Summer Comiket

August 9, 2019

The first day of Comiket had just started. With Akari being off from school, she, Chieko, and Shizuka were able to attend all four days from start to finish. Akari had a large suitcase with her, as well as a second ticket in addition to her badge that would allow her to get into the cosplay changing area. Shizuka meanwhile had a smaller suitcase filled with business supplies and artwork she intended to sell at the Shimizu company booth that year. As the three of them got off the train together, Shizuka told Akari, “You know the drill for the cosplay stuff, right?”

“Yep,” she replied with a nod. “Get in line, get a booth, and head on out.”

“You know,” Chieko then added. “I heard at conventions in America, they don’t actually have those changing rooms. People actually enter and exit in cosplay.”

“Yep,” Shizuka nodded. “I’ve seen photos and videos from American conventions. They’re pretty different from Comiket. Aside from the fact cosplayers can enter and exit in cosplay, they’re a bit more… Commercialized. Doujinshi manga isn’t really that much a thing over there, but fanart is huge. Conventions tend to have a much larger presence from anime studios and manga publishers over there, although I will say their presence at Comiket has definitely grown over the years.”

Akari then asked her, “Have you ever thought about going to an American convention?”

“Maybe, but my schedule probably wouldn’t allow it. I’ve thought about it this year, though. Anime Expo, the largest in America, already happened in July in Los Angeles, but maybe I could pull some strings and go to Anime NYC in November. Anzai-sensei’s actually taking a brief hiatus from Uncontrollable Battle to go there, so maybe I can talk to the executives and see if I can tag along.”

Chieko then asked her, “Wait, where’s Anime NYC hosted?” In disbelief she asked such an obvious question, Akari and Shizuka looked at her with dumbfounded expressions. “…What?”

Both Akari and Shizuka said at the same time, “New York City!”

“Wait, New Yo-“ Chieko then realized what the NYC part of Anime NYC meant. “Oh… New York City…”

“I’m gonna leave before I lose any more brain cells,” Akari joked before walking away to go to the cosplay line. “I’ll see you guys inside!”

“Bye-bye,” Shizuka waved to her. She then turned to Chieko and remarked with a laugh, “Really? You didn’t know NYC is an English abbreviation for New York City?”

“Give me a break,” Chieko replied with a blush, embarrassed by her mistake. “I sucked at English in school.”

Shizuka pointed out, “Most of Japan sucks at speaking English. Act accordingly.”

…

As Chieko and Shizuka were sitting at the Shimizu industry booth, they spent their time talking to several company staffers and even some passers-by who did not recognize Shizuka due to her wearing her hair in a bun and having a hat on. After a while, though, Shizuka got up and told Chieko, “I’m gonna head out and look at the doujinshi circles. I got money to burn.”

“I’ll see you around,” Chieko replied with a wave.

As Shizuka walked away from the booth, she noticed someone in a cosplay of the main female character of Uncontrollable Battle walking towards her. “You don’t recognize me?”

“Wait a minute, Kunugi-san?”

Akari, who had walked over to the industry area of Comiket to see Shizuka, laughed and replied, “Wow, I must have done a good job if it took you that long. So, how do I look?”

“Woah, you really pulled it off well,” Shizuka replied as she pulled out her phone. “I gotta take a picture of this and send it to Anzai-sensei.”

“Go ahead. I can’t pull the sword out here, though. I gotta be in the cosplay area for that.”

“I’m gonna stop by over there after I take a Quick Look at the doujinshi area,” Shizuka explained as she took the photo with her phone and then quickly texted Michi it.

“I’ll go with you. Come on.”

“Alright.” Shizuka and Akari began walking to the doujinshi area of Comiket, passing by throngs of people who had come to the giant convention.

“Are you staying hydrated? It’s pretty hot out there.”

“Yep,” Akari said as she then pulled out a bottle of water from a bag she had been carrying. “This is my second bottle of water so far for the day. I’m not taking any chances.”

