Rokujouma no Shinryakusha!? - Volume 38 - Chapter Aft

Hint: To Play after pausing the player, use this button

Add to favorites

Afterword

Long time no see. Author Takehaya here. This is volume 38 which, factoring in the two side volumes, is actually the series’ fortieth book. Thank you all for the continued support that has made this possible. Additionally, this afterword contains spoilers, so proceed with caution.

As for the content of this volume, the third Sanae finally appears! Sanae is the only one of the original four invaders to just have two feature volumes so far; this is the third. It was gated behind certain developments in the story, so it couldn’t come before this, but the spotlight is now gracing her for a third go-around. I’m glad it’s finally her time. However, per usual, her story moves along with the main plot, so it will continue beyond this book. There’s also the Gray Knight in play, so I can’t say for certain, but there should be another volume or two.

Since there’s now a third Sanae, I asked for a color illustration of her. Even though it’s a third version of the same character, Poco-san did a wonderful job. The image isn’t entirely true to the story, though. Even with Sanae-san astral projecting outside of Sanae, it should still look like two Sanae-sans. At most, Sanae-chan and Sanae-san might have different haircuts now, but I thought it would be a waste not to see all three versions of her together, so I asked for all three—original Sanae-chan included! It was a case of putting the art before consistency. I hope you can understand. I just wanted to see it (lol)!

At the end of the volume, the Gray Knight’s identity is finally revealed. That’s right. It’s him. Once Koutarou gathered all nine colors in his sword, he was bound to come. After billions of loops, it was inevitable that he would appear. They have opposite energies, and they’re stronger than ever. Fighting Koutarou was a foregone conclusion in his eyes.

And now that we know who the Gray Knight is, I’m sure you can all understand why the story of volumes 28 and 29 came first. If that story ran parallel to this one, Maki and Clan would be disappearing about now. The girls would slowly vanish, and it would take Koutarou a few volumes to reach the ruins. It really would’ve drawn things out, and we’d be working with a shrinking cast. Since everyone has their favorite character, it would’ve been frustrating waiting for them to appear again.

But now we’ve reached the fortieth volume. Things have proceeded this way with a lot of consideration. Is it really okay for me to take forty books to reach the conclusion of volume 29? Shouldn’t I at least do this first so that characters aren’t missing for too long? All kinds of thoughts ran through my mind, and I ended up deciding to separate the “thematic” end of the story from the ending events of the story in order to tackle the former first. I made that decision around volume 25 or 26. There was a time when I was unsure of how to handle it, as you can go back and read in the afterwords. Back then, I couldn’t share that the story could continue for a long time, or of the changes in policy regarding that. That’s how things got this complicated.

Ultimately, I decided to separate those elements of this long-running story only to rejoin them later, which is how it’s turned into what it is now. That was sort of a safety measure I took because I’m not a big-time author and because Hobby Japan is not a major publisher. I couldn’t write on the premise that this story would last forever. Several years have passed since then, however, and the ending events have finally caught up to the “thematic” ending. What a relief. I have nothing but gratitude for your support. Thank you all again. I’ll keep doing my best from here.

Now let’s look toward the next volume. We had a battle in space this time, but the story will move back to the surface in the next installment. Like the Gray Knight said at the end of this volume, he’ll be returning to Kisshouharukaze City to uncover why Signaltin isn’t displaying its true power. That means there will be a focus on a certain someone in addition to Sanae. Koutarou and the girls will have to deal with that as they prepare to make for Forthorthe. I expect the next volume to hit shelves in November per my usual schedule. Probably. Anyway, please wait until then!

I’m running out of space now, so allow me to conclude with the acknowledgments. Thank you to everyone at the editorial department, to Poco-san for the fantastic artwork of all three Sanaes, and to you readers who’ve stuck with me for so long.