Chapter 191: I'll Give You a Slap! (Patreon)

The boy with glasses was still talking.

"Senior Kasumigaoka, please hear me out!"

"Doujin games are the hot trend right now — if we start now, we'll seize the opportunity! With your fame as Kasumi Utako, once you write the script, this game is guaranteed to blow up!"

Across from him, the girl lifted her eyelids slightly.

"Tomoya, I already told you — I don't have time!"

"How could you not have time?"

The boy named Aki raised his voice again. "Didn't you say the next volume of Love Metronome is stuck? Write something else instead — maybe you'll find some inspiration! This would be good for you too!"

"..."

The girl fell silent.

Shido Makoto looked away and turned to Sora.

Sora was staring at the piece of strawberry cake that had fallen onto her plate, her small face already dark with anger.

"Makoto."

"That glasses guy is so noisy."

"Mm."

"My cake fell."

"I saw."

Shido Makoto reached out and patted the back of her hand. "Don't rush. Eat slowly."

With that bit of comfort, Sora's expression eased a little.

She speared another piece of cake, and this time, before it could get shaken off again, she stuffed it into her mouth quickly.

But the boy at the next table only got more worked up.

"Senior Kasumigaoka, remember how passionate we used to be when we talked about our work together? Back then you said you wanted to write a story that could move people's hearts!"

"And now? You're trapped by commercial formulas. You've forgotten why you even started writing novels in the first place!"

Slap!

The boy smacked his hand on the table.

People at nearby tables turned to look.

The long-haired girl's face went white.

Shido Makoto glanced at her again.

This girl wasn't as composed as she looked.

She kept her eyes down, but the foot tucked under the table wouldn't stop trembling.

Nobody could stand being called out like that in public.

Especially not when the other side dragged out something like "original intentions."

That kind of talk was the worst, because it wasn't about logic — it was about emotion.

Push back, and you become the ungrateful villain.

Shido Makoto could tell the girl was genuinely choked up now.

She had a stomach full of retorts and no idea where to start.

Call him selfish, and he'd say he was chasing a dream. Call him childish, and he'd say he had passion.

No matter how she scolded him, it would look like she was bullying someone with a dream.

"Tomoya."

The girl finally managed to squeeze out a sentence. "I don't have time to play these childish games with you. Please calm down."

"Childish games?" The boy's eyes went wide.

"Senior Kasumigaoka, how can you say that? This is my life's work!"

He bent down, pulled a stack of papers from the bag on his back, and slapped them onto the table.

"Look at this! This is the proposal I stayed up several nights straight to write! Read it, then tell me if this is a childish game!"

The girl glanced at the stack of paper, her brow furrowing.

Shido Makoto looked over too.

The stack of paper sat about two meters from him, cover facing up. Large characters on it read "Doujin Game Proposal," with dense text crammed underneath.

At that distance, a normal person could barely make out the title.

But Shido Makoto wasn't a normal person.

As he read, his brow furrowed.

After reading through the first few visible pages, he nearly laughed out loud.

This was no proposal at all.

There was no budget anywhere, no market research, no division of labor, no timeline.

The entire first three pages were nothing but phrases like "We're going to make the best game ever," "powered by love," and "move the players' hearts."

The most important part was the section on copyright and revenue split.

Shido Makoto ran those lines through his head again.

Terms of cooperation: the script will be provided free of charge by Ms. Kasumi Utako. After the game's release, all rights belong to the producer, Aki Tomoya, who will oversee distribution of any profits.

Free of charge.

Shido Makoto understood now.

This was a slave contract, plain and simple.

Get someone to write the script for free, and even after it's done, the copyright still isn't hers — and however the profits get split, she'd have to depend on that glasses-wearing guy's mood to see a cut.

In plain terms, it was a con run on empty hands, and the thing being conned was someone else's talent.

The corner of Shido Makoto's mouth twitched, and he let out a cold laugh.

This guy really had a thick skin.

He'd turned freeloading into something that sounded righteous, wrapping himself in the flag of "dreams" until the person being exploited felt too embarrassed to refuse.

If the noise hadn't been bothering Sora's meal, he wouldn't have bothered with someone else's business.

Shido Makoto turned to look at Sora again.

Sora's cake-eating had hit trouble again.

Every time the boy slapped the table, the dessert on her fork trembled.

She'd eaten three bites, and her scowl had deepened each time.

"Makoto." Sora set down her fork.

"If he yells one more time, I'm going over there to knock his glasses off."

"..."

Shido Makoto took hold of her hand.

"Stay seated."

"But—"

"Watch for a bit first."

Shido Makoto's gaze drifted back to the next table.

The boy was still ranting, spit flying.

The long-haired girl's face kept getting uglier, but she still couldn't get out a single word with any real bite.

This scene was actually kind of interesting.

Someone clearly talented was being talked into silence by someone clearly freeloading off her.

She was wrapped up in his rhetoric, unable to find an opening to strike back.

