Chapter 382: The Mysterious Artist, Miss Kashiwagi Eri
Twenty minutes later.
"Is this... the anime convention?"
After entering the anime convention venue, Fujiwara Chika immediately noticed the cosplayers dressed in all kinds of costumes, the tall cardboard cutouts of anime characters visible everywhere, and the stalls selling merchandise.
"It feels very lively."
"That goes without saying. If you like this kind of atmosphere, we can even go to Akihabara after we return to Tokyo..."
Just as Asagiri was halfway through speaking, two female cosplayers ran over. Holding their phones, they approached him with practiced poise.
"Excuse me, could we exchange contact information?"
"Exchange contact information?"
Asagiri waved his hand, then pointed at Fujiwara Chika beside him and smiled.
"I'm here with my girlfriend."
"Oh, is that so? Sorry about that~"
Upon hearing this, the two female cosplayers did not say anything more. They simply gave sweet smiles, apologized, and turned to leave.
"Fujiwara..."
Asagiri turned his head, just about to say that he would take Fujiwara Chika around the convention venue, only to see that her fair cheeks had already turned bright red.
She had once again entered steam girl mode.
"Girl... girlfriend..."
Fujiwara Chika gathered her courage and looked at Asagiri's face, her eyes filled with hope as she asked,
"Utsunomiya-san... are we, are we... are we in a romantic relationship now?"
"No."
Hearing Asagiri's negative answer, Fujiwara Chika had not even begun to feel disappointed when she heard him continue.
"We haven't even had a formal confession yet, so how could we be in a romantic relationship?"
"Of course, just because we aren't in a relationship now doesn't mean I don't want to be. My willingness to help you with the matter that's been troubling you already shows my stance, but it seems you didn't quite understand what I meant."
"Eh?"
Fujiwara Chika was stunned when she heard this and hesitated.
"You agreed to help... does that mean you like me?"
"What else would it mean?"
Asagiri shrugged and spoke as if it were only natural.
"How could I possibly touch the body of a girl I don't like? Don't let my appearance fool you. I'm actually a very conservative person."
Fujiwara Chika could not help chuckling as she teased,
"Conservative? I have my doubts."
"Don't doubt it. I thought that as a love detective, you would be able to solve the riddle set by me, the Eroge Shooter. I didn't expect you to fall at the first hurdle."
Asagiri sighed.
"It's truly disappointing. So the so-called love detective is only at this level."
"No, no, this time doesn't count!"
Fujiwara Chika shook her head like a rattle drum and pleaded in a cute tone.
"Give me another chance! I just wasn't in the zone..."
Just as she was speaking, Fujiwara Chika inadvertently saw a familiar figure sitting behind a booth.
"Eh? That is..."
Fujiwara Chika pulled on Asagiri's sleeve and ran over quickly.
Looking at the beautiful, dignified, and mature woman wearing a kimono and holding a folding fan printed with anime character illustrations, she greeted her in surprise.
"Auntie Sayuri, why are you here too?"
"Oh? Isn't this little Chika? I thought it looked like you earlier, but I wasn't sure."
Sawamura Sayuri smiled as she said this.
Then she cast her gaze toward Asagiri beside Fujiwara Chika, covering the lower half of her face with her folding fan as she made a meaningful sound.
"And who is this...?"
"He is... he is my friend and classmate, Utsunomiya Asagiri..."
Fujiwara Chika introduced him first, then whispered an addition.
"For now, we're just friends and classmates."
"Oh? For now, you say... How nice, romance between high school students."
"Auntie Sayuri, are you selling things here too? Since that's the case, I'll buy..."
Although Fujiwara Chika did not know why Sawamura Sayuri was here, since the other party was selling things, she definitely wanted to support her.
However, just as she was halfway through her sentence, her gaze drifted to the explosive covers of the magazines on the booth, and she instantly froze.
Her pretty face turned bright red.
"Auntie... Auntie Sayuri, this... this is..."
"This is called a doujinshi."
Before Sawamura Sayuri could speak, Asagiri took the initiative to introduce it to Fujiwara Chika.
"So-called doujinshi are works created independently by authors without commercial influence. Although they say without commercial influence, self-created works can still be sold, just not on a large commercial scale."
"Usually, they are either ordered online by supporters or sold at comic conventions like this."
"I see."
Fujiwara Chika nodded as if she understood.
Looking at the covers of the doujinshi on the booth, she said somewhat embarrassedly,
"Auntie Sayuri, may I ask what the content inside is..."
"It's exactly what you're thinking."
