So, there's a whole thing about censorship lately in the Western world and there's one anime that meets these criteria for an idea: Shimoneta (or: Shimoneta: A Boring World Where the Concept of Dirty Jokes Doesn't Exist). There's another anime that I saw a while back where essentially what is considered a militia protects works called Library Wars. So, I started to do some thinking, what if in the world of Shimoneta there was a group of armed archivists – librarians – armed by those opposed to the current puritanical regime both foreign and domestic to protect the great works of both domestic pieces and foreign, imported works? How would this island of artistic freedom survive and interact with the surrounding oppressive (albeit polished) country around it? How do the employees live as a micro-society? Do they live on the property like some kind of apartment above a shop or some kind of compound? Do they commute like any other person in the city, but free from the control that Anna's mother's faction enforces? Are they extremely insular and all relationships limited to be inside of the group in order to protect that which they swore to protect? Does the pro-censorship government try to stage incursions constantly to destroy the last bastion of artistic freedom? There are many questions that can be brought up for this idea.
Since there are so many questions above, what was I thinking for this entry? Tanukichi Okuma is a secret operative of the Library Defense Front, an organization of citizens of Japan that prior to the Nishikinomya Faction came to power defected from the now-defunct JDSF with military-grade weapons to defend the last free Library in the country housed in the center of Tokyo. He is tasked with attending Tokioka Academy where the daughter of the Nishikinomya Faction's head, and childhood acquaintance of Okuma, is currently the student council president. He is tasked with either convincing Anna Nishikinomya to either turn her back on her mother and mother's faction or gather important information that will allow the Library Defense Front to overthrow the Nishikinomya Faction and return Japan to a free and open society as it was before. So, how will Ayame Kajou come into play? She's essentially a free agent not unlike White Climax but is seeking freedom for the populace not through subterfuge and political maneuvering, but through rousing the population up to revolt through exposure to the things they've been banned from seeing. Due to the LDF's desire to defeat the Nishikinomya Faction, Tanukichi sees no issue in allying with Ayame.
Title: [undecided]
Summary: Tanukichi Okuma is starting his first year at Tokioka Academy and while some may be able to pin him as the son of Zenjuro Okuma, he's a secret operative of the Library Defense Front tasked with either convincing Anna Nishikinomya to defect from her mother, or gather important information in order to defeat her mother's faction holding an iron, puritanical fist over the country. In the first exposure to the outside world, he's exposed to the lewd "terrorist" Blue Snow and her antics. How will he deal with an extremely sexually repressed Anna who has a yanderic crush on him and allying with a lewd "terrorist" while trying to undermine the current regime?
Rating: M for language and innuendo language as well as Anna's lewd antics.
Pairing(s): Sort of undecided at this time. Three ideas for this are Tanukichi (Okuma) x Anna or Okuma x Ayame. Or, could be a threesome of Okuma x Anna x Ayame. Again, at this time it is undecided.
Disclaimer: I own nothing other than my copy of MS Word and my desktop. Shimoneta: A Boring World Where the Concept of Dirty Jokes Doesn't Exist belongs to the appropriate rights holders, I only own this specific idea's iteration. See the forward for the full disclaimer.
XxXxXxX
"Do you understand the importance of this mission?" a man's voice asked.
The target of this question, a young man of Japanese descent, sat at a wooden table in a completely closed-off room with no windows or doors. "Yes," he replied. "I do."
"The fate of the Library depends on it. This is your last chance to back out."
"I accept the risk of this mission," the young man stalwartly replied.
That being said, the lights in the room dimmed and a projector whirred up. The other man took a remote and brought up a presentation. "As you know, twenty years ago technology advanced at an unprecedented rate allowing for innovative technologies allowing for wearable technologies to become commonplace and relatively inexpensive. With this came a neo-Puritanical push from the now ruling 'Purity Party' run by the then young, promised to be married, matriarch of the Nishikinomya family. Due to the state of the nation at the time and funding from borderline forgotten foreign entities that believed the same as them, they took office in the Diet as well as having many Prime Ministers as part of their party and were able to push through many laws and regulations that favored their stated goal of bodily purity."
