Bold Idea

"What? JK-san came back again?" Kojima Taira held a teacup, wearing an expression that said, "Has she been driven insane?"

Misawa Hiroshi stuffed a key frame into Kojima Taira's hands.

Kojima Taira had no idea what was going on, but seeing how excited Misawa Hiroshi was, he set down his teacup, found a seat, opened the key frames, and planned to take a quick look.

He felt nothing much upon seeing the first few key frames. Though they were well drawn, they only showed the protagonist's hand gripping a toe. The character was off-screen, with only a close-up of the hand, so the difficulty was low.

But the further he looked, the more astonished he became. By the time he reached the latter half, he was completely stunned and finally understood why the stack of key frames was so thick.

"Holy shit!" Kojima Taira shot to his feet as well and shouted before looking at Misawa Hiroshi in disbelief. "Which god-tier key animator drew these?"

His first impression after finishing them was that they had been drawn by a god.

Never mind how explosive the connected sequence would look. The shot where the camera followed the protagonist's Holy Sword as it spun was already ridiculously impressive. Having the camera rotate dramatically around the subject as its axis was incredibly, incredibly difficult to animate. Even Animation productions with ample budgets and long schedules rarely pulled this kind of thing now, because few key animators were willing to draw it.

Yet the key frames in his hands were almost perfect.

"Look at the animator's name," Misawa Hiroshi said.

Kojima Taira opened the Dope Sheet and glanced at the animator's name. He froze for a moment, then muttered, "Really? Could JK-san have bought these from someone? Or did someone write her name down to curry favor with her?"

Misawa Hiroshi laughed. "Do you think that's possible?"

"Not possible..."

Key animators capable of drawing shots like this hardly ever took jobs casually, and they were already too busy. Let alone drawing key frames like these just to please a girl.

A girl's affection was nowhere near as valuable as key animation...

"Because of what happened last year, I didn't assign any cuts to JK-san. I never expected her to improve this much. If I'd known earlier... Though even if I had, it probably wouldn't have changed the fact that this Animation was trash. Still, we could at least have done better in some areas."

As the storyboard artist and episode director for Episode 6, Misawa Hiroshi would have been lying if he said he did not want to make it good. What film director did not want the audience to approve of the movie they had made?

He wanted to make it good too, but there was a gap between reality and ideals.

But after watching the two cuts Gu Xue had drawn, the fire in his heart, which had already gone out, suddenly reignited. Besides being the storyboard artist and episode director for Episode 6, he was also the storyboard artist and episode director for the Final Episode...

"She seems to have changed the storyboards and composition, right?" Kojima Taira suddenly said.

"That's right." Misawa Hiroshi came back to his senses and gave a bitter smile. "Though I think the directing effect is excellent, it's still a headache that she didn't discuss it with me beforehand. Who knew she would redraw everything? Luckily, these two cuts have no dialogue. Since the rotating shot is in midair, the background department probably won't find it too difficult either. The sound effects will be a bit troublesome, though."

"Then we've struck gold." Kojima Taira flipped through the key frames again, giving them a rough pass in his capacity as animation director. "They really are drawn well. There are basically no problems. It's just the characters' faces... They generally match the character design sheets, but aren't they way too handsome? And their expressions are far too rich. Compared to the faces in the other key frames, they stand out like a crane among chickens. I don't even know whether I should correct them."

One of an animation director's duties was to unify the faces and body proportions according to the character design sheets, correcting anything that differed.

Misawa Hiroshi fell silent for a moment. "Don't correct them. They haven't strayed from the original character designs, and they look more handsome."

Kojima Taira's eyes widened. "Holy shit, aren't you afraid that once these two cuts are animated, the audience will get that feeling of finding chocolate mixed into a pile of shit?"

"Then it's still chocolate! The other episodes are nothing but shit. Being able to add chocolate to shit is a skill too. Could the other episode directors pull that off?" Misawa Hiroshi spread his arms, looking smug as hell.

Kojima Taira suddenly felt that he made a lot of sense.

"Alright, get lost. I need to keep checking the key frames." Misawa Hiroshi took back the key frames from Kojima Taira and signed his name directly on them along with the other set. Later, production would hand all the checked key frames to the animation director for the next stage. It was not Kojima Taira's turn to work yet.

Ever since seeing Gu Xue's key frames, a fire had been burning in Misawa Hiroshi's heart, and it was only growing stronger. He glanced at the Final Episode storyboards that had already been completed beside him, impatient to finish today's checks as soon as possible, because he had suddenly come up with a bold idea.

He wanted to change the storyboards.

Meanwhile, Gu Xue had no idea what had happened. After going home and taking a shower, she prepared to sleep. But after messing up her body clock, falling asleep before three in the morning was indeed a little difficult.

After rolling around in bed twice and still being unable to sleep, Gu Xue simply stopped trying to force it. She picked up her phone and started watching Animation.

This parallel world was much the same as Earth. There were four seasons a year, and new shows constantly aired. There were slapdash, garbage Animation productions, and there were also excellent ones.

For example, that manga adaptation produced by snakehead Animation was outstanding.

The original story was already quite good, Shueisha had provided a generous budget, and the schedule was not too rushed. As long as they did not screw around, it definitely would not turn out ugly.

As for snakehead Animation's other production, Ore-sama, it performed terribly. The production schedule was rushed, the budget was limited, and many scenes had fallen apart.

Yet the story was surprisingly interesting. It felt like watching a cult film. Once she got on its wavelength, Gu Xue kept watching.

After watching two episodes in a row, Gu Xue was about to open the next one.

Ding.

A message popped up.

"Xiaoxue, could you please give the key frames to me first next time... Or at least let me know. The episode director thought I'd run away."

The message came out of nowhere, but after thinking back, Gu Xue remembered who it was.

It was the production assistant for Episode 6.

Come to think of it, Gu Xue did not seem to have met the production assistant before. The two cuts she had been asked to clean up into second key animation had been left directly on her desk. Because she had redrawn them herself, Gu Xue had spent three days on them. Cleaning up second key animation definitely should not have taken that long, yet the production assistant had not come to rush her.

When it was time to hand in the key frames, Gu Xue had been determined to finish them so she could go home and support her sister. She had directly tossed the key frames onto the episode director's desk without going through the production assistant. That really was a little excessive...

What did this production assistant look like again?

Gu Xue thought back.

He had attended the animation meeting. He seemed to be a young man who had just graduated.

So beautiful-girl production assistants really were a lie.

Calling her Xiaoxue over and over, she had thought the person was a girl. Turns out he was not.

Gu Xue pursed her lips and stopped reminiscing, but she still had to apologize. After all, handing in the key frames without going through him or even informing him had indeed been her fault.

"Sorry, that was my mistake."

Gu Xue sent the message. Almost the very next second, a reply came back.

"You're not asleep yet? Take care of yourself. It's fine."

"..." Gu Xue was stunned.

What kind of typing speed was that? And that reply did not look good either. Why did it feel like the other person was about to start making awkward small talk?

The facts proved it.

Gu Xue's feeling had been correct.

The other person really started making awkward small talk...

Gu Xue gave perfunctory responses while sounding him out. Once she learned that the episode director had no objections to the two cuts she had drawn and that she had not been fired, she used needing sleep as an excuse to brush him off, then... continued watching Animation.

But halfway through.

Gu Xue thought of something very serious.

She closed the playback window, opened the chat app, pulled up the conversation history, and took a look.

"I think I've become the kind of person I hate most..." Gu Xue tossed her phone aside, rolled over, buried her face in the pillow, kicked at the blanket, and cursed herself.