Volume 25 Chapter 8 (1/2)

Wah, wah, wah.

What should I do, now I've done it?

h.e.l.lo, this is Konno.

You often read, ”The character just wrote themselves” in other afterwords.

”The character wrote themselves, and as the author I just had to hold on.”

- Something like that.

That does occasionally happen to me too, but typically that sort of thing doesn't happen walking down the story's main street, it's one of the characters in the side-alleys, so it doesn't really have much of an impact on the overall story.

But this time they really did write themselves. Well, to be precise, she would suggest things like, ”How about I act like this here. What do you think?” and I'd agree, ”Ah, that sounds good.” (Feel free to call this a wild delusion.)

Oh no. It's not connected to what I thought I'd write in the next story, and the one after!

Wah, wah, wah. What should I do, and so on.

Well, that includes short stories too. I think when a character writes themselves, it's because that's the most natural course of action for them. Right, Noriko?

Setting aside that glimpse backstage, let's discuss ”Maria-sama ga Miteru: Big Door, Small Key.”

Readers that are reading this after the novel may be thinking ”Huh?” because there's something different about this volume.

What is it that's different? None of the stories are told from Yumi's point-of-view.

Up to now, we've seen Noriko's point-of-view, s.h.i.+mako's point-of-view, Yos.h.i.+no's point-of-view, Rei's point-of-view, Sachiko's point-of-view, the graduated onee-sama's points-of-view, and others, but I don't think there's been a volume of ”Maria-sama ga Miteru” that hasn't had at least one story with Yumi as the main character (excluding the Premium Book and Ill.u.s.tration Collection).

In exchange, about half of this volume is told from Touko's point-of-view, which we haven't seen much of before (except in small parts like Joanna).

I'm sure the back cover and advertising for this volume will probably have ”Touko's secret!” As for what the secret is, read the main story and enjoy (although saying ”enjoy” feels a bit awkward).

* * *

The food and drink that appear in this volume didn't make me feel all that envious, either writing about them or reading about them. Especially Kas.h.i.+wagi Suguru's souvenir. I hate feeling like I've been tricked.

Occasionally, I find myself craving cola. It's like I'm after the ”beer after work” feeling, although I'm not a regular drinker so I don't really know what that's like. But, like beer, it's not the sort of drink that's there when I open the refrigerator (although I'm sure there's some households that would always have cola), so typically I'll just trick myself with cool tea, thinking ”If only there was a convenience store right outside our house.” Naturally, our refrigerator doesn't have beer either.

Right, right. Be careful, because drinking too many carbonated drinks can be dangerous (too much of anything is not good). About ten years ago, I got soda-addiction and ruined my health. What sort of symptoms did I have? If I didn't have soda, I'd start feeling withdrawal symptoms, and I didn't want to drink anything other than soda. My stomach would hurt, but I still kept craving those sweet fizzy drinks. I'd get on my bike to go to the corner store to buy them. Soon I'd be back in soda h.e.l.l. Getting free was tough. Hearing that story, most people's first thoughts are, ”&h.e.l.lip; That's scary,” followed by, ”That doesn't sound like you, Konno,” finally leading to the question, ”So, did that make you put on weight? Lose weight?” I mean, come on, the point wasn't whether I lost weight or not. My life was in danger -