“Smart girl. Don’t be like me and have to sit down at my first Summer Comiket because I was a dumb high school girl and underestimated how hot it was gonna be.”

…

After waiting in a line to get to the doujinshi area for a bit, they rounded a corner and went past several food stalls, with Akari buying a third bottle of water from a vending machine. As she did, Shizuka said to Akari, “You know, I spoke to your father a few days ago. By coincidence, a client of his had his own father pass away, so he had to reschedule a meeting, freeing up a chance for me to meet him.”

“Oh? What did he have to say?”

“We talked about you, the industry, how much I made, and some stuff about his job. Overall, it went very well. I told him how happy working for me made you, and he seemed to really enjoy that. He said he couldn’t believe it at first that you were working for someone as experienced as me, but he was so happy that you were able to follow your dreams.”

Akari smiled, finding his words to be nice. “I’m glad he said that. I didn’t know how he was gonna react to hearing about me working for you, but I’m happy he accepts it.”

“He truly loves you,” Shizuka pointed out. “I got the vibe from him that he does worry about you since he doesn’t get to see you a lot, but he knows that you’re happy doing what you’re doing. He even said that he could see you becoming a mangaka one day.”

“Let’s not get too hasty,” Akari replied, being cautious. “I don’t know if my ideas would be good enough for publication, honestly. I’m content right now just doing online commissions and being an assistant.”

“For now. When you graduate high school, you’ll need to make more money. Will you go to college or try to strike out on your own as an artist without it?”

“I honestly don’t know, which is kinda scary considering I’m already sixteen and only two and a half years away from graduating.”

“Yeah, that’s a bit… Late.”

“What did you go to college for anyway?”

“Me?” Shizuka as was clearly embarrassed to say what she went to college for, as evidenced by her reluctance to answer. “Well, uh…”

“Spit it out,” Akari replied. “Come on.”

“It’s not really something I’ve use a lot, honestly…”

“Just say it.”

“Okay, okay, I went to college for computer science,” Shizuka finally admitted. “To be honest, I only took it because it was something I was vaguely interested in besides art, but my parents weren’t too convinced I could make a career out of it at the time, so I went with that as a backup plan. I’d Break The Ice hadn’t been accepted, I’d probably be working in the IT department of some corporation while selling doujinshi manga and fanart here on the side.”

“Not a bad career choice,” Akari pointed out. “People who work in IT make a shit ton of money, especially these days. That, combined with your art on the side, could have made you a lot of money.”

“Yeah, but it wouldn’t be fulfilling for me,” Shizuka explained to her, getting passionate about her reasons for making art. “While I like making money and having things like every other person in the world, I love making art more. Sure, maybe I make a little less as a mangaka than I do as an IT tech without doing commissions on the side, but it’s more fulfilling to me because being an artist, and a writer for that matter, is something I have always seen myself doing. There’s nothing more I want to do with my life than to be a storyteller.”

Akari concurred with a nod. “That’s pretty profound. I agree.”

“By the way, do you have any ideas of making a manga of your own? I think you could pull it off.”

Realizing she could not run from it anymore, Akari admitted, “I do have some, but I want to refine them more before I even think about submitting them for publication. I got one idea involving oni fighting for their freedom against the Tokugawa Shogunate, but it’s not fully fleshed out yet.”

Shizuka was intrigued by the idea. “Hey, that sounds like a cool idea. Is that what you were drawing on Sunday?”

“Yeah, I was. I kinda lied to you about it. Sorry.”

“With some work, you could make it a best-seller one day.”

“I don’t think it would be massive, honestly. There’s plenty of other battle manga out there. The field’s kinda crowded. I guess the only thing setting it apart from most is that I don’t want to run away from the romance angle.”

“The romance angle?”

“You know how a lot of main characters in battle manga, especially shonen battle manga, are oblivious to the fact a girl is in love with them?”

Shizuka now understood what she was talking about. “Oh, now I see. Yeah, I never liked that.”

