I smiled while I watched over Kanna sleeping. Just what is she dreaming about? The truth is that I had already realized it.
The next day,
"Everyone, Thank you for yesterday." Everyone looked at me.
"What's up Kenji? that is out of nowhere." Kozue is confused
"Yesterday's birthday party, Kanna really loved it." I implored.
"Oh, that's about it." Yasuyuki sighs.
"Kozue, your 'poly cure poster,' she placed it over her bed. And, that limited edition that Fumi gave her, she placed it over her desk beside our club photo. Tell your uncle that Kanna wore the cosplay set in her sleep. Although my father is not liking it. HAHAHA! She can't wait to play the poly cure game you gave her, Yasuyuki. Well, the pencil case that Nagi and Nami gave her is in her bag now. Kanna sure did have fun yesterday, also me too, you know. So thanks!"
I smiled brightly as I voice out my thoughts,
"WHAAAAAAAAAT! HOW CAN YOU SAY SOMETHING THAT EMBARRASSING WITH A STRAIGHT FACE."
Fumi's face is beet red as my words touched her.
"YEAH RIGHT! CAN'T YOU FEEL THE ENVIRONMENT?!"
Kozue jumped in and squished my face
"Ah, sorry! HAHAHA, I'm just overwhelmed with happiness." I scratched my head.
"Well then, for a nice change of mood let's go back to finishing our manuscript for AKATSUKA," Nami suggested we start working on our manga.
"Yes, we are almost done with half of it," I stated while preparing my workstation.
"I'll go buy us snacks just email anything you want." Yasuyuki ran outside
"Kozue, can you check this out? What do you think? It feels vacant like something isn't right about this page." I handed out
"Yeah, how about adding a background character."
Since we are a club, and we get calls from our editor, we set up a telephone connection to our club room.
"Yes, Aoyama speaking?"
'Aoyama, this is the student council, will the mangaka club participate in the school cultural festival?'
"Oh, I forgot about that, I'll ask them. Thank you! Will get back to you as soon as I get an answer."
'Okay, thank you!'
"Everyone, I got something to ask you. The school cultural festival is coming up and they asked us if we will participate." Kozue told us what she and the student council talked about on the phone.
"Kozue, you just stepped on a landmine?!" Nagi menacingly approached Kozue
"La-la land mine?!" Kozue is shaking on his feet.
"Yes, and we can't afford to rest right now. Because the AKATSUKA's deadline is coming as well!" I dismissed the topic but,
"Well then, let's finish this as soon as we can to participate in the school cultural festival." I don't want to miss this opportunity to get attention for the mangaka club.
"But..?" Nami seems to be concerned.
"I wouldn't like to lose that opportunity to attract attention to the mangaka club, right? That's what we agreed on right?" I reminded them of our goal. "We may have already attracted too much for ourselves, but they have not seen everything yet. Let's close this obstacle on that day, we will make a name for our club." I stated proudly.
The Inari Okami Highschool Cultural Festival, A school festival held every year for three days. Day one is the sports festival, day two and three is the cultural festival. The cultural festival especially with the public attending as guests attracts overwhelming excitement for that reason, the cultural festival allows a great deal of freedom. To show everyone what you've got and your talents, students are encouraged to participate as much as possible.
"So let's get over this mission first and then proceed with our plans for the festival." I started working on my character designs.
"Roger! President!"
"Yasu, I'm going back to my old style drawing, is that okay?"
"What do you mean?"
"I'm thinking that my old art style suits better with I AM ALIVE."
"Oh Yeah, I think that would be alright."
"I've been noticing you staring at the questionnaire for a while now, what's in it anyway?"
"Nothing. It says to choose the three best stories in order from most interesting to the least interesting."
"So? That's what it always says."
"If there are 21 manga and you choose 3, then there we'll be a one and the seventh chance that it will be chosen."
"Huh? Oh, twenty-one divided by three is seven."
"Mr. Kiichi said that if two out of ten people choose it, then it's a popular manga. So that's one and fifth."
When I first heard Mr. Kiichi says two out of ten, first I thought it'd be a cinch, but when you figure it out in the one and seventh, that will be tough.
"Yeah, I guess so, after all. Many are trying their best to be chosen. Anyway, there is no time thinking about that now. If you've got some time, why not work on a name? Your drawings suck that is why I'll redraw it once you are done."
"I know but, the harder I think about the scenarios of actions that the main character is facing, the harder it gets the story is deeper than I thought. Mr. Kiichi really wants me to realistically show the struggles between each challenge that our protagonist is facing to make it as repulsive as possible."
"You're talking about survival tactics and hurdles though, so shouldn't it be easy? There are lots of that on the internet so we can do research for that."
"That's possible, but let us do it with a situation we can think of."
"A situation where he faced a group of bandits with weapons which he doesn't have one, will he risk it or just go find somewhere else to stay. Or like he was invited to a group that changed his life being in an apocalyptic world."
"Let's take that, all his time thinking he was the only living human in the world and then found out other survivors and a bigger world with still human civilization."
"That should do it, alright let's finish the day with that chapter."
"Okay, I'll write it down."
"Let me just check the rest of the other pages, Fumi? Kozue? Nagi? Nami? Hanako?"
"I'm done with the background, post-apocalyptic environment is a challenge, thanks for the techniques of Nagi, I finished it quickly." Fumi handed me the pages.
"The layout is done, please check it out." Nami did the layout nicely.
"I changed the stuff where I feel it is too tight," Kozue added effects and changed some void gaps.
"Thank you and Good work, everyone! See you tomorrow, we have the last two chapters almost ready."
"Roger!"
"Yes!"
"Thank you!"
We are ready to take the crown in AKATSUKA!