Leaving Kido to handle the intricate legalities of the contract drafting, Renji stepped out of the corner office and walked down the quiet, oak-floored hallway of the PRNC Agency.
He bypassed the reception area and pushed open the heavy, frosted glass door that led directly into the agency's private styling studio.
The room was vast and impeccably clean, brightly lit by rows of professional, daylight-balanced LED panels suspended from the high ceiling. Racks of expensive, unreleased clothing lined the walls in meticulous, colour-coordinated rows, representing the upcoming autumn collections from several top-tier fashion houses. The center of the room was dominated by a circular fitting pedestal, surrounded on three sides by a pristine, floor-to-ceiling mirror setup.
Waiting for him was Haruka, a veteran of the Tokyo fashion industry, and his dedicated stylist. Haruka was a man in his late thirties, sporting sharp, wire-rimmed glasses, a meticulously trimmed beard, and a yellow tailor's tape measure constantly draped around his neck like a permanent accessory.
"Good morning, Kamishiro-sama," Haruka greeted, his hands already holding a dark, heavy wool blazer on a velvet hanger. "Let's get straight to it, if you don't mind. The 'Sapphire Line' samples arrived late last night. We need to check the tailoring on the shoulders and pin the inseam for the trousers before the official shoot next week."
"Morning, Haruka-san," Renji said easily, his tone relaxed and entirely cooperative. "Lead the way."
He stepped behind the tall, minimalist privacy screen, shedding his high-end trench coat, turtleneck, and dark trousers. He swapped them out for the sample dress shirt and the heavy suit pants.
When he stepped out and walked up onto the low pedestal, Haruka went straight to work without a single second of hesitation. The stylist moved around him, tugging sharply at the high-quality fabric, sliding a piece of white tailor's chalk across the side seams, and pinning the excess material at his waist with rapid precision.
"Arms up a little, please," Haruka mumbled, a few silver pins held expertly between his lips as he crouched down to examine the drape of the jacket.
Renji obliged, raising his arms slightly and looking straight ahead into the massive three-way mirror.
Looking at that reflection, listening to the quiet snip of Haruka's fabric scissors, a quiet emotion washed over him.
In his previous life, he had completely given up on women.
It hadn't been by choice, but rather by the sheer, crushing weight of his daily circumstances. When you are working yourself into the ground just to make rent, living in a cramped, drafty apartment that perpetually smells like damp laundry and cheap cooking oil, romance quickly becomes an entirely unaffordable luxury. He had lived his life constantly vibrating with the low-level, exhausting anxiety of being poor.
He had lacked the money to take anyone out on a decent date. He had lacked the free time to build a genuine, meaningful connection. But most importantly, he had completely lacked the basic self-confidence required to even approach a woman in the first place. He had been invisible, just another exhausted, unremarkable, dead-eyed face shuffling through the crowded subway stations of the city.
But now?
Renji looked down at his own large, well-manicured hands, then back at the mirror. He was Kamishiro Renji. He was eighteen years old, the sole heir to a staggering fortune, and he possessed a literal cheat-tier character design in a world that fundamentally operated on the logic of a dating simulator.
To waste this miraculous second chance by acting like a stoic monk, or by playing the role of the passive, entirely oblivious protagonist like Takumi did, wouldn't just be foolish. It would be an absolute tragedy.
He didn't just want a peaceful, quiet life anymore. He wanted everything he had been denied. He wanted the warmth, the intimacy, the romance, and yes, the sexual experiences that he had completely missed out on in his miserable past life. The world is literally designed to cater to him, and he fully intended to use his charm, his wealth, and his capabilities to enjoy every single drop of it.
"The break on the trousers is slightly too long," Haruka muttered, crouching down by Renji's expensive leather shoes and folding the hem up. "I'll have the tailor bring it up half an inch so it doesn't bunch over the laces and ruin the silhouette."
Renji looked down at Haruka, who was strictly focused on the wool fabric, his brow furrowed in deep concentration.
Haruka was excellent at his job. But as Renji felt the man clinically pat down the fabric of his suit to check the fit across his thighs, a very simple, honest thought crossed his mind.
'This would be infinitely more enjoyable if a beautiful woman was doing it.'
His parents had outsourced this agency's staff to be functional, professional, and entirely safe. But as Renji continued to plan for the upcoming expiration of their corporate contracts, his vision for the agency's future began to take a much more specific, enjoyable shape.
He didn't want a sterile, hyper-corporate environment. If he was going to be the boss of his own life, he was going to actively curate his surroundings to suit his exact preferences.
When the time came, Kido's eventual replacement, or at the very least, Renji's direct personal secretary and daily assistant, would absolutely be a beautiful woman. The same went for his personal stylist and his makeup artist.
There was no strategic or corporate advantage to it; it was purely a lifestyle choice. If he was going to spend hours of his life standing in fitting rooms, sitting in makeup chairs, and taking meetings in private offices, he wanted to be surrounded by soft voices, pleasant scents, and attractive faces. He wanted an environment where he could comfortably exercise his natural charm, build genuine, enjoyable dynamics with his staff, and perhaps naturally blur the lines of strict professionalism when the doors were closed.
"Alright, that should do it for the suit," Haruka said, standing up and brushing a stray piece of white thread off Renji's lapel with the back of his hand. "Take it off carefully so the pins don't catch your skin. We'll do the casual wear next."
"Understood. Great work as always, Haruka-san," Renji smiled smoothly, his polite demeanour perfectly in place, despite his not-so-polite thoughts.
…
Thirty minutes later, Renji exited the styling studio. Before heading back to the private elevator, he made a slight detour down the opposite side of the hallway, stopping in front of an office that hummed with a much more frantic energy than the rest of the floor.
