As appeared in Young You, January 1999.
Written by Takeuchi Naoko.
Translated by Kurozuki (manga@kurozuki.com). Version 1.01, 1.99.
Message Corner
Naoko: Everyone! Thank you so much for the fan letters!
Send me lots more of them!
Manga artists who are friends of mine checked out round 1.
To my manga artist friends and acquaintances and everyone in
the industry, thank you for reading it! I'm at peace with
Nakayoshi, as well.
My boss at Nakayoshi, Kappii, and my boss at Young You,
Saruko-chan, were classmates in college.
(Wow, that's an amazing coincidence! Or I wonder if Kappii
sold me out to Shueisha. How mean, Kappii!)
The postponed Sailor Moon creation art collection has been
set to go on sale in April of '99. Congratulate me! Buy it!
["creation art collection" is a loose translation. It more
precisely refers to a collection of the original drawings that
establish the design of the characters.]
Hiura Satoru: You've been pounded on by the rain, Take? And around where
were you picked up?
[HS is the author of such manga as Angel Blue and Paradise Cafe.]
Naoko: Back then, I had never been soaked through by the rain, being
in a taxi or a Porsche or a Ferrari, but since I'm currently
doing my life over again, even if the rain is pouring I do
things like go out to my place of work.
Queen Ichijou Yukari-sama:
The prince's face doesn't look anything like that. You big
liar girl!
Naoko: What!? But he looks like that to me!!
The subtle Yoshizumi Wataru:
The episode of your meeting with the prince wasn't like that.
[YW is the author of Marmalade Boy and other manga.]
Narration: And so, in round 2, it's...
Title: From the meeting with the prince to the present!!
What will become of Princess Naoko!?
Meeting Punch
Narration: One day in August '97, I was invited to a party hosted by
the Weekly Shounen Jump manga artist Hagii, Hagiwara
Kazushi-aniki.
[HK is the author of the manga series Bastard!!]
['aniki' means 'older brother', and in this context is an
affectionate but respectful suffix.]
Trustworthy Hagii-aniki:
I'm sure I could make my partner come three times with one
screw.
Naoko: Well then, I'll have to see once... Or not...
Label: The super-VIP corner of Hagii's, Hagiwara Kazushi-aniki's,
setting.
Names are shown around a table:
Itou Takehiko-sensei [Outlaw Star]
Hara Tetsuo-sensei and family [Hokuto no Ken]
Shibata Ami [Jiyuujin Hero]
Watsuki Nobuhiro-sensei [Rurouni Kenshin]
Princess Takeuchi Naoko
Prince Togashi Yoshihiro
Narration: The business card exchange began.
Drawing of a man in a black hat and glasses.
Comment: Wakkii, Watsuki Nobuhiro-sensei, from Rurouni Kenshin.
Drawing of a young girl in a sailor suit.
Comment: Yuuko-chan, the daughter of Hara Tetsuo, of Hokuto no Ken,
was doing a Sailor Moon cosplay
Narration: Only the otaku-ish man sitting next to me didn't give me a
business card.
Naoko: Umm... Are you a manga artist?
Yoshihiro: Yes, I'm Togashi Yoshihiro.
(I don't have a business card.)
Naoko: Togashi Yoshihiro!?
Narration: Togashi Yoshihiro is...
Comment: He often loses manuscripts, and runs away, and draws scary
pictures, and distributed free books at Comiket making six
million girls sob.
Narration: In any case, he's a legendary shounen manga artist!
Comment: I was terribly frightened.
Narration: Back then, when my boss for Sailor Moon who belonged to the
secret association B (whose official job is related to toys)
moved to work at Jump...
Naoko: Despite being at the age for marriage, I don't even have a
boyfriend, and I'm just drawing manga... It's too lonely!
Editor: I'll introduce you to one of the popular single manga artists
at Jump! Who would you like?
Naoko: I'd like Togashi Yoshihiro-sensei!
Narration: At the time of Yuu Yuu Hakusho, Togashi Yoshihiro was the
favorite of Ashi-chan and the others at my office. They were
all big fans. I love the alien manga Level E, with its pitch
black covers and appearance of spirit photos.
After that...
Naoko: Hurry and introduce me!
Editor: No! He's just playing games at his separate house in
Shimokita. I hear he's a game otaku, and a terrible
eccentric, and terribly dirty! You should probably give it
up.
Naoko: Just what kind of an eccentric is this Togashi Yoshihiro!?
A dog wearing a crown and glasses eagerly runs to her.
Narration: I pick him up unintentionally.
[As a bunny represents Naoko, the dog represents Yoshihiro.]
