I think this might be the first time I’ve actually written an afterword for the final volume of a series.
Even before I’d finished Grimoire of Zero I had plans to start working on The Dawn of the Witch, so my note at the end of that first series was more of a “continued in part two” kind of send-off. And now, six volumes of Dawn of the Witch later, here we are.
My entire life as a writer has been spent with at least one foot in this world. Even when I was working on screenplays, rom-coms, children’s books, the deadlines for these books have always floated vaguely at the back of my mind. There hasn’t been a single day without that. And I don’t think I’ll ever forget this world or these characters, not really. I expect I won’t be putting out any more books that take place in this world, but it will always live on inside my mind. Professor Los will continue searching for new things, Saybil and the others will continue to grow and mature, and Zero and Mercenary might just keep on quietly saving the world off in some unknown place.
Maybe it’ll be the same for some of you, too. Maybe in the minds of some of my readers who’ve stayed with the story to the end, this world I envisioned will continue to exist, and these characters I’ve tried so desperately to understand will live on. Who knows, maybe Los, Sayb, Zero, and Mercenary will go out and perform great deeds I could never even have conceived of.
And maybe someday, someone who reads this book will want their own characters to go on an adventure like this, in a world of their own imagining, and they’ll start writing that adventure down. I would be so excited to read that story! I’d be like, “Yeah! I love this kind of book! Me and this author are totally on the same page!”
I dream about that day.
Incidentally, the fact that Kodansha published this story is thanks in very large part to the manga artist Tadadi Tamori. When I was waffling over where to take the manuscript for this sequel, Tamori-sensei offered to talk to Kodansha’s editorial staff for me, and I’d like to take this opportunity to express my deepest thanks.
And it’s thanks to my editor Shoji-san that I was able to do whatever I wanted with this story. I think if I’d had an editor who said, “Do this, do that, this part won’t sell,” I wouldn’t have been able to keep on writing. I’m in total awe of the speed with which he’d get the revised manuscripts back to me, especially given the frankly extraordinary number of typos.
Iwasaki-sensei, I’m really, really, really sorry for all the hassle with the illustrations. Even after the super long gap between volumes two and three, even when delays with the manuscript made the illustration schedule hellish, you still said working on The Dawn of the Witch was fun. Big thanks for sticking with this series to the very end.
Tatsuwo-sensei’s art for the manga version is always so amazing that lately I feel less like the original creator and more like a fan just waiting for the next chapter to come out. The characters’ faces and the page layouts are always so full of a uniquely manga-esque expressiveness, to the point that it wouldn’t surprise me at all if people thought the manga came first. It’s been such a pleasure to have Tatsuwo-sensei on board, and I’m going to keep following his work even after The Dawn of the Witch finishes its run.
Also, the fact that Tezuka Productions did the anime version is the honor of a lifetime. Thank you so much for producing such a wonderful adaptation.
At the end of the closing credits, it often says “and you.” And it’s true: without our readers, we authors wouldn’t exist. It’s unquestionably you, the readers, who have allowed me to follow this path.
I don’t have much space left, so at this point I’ll say my goodbyes.
See you again sometime, in the afterword to some other story.