Three-Topic Dialogue: A Story of a Penny-a-Liner's Pescado Grande Vessel Being Pequeño

■Dialogue
“Short… no, make it a Grande size.”
■Three Topics
・Grassland
・Return
・Penne


“Welcome!”

“Short… no, make it a Grande size.”

“Coming right up! One large draft beer!”

“You knew exactly what I meant.”

“Well, in this shop, when someone says small, medium, or large, it’s always draft beer.”

“Sorry, it’s just that I’ve been having some trouble with sizes lately…”
“Is that because of what’s inside that bizarrely colored envelope?”

“Yes, I showed it to you before because a light green manuscript return envelope is so rare.”

“Did it get rejected?”

“No, how should I put it…”

What Mr. Jumonji told me while snacking on the penne gratin appetizer was…

He got the inspiration from the light green envelope,


and wrote a story about a mischievous fox living in the grasslands,
who would play pranks on passing caravans and knight orders.
Whenever there was someone pompous or arrogant,

the fox would approach a group of young recruits on their break,
“Hey, I can transform into that captain of yours!”

“There’s no way a puny fox like you could transform into our captain.”

“Will you give me a reward if I look just like him?”

“Sure, I’ll give you some meat.”

With a somersault, what he transformed into was…

A tiny sake cup.
The young recruits burst into laughter!
The sub-captain heard the laughter and came over to see what was going on,
“I see, but this won’t do.”

The sub-captain flipped the sake cup over,

“How’s that? Better, right?”

After that, the sub-captain gained the trust of the young recruits and was promoted,

the previous captain’s small-mindedness was exposed,
and he ended up having to return his captaincy.
A story about a fox stripping away a disguise, ta-da!

“It’s more like a picture book than a novel, but it feels like a satire, too.”

“So that’s how it looks to you, too…”

According to Mr. Jumonji, who was on his second Grande-sized drink…

All over the editorial department, people were arguing about who the model was, who was who, and what was what.

It seems it even dragged other departments into the mess.
The subtitle that appeared out of nowhere,

Does it make your back break out in a cold sweat when you read it?

The Sake Cup Who Wanted to Be a Bowl
When they tried to publish it with a book band, a small-minded executive called it a “problematic work” and it fell through.

“I don’t think they needed to make such a big deal out of it…”

“Why don’t you ignore those narrow-minded people and self-publish it?”

“Maybe I’ll co-publish it with an illustrator friend of mine. Since I’m at it, I might as well choose the size freely…”

And what they released was a picture book the size of a sliding paper door!
I thought, who would buy something like this? But,


companies with a sense of humor bought them in bulk for training purposes…
And apparently, a surprisingly common use was as a gift for one’s boss.
Hmm? Did you break out in a cold sweat too?

I participated in this 🦊