Training Punch
Narration: After he introduced himself, he wrote out a business card
right there.
Comment: On the back of a business card printed for Sanshin.
Written on the card is Yoshihiro's name and phone number.
Narration: While I was standing in the bathroom, before I knew it he was
gone.
Naoko: I wonder if this means he wants me to call him. Is this an
invitation!?
Narration: And so, as I was at an impasse with work, being on a
long-term vacation, I promptly called him up.
Yoshihiro: Sailor Moon? I've never seen the manga or the anime, sorry.
A sweat drop forms on Naoko's head.
Narration: I had plenty of free time before the serial, and Prince
Togashi Yoshihiro allowed me to study at his side. I'll
introduce him. My teacher is a super-popular shounen manga
artist at Weekly Shounen Jump, currently doing the very
popular serial Hunter X Hunter.
There is a self-portrait of Yoshihiro, with arrows pointing to
various parts.
Heading: Illustration of Prince Togashi Yoshihiro.
Arrow to hair: A little thin.
When it had grown halfway, he looked just like M Saki-kun.
Arrow to hair: He's called Prince because his hair style resembles that of
the main character of Level E, Prince Fool.
Arrow to glasses:
His broken glasses always held together with Scotch tape.
Arrow to nose: His hobby is using Biore pore packs and videotaping Downtown
programs.
Arrow to mouth: He often hums to himself tunes he made up.
Arrow to shoulder:
Stooped back and sloping shoulders.
Arrow to an origami crane in his hand:
His special skill is folding a crane in thirty seconds.
Arrow to hand: Beautiful white hands.
Arrow to a book in his other hand:
He subscribes to Uwasa no Shinsou, Sou, and GON!
*He has a habit of turning pages by flipping them with his
fingers.
Arrow to heart: He's just like the main character of Hunter X Hunter, Gon,
in that he has the evasive heart of a young boy.
Arrow to Yoshihiro's name:
His signature.
Warning: There are parts where the real thing is notably different.
Narration: We started with my training as a manager.
Naoko: Prince, so I can become a mature manga artist, be sure to
teach me.
Yoshihiro: Well, first we'll clean my room. Shall we go?
Comment: And with that he brought me there.
Naoko enters a very, VERY messy room.
Narration: A wasteland! It feels like a nerd's room after being
burglarized. It looks like Saru Matake's place in Matsumoto
Reiji's Otoko Oidon.
Yoshihiro: I'll give you a million to clean it.
Narration: He really is a prince! I wanted the million, so I thought I'd
go for it, but...
Since I couldn't begin to do it (I'm allergic to dust), he
used the million to proceed with his move.
Naoko: I became his guarantor. It was for my teacher.
Narration: The prince's new office building has a cleaning service that
empties the garbage when you leave it outside the door. There
are lots of restaurants in a separate building, and there's
even a bowling alley, a tennis court, and a billiard hall!
It's a super-high-class condo, just like a hotel!
Comment: There's also a pretty lady at the front desk!
Woman at desk: Welcome back!
Comment: I hear the star **nomoto **na**-chan lives there, too!
[The name is not given fully.]
Comment: A while back, the rent was so obscenely high I wasn't
able to afford a place here.
Naoko: He really is a prince! Wow...
Narration: Suddenly, it seemed there was nothing for me to do.
Yoshihiro: Well, next it's laundry!
(No, that's embarrassing!)
Narration: Jeans were scattered all over the floor of his room and
hallway. It's like he takes them off as he's walking. Like a
corpse...
Laundry was the job of the washer and dryer, so I had free
time! I happened to read a pre-sale issue of Jump, and was
overcome with a feeling of superiority. When I threw it away
after I finished reading it, the prince got angry.
Yoshihiro: Please don't throw it away! It's got my manga in it, so take
it out!
Naoko: So, how about I make something to eat.
Comment: My manager-sama and chief-chan often made me dinner. I was
such a trouble for them then.
Narration: Inside the refrigerator, there was nothing but milk puddings!
Yoshihiro: I live off milk puddings.
Comment: Morinaga-san, could there be a person who loves your milk
puddings so much here?
Narration: I bought some rice and cooked a rice meal for him.
Comment: I made a delicious meal.
Narration: He finished off half a liter in three minutes.
Yoshihiro: More!
Narration: In half a year, he had gained 10 kilograms.
Yoshihiro: Soon I'll be able to reach my maximum weight of 80 kilograms!
Narration: So that I didn't shatter the fans' image of him, I quit
cooking meals for him immediately.
Comment: What the prince lives off now: persimmon seeds.
Naoko: I've got it! A manager is the one who arranges all the
receipts and keeps the books.
