-destructed at the end of volume 30. If the 20 percent or so that were never recovered fall into the wrong hands, terrible things could happen. This storyline covers how the group is handling that issue.

Another highlight is that Yurika has passed the ditz role off (to Nalfa) and simply become a hot mess. How will things work out for her? She’ll get her chance to shine in the next main volume, so this might be the last time we see her like this for now.

As those of you who have already read the volume know, our story takes a turn back underground. This volume was about laying the groundwork for that. At the end of the volume, Vandarion’s faction manages to secure a foothold there, and our story will follow them accordingly. But you know what that means? Going underground means it’s Kiriha’s turn to take the stage again too. That said... I don’t know if the story will literally be underground or not. The next arc will be a battle for the underground people’s technology, but whether that takes place above or below the surface will depend on how things unfold as I write. I think it will be underground, but please forgive me if it doesn’t pan out that way. (Ha!) However, the volume directly following this one, volume 33, will go back to the “going out with X” series, so the new underground arc will pick back up no sooner than volume 34. That means there will be something of a wait, but since this is our tenth anniversary, I hope you can overlook it.

With so much to say, this afterword ended up quite long. I guess it’s time to wrap things up.

I would like to give my heartfelt thanks to everyone at the editorial department for their nonstop help; to Poco-san for all the trouble I cause you packing a volume full of new elements; and to all of the readers who’ve been along for the ride for ten whole years. I would love to keep moving forward to the best of my ability.