This was the PR and Social Media management desk.
Sitting behind a pristine white desk surrounded by three large, glowing monitors was Nakata. She was a sharp, highly observant woman in her mid-thirties, currently wearing a sleek blouse and glasses that rested slightly too low on her nose. She was typing furiously on her keyboard, her eyes darting between constantly updating analytics dashboards.
Renji knocked lightly on the open glass door frame. "Am I interrupting, Nakata-san?"
Nakata looked up slightly, pushing her glasses up her nose as she spun around in her ergonomic chair. "Kamishiro-sama. No, not at all. Please, come in. I was actually just compiling a weekly engagement report to send to Kido-san."
Renji walked in, casually leaning his hip against the edge of her desk. "How are the numbers looking?"
Nakata let out a breath that was half-laugh, half-sigh of disbelief. She reached out and tapped one of her monitors, waking up a screen filled with line graphs that looked like a mountain range steeply aggressively upward.
"The numbers are completely unprecedented, Kamishiro-sama," Nakata said, her voice laced with genuine awe. "Over the last fourteen days, your overall social media engagement, follower growth, and active daily impressions have spiked by nearly four hundred percent."
Renji looked at the data, a small, knowing smile touching his lips.
The spike hadn't happened by accident. In the game, the original Renji was incredibly passive about his public image. His official social media accounts were entirely managed by the agency, filled strictly with highly polished, heavily edited magazine covers, formal announcements, and agency-approved promotional shots. He had been portrayed as a distant, untouchable idol on a pedestal.
But after regaining his memories two weeks ago, Renji had quietly taken the reins of his own accounts. He hadn't fired Nakata or taken away her access; he had simply started supplementing the professional posts with his own content.
He had started uploading simple, everyday moments. A casual morning selfie sitting at the Kamishiro kitchen island with a cup of coffee, his hair unstyled and his shirt slightly open. A fifteen-second video story posted after his evening workout, his dark hair slightly damp, a towel draped over his broad shoulders as he offered a tired, genuine smile to the camera.
He was actively dismantling the robotic facade and replacing it with an incredibly attractive, wealthy, yet approachable young man. The fans weren't used to seeing him unfiltered, and the internet had completely lost its collective mind.
"The casual posts you've been uploading from your personal phone are driving the algorithm insane," Nakata explained, bringing up a separate window showing thousands of scrolling comments. "Your followers are completely obsessed with this new, relaxed, and genuine side of you. The 'after-shower' story you posted on Wednesday generated more direct interactions in three hours than your entire winter catalogue campaign did in a month."
"I thought it might be good to show them I don't actually sleep in a three-piece suit," Renji joked. "I take it the agency isn't upset about the deviation from the standard PR strategy?"
"Upset? We are thrilled," Nakata assured him quickly. "But… there is a specific demographic trend I wanted to discuss with you. Something we should perhaps keep in mind for your upcoming shoots."
Renji tilted his head, giving her his full attention. "Go ahead."
Nakata hesitated for a split second, a very faint blush dusting her cheeks as she pulled up a demographic breakdown chart.
"Well, since you officially turned eighteen, the composition of your active fanbase has begun to shift," Nakata said delicately, maintaining her professionalism. "We are seeing a massive surge in engagement from female demographics ranging from high school students up through women in their late twenties. And looking at the sentiment analysis of the comments…"
She cleared her throat softly.
"They love the elegant shoots. But… they are actively demanding more, well, daring content," Nakata confessed, gesturing to the screen. "The fans want to see you look more mature. They are incredibly vocal about wanting Kamishiro Renji to shed the 'pure teen idol' image and step into something much more masculine."
Renji stared at the demographic charts on the glowing monitor.
As he processed Nakata's words, a sudden flash of clarity struck him. The invisible puzzle pieces of the original galgame's lore suddenly snapped perfectly into place in his mind.
In the original game timeline, Kamishiro Renji's character arc eventually stagnated. He remained a highly popular, beloved side character, but he never truly progressed beyond being Takumi's helpful best friend and the school's untouchable Prince. His modelling career in the game was always mentioned as being successful, but it never reached the top of the industry, despite him being quoted as "perfect".
Now, looking at the data, Renji finally understood exactly why.
The fans, and by extension, the literal mechanics of the galgame world, had craved romance, heat, and maturity.
In the original timeline, Nakata must have, looking at this kind of trend, suggested this identical pivot to him.
And he, with his stiff, overly polite, overly sheltered mindset, would have absolutely refused feeling it was improper or immodest. He would have shut Nakata down, strictly maintained his pristine, untouchable image, and consequently, completely killed his own momentum, forever locking himself into that role.
Renji couldn't help but let out a low, smooth chuckle that seemed to vibrate in the quiet office.
Nakata blinked, looking slightly nervous. "Kamishiro-sama? Is the suggestion… inappropriate?"
"Not at all, Nakata-san. Actually, I think your analysis is completely fine," Renji said, pushing himself off the edge of the desk.
"I'm officially an adult now. I think it's perfectly fine to let the brand grow up a little," Renji said. "If the market wants a more mature, daring aesthetic, we shouldn't disappoint them. When you finalize the mood boards with Matsumoto-sensei for the shoot next week, tell him I am entirely open to pushing the boundaries. Let's give them the heat they're asking for."
Nakata's eyes widened. "Absolutely, Kamishiro-sama! I will coordinate with the creative team immediately. The fans are going to go absolutely crazy."
"I'm counting on you," Renji smiled warmly.
He turned and walked out of the PR office, heading back down the corridor toward the private elevator.
As the polished steel doors slid shut, sealing him inside the quiet car for the descent back down to the lobby, Renji shoved his hands casually into the pockets of his dark trousers, a satisfied smile resting on his face.