The Downpour

Time flew by.

It had been more than three weeks since work began on the final episode of Ore-sama. Including the time set aside for outsourcing the in-between animation, the deadline was next Monday—or rather, tomorrow. No, it was midnight tonight. If any key animation was still unfinished by then, well, sorry, but it would have to go in no matter what. There really wouldn't be enough time otherwise. No matter how good the key animation was, if the animators didn't have enough time to clean it up and fill in the in-betweens, they'd give up and turn the whole thing into a mess. The only alternatives were to make a recap episode or delay the broadcast.

For these three-plus weeks, Gu Xue had been working herself to the bone, and had spent most of that time in a state of "This dumb anime can go animate itself; I quit." But that was just wishful thinking. Her assigned cuts had been progressing in an orderly fashion: finish the second-key animation, the first-key animation (rough animation), and the layouts, then get yelled at by her sister for working herself to the bone, then go back to work. And so on, over and over.

At the beginning, Gu Xue would rather have done rough animation than clean up second-key animation. By the end, she'd rather have cleaned up second-key animation than done rough animation...

It was just too much trouble. Several people were fighting at once, and with the ground visible, she had to consider their positions, perspective, and all the rest. There were even superpowers mixed in, and most of the effects had to be drawn by hand. It was torture.

Getting stuck for a day without knowing how to draw a cut was normal. Then, once she'd finally overcome it, she'd get it drawn.

After that came the big fight between the protagonist and the Demon King. That bastard Misawa Hiroshi had made the storyboards so grand and imposing that every shot was a huge set piece—more torture.

Honestly, if Mihara Chisa hadn't kept such a close eye on her, Gu Xue really would've wanted to quit, or just slap something together and call it done.

Fortunately, Mihara Chisa watched her closely, and Gu Xue herself was stubborn. Before the deadline, she couldn't stand seeing a half-hearted drawing, so she'd stuck with it.

Whenever she got stuck on a cut and couldn't figure out how to draw it, she'd frantically watch fight videos and movies with impressive fight choreography. Of course, she wasn't copying them; she was just looking for inspiration. She kept watching until inspiration struck.

During the process, Gu Xue checked in with Misawa Hiroshi every week, discussing whether to add or remove a line or two of dialogue, or confirming what effect or performance was required. As for Gu Xue's original goal of getting Misawa Hiroshi to cut some of the shots, she'd long since forgotten about it after their first few discussions...

Misawa Hiroshi had also given Gu Xue a pleasant surprise. Starting in the second week, he'd handed most of the animation direction checks over to the director, Abe Shinichi, and returned to doing key animation himself. He even drew the explosion scenes Gu Xue had given up on...

Aside from exclaiming, "That's freaking awesome," Gu Xue also discussed adding a shot and a line of dialogue with him. Misawa Hiroshi agreed.

Now Gu Xue was drawing that newly added shot—the one she'd added out of a bit of mischief.

It was two in the morning, with twenty-four hours left until the deadline. The cut was quite difficult, but Gu Xue didn't think it would be a problem. She was definitely going to get scolded by her sister, though.

Before this, Gu Xue had already been lectured by Mihara Chisa. Adding a shot right before the deadline was wildly reckless. If Mihara Chisa hadn't seen how steadily and quickly Gu Xue was drawing the first-key animation, she would've forcibly stopped her from doing anything so reckless.

As for Mihara Chisa, she was getting ready to collect the key animation.

Two weeks after work began, just as Mihara Chisa had expected, most people's progress had fallen behind to some extent. The worst offender had only passed two cuts, despite having nearly twenty more in hand... Her assessment was that these people really were too young.

Mihara Chisa hadn't sat by and done nothing. Once she confirmed that one animator couldn't finish on time and that Misawa Hiroshi wasn't willing to lower his standards, she took back some of the shots from that animator and several others who were also seriously behind schedule. In total, there were more than forty cuts, all of which she outsourced to animators outside the company.

Finding enough animators willing to take on that many shots during the changeover between seasons, with so little time available, really showed how good Mihara Chisa's connections and abilities were. After all, no single animator could possibly draw that many shots; there simply wasn't enough time. Even if the work was split among five or six people, it was still a heavy workload. With the industry in its current state, what freelance animator didn't already have key animation work for several anime on their hands?

But she'd found people. She'd practically used up every connection she had, but Misawa Hiroshi had plenty to thank her for.

In a sense, the company had really struck gold.

If you overlooked Miss Mihara's personality, that was.

Just as Gu Xue had expected, during her time as the production assistant for Ore-sama, Mihara Chisa had managed to offend almost every staff member, especially the animators who'd fallen behind schedule. Whatever little goodwill they'd felt at first because of her looks had completely vanished. Even those she hadn't offended couldn't be said to like her.

But she didn't seem to care much.

Production assistant's office.

Mihara Chisa confirmed the schedule, contacted the freelance animators, and breathed a sigh of relief when they gave her definite answers.

It was kind of funny. Out of all those animators, the only one Mihara Chisa basically didn't have to worry about was Gu Xue...

The world really was full of surprises.

She stared at Gu Xue's name for a while. When she realized she'd drifted off, Mihara Chisa immediately saved and closed the schedule, stood up, picked up the keys and umbrella from the desk, and turned to leave.

Her coworkers in the same office continued with their own work. No one asked where Mihara Chisa was going. They'd barely exchanged a few words with her to this day. If they didn't see her every day, they might even have forgotten she existed.

Rumble, rumble.

As soon as Mihara Chisa stepped out of the company building, she glanced at the sky.

It was already late at night, and the sky was pitch-black. Thunder rumbled in the distance. It looked like there would be a downpour.

To be honest, this wasn't a good time to go collect key animation. Even without considering whether the other people were asleep, the time and the weather alone made it a poor choice.

But... perhaps because she wanted so badly to prove herself, or perhaps because she didn't want to lose to anyone, Mihara Chisa was determined to go.

Driving the company car, she expertly backed up and turned around. Accompanied by rumbling thunder, Mihara Chisa drove off into the distance.

The drive passed without incident. Mihara Chisa was technically driving while tired: she'd arrived at the company a little after two in the afternoon and hadn't rested since. But perhaps she had an incredible amount of willpower. She showed no signs of fatigue, let alone drowsiness.

Even though there was no one else in the car, a lilting voice sang a very obscure song.

When she visited the first animator, he was indeed still awake. At this stage, when most anime were wrapping up their final episodes, it was impossible to finish the work in hand without working yourself to the bone. Once you'd chosen to enter this industry, there was no other choice.

The animator wasn't particularly surprised that Mihara Chisa had come to collect the key animation in the middle of the night. He even stood by the doorway and chatted with her for a while, as a way to relax. Unfortunately, Mihara Chisa had an expression that kept people at arm's length. They didn't talk for long before she bowed and turned to leave.

Watching Mihara Chisa walk away, the animator leaning against the doorway sighed and shook his head with a wry smile.