"Abstinence," the young man commented.
The older man nodded. "While a noble idea on an individual level, many were against it as mandated law. Thus began the revolts." He paged past some pictures of the Nishikinomya family before their widely publicized wedding and daughter's birth to the violent riots some nineteen years ago. "It was around this time that the Nishikinomya faction started to push for book burnings of anything they considered 'unwholesome' and 'lewd.' It was at this time the first Chairmen of the Library Defense Front emerged to organize an armed resistance against the Nishikinomya faction. Thanks to inroads many had made in the Yakuza families as well as NATO countries, they were able to arm themselves with modern military hardware and equipment to protect the main branch library we now occupy as a sovereign nation-state.
"While we were able to protect much of what was in the libraries, as well as what was donated for protection, the same couldn't be said for the public." He next showed slides of the destruction of property that appeared in many JAV films over the years and many books, anime, and figurines being destroyed in large bonfires. Those that saw these leaked images overseas had made comparisons to 1930's Germany and a strange push in the west almost just as long ago for burning historically significant books because of 'problematic' things. "Those who didn't join up with the LDF were harshly persecuted and arrested citing 'public health' and much more. Your father was one of the men arrested for such things."
The man didn't need to page to a slide, mainly because he didn't have one of the events, but it was imprinted on the young man's mind. Ten years ago, when he was six, his father stormed up the front steps of the Diet building to protest the treatment of dissenters and to make the argument that this puritanical ruling was not natural or normal. That it was normal to appreciate the form of the opposite sex (and same-sex if they were into that) and to go against it was going against the natural order. His father had been arrested and sent to one of the many work camps hidden throughout the country that the regime used as 'rehabilitation camps.' He hadn't seen his father since then, not even a letter. It was only thanks to the generosity of the LDF was he given a home and cause to fight for.
"But all of this will change for us soon." He changed the slide again to show a woman with platinum-blonde hair that was borderline snow-like. "Your job entails gaining access to this young woman: Anna Nishikinomya, daughter of matriarch Nishikinomya. You are to either gain information from her by befriending her or flipping her to our cause, undermining her mother to depose her peacefully. We've lasted this long thanks to international support from countries like the United States and a show of force as a deterrence, but we wouldn't be helped if we go on the offensive; we only hold power on the defense. You know Anna Nishikinomya, do you not?"
"It's been a long time. Used to be childhood friends before dad got arrested."
"Use that, it will be your 'in' to get into her inner circle. Do whatever you must to gain her trust." He turned off the history presentation and the lights were brought up. Out of a manilla envelope, he pulled out paperwork. "Thanks to our contacts internationally, we were able to forge Peace Makers," he said as he pulled out the silver, wearable devices. "The work in every way like your normal, everyday Peace Maker however they have a custom Operating System that falsely logs language and 'lewd' hand movements. While you will still get warnings, they will not be reported. A custom TOR node configuration has been installed to securely transmit information back to HQ. Wirelessly pair it with a device to transmit the data to it. Codebreaking software has also been installed to brute force your way into most systems, but your detection possibility increases with heavier protocols. Be wary of use." The young man nodded. "Lastly, they have what was dubbed by the techies as 'nuclear reset,' if initiated this will overwrite the contents of the Peace Maker ten times to make data recovery impossible before loading the default operating system of the Peace Maker. It should be stated that this should be the last resort upon discovery. Many in the Nishikinomya faction will consider our actions as an 'act of war' on them despite them performing the same to us for over a decade."
The young man nodded and put on the devices and confirmed they worked.
"Lastly, your identification and papers," the man said as he pulled out an official ID card and passport.
The young man took them and looked them over. "Tanukichi Okuma. You're using my real name?"
