Volume 12, Afterword  

How did you like the twelfth battle of a bunch who can't read the mood?

It's been a while, Yanagimi Touki here.

This work has finally entered the climax and even though there was was a battle against Kiseki this time, this volume had few combat overall.

Hey you, yes you who's thinking "what are you doing, reducing battle time at this point in the story"!

I'm sorry, I've hoarded lots of that stuff and I'll go all out next time. I intend to put various stuff in there, so forgive me.

Now, twelfth volume.

It was full of talk about love despite the fact world was being destroyed.

Although I wrote a little about how the girl called Kusanagi Kiseki is inside, but this was the first time I properly described her mentality.

Reminds me of the time when each volume focused on one character. Ouka in the first, Mari in the second, Ikaruga in the third, Usagi in the fourth, Takeru in the fifth, and Lapis in the sixth volume. Seventh, eight, ninth, tenth and eleventh were full of chase after sub-characters and the main story. The twelfth volume is finally the time the Kiseki comes into the focus.

I have been placing Kiseki and the Hyakki Yakou as a very important factor in the series and made her to be like a last boss, but I kept writing about her with intention of making her an ordinary and naive girl deep inside.

My intent was to make Kiseki so normal, that Takeru will seem much more broken in comparison. The two share Kusanagi's stubbornness and inflexibility since they're siblings, but Takeru is much more abnormal.

Also, this was the first time I wrote about Takeru's "love and such", heck, it might even have been the first time I had him say that word. This series should have few love comedy moments, I still wrote plenty of it for the girls, but I hardly touched on Takeru's matters of heart.

It was unexpected… no, actually it might not be. Well, that's just how the first love often is.

I myself avoided the romance parts (it's one thing that I'm not too good at it, but it also doesn't fit the story) as I've written this, but I haven't written about it as clearly in the previous series and one before that.

That's why, well, this is my first time.

It was the first time I have written a scene where the protagonist hears out a girl's confession and properly gives her answer.

Whenever I write about Kiseki, it turns out like that. Somehow, even when I wrote the scene of Kiseki and Takeru confronting each other my brush had stopped moving.

I have already written plenty embarrassing scenes so far and made lots of sick characters, but the scene where Takeru exposes his feelings for Kiseki was incredibly embarrassing to me for some reason.

I think it varies by person, but when I'm writing a story I do my best not to "self-project" myself onto characters. I do read those sometimes, but I never write them. As for the reason behind that, if I self-projected myself onto the characters, they would all turn into bunch of assholes.

The human being I wrote in that would be the closest to me, would be Tenmyouji Reima. Takeru, Ouka and others are far different from me. It's just that I stuff the ideals and what I lack into the characters.

But, "thinking well about it, isn't this self-projection as well?", is what I've recently noticed. Isn't that a bit like parents who raises his kids to be different than they are? That's also self-projection if I'm not wrong. That's why, I guess… is why I become strangely embarrassed. It's similar to when I noticed that "I'm a chuuni" during puberty.

Also, they're siblings right. That must be it. No wonder it makes me embarrassed. They say that the only ones who go for imouto moe are they one's without a little sister, don't they. I think that's exactly the case. There were plenty of people among those who worked on anime and they said they don't understand imouto moe.

If I felt romantic feelings towards my sister… there are few people who would think of such things. I like immoral things, but in reality it's, y'know right? Real little sisters and little sisters in anime, light novels are completely different beings.

No, I wonder about that? Aren't there cases where they're really cute and you get along with them really well? Since I wrote things in fashion of a forbidden love between siblings, and it's my self-projection, then possibly I have feelings for little sisters… wooaah, I ended up thinking of having such a relationship with a real sister, daaamn, this feels weird what do I do? I can't look at my imouto's face now, this is horrible from a decency's point of view. I thought such things despite the fact I don't have a little sister myself, and yet I ended up writing stuff like this. Which is probably the worst part decency-wise——is what I noticed just now.

I have nothing but little sisters in my head now.

Yes, today I've gone disgusting in a different way from usual.

Boobies? The recent trend are shoulder blades. It's difficult to say who has the best boobies in this story, but Kiseki surely has the best shoulder blades.

——There's no doubt about it since that's what I say.

This time I have nine pages for the afterword, so I did my best to write useless stuff.

This work has finally entered the climax.

Next volume will be the last. Well, there's one more short story volume in plans so that actually makes two volumes, but the next one is the last story volume.

In recent years it's gotten quite difficult for light novels to continue stably as series. With that said, people who are involved in writing books always had it hard so I'm kinda late to say that, but it still is much stricter than it used to be.

Under such circumstances, I think the "Antimagic Academy "The 35th Test Platoon" " was a very fortunate story. It had excellent editors-in-charge, wonderful illustrator, comic series and was even animated.

Around the eight volume I was finally able to tell "this is all I have left to do with this series".

There was a time during the anime's planning when I have opened plenty of free time and readers have been fretting "Are you writing?" and such. Well, it's true that there were some unexpected twists and turns. I'm sorry to have kept you waiting.

However, the work on anime had extended and there were changes in original story's schedule.

That is because this series was scheduled to be completed on the tenth volume. When anime was in the works and I wrote it while planning to end it on the tenth volume, it felt like it was a good time to do it.

But the animation work took more time and I was told they would like me to continue a little longer. As an author, I was very happy to be told that.

And when it turned out that I continued onto the eleventh volume my "this is all I have left to do with this series" had changed into "what can I do with this series?". Working at ease at times like these doesn't really happen. But I had a lot of fun every day thinking "what should I do".

It was a really blessed world. Quite lucky one.

And above all, the fact I could continue it like this is all thanks to the readers who have been with me this far.

You might think that I always write the afterword's acknowledgements reluctantly, but that's not the case at all. I mean, although all authors write acknowledgements by the end of their afterwords, we all write them wholeheartedly. I don't know how is it about acknowledgements for people involved in work (laughs), but any author puts their heart into thanking the readers.

Thank you very much.

And if possible, please stay with the "Antimagic Academy "The 35th Test Platoon" "… the name's so long, both the title and the series are long, but please stay with until the very end.

What's left are the short stories, right. I'll probably write about what happens after the main story, so look forward to it!

It's not over yet, but since it's a long afterword, I wrote my thanks to everyone. It would be great if I could write about characters in the last volume's afterword?. But at times like those it's usually just two pages of afterword.

Well then, next volume's last. What about the last boss? What happens to Kiseki? Will everyone in the 35th platoon be safe? Die, haunted. The twelfth volume was full of chatter making you ask that, but most likely it'll all settle in the last volume!

Enjoy yourself to the very end!

Now, acknowledgements.

The editors in charge whom I always inconvenienced, K-sama and S-sama.

Kippu-sensei who did his best to draw wonderful illustrations despite being busy.

Yasumura Youhei-sensei to whom I am indebted for the comic version.

Everyone in the Fantasy Bunko's editorial department.

Silver Link's anime staff who did their best despite not having much time.

The cast who did their best to play each character perfectly.

And all of you who have taken the series in your hands, you have my sincere gratitude.

It's finally the last volume (how many times are you gonna write that?)! What awaits Takeru and the others is——!

Stay tuned! Well then, let's meet in the last volume!

Yanagimi Touki

Yanagimi Touki

Debut work: "量産型はダテじゃない!" (Production Model is not just for show!)

Twelfth volume. I sure did well writing this far, even if I do say so myself.

"Everything so far had gone just as I planned!" is something I won't say even if you force me to, but all the boobies so far are just as I planned them to be. Heck, isn't volume twelve devoid of boobies? They've been swaying back and forth in the anime and yet… please do take care of this twelfth volume.