Publicity Is Essential

Because he'll always go back... after all, it's his hometown.

Given his personality, it's unlikely he'd go back alone; he'd probably grab someone to accompany him, otherwise he wouldn't have an excuse to convince himself to go back to that place. So, the content of these events is basically the same.

Shoko had been keeping an eye on the fact that Shuya and his friends went back to their hometown.

She knew that in this incident, Shuya visit the neighbor's house at night, and would inevitably be harassed by the Curse again.

Even though he could definitely fight back against the Curse, his personality still slid a little towards the darker side without him even realizing it.

According to Rio's analysis, this seemingly small slippage is the beginning of the collapse—of course, this is just speculation and not guaranteed to be 100% accurate.

Even if Rio possesses special abilities, she cannot predict the trajectory of every timeline.

However, these considerations will not prevent Shoko from adjusting that incident; it was a very important incident, and he had to take action to remove the flag.

Shoko paid a heavy price for this adjustment. From that day until now, she hasn't stepped out of her Little Senior Sister's house, and she spends 80% of her time sleeping.

Such adjustments certainly cannot be made arbitrarily.

Change always comes at a price.

The fate of each world is not fixed; there are countless possible future paths, and different futures will be entered due to various factors. However, these "various factors" obviously do not include people from other worlds.

Shoko Makinohara is an anomaly in this world; she is something that should not exist.

She was able to remain unharmed entirely thanks to the power of the Mai in her robes, which helped her conceal herself.

However, her involvement in the previous incident meant that she would expose her whereabouts and face rejection from the world.

Fortunately, she only appeared for a moment, and her appearance was brief.

---As long as I'm fast enough, the world can't keep up with my Speedster!

The world's rejection wasn't strong, so Shoko could continue to try and gain some more advantage. She was slowly guiding the power of the hairpin to enter a hidden state once again.

During this time, she couldn't do anything.

However, there wasn't much else that required her to intervene, Shoko had planned her actions carefully before acting.

Thinking of this, Shoko, distracted from listening to the song, gripped the hair clip.

(It's a pity that if Mai- senpai were still here, I wouldn't have had to wait so long, and we could have been bolder in our actions...)

"Well..."

Shoko sighed softly.

She was lying on her Little Senior Sister's lap, looking at her phone, but her eyes were vacant, clearly thinking about something else.

(Unfortunately, this is impossible because...)

Their ability to evade the Demon King Faction's forces and continue their resistance was built upon the sacrifice of Sakurajima Mai.

Actually, I think my book is quite complete; I've skipped all the pornographic parts. My previous book was banned, so I've stopped writing a lot of things there.

However, there may still be some areas where the virus hasn't been contained.

If you have time, I hope you can help me think of which plot points are unacceptable, and I'll see how to handle them.

Ugh, so annoying. I didn't make much money writing this novel, and there's so much trouble.

Section 570, 530: Propaganda is fundamental.

Shuya sang for over an hour, only stopping when Mai fell asleep.

He had already sensed trouble in his heart, and seeing her asleep, he was afraid she would wake up again, so he quickly cast a Strange Arts on her that made her sleep even more soundly.

He finally breathed a sigh of relief.

"Alright, I'm not singing anymore. Mai- chan's asleep, I can finally relax."

Shuya spoke into his phone.

Amidst the disappointed comments from many, Motoko's "???!!!" stood out starkly.

... Looks like I can go collect some erotic novels another day. Shuya saw through what Motoko was up to.

But that's not important now.

Shuya casually turned off the live stream, put the guitar back, and then squatted down next to Mai.

"Hey, what a blissful sleeping face."

He reached out and poked her soft cheek.

Mai didn't react at all, simply lost in a sweet dream.

She was subjected to Strange Arts by Shuya, and no matter what was done to her, she would not react.

But Shuya only poked her a little as a way of venting, and didn't do anything else.

He picked her up in a princess carry, quickly flew to her house, put her on the bed, and left without looking back.

Shuya had no interest in doing anything to the sleeping Mai.

He didn't really need to wait until she fell asleep to do what he wanted to do.

After dropping Mai off at home, he also went home.

After taking a shower, he scrolled through his phone for a while, looking at news about himself.

Today's live broadcast was a great success; according to online news reports, his album sparked a wave of online shopping frenzy.

Unfortunately, the live broadcast arrived too late, and all the DVD stores were already closed; otherwise, there would have been long queues again.

But Shuya felt it wasn't a big problem, since tomorrow, Saturday, is a day off for many people, and they could sell a lot more then.

"The difference between doing publicity and not doing publicity is indeed significant."

Shuya nodded, thinking that there would be a live broadcast with Hyakka tomorrow, which would be another opportunity to promote the show.

Since it's a live broadcast by our own company, we might as well take advantage of it.

After scrolling through his phone, he started playing games and didn't fall asleep until three or four in the morning.