“I want to avoid that,” Akari explained. “My main character is a girl, first off. Second, I want love to be a key part of the story, although obviously it’s not the focus. Honestly, it might have to be a seinen manga depending on how I want to approach love and sex in it.”

“Well, if it’s a seinen, you’ll be able to get away with quite a bit. You don’t see girl’s boobs getting flashed in shonen magazines, after all.”

“You’re right. I mean… I’ve seen shonen with more violence than some seinen, though.”

“At the end of the day, it’s all about what you want to write,” Shizuka shrugged. “Demographics are just demographics. I could have easily run Break The Ice in a seinen magazine with very few changes, although that sex chapter might have been a little more… Explicit. Hell, even the target demographic of the magazine it’s in isn’t the be-all and end-all. I have plenty of adults who read my manga. You’ll probably find doujinshi circles who are selling parodies of Break The Ice here, both pornographic and not, and obviously, it’s generally not little girls making that kind of art. The fact that the two of us are avid readers of Uncontrollable Battle are also living proof of that. Obviously, we’re not young adult men, and yet we both love that manga.”

“Speaking of,” Akari then noticed. “I think there’s a circle over there selling Break The Ice stuff.”

“Wait, really?” Shizuka looked over and noticed that indeed, there was a doujinshi circle selling multiple R-18 parodies, two of which seemed to be of Break The Ice. “No fucking way. As soon as I said that…”

As she began to walk over, a shocked Akari replied, “Wait, you’re actually going over there?!”

“Duh. Don’t say my name out loud here, by the way.” She then walked up to the doujinshi circle, which was based at a desk with a small banner showing off a logo they had made, with a warning indicating their artwork was pornographic in nature and only meant for adults. “Hey there, guys.”

None the wiser in regards to who they were talking to, the man at the counter replied, “Hello. Are you enjoying Comiket so far?”

“I sure am,” she replied with a nod. “I see you got Break The Ice stuff here.”

“You’re damn right we do,” he replied as he pulled out a copy of each Break The Ice doujinshi the circle had to offer. “This first one is a fairly straightforward one where Ichigo and Kazuya have marathon sex. This second one is actually Taeko and Miwa having sex. We draw straight sex and lesbian sex, and we know plenty of fans ship these two, so we figured why not have them fuck each other?”

“Ah,” Shizuka replied with a nod. “Ichigo’s little sister and her best friend who’s three years her senior. Definitely an interesting pairing. I’m partial to those kinds of ships myself. There’s just something about when a little sister or brother gets a crush on their older brother or sister’s best friend that really appeals to me, within reason of course.”

“Hey, I get it,” he nodded. “We don’t put out stuff with little kids and adults. We do age gaps, don’t get me wrong, but the youngest we’ll do is age gaps with older teenagers and adults.”

“I don’t judge. Don’t worry. I’ve seen my share of, uh, that kind of art. It doesn’t phase me, honestly. How much for the two Break The Ice doujinshi manga, by the way?”

“It’s ¥450 for each separately, or ¥800 for both together.”

“I’ll get both together,” Shizuka replied as she passed him ¥800. He then handed the two doujinshi manga to her. “Thank you very much.”

“Have a good rest of Comiket.”

“Same to you.” Shizuka then began to flip through the pages of the Ichigo and Kazuya doujinshi, noting to herself the quality of the art. “Well,” she thought to herself. “He wasn’t kidding when he said it was marathon sex. There’s like forty pages here, almost thirty of which are just them fucking. Damn, and I thought I made them horny in canon.”

As she walked back over to Akari, she said to her boss in a stunned voice, “You actually bought doujinshi of your own story?!”

“Fuck it, why not?”

“Oh my God…”

“And no, I’m not gonna show you,” Shizuka teased her. “You’re not eighteen yet, after all. Go get your fix somewhere else. There are booths here that don’t give a fuck about checking IDs, and you could pass for an eighteen-year-old, honestly.”

