IV. A to Z: Chiefs, Editors and Oneshots

Headquarters, Old man and Seria’s main office.

Modern Earth, 20xy - 3weeks

The usual ‘meeting ongoing’ signage of a certain room was replace with ‘deliberation ongoing’. The meeting room of their office was filled with people, from high positions to the senior and junior editors. The number of employees at their publishing company were not exactly comparable to those of the corporate ones but still the overall employee count exceeded a hundred. But regardless of the count the several selected people were only allowed to attend the meeting.

“I really think girl x’s work is far more superior”

“But I root for boy x’s work.”

“This man’s work seemed to have more potential in the long run”

“We need a huge impact right at the very first chapter.”

“Hey… Isn’t this work nice?”

The room was filled with several voice coming off together at once. A person who’s not used to being within a noisy crowd or someone who have sensitive hearing won’t last for even ten minutes for these storm of words and ideas.

For what reason?

The projector facing the screen were flashing several titles and front covers and their corresponding authors.

“Come on guys, we won’t get anywhere with everyone talking at the same time.”

The one seated at the center of the room at the back of the projector was the editor in chief. The man did not really need to have himself look like someone at a higher position. With just a white t-shirt and a dark blue blazer on top with matching slacks and formal shoes, his looks really did not match up with his role. But even so the way he looked was too dignified and composed that just by seeing him as he sat at the chair, you would immediately know that whatever he says will impact everyone at the room in an instant. That’s just how strong and experienced he looked was.

“But Chief can’t you see everybody had been so gung-ho about this discussion, won’t it just hurt to let them be just for a moment?”

Seria talked. She was sitting beside the editor in chief. There isn’t really a position called assistant editor-in-chief on their team. It was just the juniors and the seniors. But the way she spoke to her superior was like they were buddies from way back.

“The point is. It’s been an hour since we’ve started this deliberation. And we’re getting nowhere.”

“Oh, it’s an hour already?” –Seria asked and checked her wristwatch. “Oh yeah.”

CLAP CLAP CLAP!

“Okay guys! We’re getting nowhere! I guess we should wrap this up already, boss’s orders!”

Seria shouted inside the room. The meeting room should be almost sound-proof from the noise being produced inside but her loud voice stood out that it was even heard at the other rooms right next to it.

“Here you go again, senior Seria, we still haven’t finished discussing.”

“As expected of the boss, to even have Seria under his command.”

“Now now, she’s just acting professional and shush!, keep quiet what if she hears you?”

“At least we should narrow it down to a few choices, we really got nowhere since we’ve started.”

There were several more sentences that followed Seria’s loud command. As a senior, she was only supposed to follow what her lead have asked but it escalated the situation even further. And even though her seniority was her one of distinctive traits at work, what the group of brainstorming editors have to do still didn’t changed.

“Well, at least you had your say.” –Old man sitting beside her told her after she got embarrassed.

“I’m quite not satisfied, do I need to repeat that? Say it chief.”

“Ah, no need. At least they’re aware of the urgency. I mean, we could still do this all day. It’s just the earlier we finish the more work will be finished. Having a definite goal prevents the discussion from going into circles.”

“That’s why we’re here at the very first place.’ –Old man murmured.

“Well being the one with the most experience here, Seria, what do you think?”

“Eh why me?”

The team members that attended the deliberation were still noisy and discussing continuously. The Chief’s volume was very minimal that it should not catch the attention of most of them actively participating at the discussion. The only ones who have heard should be Seria, Old man who was sitting beside Seria, and the ones near them that were focused on the Chief’s words too.

Seria was so startled that a very important decision had been pressed to her by her only superior at that room. It should be a unanimous vote between her and her fellow editors but the request came too sudden that it caught Seria off-guard that’s why she couldn’t answer immediately.

“Err… Hmmm. If I were to say, what genre was the previous winner?”

“Fred’s work was a shoujo.” –Old man, being the editor of the author in question, answered.

“Oh, a shoujo, huh?”

Seria looked upon the entries listed at the projector screen again. She seemed to have been picking the best and the best one an editor could defend given the situation. The room fell silent. The juniors and even the other seniors put their attention to her.

“I think we should go for that one then.”

Seria pointed out that one entry that least stood out. The whole room went silent and looked at her.

“May I hear your reason?” –The Chief asked her.

“I mean have any one of you guys read the oneshot?”

Everybody wondered what Seria had been talking about. She and the Chief was the only one that had calm faces.

“Yea that’s a gore action with romance.”

“The story is good, but the brutal parts were too exaggerated.”

“I really think the author of this was depressed. She would need someone to talk to first.”

“I really don’t think we need a gore serialization at this moment.”

“That’s right, getting a ‘just good’-plotted action gore won’t benefit us and the author at this moment.”

“Are you serious, senior?”

