Chapter 1: The Proposal

Japan, 1998.

1998 was year of revolution inside the doujin market that no one knew about. It was the crazy time that many comic-cons had plenty of comics, several made by one artist named Hisaya Sakiyama. Sakiyama-san as he was called was a man in his late 40s, and lived a long life working on several jobs. His life experience was unmatched but he had a big dream, he wanted to get into art. ‘Where to start?’ he always thought.

He learned the basics when he was 35 but the time he was 40, he could make a decent living on art alone, drawing the raunchiest of doujins for people that would pay for commission. The internet was merely a conjecture at the time, and posting online would only explode a few years later, so it was hard to get people to buy things via online. Commissions came by mail, envelope and all, and he had to filter was the best ones to do.

So, he decided that the best way to make serious, real money was to make his own stories. He could draw them and excuse plots usually didn’t matter much if the art was good. He was good at writing and designing character and after several months planning and drawing it, he created a story arc based manga called ‘Look Different Syringe Application’. Named after the story’s macguffin, a syringe that allowed people to look different, it was a series of works he made with a single connected thread, the syringe and how people would react with such a thing. He made both the normal and lewd types of doujins and both stories were equally valid to the continuity.

The doujin was very well accepted by the community and through word of mouth, Hisaya was able to sell thousands of copies, and the demand was so strong that he had issues printing as many copies as he needed to sell. The success attracted a lot of potential investors, but Sakiyama-san turned every single of them down for reasons that abranged anything between ‘get out of here, shady-ass motherf-‘ to ‘sorry, not interested’.

September, 1998 was the launch of Chapter 5 in the series, and it was sold personally by him in the Arashiro Comic-Con, hosted by the Arashiro Convention Center, downtown Arashiro, Osaka. He had hopes that his thousand copies print would last through the weekend but all copies were sold in first day. To say it was a success was underselling it.

Hisaya was sitting in his stall at the Arashiro Center, waiting for people to buy more copies of his other works, signing the covers and just being a general nice guy. “Sakiyama-san?” A particular woman half his age approached him with a smile and approving look, seeing that he was always ready to do some sales. “Are you busy right now?”

He looked up after signing a cover. “Hm?”

“I’m Chikanari Ryuko. Investor at the MediCorp International, Japan Branch. Do you have a moment?” She spoke as she approached the stall.

Immediately the worst thoughts went through his mind, since he had a floral shirt from the USA, after he went there for a few weeks, to sell more of his comics. He also translated it all to English on his own too, making the reach even greater.

“Chikanari?” He could swear he knew that name but not from where. “I’m not that busy at the moment, but I guess I can hear you out. You said you’re an investor?”

She nodded. “Yes, exactly. It won’t take long, if you could come with me in private.”

More alarm bells went off in Hisaya’s mind, ‘what was this woman up to?’. But since he was inside the building and there were plenty of security guards around, nothing was gonna really happen to him, he imagined. ‘So why not?’ he thought and went with Ryuko.

Ryuko took him to an area next to the food court, almost the backstage of it, close to the bathroom, to the south area of the building.

“I’m here to talk about something very amusing, Sakiyama-san. We’re developing an experimental drug in secret. Now, why would I be saying that? Well, your comics have exactly the effects that we’re planning to do. Exactly, down to a T. I found you were selling all the comics you made in some places and I managed to get a full collection, including chapter 5.” Ryuko said, ousting herself as a fan of his, apparently.

“Eh? What? You guys are making the syringe real? Isn’t that like… Virtually impossible?” He asked, just to be sure.

“In a way, yes. But we have cracked the genetic code in secret. The public will never hear about this for obvious reasons: Military usage.” Ryuko explained.

“Wait, what? Military usage?” He asked, still curious and a bit confused.

“Yes, MediCorp International serves military contracts. Engineers and scientists are working for the Swedish government as you and I speak, trying to figure out how things work.” She continued to explain.

“I’m sorry, Chikanari-san but this is far beyond my area of expertise. I’m just a man that did a lot of jobs and found himself with drawing, I don’t have any knowledge about how the real world science works. My thing is fiction, as you can see.” Hisaya tried to shut down any sort of thing that this woman was planning. “Plus, this sounds incredibly farfetched. Like, for real. Think about it! If we could have a magical syringe that allows you to be any person you want, we would have chaos. I even covered that on Chapter 3 stories!”

Ryuko was a bit more cutthroat than most people would be, and continued to talk about it. “Let’s say we get it working, no ill effects. Would you care to get some samples?”

That made Hisaya pause for a moment. “How close are you to complete the work?”

“We have discovered to realign chromosomes in a cellular level. Anyone would be a woman or a man.” She smirked a bit.

“How about Chapter 4’s clothes creation? Or object manipulation?” He asked, trying to test her knowledge, if she was such a fan of his work.

“That’s the next step. I was thinking of suggesting the same thing as Story 3 in the Chapter 4 had, the person just gets unconscious and wakes up after being turned back.” Ryuko replied.

‘Hm. She’s good.’

Hisaya was getting convinced over the craziest thing he had heard in his entire life, it was going to make his idea real.

“Jeez, Chikanari-san… Okay, say I agree with your investment. What’s in it for me?” He asked.