The man nodded. "Considering that you have a connection to Anna already, it was decided on higher levels to go this route."
"And the fact that my father is a 'lewd terrorist?'" he asked.
"We've falsified your history since your disappearance ten years ago at the steps of the Diet building. Your mother had a sister living in Alaska where you've lived a 'pure life' as a rancher and applied to Tokioka Academy and passed their exam, both written and purity, with flying colors. Since you never renounced your citizenship, there was nothing for them to flag. As far as the government is concerned, you went on a long transfer to another school overseas promoting party propaganda to the Americans. They won't suspect a thing even with deep probing. You're a repainted white picket fence in their eyes."
"When do I leave?"
"Tonight. Gather your equipment and any personal effects that don't tie you to us upon inspection." They both stood up and the older man held out his hand to the younger man. "Best of luck, Tanukichi Okuma."
Tanukichi grabbed his hand and shook it.
XxXxXxX
The light rail rumbled along the tracks towards the next station. Tanukichi sat in his early-grabbed seat looking out at the scenery. As he did, he examined the lapel pin on his jacket – not unlike a member of the government, or Yakuza, would – it was the crest of Tokoika Academy: the school he had studied so hard to get inside of. The previous winter was hell. He left the Library in the dead of night in the middle of a planned brownout in the area which killed all surveillance for ten minutes. Long enough for him to enter the sewer and emerge blocks away. False footage would be uploaded to a building showing he emerged from it rather than the sewers. From there he went daily to the cram school to learn 'decency' and a month later, in the month of December, he would take the entrance exam which he passed with flying colors. It helped to be an infiltrator that knew all of the questions and how to think like their enemy.
'Everything I've trained for has come to this point,' he thought. To those that did glance his way, it looked like pride. 'Anna and I will be reunited. I wonder how she is now? Will she be different than I remember her?' He heard growling and gnashing of teeth and turned around to see a gorilla of a man gnashing his teeth. For what reason, he does not know. But it was making the woman in front of him extremely uncomfortable. To say it made him uncomfortable was a bit of an understatement. Mainly the gnashing of teeth and grunting. 'What is he doing?' he asked himself. The 'gorilla's' gaze was upon him. 'Why does he keep looking at me? Is he a legitimate pervert?'
"Hey! What do you think you're doing?!" an annoying female voice called out. "You've been touching my gluteus maximus!" This made Tanukichi cringe. The clinical talk was always that way with him, but he couldn't let it show; this was the norm of the 'outside world.' She was currently holding his hand as if it had touched her.
"I wasn't touching your glut… I mean, why would I need to do that anyway?" the gorilla of a man asked. He was clearly confused, the dumbfounded look certainly added to it.
"Isn't he a student at Tokoika?" a man asked while taking pictures of the event.
Another added, "He must not realize touching a woman is a crime."
'Well, touching a woman in that way, yes,' Tanukichi agreed internally.
"It's a PM generation, after all," the first man added. He must have been from the 'transitionary generation.' PMs, while around for twenty years at this point – or close enough to it – there were still the 'old timers' that remembered the 'before times.'
'But he was looking at me the whole time. It's a false accusation,' Tanukichi thought. He looked to the 'gorilla man's' PMs. They were custom-made. 'Only the upper echelons got this kind of special treatment, the plebs only get the basic model. I only got into Tokoika because of good testing scores and a falsified history. This guy's money. I can use this.' While he was all good for protecting the innocent, this was merely the means to an end. Having powerful allies would increase his mission's success rate dramatically.
Quickly, he shucked his jacket and tie and placed them in his messenger bag, and donned a do-rag. It did make him look like a punk, but he couldn't jeopardize his entry into Tokoika. Looking at his map, the next station was a couple of minutes away. He confirmed an escape route if needed. The tram slowed to a stop and the doors opened. Now was his time to act.