There were several opposing reactions, the others remained silent and thinking what have made Seria chose the one being on the least pick. Old man was scratching his head too, before being promoted to a senior spot he was Seria’s junior so he should have known how her thought process works, but that’s not the case. Even with the years they’ve been through Old man still could not assess which was which.

But at some point he realized something:

Why did Seria asked the genre of the previous work that won last year?

“You can’t mean…”

“Well, I guess we’ll go for that one then.” –The editor in chief agreed with Seria.

“EH?!!” –most of the employees at the room shouted in surprise.

The chief had decided, all that was left to do was to explain why it was chosen. Seria was the one who pointed it out. It looked like a biased decision. But just because Seria and the chief were quite close colleagues that goes back years ago didn’t mean the chief’s decision was favorable of her. She needed to explain back her explanation up with something that would make the other guys at the room agree and realize that the oneshot was worth the win.

“Well guys you’ve been looking at the story on the wrong side. That’s not a gore, that’s a shoujo. Or rather, it’s a gore that was originally written for the sole purpose of being a shoujo. I wonder comes of the mind of its author?”

There was a brief silence, then followed with a huge “EEEEH?!!” of the startled editors.

All the chief needed to decide was something that would shock the whole meeting body that was currently inside the room. What he based the decision upon was simple: if the editors who have keen eyes on mangas would be surprised, what more for the readers? The reaction was natural for Seria for she was the one who have noticed it first. He knows of Seria’s vast experience already so he fully trusts it. She was an exception from exceptions.

The deliberation had been concluded that very moment. The long work then follows.

“Well, let’s proceed. Who will be in charge of contacting Anemone-sensei?”

---

“It’s been a while we’ve had a talk like this since you got promoted at a senior position.”

Seria took a sip at her cup of coffee. She was talking to Old man. A whole day of straight work would be tiring, even for the best employees around the world. That’s why there had always been allotted break time for a long day of hard work.

Seria was the one that invited Old man for a cup of coffee.

It was a long day. The separate tasks have been assigned to the respective employees that will handle them. After the long deliberation to determine the winner of the annual ‘Fresh Aspirants’ manga competition the Chief finally adjourned the meeting. Several members went back to their stations to continue their work, some went for a break. The two of them took theirs too and went to the nearest coffee shop just a few minutes’ walk from their office.

“Well I’ve been assigned to authors here and there right after each other. What can I do?”

“Well, at least you’ve learned lots of experience.”

“Also why do you make it sound like it really is a big deal to you? What does it make you after not being with me for a long time, you’re not my mistress?”

“Wha—?! Oh, please don’t get too full of yourself.”

“Just kidding just kidding.”

Old man smelled the hot vapor coming out of coffee.

Their hot coffee had a complementing effect to the cool environment of the café. The place was filled with the smell of freshly brewed coffee ordered by the customers. It really should be a nice place to cool off one’s head and have a nice long chat with others.

“So how’s your author lately? What was his penname again?”

“Oh, Maou Spence-sensei? What could I say?...”

Old man gave a pause for a while.

“Ugh…”

“That… really doesn’t sound like he’s doing good..”

“Well, it’s been almost months since his last release. They’re managing, him and with his team I mean… But they still hasn’t passed something which I could approve.”

Old man were open to talks like this, he had always been. He tries to talk as much as he could about the situation of the authors he’s been assigned with, but also at the same time did not let others influence his decision making too much. Still, he tried to get as much advice as he could from his seniors.

“Well he had passed a draft a few weeks ago. It’s okay to be published but I still rejected it. He’s aiming for a long serialization so I thought I should only approve something that’s within the levels of his ‘fresh aspirants’ winning entry. I wonder what happened? He wouldn’t ever want to serialize that series yet he could not produce something at least comparable to it.” –he further explained.

“Sigh… I see now. Will you get angry at me if I say ‘you need to find out why your own’ like those of the shounen mangas you’re reading?”

“No.”

“Okay then, But in any case I kind of forgot your author’s story already it was a year ago. Could I borrow a copy of his award-winning oneshot?”

“I still have a copy at my desk, you could read it later.”

Well it’s not like I’m just gonna sit here and watch my junior make mistakes one after another. Well I guess I’m going to take a bit of action myself. I got some free time anyways.

Seria thought as she continued to sip at her coffee. That was a statement she could not tell Old man on the fear of wounding his pride as an editor. She had decided that if she had to take some action it would be better to stage up something that will trigger some events that would make Old man realize which parts he needed to learn and grow, without ever telling him about it.

But at least she had to give advice too that it won’t be obvious that she’s not been doing something.

“Well I think it would take some time for the author to make something comparable to an award-winning piece so I could advise you to have him take sure little steps first, if you were to ask me.”