“I’d rather not take that chance,” Akari replied. “I fear I’ll go to a booth that does require it and get kicked out.”

…

In the cosplay area, Shizuka was waiting in a line of people to get in and start taking pictures of the various cosplayers who had gathered, including Akari, who was getting quite a bit of attention already for how accurate and detailed her cosplay was. As she entered the area, she made a beeline for Akari just as two professional photographers packed up their things and left. As she did, she asked her, “How’s it going so far?”

“So far, so good,” she replied. “You’re like the fifth person to come up and get photos.”

“I know it’s not really professional,” Shizuka joked as she held up her phone. “But it’s the best I got. I’m an illustrator, not a photographer, after all. I draw pictures, not take them.”

“Fine by me.” Akari then pulled out the fake prop sword she had and began making poses for Shizuka to take photos of.

As she took photos of a third pose she did, Akari stopped and turned to find Kazu walking into the cosplay area, which also surprised Shizuka. “Wait a minute, Hori-san?”

“Hori-kun,” Akari asked him. “What are you doing here?”

“I managed to get in finally,” Kazu replied. “The line was a pain in the ass. I heard about some girl with a really good Mary of Truman cosplay, and when I saw a photo someone took, I thought it was you.”

“Indeed it is me,” Akari replied. “Wanna take photos?”

“Sure thing,” he said as he pulled out his own phone. “Are you guys enjoying the con today?”

“Yeah,” Shizuka replied as Akari got back into a pose. “Iwaya-san’s doujinshi circle is gonna be at a table tomorrow, so she won’t be with me and Kunugi-san at the Shimizu booth that day. Aside from that, though, all of us will be here all four days.” Both she and Kazu then both began taking photos of Akari before she struck a fifth pose. “Excellent, Kunugi-san!”

“Thank you,” she replied with a confident smile.

“You really should look into doing cosplay more frequently, honestly. You can pull it off pretty well.”

Kazu added, “Why not?”

“Maybe,” Akari replied before striking a sixth pose, with Shizuka and Kazu taking one last set of photos. With this set done, she then asked them, “Can you send the photos to me? I wanna post them on my PictoView account.”

“Sure,” Shizuka replied. “Honestly, it wouldn’t be a bad idea. It could expand your horizons a bit beyond just artwork. It’s always good to diversify yourself and not rely on just one thing.”

Another photographer then walked up to Akari, asking her, “Excuse me, would it be okay if I took some photographs of you? I love your Mary of Truman cosplay. Heck, I actually have a friend cosplaying Angel if you two wanna do some poses together.”

“Hell yeah,” Akari excitedly replied. “Bring him over!”

As the aforementioned other cosplayer came over, Shizuka asked Akari, “Are you two gonna do that pose from when Angel died?”

“Why wouldn’t we? It’s a huge meme in the fandom at this point, especially in America.”

“Of course, you are…” Shizuka joked, “Go on and be sure to give us plenty of emotional damage, Kunugi-san.”

“Oh, shut up. I cried a bunch when he died.”

“I can’t lie. I did, too.”

“Even I shed some tears,” Kazu admitted, somewhat embarrassed by it. “And that rarely happens.”

…

August 10, 2019

On the following day, Akari had once again dressed as Mary of Truman, although this time, she wore a more formal light red dress rather than her battle outfit. Meanwhile, Chieko was sitting at her doujinshi circle’s booth rather than at the Shimizu booth in the industry area. Because she normally was not good with people, a different woman in her circle handled most of the person-to-person interactions and sales, while she handled behind the scenes stuff such as opening up boxes and stowing away money.

Shizuka walked up to the booth and asked the woman at the front, “Hello. Do you have a sampler for your manga?”

“We sure do,” she replied as she handed Shizuka a small booklet showing the various doujinshi manga and fanart they had for sale. “Take a peek and tell us what you want, Hiratai-sensei.”

“Wait a minute,” Chieko then replied from behind the woman. “You knew the whole time?!”

