Not long afterward, Sato led one more person into the backyard.
"Eek!"
Eriri froze in surprise at the lively scene before her.
"Why are there so many people here?!"
She turned toward Sato in shock.
"These are..."
"Oh, they're all my friends."
Sato introduced them casually, pointing toward the girls who had looked over curiously.
"Those over there are friends from my club. They're first-years like us. The others are friends from the apartment. Everyone's pretty friendly."
Eriri nodded lightly and looked through the crowd.
She recognized quite a few familiar faces, and naturally, she also spotted Sagiri Izumi sitting among them.
Her sapphire-blue eyes immediately lit up.
"Then I'm going to find Sagiri!"
"Go ahead."
Sato smiled and nodded, watching her walk away thoughtfully.
Although Eriri was an otaku, she wasn't the kind of shut-in with terrible social skills.
At school, she was one of the most popular students, surrounded by an aura of brilliance. She had everything people admired: an excellent family background, refined beauty, extraordinary artistic talent, and countless other enviable qualities.
Granted, that "refined beauty" was only on the surface.
She had managed to completely hide her otaku side at school and had gathered quite a large circle of so-called friends.
Whether those friendships were sincere was another matter, but one thing was certain.
No one needed to worry about Eriri's social skills.
After all, she was the daughter of a diplomat.
Her communication skills were practically maxed out.
"And this one?"
Fujimiya Konomi had quietly walked over to Sato again, narrowing her eyes as she watched Eriri's retreating figure alongside him.
In the distance, Eriri had already sat down beside Sagiri.
Her golden twin tails flowed like smooth silk, as perfect as a carefully crafted work of art.
Her delicate, adorable face wore a bright, innocent smile without the slightest trace of impurity. Her clear eyes were like an oasis in the desert, sparkling with the same crystal purity.
She's such a cute girl.
Konomi couldn't help marveling inwardly.
And... she looks as pure as a blank sheet of paper.
She silently added another thought before shooting Sato a resentful glance.
Why are all the girls you know so outstanding? The pressure on me is enormous, you know!
"Eriri..."
Sato hadn't noticed Konomi's expression.
Watching Eriri, he couldn't help smiling as memories of the beginning resurfaced.
"You could say she's my partner."
Eriri had been his very first partner.
Even before writing Hero Throne, he had already been working with her.
Working with a doujin artist naturally meant creating adult doujinshi.
After a chance encounter, he had provided Eriri with countless ideas and story scripts.
After all, he had "read extensively."
Even counting only the high-quality works, he'd seen at least eight hundred, if not over a thousand, so he had no shortage of stories stored in his head.
After talking with him, Eriri had regarded him as nothing short of a genius.
Though looking back now...
Sato scratched his cheek awkwardly.
He had first met Eriri when they were in their first year of middle school.
Back then, he had never imagined that the veteran hidden behind the screen would turn out to be a girl.
Not only a girl, but a first-year middle school girl.
Still, regardless of how strange it started, they eventually became good friends.
"Hmph. You really like her, don't you?"
Noticing the tenderness in Sato's eyes, Konomi finally felt her jealousy completely overflow.
"Hm?"
Sato looked at her in surprise and blinked.
"Are you jealous?"
She rolled her eyes and answered quietly,
"No."
"I don't believe you."
"Then why did you ask if you weren't going to believe me?"
Konomi glared at him angrily.
Pretty girls somehow managed to look adorable even when they were angry.
Chuckling, Sato reached out and pinched her soft cheek.
It felt pleasantly squishy.
Unfortunately, making a girl angry came with consequences.
Faced with the increasingly icy look in her eyes, he immediately raised both hands in surrender with an awkward laugh.
"I do like Eriri."
"But not in the way you're thinking."
"It's more like..."
He pondered for a moment.
Even his own expression became rather strange, as though he found his own explanation bizarre.
"...fatherly love?"
He forced out the two words.
Time seemed to stop.
The two of them simply stared at each other.
Looking at Konomi's expression that practically said Do I look that easy to fool?, Sato sighed helplessly.
"Believe it or not, that's honestly the closest way I can describe it."
Eriri was a classic tsundere.
The kind whose mouth said no while her heart said yes.
She embarrassed easily.
Whenever something happened, she'd blush bright red, turn her head away, and still agree in the end.
She was incredibly cute.
Even though she worked as an adult doujin artist, she herself was as innocent as a blank sheet of paper.
She was far more easily embarrassed than almost anyone.
And although she appeared to have many friends, there was hardly anyone she could truly open her heart to.
She was a fake social butterfly who had nothing except her doujin work.
Sato often felt like an old father, quietly watching over and protecting Eriri.
Calling it fatherly love wasn't entirely wrong.
Coming back to his senses, he noticed Konomi stroking her chin thoughtfully.
"What are you thinking about?" he asked.
At the same moment, Konomi seemed to have realized something.
She looked at him with a rather peculiar expression.
"Blonde twin tails... fatherly love..."
"Hm?"
Sato raised an eyebrow.
Somehow, that sounded familiar.
"You want to become Akizuki Kouzou?!" (H-Anime: Oni Chichi)
The moment Konomi said those words, Sato completely froze.
He stared at her in disbelief.
"How do you know about him?!"
Konomi casually twirled a lock of hair hanging over her chest around her finger.
A faint blush crossed her face, but she remained composed as she looked him straight in the eye.
"Just because I didn't understand before doesn't mean I still don't."
The corner of Sato's mouth twitched.
Akizuki Kouzou.
That was... certainly a story full of "love."
It was also one of the scripts he had once given Eriri.
Back then, when he wrote it, he had assumed the girls wouldn't understand what it meant, so he hadn't bothered being careful.
Looking back now, they had probably seen at least part of it.
Which also meant...
Konomi probably knew exactly what kinds of scripts he had written.
After all, the scriptwriter's name had always been one of his pen names.
Suddenly, Sato realized something.
He looked at the girl before him with a rather strange expression.
"...Exactly how many of them have you read?"