Old man finished his coffee. He’s not the type to savor a cup of coffee towards its very last drop.

“You see it troubles me that he’s still not serializing something months after he dropped his LN* adaptation. Well it’s not like I should rush him. Sometimes I wonder if I were to blame and should change the way I handle him.”

“For now you should stick to your trusted methods.”

“Is this the real reason why you asked me to have a long break here?”

“Not really, I just want to enjoy a cup of coffee that’s not the free one at the cafeteria. Also the office is too crowded, it stresses me. I just want to see a clean and tidy environment for a while.”

“Signs of aging.”

“Shut up. Besides. I’m troubled. Anemone-sensei might be assigned to me.”

Seria looked troubled. In fact, it has been a while since she was assigned to a new author and she’s not used to handling new authors anymore. After being a senior which was ages ago, Seria had always been assigned to experienced writers with ongoing long serializations. Those were not at the country’s top charts but still mangas with considerable reader base and were often hot topics all over the internet forums.

In short Seria was troubled that she might not be able to handle newbies anymore.

“Why? You’re the only one that noticed the story at a different perspective than the others. Oh that doesn’t count the chief. Don’t you not like it?”

“We still had no assurance though. It was just how I’ve looked onto her story. Yes I’ve found it amusing but I just based my choice from the results last year. Maou Spence-sensei wrote a shoujo so I thought it would be nice to select something that is a complete 180 of the previous one. Not saying that that’s my only basis, but I really felt that it would sell great for a long time.”

“Woman’s intuition, huh? Good thing if I would have that too…”

“UWAH!—” –Seria suddenly looked disgusted.

“No no! Tha-that’s not what I mean!!”

“I’m kind of worried about your wife.”

“NOOOO!!!”

Seria stood up while holding her coffee which was still not finished. It was a paper cup though so a take-out was possible. She seemed to just have been waiting for Old man to finish his. She readied herself to return to work and return to her usual work tasks. It pains her that she couldn’t just spend time at the coffee shop for as much as she likes.

“Let’s go. I don’t want to be charged with overbreak by the chief.”

“Oh, you’re right.”

The two left the coffee shop and headed back to their office.

---

It’s been almost an hour since Seria and Old man left the office. After all the hurrying back towards their office, they still did overbreak. As soon as they entered their area, Seria immediately rushed towards her station and found herself a comfortable spot at her seat.

But right after seating a colleague immediately appeared at her back and called for her.

“Seria the chief has been requesting for you.”

“Ugh…”

Seria felt like was struck by a lightning. Just like a kid that’s about to get scolded by her parents, a shiver went down her spine.

Was it because of the overbreak? Or was it because I’ve made a mistake on choosing this year’s oneshot award winner?

Seria couldn’t help but get anxious. Either of the two would produce negative impact on her performance as an employee. Whether it would be the first reason or the second reason she would need to have to explain it to her superior. Somehow Seria had develop a tendency in which she would be afraid of her direct superior at work so she would always have to provide only and only positive results.

“Te-tell him I’ll be there in a minute or two. I just need to take a deep breath.”

‘A-are you okay?’

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Then if you say so…”

Her colleague left.

Inhales…

exhales…

“Okay then.”

---

“You called for me?”

Seria said as she peeked at the door of the Chief’s office.

The Chief’s office was not really far away from the aisle which the editor’s stations were located. It would just take a few seconds of walk and you could finally reach the door. There had been a very few person who usually enters the room. The Chief himself, those at the higher ups which would probably have business with him, his very few colleagues at the office that he could treat him as a friend, and those he asked to go to inside to have a ‘little chat’ with.

“Yes, also what took you so long outside? You could’ve just ordered a takeout.”

“Hehehe… We’ve been talking about the author from last year’s annual oneshot contest. Seems like he’s having trouble on his next serialization. We had a good time talking then we didn’t noticed the time.”

The chief’s attention had been diverted.

“Oh, Maou Spence-sensei, huh? Actually the thing I’ve want to talk to you about was other agenda.”

Seria had it coming. She was free from a heavy workload and didn’t had any authors assigned to her at the moment so it would be a good choice to have Anemone assigned to her. Also, she was the only one who had looked at Anemone’s work thoroughly and interpreted it on a different approach. The best course of action would be to have a very good experienced editor to handle the job. Seria could be classified on both of the latter two.

“I want you to be Anemone’s editor.”

The chief cut to the chase.

“But why me? Aren’t we letting the juniors handle new authors so that the growth of experience will be simultaneous?”

“Well what you said was true. But I think we got a bit of a situation here. I’ve actually talked with Anemone-sensei via phone. And…”

“And?...”

“I think she had a bit of a screw loose.”

“Okay count me out.”

Seria immediately backed out of the offer, pushing to the chief that she did not want to associate herself with an author with a high-class brain damage.