He approached and kept his hands visible the entire time. "Excuse me!" he said getting the woman's, the gorilla's, and the onlooker's attention. "Ma'am if he were to have touched you in such a way, his Peacemaker would have gone off. After all, Tokoika students are the purest in the country and would never do such a thing. But if you'd like I can escort you to the nearest station to make your report." He grabbed her hand without waiting for her response and pulled her out of the train. The doors closed at the precise time they needed to, preventing her from going back.
"Why'd you have to get in my way?!" she cried out. She grabbed his collar. "I was about to make good money off of him!" she growled.
'Knew it,' he thought. "I saved you from getting sued," he bluffed.
"What?" He now had her attention and released his collar.
"The 'gorilla' looked to be socially awkward at best, socially inept at worst. He comes from money, which is why I gathered you went after him. He had custom PMs, meaning he comes from money."
"Yeah-!"
"And if I were his family, I'd be recording everything he did to counter sue." This caused her to pause. He pulled up his wrist and wrestled a finger under one of the bands of the wrist PMs. "These things sense blood pressure, heart rate, neurological twitching in your hands to establish what you're doing. That's all fed into an algorithm to determine what you're doing and where you're doing it at with timestamps down to the ten-thousandth millisecond. Since you admitted to me that he didn't do it, he has physical, timestamped evidence to back it up and his family likely has lawyers on retainer. They'd sue you back for exponentially more than you would try and get out of him before court and lawyer's fees. Based on my estimates, tens of millions of yen leading you to lose everything you've ever worked to get." He started to walk away, "You're welcome."
Before he could say anything more, the woman shrieked out, "Pervert!"
'That motherfu-,' he thought thinking that the woman was going to pin the blame on him. But it was a different woman pointing towards a long-haired woman standing on the rafters of the elevated station. 'How did she get up there?' She was dressed in a long, white gown-looking piece of cloth.
"What do you think you're doing?" the girl asked.
"Passengers, please evacuate the station!" one of the conductors cried out. "Blue Snow has appeared!"
On cue she turned around and – sure enough to the news reports – she had a pair of panties on her face. "Big dingleberries!" she cried out gleefully. There was a deafening silence where you could hear a pin drop. It didn't las long before the passengers waiting for their connecting tram cried out in fear and started to run away. By this time, the local Morals Department personnel had shown up.
"Run for it! Don't get caught up in her terrorism!" the conductor called out, just as fearful as the rest of them.
"Cover your ears! Don't listen to her!" a Morals officer tried to calm the panicking populace.
"Cock-a-doodle-pussy!" she called out before laughing in the 'ojou-sama' manner, her hands making strange groping movements. "Oh, how refreshing it is to shout out dirty jokes in a public place!" She looked over to see the officers starting to crawl on top of the upper tracks and shouted to them, "Stay back! I wear nothing beneath this towel! If you make me struggle, I shall become buck-naked! Then anyone who holds me down will be blackballed for exposing a woman in public!"
She lifted the hem of the towel-dress above her knees highly hinting at that she truly was naked under there. 'Now I see her bluff. They're damned if they do, damned if they don't. Smart," Tanukichi complimented her.
"I demand liberty from oppression! Dirty jokes as a civil right!" She pulled out cards and fanned them out with one hand. "Farewell, bye-bye, until we meet again!" She threw them up in the air and the cards scattered all over the platform. A few curious onlookers reached out and grabbed them. Immediately they blushed and cried out in excited shouts.
Feeling curious himself, Tanukichi reached out and picked one out of the air. On the card was a photo, specifically one of a teenage schoolgirl in the 'sailor-style' uniform popular in the early to mid-2000s in anime except that she was missing the skirt showing pink panties and the hem of her blouse being much higher than her midriff. "What is happening?" he said aloud.
Before he could ask any questions, the girl leaped fifteen feet and landed on the platform with the grace of a cat right in front of him. "I'll handle things here! You don't want to be late for school," she mysteriously said before running off, laughing in the same 'ojou-sama' style as before.