“It doesn’t really matter if you guys know who I am,” Shizuka explained. “Besides, you already know Iwaya-san works for me and that we were both here yesterday, and it’s early enough in the day where there’s not a lot of people to even notice me anyway.”

“You got a point,” the woman at the front replied. “You’re actually our first customer of the day, hopefully of many.”

“I hope so, too.”

…

Later, Shimizu was hosting a panel for a series of announcements, and as everyone began to get ready, Shizuka set her stuff down at the end of a long table on stage. She laid out several folders and then turned to Kyosuke, asking him, “How much longer until we start letting people in?”

“Another few minutes,” he replied. “It won’t be too long of a panel today. Only about an hour.”

“How many questions are they gonna ask of me?”

“Only a few. The only authors that were available were you, Iwakawa-sensei and his wife, and Anzai-sensei.”

“That reminds me, actually,” she then remembered. “Would it be okay if I tagged along with Anzai-sensei to Anime NYC in November? I’ve never been to a convention in America, and I think it could help me grow my readership overseas.”

“Hmmm…”

“Please,” she replied, putting her hands together. “Can you let me, Hagino-san?”

“I’ll talk with the other executives and your editor about it,” he replied. “It wouldn’t be a bad idea, but you’d still be going to another country you haven’t gone to before, not to mention the fact that American conventions are pretty different from Comiket.”

“I get it. Is it too late to ask?”

“No,” he assured her. “I can squeeze you in if everyone’s okay with it. We haven’t even made the public announcement that Anzai-sensei is going yet, so we could add you to it.”

“When would that be?”

“We’re gonna announce it after Comiket, so you’ll get an answer from us in a few days.”

Then, a security guard near the front door asked Kyosuke up on stage, “Are we good to start letting people in?”

“In a few seconds,” he replied to him. “Once Hiratai-sensei and Anzai-sensei are all set, we can begin.”

Michi then walked over to the two of them, asking as he held a half-empty bottle of water in his hand, “Hey, do you guys know where I can get another bottle of water? I’m probably gonna go through this one pretty quickly.”

“Yeah,” Kyosuke replied as he jumped down from the stage and walked to a storage area nearby. “I’ll get a few more!”

Shizuka asked him, “Hey, are you okay? You’re going through water pretty fast.”

“I’m just really thirsty for some fucking reason.”

He then downed the last of his water. “This is like my fourth bottle today, and I’ve only been here about an hour and a half.”

“Holy shit. I know it’s hot out, but not even I’m chugging that much water. Hell, not even Kunugi-san is, and she’s in cosplay as Mary of Truman.”

“Yeah, I don’t know what it is.” He then sat down in a chair next to her. “By the way, tell her her cosplay looks great.”

“I’ll be sure to pass along the message. Today, she’s got on her light red dress instead of her battle outfit.”

“Nice. I don’t see a lot of people cosplay that outfit, so it’s good to see her mix it up.” He then sighed and looked up at a clock on the wall. “This is the first Comiket I’ve actually attended since 2014, surprisingly enough. I haven’t gone to any since the one you won the yearly contest at.”

Kyosuke then walked back over with a whole case of water bottles. “I got a whole case. I’ll leave it under the table. There’s twenty-four here.”

“Excellent,” Michi said as he got up and picked it up from Kyosuke before setting it down and opening it up, grabbing two bottles and handing a third to Shizuka. “I’m gonna be pissing like a racehorse when this panel is done.”

“No shit you are,” she chuckled as he walked back to his normal seat. Shizuka then sat down at her seat and told Kyosuke, “You can start letting them in.”

As Kyosuke hopped back onto stage, he told the security guard at the front door, “Okay, let them in!”

A stream of attendees then started to flood the panel room and fill all the chairs on the floor. Shizuka waved to them, thinking to herself, “I always love doing these panels and seeing fans. It motivates me to keep going, even on the worst days.”

