AFTERWORD
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WELL, WOULD YOU LOOK AT THAT? What do we have here? Another afterword. Four pages of it, no less.
You might think that old trickster Y—da-san is to blame, but no! The new editor, K—guchi-san, is the culprit. New editor, same mistakes.
On that note, I would like to congratulate Y—da-san on their promotion and thank them for all their work on this series.
To K—guchi-san, who is no doubt swearing up a storm because this series was dumped on them, I offer my best wishes and the promise that I’ll continue to tortur—I mean, write for you. That’s right, I’m dumping everything in your lap. Have fun! (Ha ha.)
K—guchi-san enjoys camping and mountain climbing. Their dream is to one day push Y—da-san off a mountain. A big thank you to the Overlap editorial department and its various tangled interpersonal affairs.
Moving along, it is my pleasure to announce that Volume 13 is complete. Thank you very much to all my readers. (Psst, Enomaru-sensei, blame the hellish production schedule on K—guchi-san. Thank you for another volume’s worth of lovely illustrations (particularly on a non-existent time table.))
My thanks also to Bibi-sensei, along with my apologies for once again dumping all the work in your lap. The obi—the paper strip that runs along the outside of Japanese books—was entirely at their discretion. (Ha ha.)
I mean, if I’m leaving all the creative decisions for how these characters and world look to Bibi-sensei anyway, I might as well have them listed as the author. I’ve pushed for this incessantly, but alas, I am still credited as the original author. I’m so sorry, and I really can’t thank you enough for all you do. (sweat smile)
I would encourage everyone to check out Bibi-sensei’s world in motion—that’s right, we’re getting an anime!
Which means further acknowledgements. Thank you to the director, the animation studio, and the voice actors. I’m sorry I didn’t come say hello to you myself—this story has ballooned to such an alarming degree I felt too shy.
They say too many cooks spoil the broth, so I was more than happy to pawn off the work—ahem, ahem! Excuse me, rogue coughing fit—leave the anime adaptation work in the able hands of the director and Bibi-sensei.
Y—da-san, who was still my editor at the time, first reached out to me by asking, “If I told you Loner Life was getting an anime, what would you say?” I said, “That you’re touched in the head. Please get a grip on yourself.” He laughed. I laughed. And then they went and made an anime of Loner Life anyway. Ha ha ha.
I’ve been slow to update the web novel for assorted reasons, so I apologize to my web readers. Take this as a life update, if you will (or an excuse, if you will), but my eyes have been so habitually glued to my monitor that I’m extremely behind on writing new chapters. I haven’t been able to keep up on responding to reader comments either, but I read them all and cannot thank you enough for them.
Oh well! Blame it all on K—guchi-san and the impacted schedule. Please direct your complaints, anger, and sharp rocks at the Overlap editorial department.
I know I say something to this effect every time, but to this day I still think “How?? What? Huh??? How did we get so far?” First a manga, now an anime. I’ve cycled between shock and horror roughly ninety-nine times to the point where now it all feels so far away from me.
I mean, let’s be real. Prior to LL, I’d never written a thing in my life, much less a novel. I had no aspirations to be a novelist either. This series began life as a shitpost I uploaded to Naro, and it was picked up by a publisher, turned into a manga, and finally adapted into an anime. Back when Overlap first approached me about making this into a book, I thought “This has to be a prank.” If it is a prank, it’s taking them an awfully long time to get to the reveal.
So, thank you to the many, many people who have brought me so far and to the point of this nigh-miraculous anime adaptation.
Let me repeat myself once more and thank you for reading. Truly, you are doing me an honor.
And that is the end of the afterword. I have filled four pages with acknowledgments and accusations against K—guchi-san. This afterword would not have seen the light of day had K—guchi-san not called me, sometime in the evening, and said, “We have four pages left! Can you write us an afterword? …By EOD?”
Bafflingly, the change of editor has done nothing to slow the breakneck pace of production. These glimpses I catch into the inner workings of the Overlap editorial department are frightening indeed.
I plan to write a few detailed—so very detailed it will make K—guchi-san cry—pages for the Overlap website in regards to the anime announcement. (Please look forward to it. Mwa ha ha.)
Finally, while the base story is unchanged, I hope you will check out both the manga and anime.
—SHOJI GOJI