The Hero King, Reincarnate to Master the Art of War (LN) - Volume 1 - Chapter Aft

Afterword

First, thank you very much for picking up this book! This wraps up the first volume of Reborn to Master the Blade: From Hero-King to Extraordinary Squire ♀. What did you think?

On a personal note, it seems like this is about my twentieth book. Honestly, I’m a bit amazed at how far I’ve come. When I first started writing, I’d hoped I could strike it big and retire off the money, but somehow, I’m still down here in the salt mines. Life is cruel. It wasn’t supposed to be like this! And I’ve been sick all year, yet somehow I managed to power through.

It’s fun to write light novels, though, so I want to get myself back into shape to keep going. There are still so many stories I want to tell, so many things I want to try—though this was pretty experimental and an adventure in its own right.

For starters, it’s the first time I’ve decided to write a female protagonist (even if, in her own head, Inglis still thinks of herself as the old hero-king, just gender-bent). I always used to assume that my protagonists would be guys, so writing this—having written this—is a big change. I need to get invested in the story before I can write it, and it was thanks to sitting down with the kids to watch PreC*re and playing games with them that I really opened my eyes to writing this story.

Things like the magicite beasts, Highland, and hieral menaces are all ideas I’ve had bouncing around my head since my first book, so there are a lot of pretty serious scenes and concepts. But Inglis, that lovable gender-bent meathead, managed to smash her way right through all the doom and gloom. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like this before. It’s refreshing. I can’t wait to see how she mauls all the gritty ideas I was taking seriously.

There are a bunch of scenes I’ve had floating around in my head since I started putting the web novel online. I hope to someday fit them all into a book. This series is even getting a manga version, so with that on the way, somehow... Somehow I’ll do it! It’s the first time I’ve ever been adapted, so I’m really hyped! It’ll be starting in Comic Fire soon, so check it out!

Finally, I’d like to thank my editor N, the illustrator Nagu, and everyone involved with this project for all their hard work. Just looking at the cover of this volume has me fired up to write more. Thank you so much! I can’t wait to see what the next cover will be.

See you then!