“No no no wait! Listen to me first. I knew you’re the only one I could entrust this with…, I trust your experience too.”

“Hey did you really think I was some nurse at a mental hospital? I didn’t applied for this spot to babysit a screw loose.”

The chief was getting too pushy. It was an indication that he’s thought about it over and over and Seria had been the only option left. He’s exhausted all his options.

“Besides, there could be a possibility that what you’ve told us at the meeting room was true. When I spoke to her she just kept on talking and talking about idolizing Maou Spence-sensei’s work. The girl was a real nutjob and a hardcore fan at the same time.”

“Then all the more reason why I should reject!”

Then suddenly there was a spark at Seria’s eyes. She looked like someone who’s found something that would work up her dormant brain due to inactivity for a long time. She felt like all the puzzle pieces had been put into order, the only thing left would be to put them into their rightful places.

“Chief I have an idea.”

“What is it? Somehow I don’t feel comfortable, hearing that from you. Just don’t put the company out of business with it.”

“You still remember him right? The fooly of an assistant which I’ve had three years ago. He recently got promoted to a senior role. And such coincidence, he’s the editor of Maou Spence-sensei right now.”

The chief was surprised. The proposition was still not complete. He could try to guess out the many possibilities Seria could introduce to him, but he immediately got what Seria was trying to point out. And it was not something that gives a sure win.

“You can’t mean!”

“Yes, this would be my proposal, since I’m quite interested in this ‘Maou Spence-sensei’ too.”

Seria threw a bunch of papers at the Chief’s desk, it was a pile of papers which was supposedly a oneshot. It was Fred’s very first work, which have fetched him the mangaka career he had pursued.

“A senior editor needs to grow in experience. What if we have him handle Anemone-sensei and I will be the one to handle Maou Spence-sensei.”

“You…”

The chief went quiet at first, and after a few seconds of thinking he spoke again.

“Are you saying your fooly of an assistant would be able to handle Anemone-sensei, and trigger a growth for himself? This is a heavy bargain. What are the odds of producing best results?”

The chief assessed the situation and asked Seria the odds.

“To be honest, I don’t know. This was just one of my hunch. After comparing the works of the two, I’d like to put my bet on Maou Spence-sensei. Not like there had been much of a huge difference in talent, but I really feel like I could wring him out of an even greater potential. Just a hunch.”

“I see… And what about him being assigned to Anemone.”

“I trust him to overcome this. Even though he was a fooly of an assistant which I’ve had. I’ve poured on every drop of learning I could onto him. That’s why he got promoted in no time. He could manage on his own.”

“That’s quite irresponsible.”

Seria was just being honest. It was just a coincidence that Anemone had a shocking characteristic that got revealed and she had no intention to push the burden of a responsibility towards Old man, but initially she really intended to have him gain experience which he had not yet gained while he was Fred’s editor. She knew it would be fine and Old man would be able to manage. That’s how he trusts him too much.

It was just like being in a sports game, being at an ‘away game’ would lessen chances of winning, but it was always the experience that’s being counted. After all, you miss the opportunities you don’t take.

“Tell me we aren’t gambling on this.”

“We’re gambling... But I’ll produce results… Whatever it takes…”

The atmosphere within the room became too tense due to these two high-positioned and experienced beings began talking about a serious topic that would have a huge impact on their company’s future all of a sudden. It was a good thing that they were the only ones at the room that time. It’s not like they should keep it under the table since it was a move that had only been discussed by the two of them. It’s just that if ever there would be others at the room they doubt they would be able to keep themselves in track of what they’re discussing. They won’t need to.

The only one to keep what they have discussed from for the time being would be Old man, who would later on be struck by the sudden change and will have to adapt.

“For starters we would need to process the proper documents and email materials to be sent to Anemone-sensei. I would entrust that to you. Leave the talking to your fooly subordinate to me.”

Seria picked up Fred’s oneshot lying at the Chief’s desk and raised it as to emphasize her statement to correct him.

“That’s a senior editor now.”

“Oh, right.”

Seria then prepared to leave the room but the Chief forgot to tell something.

“Oh right, one last thing…”

Seria knew what he had to say so she tried to talk to him one last time. She was still hoping she could escape it somehow.

“…Can you lift the sanction… please?”

“No. write a memo of the overbreak and mail it to me. You only had today.”

“uuu… fine…”

Seria dejectedly left the room, but she peeked again to follow up something.

“You know, you’ve changed a lot, since the first time I was accepted here.”

“Trust me, stress handling and repeated instances are the key.”

“I really think we should gather up again every once in a while, our group.”

“You know that won’t happen.”

The expression between the two changed, from joking to serious.

“But in any case, just us here, we could gather up and pay a visit.”

“Right, I’ll arrange a meetup.”

Seria didn’t said anything more. She left the room.