Kämpfer:Volume 9.5 Afterword

Volume 9.5 Afterword

Hello everyone, I'm Tsukiji. This volume is... well, Kämpfer Volume 9.5, also known as Nine and a Half. It's time for our customary break volume. While the plot hasn't advanced significantly, the character relationships have undergone dramatic changes. Natsuru has become quite troublesome too.

It's not just the character relationships; the work itself is also making big moves. You can tell from the color illustrations – the anime adaptation project is progressing steadily.

This time, I ended up talking a lot about the anime in relation to Akane, but that was just a coincidence. Although, I do think it might be some kind of fateful guidance.

This time, the roles of the Internal Organ Animals have also increased; it feels like it's been a while. While this is preparation for the so-called anime adaptation, the thought of me having to consider such things is a bit daunting. Animals with exposed internal organs being able to talk... if you think about it, it's really a miracle.

In the story, these Internal Organ Animals are very popular but often just end up being luggage. Considering these factors actually made it a very enjoyable task. It's not just about the types; just thinking about what kind of unfortunate encounters the company that produced these things must have had is fun in itself. Every single time, it turns into inspection and judgment... honestly, it's not really a healthy activity. If the time spent going out decreases, not only the body but even the mind can become warped – you could say that's the nature of being an author.

Linked to the Internal Organ Animals, I also came up with the name of a high school for another work. It's the school that appears in Gakuto Mikumo's Asura Cryin'. Since the Internal Organ Animals appear there too, I was put in charge of designing the school setting. Actually, the worldviews of the two are somewhat connected. Since Asura Cryin' has also been decided for an anime adaptation, the day when the Internal Organ Animals appear in both is coming... or so I just unilaterally thought up as a hypothesis, so when the time comes, please, dear readers, don't send letters to the author of Asura Cryin' saying, "The Internal Organ Animals didn't appear at all, what's going on?" I beg you.

Next, let's talk about something unrelated to the main story. Recently, I've gathered a few authors to play online games. Not MMORPGs, but online FPS matches. I can battle players from all over the world, and the players of this game are all people who really love competitive shooters, so I've been having fun going crazy with them during this break without feeling bored.

It's basically team-based matches. The two spawn points are quite far apart. This game also allows matches between police and terrorists, which is really interesting. Furthermore, after a friend said it's "{just like real person-versus-person combat}," I found it increasingly more interesting. In the game, both my side's and the opponent's controls are input via keyboard, and because of this, the number of guys who make mistakes is countless. Things like miraculous shots and frequent blunders happen, which is really amusing.

I do restless things in the game, like shooting teammates, and there are some authors who play extremely well. The person currently ranked first on the server is someone who writes a novel for Dengeki Bunko starting with the sound 'Ki'. Sometimes, when I follow behind a teammate and watch the person in front of me weaving effortlessly through a hail of bullets, I think, "Is that really human operation?" Those people must have fused with their computers. But playing too well here also attracts... friendly fire.

The people from Fujimi Shobo are very united; I've never seen them argue in the game. This can be seen as both good and bad, because a team that doesn't get angry isn't fun even if they win.

On our MF Bunko side, I'm the only one playing; it's really lonely. So I want to take this opportunity to drag a few more people in to play, and it's best to find those who would abandon the manuscript they're writing for the game... but after careful consideration, I decided to look for those who are relatively free instead.

The next volume will be released in three months. Please look forward to it.

February 2009

Tsukiji Toshihiko

Translator's Notes

This chapter was translated from the Chinese translation of the original Japanese text.

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