He'd seen this kind of thing plenty of times before.

The boy with glasses stood up.

One hand on his hip, the other pointing at the girl across from him, he stood there as if occupying the moral high ground.

"Senior Kasumigaoka, I'm really disappointed in you." He shook his head, his voice loud and full of anguish.

"You weren't like this before. You used to stay up all night for a good story, used to talk with me about characters until dawn!"

"Now all you think about is royalties, sales figures, reprints! You're not the Kasumi Utako you used to be! You've lost your original passion!"

"I—" The girl opened her mouth.

"Do you remember?" The boy gave her no chance to speak.

"During the culture festival, you said you wanted to write a story that could make people cry. I supported you so much back then!"

"Now that I need your help making a game, this is how you treat me?"

"Tomoya, that's different..."

"How is it different!" The boy raised his voice.

"It's all creation! It's all about moving people! You're refusing me now just because there's no money in it, aren't you?"

"You've turned into someone reeking of money!"

Those words changed the way people at the surrounding tables looked at things.

Shido Makoto saw it clearly.

Up until then, everyone had just assumed the two were arguing, without taking sides.

But that one line from the boy had forcibly cast the girl as the villain.

A middle-aged woman muttered quietly to her companion, "Kids these days only think about money. It's not even that big a deal."

Someone at a nearby table nodded along.

The girl was shaking with anger.

Her foot trembled even harder, but she still couldn't get out a single complete rebuttal.

Shido Makoto could tell the girl was too furious to think straight, unsure which point to even address.

Sora suddenly stood up.

Shido Makoto grabbed her and held her down.

Pressed back into her chair, Sora glared at him, puffed up with anger. "Makoto, they're bullying her! That glasses guy is obviously freeloading off her!"

"I know."

"Then why are you holding me back?"

"Because I'm worried you'd lose the argument too," Shido Makoto said.

"..."

Sora choked on that for a second.

To be fair, that was probably true.

Shido Makoto stood up and pushed his chair back. "Leave it to me."

Sora blinked.

Makoto rarely got involved in other people's business.

But if he was stepping in now, he meant business — maybe not with his fists, necessarily, but he'd definitely make someone miserable.

Shido Makoto walked over to the next table.

He raised his hand and knocked on the table twice.

Knock, knock.

The boy with glasses, right in the middle of his heated speech, was interrupted by the two knocks. He turned, looking annoyed.

"What do you want?"

Shido Makoto looked down at him.

"Keep it down, please," Shido Makoto said.

"You're bothering my sister's meal."

The long-haired girl looked up at this person who had suddenly appeared.

Her eyes were a wine-red color.

She looked at Shido Makoto, and her expression shifted from surprise to something else.

The boy with glasses looked Shido Makoto up and down.

He noticed the plain clothes — a black jacket — clearly not someone into anime or otaku culture.

He pushed up his glasses and scoffed. "What business is it of yours? We're discussing something serious."

"Serious business doesn't need to be this loud."

"What would you know?" The boy straightened up.

"We're talking about creation! About dreams! Could someone like you even understand that?"

"Someone like me?"

"A normie." The boy spat out the word, dripping with contempt.

"All you people ever do is eat, drink, and have fun. You have no idea what it's like for people like us, fighting for our ideals."

Shido Makoto glanced down at the stack of proposal papers on the table, then back at the boy.

"You're Aki Tomoya?"

"...How do you know that?" Tomoya blinked, caught off guard.

"It's written right there on top."

Shido Makoto said, "I'd suggest you don't take this proposal out in public. It's embarrassing."

Tomoya's face flushed red.

"You didn't even look at it — how can you say my proposal is embarrassing!"

"I read it."

"When did you even read it?" Tomoya pointed at the stack of papers in front of him.

"This has been sitting right here on my table! You haven't even touched it!"

Shido Makoto pulled out an empty chair beside them.

Tomoya thought he was about to leave. Instead, the man sat right down at their table.

"What are you doing?" Tomoya scooted back.

"Didn't you say I don't understand?" Shido Makoto rested his arm on the table, looking at him.

"Then sit down, and let's have a proper talk."

Tomoya was unsettled by how unhurried the man seemed.

Mustering his courage, he shouted again. "What would a soulless corpse with no dreams like you know about dreams!"

Shido Makoto let out a soft chuckle at that.

Smack!!

The slap landed on Aki Tomoya's face faster than the eye could follow, sending his glasses flying.

Back at their original table, Sora's eyes lit up, cheering Shido Makoto on.

Kasumigaoka Utaha watched all this with her mouth hanging open, but she didn't say anything like "don't hit him."

As for the one on the receiving end of that slap, Aki Tomoya clutched his swollen cheek, completely stunned.

He'd never expected the other man to actually hit him. This wasn't supposed to happen — it wasn't supposed to be like this!

Shido Makoto: "So, do you think I understand dreams now?"

...