Look Back

Ayumu Fujino is the undisputed art star of her fourth-grade class, her four-panel manga a regular fixture in the school newspaper and a source of constant admiration from her peers. That comfortable supremacy is disrupted when her teacher asks her to vacate one of her coveted slots for Kyomoto, a reclusive classmate who rarely shows up for school. When Kyomoto’s own comic appears beside hers, its exquisitely intricate linework and atmospheric detail draw immediate acclaim, igniting a fierce and consuming jealousy within Fujino. Determined not to be outdone by a truant, she throws herself into an obsessive pursuit of artistic mastery, dedicating every spare moment to refining her craft. Yet as the months stretch into years, the gap between Fujino’s ambitions and her actual progress only seems to widen. The harder she works, the more unattainable Kyomoto’s natural brilliance appears, and by the time she reaches sixth grade, her passion has curdled into defeat—she quits making manga altogether. On graduation day, a mundane request to deliver Kyomoto’s certificate brings the two former rivals face to face for the first time. What begins as an awkward, chance encounter between two very different girls, however, slowly unfurls into a connection that will profoundly reshape both of their lives, setting into motion a chain of events with ramifications neither of them could have ever anticipated.