Sawamura Sayuri rested her chin in one hand, gently fanning herself with the other, and admitted it without concealment.
"It's all 18+ content, though there are also posters of individual female characters. How about it, little Chika? Want to support Auntie's business?"
"Uh... this..."
While Fujiwara Chika was talking with Asagiri and Sawamura Sayuri, in a corner of the venue, someone wearing a baseball cap, a mask, and sunglasses, dressed in a long green tracksuit even in the hot summer, and looking almost like a stalker, was intently watching the situation at the booth.
This is the end...
Eriri never expected to run into her good friend Fujiwara Chika here.
And beside her was Utsunomiya Asagiri, whom she had met once before during the joint school exams.
Sawamura Spencer Eriri, whose name as a doujinshi artist was Kashiwagi Eri, had only let her parents know about this before entering high school.
After being selected as a Player, her teammates Shijo Maki and Kasumigaoka Utaha had also learned about it.
The adult oriented doujinshi Eriri drew were usually sold at comic conventions by her parents, and she herself usually did not need to show up.
However, the comic convention held in Kyoto today was quite large, and Eriri wanted to buy other authors' works to read and draw inspiration from, so she had come to the venue with her mother, Sayuri.
She never expected something like this to happen.
One had to know that Eriri's image at school was that of a flawless, perfect girl and a genius in the Art Club.
If others were to find out that her true identity was the somewhat famous online doujin artist Kashiwagi Eri...
That would be a disaster.
"Why would Chika come here..."
Watching Fujiwara Chika standing in front of the booth and talking to her mother, Eriri was truly baffled.
After all, in her view, Fujiwara Chika was the person least likely to be exposed to otaku culture.
Let alone otaku culture, she had not even played video games before. Her only hobbies were tabletop puzzle games.
While Eriri was struggling and did not know what to do, quietly approaching from behind, Fujiwara Chika, under Sawamura Sayuri's enthusiastic persuasion, had already begun enduring her shyness and choosing which doujinshi manga she wanted to buy.
Of course, it was not entirely to support Auntie Sayuri.
She was also thinking...
If I can learn some tricks from these and use them on Utsunomiya-san... would that greatly speed up my conquest of him?
The love detective was planning to evolve.
However...
"Auntie Sayuri, who drew these books?"
Hearing Fujiwara Chika's question, Sawamura Sayuri smiled slightly and spoke softly.
"That's a secret, oh. What's wrong?"
"Nothing, it's just..."
Fujiwara Chika picked up a doujinshi and examined the cover carefully.
After putting aside her shyness and starting to observe it seriously, she felt an increasingly familiar sensation.
"Why does the feeling of this image... seem like I've seen it somewhere before?"
Logically speaking, the oil paintings Eriri drew at school had a completely different style from the doujinshi she created, so it should have been impossible to recognize them.
However, Fujiwara Chika possessed a kind of almost wild intuition, just like a superpower.
"Utsunomiya-san..."
Fujiwara Chika looked at Asagiri beside her and asked with a blushing face,
"Which one do you like?"
After adjusting her state, Fujiwara Chika had already begun her active offensive.
She seemed to be asking what kind of books Asagiri liked, but in reality, she was probing for Asagiri's interests.
Love was war, and war required intelligence.
"What I like, huh..."
Asagiri casually scanned the doujinshi on the booth and said indifferently,
"The quality is all very poor. Even if it's a doujinshi, putting something of this level up for sale is really unjustifiable."
Asagiri did not intentionally lower his voice when saying this.
Eriri, who had already approached and was hiding behind a cardboard standee while eavesdropping, heard it clearly.
"This guy..."
Hearing Asagiri belittle the doujinshi she had worked so hard on, after staying up countless nights to create them, Eriri could not help clenching her fists and biting her lip.
A few black lines could not help appearing on her forehead.
However, just as a certain professional esports player once said.
Damage output cannot stop for even a second.
Asagiri picked up a doujinshi, looked at it briefly, then casually threw it back onto the booth and commented in a high and mighty manner.
"Even the most basic human anatomy has problems. It's practically a level below a beginner..."
"You jerk!"
Hearing this, Eriri, who was hiding behind the anime character standee, finally could not hold it in any longer.
She jumped out, walked quickly to Asagiri, clenched her fists, and said angrily,
"Do you even understand anything!? If you don't understand, don't judge it randomly!"
What Eriri did not expect was that upon seeing her sudden appearance, Asagiri merely smiled, crossed his arms over his chest, and spoke as if his scheme had succeeded.
"Yo, finally couldn't help yourself? Sawamura."
.....
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