“Oh, make no mistake, Sakiyama-san. MediCorp isn’t funding you, I am. This is a personal investment, out of my own pocket. But because I work at the company and since what we’re doing and what you’re doing align, perhaps having the syringes too would allow you to write different stories, based on personal experiences.” Ryuko informed him of her plan.

This made him pause even more. He thought about it and kept looking away from Ryuko. Ryuko, of course, smiled everytime they made eye contact.

“… 465 Nobunaga Road, Serizawa, Osaka.” He said.

“Excuse me? Is that…” Before she could continue, he interrupted her.

“That’s my address. Come by my house next week, and we can talk more. Deal?”

This time, it was Ryuko that gave pause. “… Deal. I shan’t keep you any longer, Sakiyama-san. Thank you for your time.”

With that, Ryuko walked back to the food court and vanished among the crowd. And of course, Hisaya went back to his booth, confused on what just happened, but at least he could think for a few days.

---

The comic-con was over and Hisaya went back to his home, and by the end, he sold all the comics he had printed, about six thousand copies, with one-sixth being the new chapter.

Back at the Sakiyama household, things were fine, for the most part. His wife and daughter were supportive of him, while he was supportive of them.

Kurumi was his daughter, a redhead that loved vehicles, with a bit of a tomboy streak and the best daughter a family could ask for. She was unemployed for the moment, as she just turned 18 and was looking to get a job.

Kaede was the wife and his personal support for years, making sure that he was always in the good side of things. He was incredibly supportive of him getting to draw as a way to live, and quit her own real estate job to help him manage the prints and other things that would take too long for him to do. Also a beautiful woman that only got better with age.

The three were having lunch after an uneventful morning.

“So you said that that MediCorp woman is coming soon?” Kaede asked her husband.

“Yeah, apparently.” Hisaya shrugged, and continued to eat. “Dunno when, but probably today.”

Kurumi stopped eating to look at the two. “Dad, tell me, do you think this is for real? This woman just comes in, out of nowhere and just decides that, ‘hey your story matches what we’re doing’.”

Hisaya shrugged again. “If she is or not, she’s a fan and wants to give me money. From the look of it, a lot of it. I’m not gonna say no to the money part, but the other part is still in the realm of impossibility.”

Kaede chuckled. “Yes, that would be quite impossible. The women at the gym would love it if was real, they would just get fit immediately!”

“I could be a boy for how long I wanted too!” Kurumi chuckled as well. “Is this investor lady even planning to sell it to the public?”

Hisaya shook his head. “According to her, it’ll be used by military forces. Not sure what would the utility but I’m sure the government having it is better than everyone, right? Right?“

All three chuckled at the thought and kept eating.

Once the lunch was done and Kurumi was washing the dishes, Hisaya and Kaede went back to planning next steps on their business, inside their office which was just their living room. “Honey, the copies we made were all sold out…” She mused. “I’ve ordered more with the printing company but it’ll take a few days. They said that we’re their primary costumer now. Super high demand…”

“Hehe…” Hisaya gave out a nervous laughter. “Business is booming, I guess…”

From the look of things, the investment wasn’t really needed but what Hisaya said was the deal, he was not gonna refuse money if people wanted to give him. And if the off-chance he gets a real life syringe, he wasn’t gonna complain about it either.

RIIING RIIING

“I’ll get it!” Kurumi shouted from the kitchen. A few moments later, Hisaya and Kaede would see the woman from a few days prior, Ryuko.

“Howdy, pardner?” She spoke in an accented texan English, and he could understand it, which made her chuckle when his face went confused. “Bad time? Am I interrupting anything?”

“No, no… We were talking about next steps.” Hisaya replied. “This is my wife, Kaede.” And presented his wife to the woman.

“It’s my pleasure, Sakiyama-san.” Ryuko addressed the wife.

“Same here, Chikanari-san.” And Kaede was just as polite.

Ryuko explained exactly what she told Hisaya back at the convention. She was gonna foot the bill on anything he needed, and for the most part, the thing they were missing were having a large scale operation for printing. The two weren’t even a proper company making things a little more difficult.

So, a proposal from Ryuko: “How about we create a company then? You can have me as one of the partners and I can inject you all with funds.”

Hisaya and Kaede looked at each other, wondering if it was a good idea. With her real estate experience, Kaede could handle being the CEO without effort. “A family business then?” Kaede asked Hisaya.

“Might as well…” Hisaya mused. “How long until the company is set up?”

Ryuko smiled at the two, seeing they didn’t oppose the idea. “About a month. Are you all hurting for cash?”

Kaede shook her head. “We’re fine, more than that. We have the opposite problem, we can’t produce enough copies to have a stock, it keeps selling out.”

“Oh, that’s not good… I guess we could get another printing company on the case.” Ryuko said.

Hisaya pondered if making the company was the way he could go legitimate with his drawing efforts. The outlook didn’t seem so grim in any way but the situation getting more favorable would be better than getting worse.

“I suppose we could do that…” Hisaya said.

Kaede worked on a document, to ensure that Ryuko was a woman of her word. And all parts signed up, starting their business.

A couple of months later, ‘Sakiyama Comics’ was established.