[11] New Manga

"Meow~"

A small calico cat lay on the balcony, basking in the sun. It let out a yawn and squinted its eyes as it watched Kazuya, who was drawing manga behind the closed curtains.

"At last, things have settled down..." The little cat thought to itself, letting out another soft meow. "My name is Orlina, from the noble planet of Meow. Due to various accidents, I ended up here on this place called Earth, endured hunger, but was finally rescued by these somewhat discerning natives. However, they think I carry some sort of germs and insist on giving me vaccines. It hurts so much... but, oh well, I'll forgive them since they feed me!"

"Hmm..." Kazuya looked at the relaxed cat drawing two casual strokes of a cat on a nearby piece of paper. He then took the drawing and walked over to place it beside the small cat on the balcony. "It's for you. Do you like it?"

"Meow~ (What's this? It's ugly!)" The cat responded.

"Hmm-hmm, it looks like you really like it," Kazuya nodded. He didn't mind having a cat around, especially one that was well-behaved and didn't disrupt his manga drawing or shed fur everywhere. That's why he allowed it to stay in his workspace; otherwise, he would have sent it away long ago.

However, what amused him was that this cat didn't eat cat food but insisted on eating the same food as them.

"Meow meow~ (Who said I like it? Don't make wild guesses when you can't understand Meow-speak!)"

"Hmm? Are you hungry or thirsty?"

"Meow~ (Tsk, Earthlings are rubbish. They can't even understand Meow-speak.)"

Kazuya poured some water into a bowl and placed it in front of the cat. "Here you go. As for dinner, we'll decide when Kazumi comes back."

"Meow~ meow~ (Fine, I'm a little thirsty anyway. Consider it a favor.)"

Watching the cat drink the water, Kazuya nodded. It seemed the cat was indeed thirsty. While he had never owned a cat before, he felt he was starting to understand their behavior.

With nothing else to do, he returned to his manga drawing.

He was working on his new original manga "Battle Royale."

For "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure," he wasn't in a hurry. He only needed to create a couple of color pages when necessary. Right now, his priority was his new manga.

That was the content of "Battle Royale."

Recently, he had been following someone who had survived to the end, the last person standing. In other words, he could finally use that person as the protagonist for his manga.

However, some modifications were necessary.

For example, in his dream, the person who survived to the end was a middle-aged ex-soldier in his thirties or forties. Moreover, he was highly experienced and had noticed Kazuya multiple times during his pursuit.

As a result, Kazuya had gained some experience in this regard.

But... this person's appearance was a problem...

That wouldn't work. Supporting characters could use their original appearances, with some emphasis on expressions, but they still needed to be transformed from three-dimensional to two-dimensional. They didn't have to be good-looking.

However, the protagonist was different. Even if they weren't good-looking, they needed to have some unique features.

This included their clothing, which had to be distinct from others. Even their names had to be carefully chosen—not too ordinary, but not too flashy either.

So, from earlier until now, he had been designing the protagonist's appearance and trying to find one he personally liked.

The same applied to the name. After flipping through the dictionary for a while, he settled on "Horikawa Kira," which seemed decent.

Not only the protagonist but also the female characters underwent this treatment.

All beautified.

For male characters, he beautified one or two main ones, and even drew a few ugly ones.

But for female characters... after careful consideration, he decided to beautify all of them.

Busts were drawn a bit fuller—although not overly so, with two flat-chested characters added for variety. He drew the faces nicely, made the legs longer, and refined their features...

Character design took half a day.

Finally, he started to draw.

He was starting to draw his first original manga.

Except for the plot, which didn't need to be created, it was time to test his skills and imagination with regard to storyboarding, character portrayal, and more.

"Ring ring ring ring ring ring—"

"Hmm?" Kazuya looked up at the time. "Time flies; it's already this late..."

He furrowed his brows, looking at the unfinished manuscript for the second chapter in front of him. "As expected, the speed of drawing for an original work is so slow... it's several times slower! It seems like it will take around three days to finish drawing a single chapter. That's slow." This speed was drastically different from when he was drawing "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure." Previously, he could complete a chapter in a few hours, but now it took several days!

"Well, I guess I'll stop here for now. I'll continue after dinner when Kazumi gets back."

He tidied up the manuscript and cleaned the table. "Kohana, I'm going out. It's dinner time."

"Meow~"

...

Time passed quickly, and in the blink of an eye, nearly a month had gone by. The year 1984 had come to an end, and it was now 1985.

One notable event was the New Year's gathering in January.

Kazuya considered attending just to see what the mangaka of this era were like.

"Onii-chan, have fun at the party!" Kazumi said to her brother.

"Sure, I'll be back soon. Is it okay for you to stay at home alone while I'm gone, working on your own manga?" Kazuya asked.

"Yeah, it's fine. I have Kohana to keep me company."

"Alright..." Kazuya sighed. "That's good. Having Kohana around is really nice."

He smiled, then headed out.

"Kurokawa-san, please get in the car."

"Oh, thank you." Kazuya nodded as he looked at the chauffeured car in slight surprise. He hadn't expected JUMP to be so well-developed in this era.

"If we depart now, we'll arrive about twenty minutes early. How would you like to proceed?"

"Just head straight there," Kazuya said. He couldn't deny that he felt nervous about the gathering; it was impossible not to.

In this era, he was only familiar with one mangaka, Akira Toriyama, the creator of "Dragon Ball." He had less of an impression of other popular series like "Hokuto no Ken," which was a big hit in JUMP, or the recently concluded "Cat's Eye."

However, "Dragon Ball" was a significant part of his childhood, so he was quite excited to meet Akira Toriyama in person.

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