My personal conclusion after dropping out of the industry in just 3 months.
"Who the heck do you think you are, trying to answer that question without anyone even asking?!"
I can already hear that perfectly valid comeback from the industry pros.
Let me introduce myself. I'm currently a self-proclaimed manga artist, independently serializing my shonen manga, DURRUN. I publish it on my own terms via Kindle Indies, Pixiv, and other platforms. As of April 2026, I've managed to grind my way to Volume 2.
Before I got into this, I was a street artist, using the world's walls as my canvas to blast out my messages. But I got sick of the "birdcage-like art market" that only caters to the wealthy, and I started feeling the limits of expressing a message through a single image. I suddenly felt the need for "Story," and that's when I decided to jump into the world of manga.
In 2024, while living in Europe, I drew my first one-shot titled Kokorozashi. I submitted it to Manga One and won a small award called the "Iine-sho" (Thumbs-Up Award), which led to me being assigned a professional editor, Mr. A, from Shogakukan. Kokorozashi was a story where I gave life and narrative to the "personified emotions" I used to paint in my murals. Mr. A was the very first person to give those characters a literal "thumbs up".
However, during my few months as a "manga artist apprentice," I was slapped with a harsh reality.
"It'll take you at least five years before you can get a serialization."
I had gone in with the fire and ego of someone ready to serialize immediately. That one sentence told me everything I needed to know. "I'll just put my manga out there on my own. Thanks for everything!" And just like that, after only three months, it was over. It was a blink-of-an-eye experience — like our shoulders just happened to brush in the industry hallway — but it was enough for me to see the truth.
I don't want to frustrate you by dragging this out, so let me get straight to the conclusion:
For a Manga Artist, an Editor Is Necessary
But, there's a catch. That editor shouldn't be a "teacher" trying to lecture the artist. They need to be the manga's most hardcore fan — the one person whose feedback has the power to actually move the story, and someone who deeply respects the artist for the sheer act of continuing to draw.
My stance probably comes from a visceral rejection of "a certain book" Mr. A recommended to me. The book was an anthology of old-school, "Show-wa era" grit, where veteran editors treated apprentices with a high-handed, condescending attitude. Honestly, it made me so uncomfortable I couldn't even finish it. If a master like Takehiko Inoue told me my art was lacking, I'd cough up blood while practicing to get better. But being told that by someone who has never actually drawn a manga themselves? My inner street artist starts screaming: "Try drawing a hit manga on your own first before you talk to me like that!".
At the end of the day, a manga isn't shaped by an editor's technique or a publisher's brand power. It's built on the overwhelming obsession and conviction of the artist. All those beautiful stories like "this editor discovered this talent" are just the "surface-level facts" that appear after the artist refused to quit and kept bleeding onto the page.
So Who Is My Editor Now?
With that mindset, my current "editor" is my wife, who has walked beside me for over ten years. She doesn't know the first thing about "how to draw manga," but she reads my storyboards (names) as a brutally honest fan. If she feels something isn't readable or she doesn't get a character's motive, we'll argue until we're practically at each other's throats. More importantly, if my manga fails, it directly affects her life too. Because she shares that "life-at-stake risk," her words are real, and they cut deep into my soul.
In an era where "hits" are often manufactured by the power of advertising, I haven't given up on my ambition to create a world-class manga entirely as an indie creator.
No matter how unpolished or "not-yet-interesting" my current work might be, I believe that if I keep grinding toward that goal, the work will eventually transform into something truly great.
Life is about how you live now — it's the only way to flip your past failures into "correct answers."
With that "shonen manga spirit" hidden in my heart, I'm going to keep drawing today.
AITO KITAZAKI
Official eBook
DURRUN: Volume 1
What lies ahead for the siblings as they step into the TOKYO Underworld?!
DURRUN Volume 1 — High-definition edition, available now!!
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