One night passed, and Saturday arrived.

He didn't wake up until around nine o'clock.

"I did get up a little late..."

Shuya put down the clock and muttered to himself.

The dubbing session starts at 10:00 AM. If he were just an ordinary person, he would definitely be late today.

Fortunately, he can fly.

He wasn't in a hurry. He took his time washing up, ate some bread for breakfast, and didn't change into his outdoor clothes until 9:30 before quickly flying to the company.

I walked familiarly to the lounge near the recording studio, which was already full of people.

As soon as he entered, everyone stared at him; the female voice actresses and their managers all looked at him with curiosity.

... It's all because of the album's huge sales that they're paying extra attention to Shuya today. As soon as he went upstairs, he heard the female voice actresses gossiping about him to Hyakka and Haruno.

"Morning."

Shuya calmly greeted him.

"Good morning!"

Good morning, Shu-chan.

Good morning~

Shuya, and at that moment, Hyakka, who was sitting near the door, said to him:

"Shu-chan, you're up so late too?"

"Also?"

"Because I just arrived too."

The Hyakka returned.

With a meaningful smile, Haruno, "It's all Shu-chan's fault for staying up so late yesterday. We couldn't take it anymore, and we didn't get up until very late today."

As soon as these words were spoken, the lounge fell silent, while the others stared wide-eyed, excitedly watching the drama unfold.

"Stop speaking in such fragmented sentences, it makes it sound like I've done something to you."

Shuya stared with dead fish eyes, too lazy to even explain.

Hyakka said irritably, "Haruno, speak clearly. Yesterday, Shu-chan was singing live in the LINE group until very late, so I went to bed late and woke up late... By the way, you weren't late at all, were you?"

She explained it to everyone else.

"That's great, you even have this kind of benefit."

One of the female voice actresses said enviously.

"It wasn't a perk; I was forced by Mai- chan."

Shuya wore a helpless expression.

Standing on the perimeter, Karasuma Chitose laughed heartily, "I knew Shu-chan and Ms. Sakurajima were really close, haha!"

Gojo clutched his head and said, "Your Chitose, you've actually started calling Shu-chan that? And how many times have I told you not to talk nonsense..."

Shuya laughed and said, "It's okay. Mai- chan and I are childhood friends. What's wrong with being close to someone?"

"Exactly! Gojo- jun, you stingy brat, you should learn from this! You're only failing because you lack Shu-chan's generosity!"

Chitose, relying on Shuya's support, said smugly.

It highlights the tactic of a fox borrowing the tiger's power.

With Gojo face, Wujing grabbed Chitose's arm and said to the crowd, "Excuse me, I need to go out with her for a bit."

"Ugh! I don't want to go out!... Domestic violence! This is domestic violence, Gojo -jun! Help!!!"

Chitose was dragged out of the lounge by Wu Gojo, and soon Gojo's scolding and Chitose's constant rebuttals could be heard in the distance.

"Haha, what an energetic kid. If she didn't already have an agency, I'd really like to recruit her to our agency."

Shuya admires Chitose quite a bit. It's funny to watch her do something funny, and it's even more funny to watch her make a mistake. Plus, she's cute. This girl is simply all-around amazing.

"She seems older than you, it doesn't make sense for you to call her 'kid'."

Haruno answered casually that she wasn't particularly interested in Chitose.

In her opinion, Shuya a kid; he only said it on a whim, and taking it seriously would be a loss.

Hyakka was even less concerned than she was, and didn't even glance at Chitose.

She suddenly nudged Shuya: "By the way, Shu-chan, I have to tell you, your promotion on the live broadcast yesterday was incredibly effective. I just received a message from Ms. Maeda saying that the number of pre-orders for my new song has skyrocketed!"

"Of course, don't you know how much I charge for a single advertising job?"

Shuya put on a proud look, waiting for her to criticize him.

Haruno grinned and said, "What? You're asking if we remember your advertising rates from a few years ago? It seems like... you haven't taken any commercial orders for several years, dear Shu-chan- chan?"

Hyakka burst out laughing, "Hahaha! That's right! Shu-chan, you lazybones! You still have the nerve to ask me about advertising fees. Only the president is your mother, otherwise she would let you be so lazy!"

"Ahem, you guys talk too much!"

Shuya waved his hand dismissively, indicating that he didn't want to talk to them.

The people around them found their story amusing and burst into cheerful laughter.

Even Shibasaki Kazuha, sitting in the corner, couldn't help but curl the corners of his mouth into a smile.

Next, the female voice actresses surrounded Shuya, curiously asking him about the interesting stories behind making the album, how he managed to create so many good songs, and then they asked him to take photos with them.

Shuya barely managed to get through it.

They only let Shuya go when Inoue Hikoo and Hanazawa Sakura arrived.

They were professionals after all, and they quickly composed themselves and filed into the recording studio.