Hayashi Aoyama reached into the "hard-drive" of his mind, sifting through the high-definition files of his memories for the final scenes of Edgerunners.
The Diamond-grade ability [HDD Memory] had transformed his past into a digital archive. As long as he didn't proactively delete the files, his recall was absolute. Every frame, every line of dialogue, and every subtle shift in the animation from his previous life was ready to be retrieved.
He picked up his pen. He didn't bother with thumbnails or sketches; his hand moved with a terrifying precision, sketching out the final layouts directly onto the Bristol board.
The despair of facing an invincible enemy. The agony of losing a sister-heart. The sacrifice of one life to ensure the survival of those who remained. And finally... the quiet, defiant dignity of the end.
With his Master-level [Artistic Kaleidoscope] and the perfect blueprint in his mind, Aoyama was able to replicate the stunning visuals of the Edgerunners finale with perfect fidelity.
But as the familiar faces took shape under his pen, his eyes began to sting.
Even after seeing the ending a dozen times, the sheer tragic weight of it still hit him like a physical blow. The helplessness, the fury, and the beautiful, crushing irony of "The City of Dreams" never failed to break him.
But regardless of how he felt, the story had to be finished. The masterpiece required its crescendo.
Once the sketches were complete, he moved into the color phase.
His Gold-grade ability [Color Encyclopedia] allowed him to mix the perfect shades from his base pigments with a single flick of his wrist. Rich, vibrant colors began to flood the pages.
The terrifying silhouette of Adam Smasher. The vibrant, chaotic energy of Rebecca. The weary, steady hand of Falco. David's final smile. Lucy's haunting isolation. And finally... the Moon.
Each character and each location appeared on the paper as if it were being projected from his soul.
When the final panel was complete, Aoyama's hand gave a single, involuntary tremor.
'Damn... drawing that was harder than I thought,' he muttered, leaning back in his chair.
Deep down, he knew he was just a translator, a "Script-Stealer" bringing a masterpiece into a new world. He wasn't the original creator, so he lacked the stone-cold detachment that some authors developed. He still felt the pain of his characters as if they were his own friends.
Even the original author must have felt a pang of regret as they executed their own cast.
Unless you were like "that woman" who seemed to despise her own protagonists, or "that man" who took a sadistic delight in the suffering of his fans. Aside from those few outlier monsters of the industry, even the most "cruel" writers (the ones known for their "butcher" reputation) usually felt a deep, abiding love for the characters they broke.
The only work remaining was the lettering and the speedlines.
Aoyama took a deep breath, trying to steady his nerves as he reached for the screen-tone.
But halfway through the final sequence...
Ding-dong...
The doorbell chimed.
He froze for a second. There were only two people who ever came to visit him unannounced: Akane or Ayumi.
He stood up and walked toward the door. He wasn't on a tight deadline, and since he wasn't a "true" creator, he didn't have the ego of someone whose "artistic flow" was being interrupted. Besides, he welcomed the distraction from the tragic panels on his desk.
Pochita slunk along behind him, his chainsaw-tail wagging with a cautious curiosity.
Aoyama pulled the door open to find Akane standing on the landing.
"Akane. Good afternoon," he said with a tired smile.
Akane looked at him and immediately froze. Her eyes locked onto his, widening with alarm.
Usually, Aoyama was a beacon of boisterous, optimistic energy. He was rarely down, and she'd never seen him even remotely close to tears.
But now... his eyes were unmistakably red and puffy.
'Is he... crying?' Akane's heart hammered against her ribs.
Television and manga were full of stories where people with amnesia suddenly regained their memories in a flood of emotional trauma. Cliché as it was, she couldn't help but fear the worst.
'Did he remember? Did the 'Kento' side of him finally wake up?'
"Aoyama-kun... what happened...?" her voice was a thin, trembling thread.
"What? Oh, is something wrong? Do I look weird today?"
Aoyama rubbed the back of his neck, completely unaware that his tear-reddened eyes had sent Akane into a spiral of existential dread.
"You look like... you've been crying," she whispered, her eyes searching his face for any sign of "Kento."
"Oh, that."
Aoyama touched the corner of his eye, feeling the dampness that still lingered there. The finale had gotten to him more than he'd realized.
"I was just finishing the final chapter of 'Edgerunners,'" he admitted with an embarrassed chuckle. "I guess I just got a little too caught up in the story."
Akane followed him into the studio, her relief so great it almost made her dizzy. She looked over at the desk and saw the spread of finished pages.
"The... the series finale?"
She realized then what it meant. Aoyama,the man who knew every twist and turn of the plot,had been reduced to tears just by drawing the ending.
'That means...'
"Wait. If even you are crying while drawing it... does that mean 'Edgerunners' ends in a total BE? A Bad Ending?!"
Just thinking about it made her heart sink. Aoyama had promised her that Lucy would survive, but clearly, "survival" didn't mean "happiness."
She wanted to demand answers, to ask him why he was being so cruel to the characters they loved. But she bit her tongue. She knew she had no right to interfere with his creative vision. No matter how much it hurt, the "art" belonged to the artist.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have interrupted you while you were working," she said quickly, her head dipping in an apology.
"No, don't worry about it. 'Edgerunners' is already done, really. The whole thing is etched into my brain," Aoyama said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I'm basically finished. I just have to finish the lettering and the bubbles."
"And then... I just have two final panels to draw for the 'Extra' section."
"An Extra section?" Akane asked, confused.
"Exactly. I've decided to add a small 'DLC', a tie-in to the 'Cyberpunk 2077' game.
Aoyama grinned. He wanted to use the final pages to give the game one last marketing push. After all, he was getting a ten-percent cut of the net profits. If he could use his "selfishness" as an author to boost the game's presence, he was going to do it.
He'd already envisioned the scene: V, the protagonist of the game, sitting at the counter of the Afterlife Bar. V would order a drink, a "David Martinez."
The final panel would show V raising the glass toward the neon lights.
"To the kid who made it to the Top of Arasaka. To the legend, David Martinez."
That would be the perfect bridge.
"The game? 'Cyberpunk 2077'?" Akane tilted her head. She knew he'd been busy with LightSpeed, but she hadn't realized the project was this advanced.
"Is it a spin-off of the manga?" she asked.
[Translated and Rewritten by Shika_Kagura]