"Wait... weekly?"
Aoyama held the phone away from his ear as Ayumi's excited voice crackled through the speaker. "You want Edgerunners to take over the slot for The Myriad Gods?"
"Just temporarily, Sensei!" Ayumi assured him, her voice ringing with a mix of professional urgency and fan-girl zeal. "Hirokuni-sensei's situation is critical, and we need a series that can maintain the magazine's page count. Since you have such a massive backlog, you're the only logical choice. I'll be over later today to collect the manuscripts for the next three chapters."
Aoyama let out a long, theatrical sigh. "More work, Ayumi. You're turning me into a 'shachiku' after all."
"Oh, stop it, Sensei! You have thirty chapters in your desk! You could spend the next six months at a cat café and the magazine wouldn't even notice. I'll see you in an hour!"
Click.
Aoyama tossed the phone onto his bed and stared at the ceiling. Weekly serialization. It was the big leagues. The increased visibility would do wonders for his 'Impression' and 'Reputation' tasks, but it also meant he'd have to start actually managing his output.
He glanced at his drawing board, where the first layouts for Chainsaw Man were already staring back at him.
"Guess the vacation is over, buddy," he said to Pochita, who was currently busy chasing his own tail.
---
While Aoyama was adjusting to his new-found weekly status, another creator was experiencing a very different kind of Tuesday.
Tsuruki Junsei, the mangaka known as 'ItchyMouse,' sat on the cold floor of his windowless apartment. He'd just finished a call with his editor, Sato Tetsuken. The news of Edgerunners going weekly had hit him like a physical blow to the solar plexus.
He looked at his hands, which were covered in ink stains and callouses from weeks of sleepless revision on The Spirit Sorcerer. He'd worked himself to the bone to improve his rankings, thinking he stood a chance at the New Creator Award.
But now? With Aoyama going weekly, the gap in popularity would widen into an unbridgeable chasm. Every week that passed would see Edgerunners saturating the consciousness of the readers, while his own work remained a semi-monthly footnote.
"Is this it?" Tsuruki whispered, his voice cracking in the dark. "Is this where it ends? All that effort... for nothing?"
He felt a wave of crushing futility. He was a talented artist, a hard worker, but he was up against a monster. Aoyama wasn't just a creator; he was a phenomenon. And in the face of a phenomenon, 'hard work' felt like a cruel joke.
---
Three days later, the new issue of Manga World GoGo hit the stands.
The official announcement had already sent waves through the 'Metropolis Sci-Fi Fan Group' on Penguin. Fans were ecstatic. No more waiting fifteen days for a hit of Night City adrenaline.
Shuu Fumiya, the MIT student and hardcore fan, stayed up late on Friday night just to be the first to buy a digital copy. He leaned in close to his monitor, the blue light reflecting off his glasses as he opened Chapter 16.
The chapter didn't pick up immediately after the romantic moon-glade scene. Instead, it opened with a somber, industrial tone.
David was standing in a messy hideout, eyeing a pair of oversized, gold-plated bionic hands. They were Pilar's.
"How about it, kid?" Maine asked, leaning against a stack of discarded ammo crates. "Rebecca says you can have 'em if you want. A gift from the dearly departed."
David looked at the hands, then back at Maine. "I can't afford the maintenance on those. Besides... they're tech-expert gear. I'm a street-runner."
"What, you suddenly getting picky about where your chrome comes from?" Maine laughed, his massive cyber-arms humming with a low-frequency power. "I thought you didn't care about 'second-hand' parts."
"I don't," David said, his gaze shifting to Maine's own enormous, piston-driven fists: the heavy-duty combat implants that made Maine the powerhouse of the crew. "I just have my eye on something with a bit more... impact."
Maine's grin widened. He recognized that look. It was the hungry gaze of a man who was starting to fall in love with the steel. "These? They're bigger than your whole torso, kid."
"Not for long," David replied.
"Hah! Fine. Tell you what. If I ever kick the bucket, I'll leave 'em to you in my will. Till then, focus on the chrome you can handle."
Shuu Fumiya felt a chill run down his spine as he read the dialogue. The casual mention of 'kicking the bucket'... it felt like a heavy, dark cloud looming over the characters.
He scrolled down. The scene shifted to a cold, sterile room dominated by a massive cooling tank. Kiwi, the crew's netrunner, was submerged in a tub of shimmering blue ice, her body connected to a maze of data cables that looked like umbilical cords.
"You look different today, David," Maine noted, leaning close to the boy's face as they watched Kiwi work.
David flinched, trying to maintain his cool. "What are you talking about?"
"You're usually so... broody. All 'business' and 'revenge.' But today?" Maine gave him a greasy, knowing smirk. "You look like a guy who finally got what he was looking for in the moonbeams. So... did you do it?"
David's face turned scarlet. He stammered, refusing to meet Maine's eyes.
"It's written all over your face, kid," Maine chuckled, turning back to the business at hand as Kiwi emerged from the ice, her skin pale and steaming in the chilly air.
Shuu Fumiya smiled. The transition from the romantic high of the previous chapter to the gritty reality of the merc life was masterfully handled. Aoyama wasn't just drawing a manga; he was building a world where love and death lived in the same cramped alleyways.
[Translated and Rewritten by Shika_Kagura]