…

Later on in the day, Akari and Kazu were having lunch together at a food court, with Kazu having made a sufficient haul of doujinshi manga, CDs, and even posters. “Check this out,” he said as he laid out three CDs he got. “I got two used copies of video game soundtracks as well as an indie game this one doujinshi circle just came out with today.”

Akari picked up the indie game and read its title and the name of the doujinshi circle who made it. “Hmmm… Is this a visual novel?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “It’s about a guy in high school who has to save his hometown from a secret alien invasion.”

“It says here it’s R-18,” Akari realized as she found an R-18 sticker on the CD.

“There are a few routes where you romance and have sex with a girl of your choice. Besides, I’m eighteen now.”

“Did you show them your ID?”

“They never asked for it, surprisingly enough,” he shrugged. “I did have to show my ID to get this, though.” He then showed her a book containing various pornographic manga one-shots. “This is a collection of seven parody one-shots from a few different series, all of which are R-18.”

Akari chuckled. “You really bought straight-up porn here? How are you gonna hide that from your parents?”

“I have my ways,” he insisted. “This, along with that indie visual novel game, are the first physical pieces of media I own that are R-18, actually. My parents will never know, or at least not until I’m a bit older anyway.”

“You’re playing a bit of a dangerous game by doing that. I hope they don’t find out.”

…

August 11, 2019

“So,” Shizuka asked Chieko as they both were talking at the Shimizu industry booth. “How did your doujinshi circle do yesterday?”

“We sold out on one of our parody manga,” Chieko explained. “And we only have about twenty pieces of merchandise left in total between everything we had for sale. We made out really well this year, better than we ever have before.”

“Damn, you guys made out like bandits.”

“Yeah, we did. How’s Kunugi-san doing?”

“I’m amazed she’s doing so well for being a first-time attendee,” Shizuka replied, impressed with how Akari was taking everything. “Usually, a lot of first-time attendees get overwhelmed with everything, especially if this is their first ever convention. So far for Kunugi-san, though, she’s had no problems. It’s certainly better than my first time here.”

Curious, Chieko asked her, “What happened on your first time?”

“I went during Summer Comiket in 2008. It was hot as Hell out, and I nearly passed out twice that weekend. I also got lost… Three times.”

“Three times?!”

Shizuka explained with an embarrassed tone of voice, “I got swept up in a line going to the West Hall when I was trying to get to the East Hall, which delayed me by a full hour. Then, I got lost trying to get out of the cosplay area after taking a bunch of photos. Finally, I got lost in the industry area on the last day of Comiket. Yeah, not my proudest moments…”

“That must have been terrible,” Chieko replied, feeling sorry for her. “I’ve never gotten truly lost here, thankfully.”

“Consider yourself lucky. A lot of people get lost at least once coming here.”

Then, a girl roughly around the same age as Akari walked up to the booth, timidly asking the two of them, “Um, hi, are… Are you Hiratai Shizuka-sensei?”

“Yes, I am,” Shizuka replied as she turned to see her. “How may I help you?”

“C- Can I get your autograph? I have a copy of Break The Ice Volume 1…” She then showed Shizuka the aforementioned manga volume, shaking a bit as she did so.

“Sure thing,” she replied. “No need to be nervous. I don’t bite.”

“C- Can I also, uh… Buy that Break The Ice art book for sale?”

“Absolutely,” Shizuka said as Chieko went over to grab a copy of a rather large artbook Shizuka had made based mostly, but not entirely, around Break The Ice. “You know, besides Break The Ice, it also had art I made of a few other manga published by Shimizu.”

The girl then passed Shizuka a ¥2000 note and the manga volume. “Here you go.”

“Thank you for coming along.” Shizuka then sighed the inside of the artbook before signing the inside of Break The Ice Volume 1. Once she handed both back over to her, she took the money and handed it to Chieko for storage. “It’s nice to see fans supporting me.”

“Th- Thank you!” The girl then bowed and walked away with the two books in hand.

“Wow,” Shizuka remarked to Chieko. “She was really nervous, huh? I could see her shaking.”