"How do you know me?" he said aloud. He didn't wait and left the platform himself, using a left behind rope as a quick escape. He removed the do-rag from his head and used it as improvised gloves. Somehow the piece of material survived and he moved into an alley to change back into his uniform. The trip to school was otherwise uneventful, luckily, he was just one station away from his stop anyway. He entered and blended in, taking his seat in the auditorium.
The bell rang and as it did, he heard muttering around him.
"Hey, it's him…" one boy muttered to his neighbor.
"That guy from the school with the worst morals," the neighbor boy replied.
'Great, rumor mill already,' Tanukichi thought to himself.
"Come on, talk to him," one girl dared her neighbor. They say directly across the aisle from him.
"I'm not ready yet," her neighbor replied shyly.
'Fun,' Tanukichi thought.
"Representing the student body, your president, Anna Nishikinomiya," the principal announced over the speaker system.
"New students, congratulations on making it to our school!" the borderline unchanged voice of his childhood friend greeted. She had changed very little. Her hair had been cut more so to her shoulders and wore a black hairband which contrasted with her borderline snow-white hair. The only thing that had truly changed about her was… she had become her mother's daughter in appearance. Buxom and beautiful in every way. "I am so pleased to welcome you here today. My name is Anna Nishikinomiya. To all students, old and new, you must be rather nervous and excited at the prospect of coming here."
Tanukichi was rather conflicted. On one hand, he was impressed at where his childhood friend had gotten: to the top of the food chain. On the other, he'd need to either trick or seduce and turn her against her family. 'I'm not sure what to feel,' he thought. 'I should be excited to finally get to work. But does she even still remember me?'
The speech continued and completed as if it were an everyday affair. They had already received their class assignments and went to their appropriate classrooms. Once inside, Tanukichi pretty much sat by himself, the rest of the 'upper class' students avoiding him like the plague. After all, to them, he was a pity case. He read through the student handbook in an attempt to avoid the attention of his classmates on top of passing time when he was interrupted.
"Okuma-san. Okuma-san," a girl's voice said in an attempt to get his attention. He looked around but found no one. "Tanukichi Okuma," the voice said again, but it was coming from between his legs? Looking down he saw a girl in a lab coat that had purple eyes, bags under her eyes, and messy hair. "My name is Hyoka Fuwa," she introduced herself still between his knees. "I apologize for the sudden intrusion, but I have a question to ask you." She pushed forward which caused him to scoot his chair back. "Would you please tell me how babies are created?" she requested.
"Well, you know… it's in the textbooks, right? When a man and a woman love each other, it organically…" he tried to brush it off. Of course, he knew how it worked, but he sure as hell wasn't going to say it out loud when it could cost the mission.
"You speak in lies. As does society as a whole," she countered. "By using a vague and difficult to define term like 'love,' I doubt it is possible to explain the mechanics of creation."
'No shit,' he thought to himself uncomfortably.
"I wish to unlock the secrets behind reproduction," she insisted further.
'This doesn't surprise me,' Okuma thought. 'These kids are so sheltered that they'd likely set off their PMs looking at an old 1980s Sears catalog. Or seeing a Mormon woman's ankle being exposed. Considering their embarrassment, they likely know nothing about biology at all.'
"For many days, I stayed in front of the gynecology clinic and asked the pregnant women, 'How did you become pregnant?' But I received no answers and I was banned from the premises," she added.
'That wouldn't surprise me. Shocking that she didn't get a night in the lewd equivalent of the drunk tank.' "Really, now?" he asked. 'I have no idea how to answer her satisfactorily without getting myself expelled and arrested.'
"Since you're from the outside world, you should know," she said as she pawed at my shoulders, pulling herself up. "So please tell me. I wish to solve the mystery of pregnancy." She pulled herself up so she was looking him in the eyes and was at the height that if he wanted to kiss her, he could. "If it is difficult to explain verbally, I'll accept a demonstration-."
