I’ll never forget when I first finished writing the tale of the black-lightning girl. It was May 5, two years ago.
In Japan, May 5 is Children’s Day. And I thought at the time there was truly no better day for her to begin her new life.
Since then, I’ve rewritten and switched a number of things around, until it became the novel you’ve just read—it’s like a completely different story at this point. I think anyone who has only read the light novel would be shocked if they went to Kakuyomu and read the original web version of this part of the story.
I’m sure many would say “I can’t believe it! It’s completely different!”
Basically, the original web version is incredibly simple, while the light novel describes the girl known as Jupiter in great detail.
This boils down to differences in medium. For the web novel, I tried my best to prioritize keeping things entertaining. I also tried not to write anything too dark. Or maybe, I just didn’t have enough confidence in my ability to both entertain the reader and dive deep into this character’s backstory.
But now, two whole years later, after being blessed with this incredible opportunity by Dengeki no Shin Bungei and the support of the incredible illustrator, Kakao Lanthanum, I was finally able to complete the black-lightning girl’s new story as well as Volume 3 of Before the Tutorial Starts.
I cannot overstate how grateful I am to Kakao Lanthanum, in particular. Without their illustrations, I think this volume would have turned out completely different, especially when it comes to Eliza. I took a lot of inspiration from the illustrations when I created her. And since she wound up playing such an important role in Jupiter’s story, it’s no exaggeration to say Kakao is one of the parents of this story.
And of course, I need to send a big thank you to the editors at Dengeki no Shin Bungei for introducing me to Kakao. And I have winning the Kakuyomu Web Novel Contest to thank for allowing me to work with Dengeki no Shin Bungei. Of course, I would never have won the contest without the support of everyone who read the original web novel.
When I think about it like that, it makes me realize how many people along the way have helped me get to where I am today.
I’ve taken all these feelings of gratitude and poured them into a special episode that connects Volume 3 to Volume 4. That’s right! There’s more story after this afterword! And with that, let’s meet again in the next story!
I hope you’re looking forward to it!