Is this mangaka crazy?

Generally, mangakas with little fame hire assistants to help them finish their work.

Especially for mangakas who publish weekly series, due to the tight schedule and heavy workload, hiring assistants is unavoidable.

After all, if it weren't for the urgent deadline, who would be willing to spend money to hire an assistant?

Hiring assistants truly saves them a lot of time and considerably reduces their workload.

Even some mangakas with substantial incomes hire three to four assistants to help them complete their drawings.

The work of a mangaka's assistant generally consists of drawing backgrounds, inking, applying white-out, coloring, applying screen tones, pasting speech bubbles, etc. These are more complex but not particularly critical tasks.

However, they rarely participate in the creation of manga stories and plot ideas.

Because that is the core job of the mangakas themselves.

Many in the industry believe that professional mangakas should prioritize the story, setting, and plot design of the manga, and that assistants only need to complete other tedious tasks.

Indeed, it's true that the setting and plot design are the main reasons for a manga's popularity.

If the story and plot are based on trash, no matter how beautiful the art style of a manga is, it's just trash made to look pretty.

No matter how beautiful the trash is, it's still trash.

Nobody likes trash.

That's why many professional mangakas focus their work on the story, setting, and plot design.

The main goal is to ensure the quality of the manga.

To design a better story and plot, they need to spend a lot of time thinking over and over. It's definitely too late to finish the draft at that point.

But Ren is different. After all, he is a plagiarist.

Does a plagiarist need to conceive the plot?

No, not at all. He has an excellent, ready-made plot in his mind, and he doesn't even need to think about the storyboard draft.

Thus, Ren has always been able to complete the rushed work of a mangaka by himself.

Not to mention he possesses a superpower granted by the system.

In this case, he even had time to finish drawing a complete series of Fire Punch during the serialization of Edgerunners and Chainsaw Man.

However, this doesn't mean that Ren can complete his own work and doesn't want to hire an assistant.

After all, it's nice to have a slightly easier job.

"No, no, no, the company has several candidates for assistants," said Ayumi. "They have good painting skills and have understood the scope of an assistant's work, so if Amamiya-sensei needs it, the company can let them come for a tryout."

"Really?" Ren blinked and thought, "Alright, but I value skill and painting style first, everything else is secondary."

His painting style was basically determined during the Edgerunners era; that is, his style is as exquisite as an oil painting.

Whether it's the serialization of Chainsaw Man or the single volume of Fire Punch, his art style has always maintained an almost artistic exquisiteness.

After all, how can one change their painting style at will, with a different style for each manga? Then, people would think his work might be suspected of plagiarism.

Fortunately, whether it's Edgerunners, Chainsaw Man, or Fire Punch, the difference in style isn't that great.

At least it's not as great as the difference between the style of One Piece and Detective Conan.

At least, others can't see it.

Ayumi smiled and nodded. "I know, Amamiya-sensei, the company is also aware of your fondness for painting. So they are all art students and have very good skills."

"Then, how about this...?" Ren said, nodding. "Let's set up a time, and I'll see their painting skills in person."

"No problem," Ayumi nodded. "I'll talk to the company later and ask them to arrange it."

After discussing business, Ren said with a smile, "Ayumi, it's almost lunchtime, why don't you stay for a quick meal?"

Ayumi looked at the time but hesitated.

In fact, it was just after ten in the morning, and there was still more than an hour until quitting time at noon.

Even accounting for the round-trip time, she would still have almost an hour to go back to the company and continue working.

Obviously, Ren wanted her to stay and relax.

But... why not? Ayumi smiled, "Of course, no problem. It's been a long time since I've tasted the sensei's mastery."

During this time, she has also been able to shed the identity of a new editor.

After all, Ayumi directly produced the great mangaka Ren, although others are unaware that she basically did not participate in the creation of Ren's manga.

But Ren's reputation is still there, and Ayumi has also finished her internship.

So the Akatsuki Cultural Company recently assigned her two new mangakas to manage. That's why she has been so busy lately.

Furthermore, Ayumi probably sensed the relationship between Ren and Sakura, though she wouldn't avoid anything because of it.

But she also made an effort to maintain a relationship of friendship and colleagueship with Ren.

"Well, I've bought a lot of seafood lately."

Ren took out the seafood he bought and exclaimed with a laugh, "These three dried abalones! They're amazing!"

Ayumi watched Ren's cheerful smile and suddenly said with a smile, "Speaking of Amamiya-sensei's culinary talent, if you use it to draw food-themed manga, it will undoubtedly be a hit!"

"Well..." Ren thought. "I have some ideas...".

In his previous life, "Master of Cooking" and "Gourmet Hunter" were very good cooking manga, and there was also "Aphrodisiac Spirit," which led the cooking manga scene in the post-manga era.

But unfortunately, the fate of cooking manga has always been very unfortunate.

Besides "Master of Cooking," both "Gourmet Hunter" and "Aphrodisiac Spirit" were tragically canceled in their later stages.

This seems to indicate that cooking manga are practically dead in their later stages...

"But I probably won't draw it," Ren said with regret. "After all, drawing cooking manga is too difficult...".

"Yes, Amamiya-sensei's current works are very good," Ayumi nodded and said with a smile. "Especially Fire Punch... It's a truly impressive manga. Amamiya-sensei is a manga genius, and his manga always make you think."

"And because of this, and the success of the Edgerunners animation, it seems the sensei has attracted a lot of attention in the industry lately."

- - - - - -

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