Naoko tears through the account book in frustration.
Narration: Since I had never done it myself, I had no idea how to do it.
I had no choice, so I asked my dad.
Kenji-papa: Hey! Do your own before you do other people's!
Narration: He was upset.
Comment: Thank you, Kenji-papa.
Narration: The prince did it for himself.
Yoshihiro: I like calculating money!
Comment: In the summer, he was wearing a stick-on tattoo and was
mistaken by an accountant for a member of the Ya**za, so he
lost faith in them.
Narration: Everyone at Jump, this is why his drafts and manuscripts were
late. I'll be out of a job! Would he fire his manager!? Can't
I be of any help to him!?
I've got it! I still have experience as a shoujo manga
artist. I'll help him with his job!
Sailor Moon: Oh no! I had forgotten!
Narration: My training as an assistant began. There's one job I have a
special burning for. That's...
Naoko: Could I fill in pictures!
Narration: Filling in is another word for coloring.
An outlined picture is shown of the sailor soldiers.
Picture text: Fill-in
Color it as you please!
Narration: It's an item you must have in shoujo manga. Even if the manga
contents are boring, if the color pictures are pretty, it's
no exaggeration to say interested readers will become fans.
To master the prince's way of coloring, I studied it by
observation.
He draws outlines in black ink for one color.
He colors them with paints.
He spreads them.
But he colors it in.
He spreads them, mixes them, and they go outside the lines.
Naoko: I think it's kind of messy...
Yoshihiro: Yep!
He looks through one of her art books.
Yoshihiro: Your color pictures are pretty, Princess Naoko! What do you
use?
(*sniff* I'm using markers now, too. I want to draw lots of
color pictures.)
Naoko: I love fluorescent color ink! And gold and silver and beads
and glittery stickers...
Comment: These can't be printed. They kill the printer!
Yoshihiro: I'll buy some color ink too!
Narration: All of a sudden he ordered nine hundred colors!
Comment: He really is a prince!
Narration: No requests came.
Yoshihiro: Oh, a long time ago I told Jump I didn't need a job doing
color pictures. I just remembered now.
Narration: By just being an assistant for coloring, I lost my job.
Undeterred, I undertook the challenge of applying tone to the
one-color manuscripts of Hunter X Hunter.
Naoko: I just love gradation tone! For the chasm of the heart, for
the collarbone, for the lap... Sketch tone, flower tone,
water tone! I love tone!
Yoshihiro: I don't like tone. So don't put much on.
Narration: To support him, some excellent new manga artists were sent
from Jump.
Naoko: Wow! A young male Ashi-chan! I want to draw for Jump, too!
Narration: I had nothing to do! And so, after about two months as a
disciple, I had failed.
Yoshihiro: Since my serial has started now, keep studying on your own!
Narration: I became unemployed.
Retirement!? Punch
Naoko: Since I don't have any money left after having an office and
house put up during my time off, and I'm not busy, maybe I
should get a part-time job.
(Could I get a job that's both comfortable and profitable?
Drawing manga is just terrible!)
Yuta-P (Kodansha office chief):
If you're not busy, take a part-time job doing
phototypesetting at Kiss and Magazine for 500 yen an hour.
Naoko: Maybe I'll be a pharmacist, which I haven't done in a while.
Comment: Caution! I haven't prepared any medicine since I took the
national exam.
Naoko: Then I could prescribe poison to people I wanted gone! Heh
heh...
Comment: A long time ago, I gave my boss a very strong cold medicine
I made with the proper amount.
Narration: As I was wandering on the roadside in desperation, the prince
saw me and was unable to stand idly by.
Yoshihiro: Oh! You're a princess, Princess Naoko, so you shouldn't work!
(It's dangerous!) I'll support you!
Narration: The prince picked me up in earnest.
Naoko: What!? Then, you'll make me your bride!?
Yoshihiro: Yeah, sure!
Naoko: And you'll buy me a ring!?
Yoshihiro: Yeah, sure!
Naoko: But I like Cartier and Van Cleef!
Yoshihiro: Yeah, sure!
Narration: Marriage and retirement was my dream. Was the prince
serious!?
In June '98, following my great hope, I decided to retire
from being a manga artist.
Osabu: She does that often.
Naoko: Osabu, I'm going to be a bride!
Osabu: ...Did you finish your drafts?
Naoko: I'm retiring from manga!
Osabu: Sure, sure, hurry up with it!
Comment: Speaking of which, years ago I wanted to become an astronaut
and decided to retire from manga. I sent away for an
application, but I wasn't qualified.
Narration: Starting today, at last I'm training to be a bride!
Naoko: Since you'll support me, now I won't have to work for the
rest of my life!
