Afterword
HELLO, dear reader!
My name is Kaede Kikyou. Thank you very much for reading The Champions of Justice and the Supreme Ruler of Evil. If this story made you laugh, even just a little bit, and maybe shed an emotional tear every once in a while, I, as an author, would be very happy.
Originally, I published this story as a web novel on a Japanese website. I don’t speak a word of English, so, naturally, I have been writing with a Japanese audience in mind. But then, I received an offer to get my story translated into English and published as an e-book.
At first, I was shocked. Then I felt anxious. Would people across the globe really have fun reading my novel? But at the same time, I was excited. So far, I have always received comments and reviews in Japanese, from Japanese readers, but if even a single person living in another country would read my book and enjoy it…how wonderful and amazing would that be, I thought. I’m very happy that you are now one of those people.
I asked the publisher to give me some time to revise the text and prepare it for translation. I rewrote some bits of it, but it still features a lot of Japanese local flavor and scenes from Japanese everyday life. There are small apartments in wooden buildings, police chasing down monkeys, onigiri lunch sets at Mia’s school cafeteria, the popular entertainment venue in Japan known as pachinko, and people going to hot springs for a nice long soak. What would the people living abroad make of these things? Would they be able to make sense of the Japanese dishes Subaru is making? Thinking about all these questions while working on the revision of my novel was a lot of fun.
This is a story about the Supreme Ruler of Evil plotting world domination, and a group of Champions of Justice called the Crow Rangers that are trying to put an end to Mia’s evil deeds. However, the Supreme Ruler of Evil turns out to be too full of goodness to be called a villain, and there are times where you question whether the Crow Rangers can truly be called the Champions of Justice. It’s about the positions they are in and the actions they actually end up taking, and, of course, about Ren toying with Mia’s maiden heart. If you could enjoy any of the different factors that come into play in my story, then I am satisfied as an author and writer.
Now, and I digress, I have heard that there is an American remake of a Japanese Super Sentai movie in the making. A question an American has asked me when we were talking about it has stuck with me so much I can still remember it: “Why are there five Champions of Justice?” It’s a good question!
The superheroes popular in America often fight alone. Why is it that the Japanese superheroes usually form a unit and battle the forces of evil together? I have pondered this question for a while, and, I regret to say I haven’t been able to find an answer. In the minds of the Japanese people, the Champions of Justice are a group by default, and have been for a long time now, was the only answer I could come up with, so I hope that this will do it for you! This is also why there are five Crow Rangers. They each have a distinct personality, so quintuple the fun, right?
With this, I will say goodbye for now, but I hope that we will meet again someday.
Kaede Kikyou.