If you didn’t know, 2018 marks a big year for Hunter x Hunter. The long-running series made its debut back in March 1998, and Yoshihiro Togashi has yet to finish the manga. With the series turning 20-years-old this year, fans around the world are wondering if Hunter x Hunter will ever come to an end.

So, you can thank Togashi for giving an answer to that burning question. The artist just dropped the scoop in a brand-new interview.

Recently, Shueisha published its latest issue of Weekly Shonen Jump, and the update held a new interview with Togashi. It was there the artist revealed whether he’s finished Hunter x Hunter story behind the scenes and if the manga will ever end.

“I need to finish writing Hunter x Hunter,” Togashi admitted. “It has come to the point where either the story concludes first or I die before that happens. But I do intend to finish it.”

For fans, the confirmation is exciting, but readers have no idea when Hunter x Hunter will come to a close. As mentioned earlier, the manga is 20-years-old, and it has been awhile since fans have gotten a new chapter of the story. You can thank the manga’s most recent hiatus for that blip.

If you weren’t aware, Hunter x Hunter has become famous for its extended hiatuses. When you look at the data, Togashi’s manga has been missing from more Weekly Shonen Jump episodes than it has been present since it debuted. In fact, nearly 61% of issues have lacked new chapters because of Hunter x Hunter’s various hiatuses. The long break ran from 2014-2016 and spanned about 80 issues. Most recently, Hunter x Hunter went on hiatus in 2018 and has yet to announce when it will resume publication.

When do you think Hunter x Hunter will put up its final chapter? Let me know in the comments or hit me up on Twitter @MeganPetersCB to talk all things comics, k-pop, and anime!

For those unfamiliar with Hunter x Hunter, the series was originally created by Yoshihiro Togashi. The story follows a young boy named Gon Freecss, who discovers that his previously thought to be dead father is in fact alive. Not only is he alive, he is a famous Hunter, a professional traveler who specializes in finding rare treasures, exploring unidentified lands, and hunting down dangerous individuals. Gon then decides that in order to meet his father he has to become a licensed Hunter, but in that journey gets wrapped up in way more strangeness than he ever could have anticipated.

The series first ran in Shuiesha's Weekly Shonen Jump in March 1998. Unfortunately, the series has gone on a number of hiatuses ever since 2006 which were most likely incurred by bouts of illness Togashi experienced when publishing his last work, Yu Yu Hakusho. The series has run for 360 chapters, and been collected into 47 volumes as of 2017. It's one of Shueisha's most successful selling series with over 66 million copies sold in Japan.