'Ok, she knows more than she's letting on and I can't tell if I'm being punked or not.' Before he could have any other trailing thoughts, something slammed into Hyoka's head which knocked her to the floor.
"Tanukichi Okuma, right?" another girl asked. Said girl was holding the bag on Hyoka's head. She had a very familiar voice. She had golden-yellow eyes and black hair, just like that Blue Snow persona he saw earlier. Except her hair was in a braid, unlike Snow's free-flowing locks. "I am Ayame Kajo. This is my second year at Tokioka. I am the vice president."
"Vice president?" he asked. 'This could either be really bad or really good.'
"We have nominated you as an intern with general affairs," she continued. "Will you accompany me to our meeting?"
"Y-yes!" he replied nervously. 'This could be it!'
"May I ask one final question?" Hyoka asked. Looking down, Tanukichi saw that she had her face right in his crotch. "I personally think pen-. Oops, that was close. I'll use euphemisms." She looked up, her bot breath on his groin. It was as embarrassing as one might imagine. "I think 'cucumbers' are the keys to pregnancy. What do you think?"
'I think you're right on,' he thought to himself. "You should ask your mother," he said quickly as he got up and walked with Ayame towards the student council room. He could have sworn he heard her mutter, 'But I already tried that.' It was one floor up and looked over the entire city.
Entering, Ayame took a seat at the table. The girl at the head of the table at the window wasted no time in greeting him and introducing herself. "Nice to meet you, Tanukichi Okuma!" Anna said cheerfully. "I am Anna Nishikinomiya of Year 2."
"Yeah…"
"I am the student council president of this school. Your acceptance to our school has been long anticipated."
"I wasn't doing any 'long anticipating,'" a familiar, gorilla-sounding voice said. Looking to her right side, Okuma's left, was the gorilla man.
"You!" Okuma exclaimed in shock. "What the hell're you doing here?"
"Don't swear in front of your senior," he chastised.
'Oh, if it weren't for the PMs you'd hear some unique swearing,' Okuma thought.
"I am Raiki Goriki. Year 3. I am the secretary-treasurer," he introduced himself.
'God, his mother named him perfectly. Wait… Goriki was his last name. Does that mean all of his family all have an unfortunate appearance?' he pondered.
"Well, then, let us get down to business, Okuma-san?" Anna continued the conversation.
"Yes?"
"Do you wish to join us in the student council to help protect public morality at this school?" she asked innocently.
'Ring-a-ding-ding. And that's my in,' Okuma thought. "Yes! I will! I'll protect! Thanks for the opportunity!" he replied with excitement.
"You're eager," Ayame chastised.
'Does she know-?' "But why me? I came from a school with the worst public morality score possible."
"That is precisely why we chose you," Anna replied. "Tokioka Academy is facing a situation never encountered before."
"What?" he replied, genuinely confused. 'Don't tell me there's another Op running by someone else.'
"What I'm about to say is highly confidential."
"Of course! I won't tell anyone!"
"In this city, designated purest in the nation, a masked terrorist known as 'Blue Snow' has been rampaging out streets. Public morality has been declining rapidly."
'So, there is another Op by a third party.' "I get the feeling I saw such a person this morning."
"And to make matters worse, it's very likely that the masked terrorist is a student at this very school!"
'This… is a surprise. Generalized teenage angst and rebellion?'
"We don't wish to ruin Tokioka's reputation. We wish to despise of her swiftly and confidently. However, it shames me to say this, we at the student council do not exactly understand what 'lasciviousness' is. So, we haven't yet developed a plan," Anna said as she bit her thumb. It was a nervous habit that many had. This really had to be eating her up inside. "Even I have crossed paths with Blue Snow but did not even recognize her being lascivious!"
"I had no idea how pure Anna's heart was!" Okuma complemented her. 'Mom and pop really pushing the agenda, huh? Keep her ignorant as long as possible.'
