Sakyo Furuichi/How Wonderfully Picaresque

How to Spot a Money-Grubbing Yakuza

Backstage Stories

Part 1Part 2

Izumi	Next is the set and props, and- okay!
	With that, I should have everything important written down.
Manager	Oh~ perfect! You're so fast at working, it saves me a lot of trouble.
Izumi	All we need now is Sakyo-san's approval.
Manager	Forget about that, can't we just quietly buy everything ourselves!? If you act all cutesy, I'm sure he'll forgive you!
Izumi	If he hears you saying things like that, Sakyo-san will give you another lump on the head.
Sakyo	What was that about me?
Manager	Ah! Speak of the devil...!
Izumi	Ah, Sakyo-san. I was just writing down the things we'll need for Autumn Troupe's performance, and-
Sakyo	Oh, let me see.
	... What's with this estimation of the stage costs?
Izumi	Um... It's mostly the cost of the set design.
	I wanted to have a great set that matches up to all the action scenes, and-
Sakyo	Denied.
Izumi	I thought so...
Manager	There, there! No need to be so stingy~.
Sakyo	I'm sure you haven't forgotten, but how deep in debt is this company, exactly?
Izumi	... Ten million yen.
Sakyo	That's right, it's ten million yen. And that's not an easy sum to return.
Izumi	It really isn't...
Manager	That hurt...
Sakyo	In any case, there's no room in the budget for this.
Izumi	Then we can cut some other things-
Sakyo	... No need.
Manager	Huh? What do you mean?
Sakyo	The main thing we need for the set is wood, right? We should be able to do something about it.
	... Well, we can't help but spend a little on this kind of thing. Let's go.
Izumi	Where to?
Sakyo	To buy some tools. We'll take the car.
Izumi	Huh!? Sakyo-san, you're coming, too?
Sakyo	Who else is around?
Manager	Wow, Director, this is great! I have some business to attend to, so you two take your time~.
Izumi	(He really didn't want to come, huh...)
Sakyo	Hey, hurry up or I'll leave you behind.
Izumi	Ah, coming!

Izumi	Ah! How's this?
Sakyo	Nope. It looks way too flimsy for that price. At least look at things properly.
Izumi	Huh... I thought it looked decent, though...
Sakyo	We need to put out the best product possible. Mankai Company has always done it like this.
	Quit thinking about things you can buy easily with money, and think about solutions you can buy with time.
Izumi	I see... that's one way to look at it.
	In that case, I think there are some old props in the storage room. We could recycle those, right?
Sakyo	It'll take a while, but yeah. We're not a big theater with too much spare money on our hands.
	As far as props go, the actors can make them themselves. Autumn Troupe especially, since it's full of amateurs.
	By getting involved in prop making, they'll gain a deeper understanding of the technicalities of the stage.
Izumi	I see! So it's like killing two birds with one stone.
Sakyo	Yeah, that's a simpler way to put it.
	Without money, this theater's out of business. To collect enough money to prevent that, the actors need to work hard.
	That's all. Let's finish buying things so we can go home.
Izumi	... Okay!
	(Sakyo-san... really thinks things through when it comes to the theater.)
Izumi	Thank you for coming with me today! With that, we should have most of our props.
Sakyo	As soon as we get back, double check all the things we'll need. After that, we'll have a meeting about making our own props.
Izumi	Right. I'll ask Tetsuro-san if he can help us out, too.
Sakyo	Yeah, please do.
Izumi	... Speaking of which, what are we going to do about the wood we need for the set? We didn't buy any today.
Sakyo	I can handle the wood.
Izumi	What do you mean?
Sakyo	We've been talking about tearing down a shabby old bar in our territory after the owner ran away without paying us.
Izumi	Territory? Ran away!?
Sakyo	Yeah. We can just get the scrapped lumber from there.
Izumi	THAT'S what you meant when you said you can handle it!?
Sakyo	What? You have any other way to do it?
Izumi	No...
Sakyo	It isn't owned by anyone. Nothing bad will come out of taking discarded goods.
Izumi	Well, you're not wrong there...?
Sakyo	Use whatever resources you have. I'll tell Sakoda to get things ready tomorrow.
Izumi	Th- thank you very much!
	(I totally forgot, but... Sakyo-san really is a yakuza...)

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