“She reminds me of myself,” Chieko replied. “It’s not as bad as it used to be, but…”

“You could be pretty nervous when we first met. I still remember seeing you shake a bit when the first meeting happened back at corporate headquarters.”

“Yeah, I know.”

…

August 12, 2019

All three of them, plus Kazu, had just returned to Shizuka’s apartment following the end of the final day of Comiket. Kazu and Akari both plopped down on a couch, remarking in unison, “Man, I’m so tired…”

“It was a pretty busy weekend for all of us,” Shizuka replied as she set down her luggage bag in her work room. “But I still had a good time. I’m looking forward to seeing what Winter Comiket will bring in December.”

“At least the heat won’t be bad,” Akari pointed out as she turned on the TV with a remote.

Kazu added, clearly the most tired out of all of them, “I don’t even know if I’ll be going to Winter Comiket. I think this past Summer Comiket was draining enough.”

“You say that now,” Shizuka chuckled. “But you’ll be looking forward to December in no time.”

“Speaking of later in the year,” Chieko then remembered. “Did you get a word back from Hagino-san about going to Anime NYC in November?”

“Oh yeah. Hang on.” Shizuka then ran to her computer and moved the mouse to turn it back on from sleep mode. She then opened up her emails and found that she got a new one from Kyosuke. Upon reading it, she turned around and told her, “Looks like I’ll be going to New York City, guys!”

“Hell yeah,” Akari replied with a fist raised. “Your first overseas trip!”

“Be sure to take a lot of pictures for us, Hiratai-san,” Chieko replied, eager to see what Anime NYC had to offer. “I’ve never been outside of Japan before, let alone to America.”

“Me neither,” Shizuka admitted. “This will be my first time going to a country beyond Japan, too. I’m excited, actually, not worried like I thought I’d be.” She then turned back to her computer and read the rest of the email Kyosuke had sent.

Hiratai Shizuka-san,

I am pleased to announce that we will be sending you to Anime NYC in New York City. I was able to arrange it over the course of Comiket after you had spoken to me about tagging along with Anzai Michi-san. We’ll be making the formal announcement to the public later in the month, as will Anime NYC itself.

Attached to this email is a detailed guide on how to navigate the airports you will be using as well as New York City itself. You and Anzai-san will each be given a translator to go with you, so you do not have to worry about not understanding English. You will both be doing autographs as well as the following panels:

A Shimizu Publishing House panel (both, to be held on Saturday at 3:00 PM)

A panel specific to Uncontrollable Battle (Anzai-san only, to be held on Friday at 7:00 PM)

A panel about shojo manga in America (you only, to be held on Sunday at 2:00 PM)

You will be allowed to set your own times for autograph sessions, as well as your own prices. The rules we have for autographs are as follows:

Only official merchandise of Break The Ice, including manga volumes, issues of Monthly Girl Step with Break The Ice in them, and your artbook

Blank autograph paper that we will issue you is also allowed

No photography with attendees

No audio or video recordings with attendees

No autographs, photographs, or audio and video recordings at panels

As of now, the plan is for you to leave Japan on November 13 on a flight from Narita International Airport to John Fitzgerald Kennedy International Airport, which will depart from here at 11:15 AM Japan Standard Time. You will check into your hotel as soon as possible after arrival. You will check out of your hotel and then board a flight going in the opposite direction that will depart at 3:25 PM Eastern Standard Time on November 18. It is important that you adjust any clocks you bring with you to the correct time zone, and to take into account the end of Daylight Savings Time in America earlier in the month of November, which will cause the time difference between the two time zones to shift back by an hour effective November 3.

In the coming months, you will also receive correspondence from Anime NYC itself in Japanese that will give you more specific information about the convention, such as where in the Jacob Koppel Javits Center, the convention center holding Anime NYC, our panels will take place and where within the center the autograph area will be. I look forward to hearing about your trip upon your return.

Hagino Kyosuke

CEO and CFO, Shimizu Publishing House