"Okuma-san! Since you have attended the school with the worst public morality, you must at least have a subconscious grasp of lasciviousness!"
'Well, she isn't wrong.'
"Please, join us to protect the morality of this school!" she pleaded.
'Now to play to her ego.' "I came to Tokioka Academy because I admire you, Anna. I wanted to be as close to you as possible. I wanted to be proud of myself! So, I would be honored to take on this mission!" Okuma said with bravado.
Anna nodded in approval. "Then Ayame-san, would you show Okuma-san what he needs to know?"
XxXxXxX
Tanukichi sat at the desk in his small apartment recapping his day, recording an audio log report. Thus far he had already recorded his experience of his first day up until his meeting with Ayame Kajo in the café run by an apathetic bartender.
"It was at the café that I was officially introduced to the persona behind the Blue Snow identity. To say I was shocked would be a slight understatement. I had my suspicion that the two individuals mentioned were the same person, and Anna's suspicions were not unfounded that it was a member of their own school. In keeping with my current identity, I tried to turn her in but was coerced into joining her little startup of an organization. I have no idea where this will lead me or if it will serve as a proxy to gain a better connection with Anna. If his mission is to succeed, I either need to turn her on her mother by seduction or siphon information that can be fed back to the Library. I'm going to keep on keeping on. I'll report other information as I come across it and will perform my weekly check-in every Sunday as previously discussed. Over and out."
He ended the file and sent it through the relay. By doing so the file erased itself after the file send was complete. Okuma laid down on his bed but found it difficult to fall asleep. He had a long road in front of him. A long, tedious road of subterfuge and lies.
'Am I too far over my head?' he thought as he was finally able to fall asleep.
To be continued…?
XxXxXxX
And that's all I have for this idea at this time. There are a few reasons why I may not touch this idea for a while, the main reason is because of the source material, and not for a reason you might expect. The only season of the anime only covers up to chapter 12 in the manga, volume 2 to be precise, and ends at chapter 23 which is volume 4 and is the "end" of the manga series. You'd think that'd be it then, right? Just run the road until the 23rd chapter? Well, there's a small problem with that. There are 11 volumes of the light novel series. But here's the real kicker: none of them are officially in English, and unofficial translators have only covered chapters 0-4 of volume 1 and chapter 1 of volume 5. I really do want to read the entirety of the LN series before I even go further than the anime or manga did because there's extra lore on top of character interactions that I may need to be aware of. The unofficial team is only 3 guys so this could take years. Hell, I could forget that this idea even exists by the time it officially releases. If you are interested in the unofficial series, the scanslators have it all over on the r/shimoseka subreddit with links to the Google Drive you can read it online for now. If you are a translator and want to contribute to the project pro bono, I'd reach out to the scanslators. I'm certain they'd welcome any help in finishing the project.
But yeah, out of everything, this is the main roadblock for this idea. I may write up other Shimoneta ideas but like with this idea, this will be the point at which I'll stop, and likely if I do go past the initial chapter, it won't go past the first season of the anime or past an alternate ending of the 23rd chapter of the manga. Unless, of course, more material comes out. I only have what can work with.
On to real-life things. Hopefully, you had a Happy New Year and all of you didn't party too hard. As for me, I had to work that evening so I didn't do much and stayed home. Wish I had someone to spend it with and maybe that will change next year. Who knows? Maybe my luck will change this year. As for personal projects, I've started the second batch of Applejack (for personal consumption) that I've ever run. So, we'll see how that works out considering once it's all done, I like to let it mature for a minimum of 3 months up to a year. My manga backlog… is still immense, my video game backlog has increased by 4 games and 2 DLC thanks to the most recent Steam sale. Apartment hunting is… going. I've finished reading the current release of Isekai Ojisan so I can't wait for the next release and the alleged upcoming anime adaptation. It's a great manga and I definitely recommend checking it out.
But that's all I have for now, see you in whatever I decide to do next.
