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   There are a few deviations depending on district, but “Digimon Adventure” was a television anime that broadcasted a year and one month from March 1999 to around March 2000. It had a production length of 54 episodes with a special program airing two times in its place. When it started, it was a bit irregular for a television program, so broadcast extended for another month. However, the continuation “Digimon Adventure 02” that aired after it came out to exactly one year. This novelization contains the first twenty episodes of the first series.
   The novels span all episodes and the writing for this book was done by the series director for the first series and 02, Hiroyuki Kakudou. Of course, because novel-writing, let alone writing in general, is not my principal occupation, I asked the help of screenplay writer Hiro Masaki-san, who had experience in novel publications before. So politically speaking, I actually manage 2/3 of this project.
   Well, I’ll leave the introduction at that. One of the special characteristics of the show is that all seven children are the main characters, so we tried to show that in this novel as well, except that it would be difficult to do so in one book. Please wait for more of this trilogy in the future.
   Of course, we can’t just take the TV series and put it into a digest, so the episodes have been rearranged in a different way. We’ve also contained new facts revealed for the first time that not even 02 had covered, so that those people who have watched all of the television series can enjoy them too.
   The creatures called Digimon originally came from the Digital Monster handheld game. Although they only appeared as dot graphics, there was discussion that we bring out the feeling that they exist as true creatures, so we rarely put on screen the establishment that the Digital World is a world inside the internet. Rather, that although it is different from our real world where we live in, it contains natural scenery.
   The biggest difference from the game is that after Digimon evolve into a greater size, they return to their smaller forms once the battle is over. We quite obviously included a “transform” component in there. But unlike the transformations you would see in Ultraman, it isn’t the protagonist children — the humans — who evolve, but the monsters, their partners the Digimon.
   Originally the show was meant to target the slightly older children age groups, but personally I labored in a way so that even the parents or adults who watched with them on those Sunday mornings could enjoy it. Although I say that, I had absolutely no clue until it aired what the response would be like, so as it climbed into popularity bit by bit, it finally reached this stage where it got its own novelization.

   There is one more thing I would like to write about. The first enemy that appears in this story, Devimon, was voiced by Kaneto Shiozawa-san. I first met Shiozawa-san more than 10 years ago when he performed as a guest for “Bikkuriman”. In “Shin Bikkuriman” where Digimon’s Taichi Yagami as voiced by Toshiko Fujita-san also performed its main character Pia Marco, Shiozawa-san acted with her together for the year in the role of Berry Oz. After that, he was involved in a number of important roles in shows that I was in charge of.
   When “02” started and it was arranged to make a song album that included the enemies of the first series, we also recorded a song by Devimon. It was shortly after that that Shiozawa-san passed away.

   I wish to express my deepest gratitude at Shiozawa-san for having performed as Devimon.

   March 21st, 2000