Yoshihiro: Yeah, sure.
Naoko: And since my partner's a manga artist too, we can sleep in
late, and dozing off is fine!
Yoshihiro: Yeah, sure.
Naoko: Will you take me on trips abroad three times a year?
Yoshihiro: ...
Naoko: Will you buy me antiques, Prince?
Yoshihiro: ...
Naoko: By the way, when will we have the wedding?
Narration: As the prince was busy with his weekly serial, several months
passed. In October '98, in one of his fan letters...
Comment: Of the prince's fan letters, 95 percent were from girls. Many
were written on letter sets from Ribbon, Nakayoshi, Ciao, and
Sanrio.
Fan letter: Is it true you got married!? I'm shocked!
Narration: I discovered many saying that.
Fan letter: Congratulations! I didn't know.
Comment: I didn't know, either. No way!
Narration: In the submissions to magazines, too...
Magazine: Congratulations on your wedding!
Naoko and Yoshihiro:
What!? Why!?
Narration: In all kinds of suspicious books, too.
Magazine: There are rumors that the manga artist couple who made
megahits with one work have entered each other in their
family registers.
Narration: It couldn't be... It seems rumors were even spreading on the
Internet.
She punches the magazine into the air.
Yoshihiro: Princess Naoko!
He wears a pair of pants on his head, with their legs spread and bent
as rabbit ears.
Yoshihiro: Usagi-chan!
Comment: My white pajama pants by Vivienne Tam that I don't wear
anymore.
Just after finishing a manuscript, he's really tense.
Naoko: Prince, are you serious about making me a bride? Are you
lying to me? Do you plan to have a wedding? Will you do it
right away?
Comment: If I wait for the serial to finish, it'll be ten years. And
next year is my unlucky year!
Yoshihiro takes a bra and wraps it around his face.
Yoshihiro: Yeah, sure!
Comment: My beige lace bra made in France that I don't wear
anymore.
Naoko: So which is it? Are you serious? Are you lying?
By the way, Prince, what are your views on marriage?
Yoshihiro: We both keep our separate names, have our own incomes, and
don't interfere in each other's work. No children, no entries
in the register, no wedding ceremony, and we can both be
unfaithful.
Naoko: Just what is that!?
She punches him into the air.
Narration: And so, now in November '98 (as I write this manuscript),
Prince Togashi Yoshihiro and Princess Naoko are not married
or entered in a family register.
Naoko: Well, it's suitable, since I want to have a ceremony, and I
want children. I can be independent even if I'm not supported
by this guy. I'm single.
Yoshihiro: That means it's all right for me to go to a lingerie pub with
Hara Tetsuo-sensei!
Naoko punches him into the air.
Naoko: You're inviting a married man!
Narration: The prince has tremendously high social status, and loves
manga freely. I sensed the difference in position, and
decided to pull myself up.
Naoko: Jeez... I just got to dream a little. I'm back to the
beginning, as always. I like reading more than writing, since
it's easy. I don't have any will-power, anyway.
Narration: And my dream of marriage and retirement was shattered, I
didn't have any money, and I wasn't busy, so I decided to
start working on manga again like this.
Yoshihiro: Yes, yes, you should draw manga, Princess Naoko.
(Then you can buy antiques yourself!)
Naoko punches him into the air.
Naoko: I will buy them!
Narration: Of course, I love manga freely too. Someday I want to become
a mature manga artist like the prince.
Naoko: And so I set out on a new journey for training.
Narration: But, since the prince is like this...
Yoshihiro: Princess Naoko!!
He stares at her weepy-eyed.
Yoshihiro: Ore to ko sa yome kite kero! Ore to kekkon shikero! (Honki
da sa ge!)
Comment: Translation:
Please be my bride! Marry me! (I'm serious!)
Narration: The prince is an alien... with alien language!?
They kiss.
Report Punch
Narration: And so, on the auspicious day of Wednesday, January 6, 1999,
Princess Takeuchi Naoko will become the bride of Prince
Togashi Yoshihiro, kero!
(It's Yamagata dialect.)
Naoko: One month left until the ceremony. Right now I still haven't
decided on a wedding dress! Would anyone help us out with the
wedding?
(Please help! *sniff*)
Comment: In December, I feel like I'm looking into Hell!
Yoshihiro: Since I'm going to have to get married, right now I'm going
to go to a fashion health club one last time! Yes, and a
cabaret club, and the Abeno building in Osaka!
(It's a building with lots of customs!)
Naoko: Prince, what was your New Year's resolution for '98?
Yoshihiro: To stop jerking off and going to adult shops.
Naoko punches him.