In his dream, Haruto felt a sharp pain in his head, as if someone had struck him several times with an iron rod.
A flood of memories surged up, some belonging to him, others clearly not. They tangled together and began to merge, and for a brief moment, he felt as though he was about to turn into someone else entirely. In the end, however, Haruto's own will remained dominant.
The memories that did not belong to him gradually transformed into something like fragmented video clips, sinking deep into his mind.
They became vague and distant, like an adult's recollection of early childhood. Even if you tried hard to remember, you might not be able to clearly recall them.
Everyone has experienced dreaming about the past at least once. Haruto was now in that very state. In his dream, he was someone else. And that someone seemed to be a girl.
She lay in her bedroom at home, eating potato chips and sipping cola, her eyes fixed unblinkingly on the computer sitting on her desk.
On the screen played scenes from an anime.
Blue Spring Ride.
Haruto had never watched this series before, yet the moment he slipped into the girl's perspective, the title surfaced in his mind without hesitation.
And so, in this strange dreamlike state, he calmly watched the romance anime through the eyes of the girl.
After all, in Japan, light novels, anime, manga, and games formed a massive cultural industry. Otaku culture was deeply ingrained in society, especially among middle and high school students, and its influence extended worldwide.
Haruto was no exception.
Although the situation was bizarre, he found himself enjoying it. His sense of immersion came almost entirely from the girl herself.
In the dream, the girl watched Blue Spring Ride episode by episode. She was genuinely happy. She did not have to work. She did not have to go to school. There was no meaningless socializing. Her parents had passed away early, leaving behind an enormous inheritance placed in a trust fund. The portion she could freely use amounted to several million yen in annual returns.
There was virtually no chance of her ever becoming poor.
All she needed to do was enjoy her hobbies. She lived as a carefree shut-in, occasionally meeting friends to attend conventions as a cosplayer, collecting figures, indulging in whatever she liked.
Every year's trust income was spent entirely on her passions.
Because of that, Haruto, who was experiencing everything through her perspective, felt just as relaxed and content as he followed along with her binge-watching.
So this was the inner world of a true ultimate otaku.
She really was happy.
Halfway through the anime, the girl ordered delivery. It was sweet glutinous rice dumplings with a spicy sesame filling, dipped in chili oil and houttuynia leaves.
The flavor was indescribable for Haruto, whose immersion was far too strong, yet she ate with obvious delight.
Sweet dumpling fans, savory dumpling fans, they were all heretics in her eyes. Sweet, salty, and spicy combined was the only true answer.
Unfortunately, there was no coriander at home today, so this order could only score a ninety out of a hundred.
Haruto did his best to forget the bizarre taste that lingered in his senses.
He refocused his attention on the anime playing on the computer screen in front of him. The artwork was beautiful, and the story overflowed with youthful emotion.
The heroine, Futaba, reunited in high school with Kou, the boy she had liked back in middle school but lost contact with due to family circumstances.
Thus began a tender, bittersweet coming-of-age romance. It was a shoujo anime, but even as a perfectly normal teenage boy, Haruto found his own soft-hearted side stirred from time to time.
In his daily life, he had watched and read plenty of romance stories, and as the episodes went on, his consciousness became fully absorbed.
The story really was good.
Two people who once shared mutual feelings met again three years later.
Misunderstandings, longing, and growth intertwined beautifully. Without realizing it, the anime had reached episode six.
Futaba fell into confusion when she discovered that both she and her close friend had feelings for Kou.
Should she protect their friendship and sacrifice her own emotions, supporting her friend as she confessed to the boy Futaba had secretly liked for years?
Or should she face her feelings honestly, tell her friend the truth, and compete fairly for Kou, even if it meant risking their friendship?
Unable to make a choice, Futaba decided to leave the answer to Kou himself.
On their way home together, just as the subway train was about to depart, she suddenly claimed she had forgotten something at school.
She stepped back a few paces and exited the train at the last moment.
The doors began to close.
The boy and girl stood barely a meter apart, staring at each other through the glass.
Would he get off the train and go back with her to retrieve what she had forgotten?
Or would he find it troublesome, go home alone, and let Futaba return to school by herself?
If Kou did not get off the train with me, I will stop liking him.
If he does get off, then I will keep loving him.
Futaba's inner monologue echoed as the background music swelled.
The subway doors slowly slid shut. Kou had no idea that her sudden decision to step off the train carried such meaning. His choice in the next second would decide whether Futaba continued to hold onto her unrequited love.
"Ah, I cannot watch this," the girl muttered. "If Kou finds it annoying and does not get off the train, I will be miserable all night and never fall asleep. To be safe, I will sleep now and finish it tomorrow. Better to eliminate any chance of losing sleep over this."
With a snap, she shut off the computer.
Haruto's consciousness, still immersed in her perspective, was left in utter chaos.
'No, wait. Do not stop here. Watch one more episode.'
'Are you even human? How can you sleep with the story cutting off right here?'
He cursed furiously in his subconscious, overwhelmed by the unbearable frustration of being cut off at such a critical moment.
It was downright cruel.
The screen went dark.
Haruto jolted awake in bed, drenched in sweat.
"What… was that?"
His voice was hoarse with exhaustion. The dream from the night before had felt far too real.
A sudden realization dawned on him.
Earth. A girl.
It was as if the soul of a girl from another world had entered his body, but the fusion had failed.
No, not entirely failed. Her will had already faded away, leaving behind only fragments of memory sealed deep within his mind. Occasionally, when he dreamed, he could see pieces of her life in that other world.
As for that anime called Blue Spring Ride, Haruto now ground his teeth in frustration. She had gone to sleep halfway through, forcing him to stop at the worst possible moment.
However, the lingering desire to continue watching through her memories was quickly extinguished by reality.
In the dream, because he had been immersed in her perspective, he had felt her peace of mind. His real-world worries had temporarily faded away.
But once awake, the immense pressure he had been facing over the past month came crashing back.
Haruto.
Sixteen years old. Height 176 centimeters. Weight 63 kilograms. Fairly handsome.
A second-year student at a high school in Minamojo.
His mother had died from illness ten years ago.
One month ago, his father's small company collapsed due to poor management during an economic downturn. Burdened with massive debt, unable to withstand the blow, his father took his own life together with his mistress.
The kind of tragedy you usually only saw in newspapers had happened to his family.
At first, Haruto had been stunned and heartbroken.
But after that passed, the real world beyond school pressed down on him with brutal clarity.
Even if he sold the apartment he currently lived in, it would not be enough to repay the enormous debts his father had left behind.
Under these circumstances, there was no reason for Haruto to inherit his father's estate, which was nothing but negative assets. In two or three months, once the foreclosure process was complete, he would be forced to leave his home.
He had no relatives on either side to rely on.
Most of those who could be called relatives were essentially creditors now.
Since he had not agreed to take on his father's debts, he had already burned whatever bridges remained.
The reality before him was simple and merciless.
Survival.
A sixteen-year-old high school student facing homelessness within three months, with no money to his name.
His options were limited. Dropping out and entering the workforce was one possibility.
Continuing his education was another, though hardly easy.
University tuition in Japan was not cheap.
Prestigious fields like medicine or law could cost millions of yen over four years, demanding heavy investment for future returns. Those paths were not realistic for most people.
For ordinary majors, however, as long as he could get in, student loans and scholarships were often available.
Haruto chose to continue his education. When the time came to advance after his third year, tuition issues could be handled through financial aid, regardless of the amount. So the path forward was not cut off, just extremely difficult.
Should he drop out and enter society?
Or grit his teeth and continue studying?
It was a decision he had to make soon.
It was already late January, and the new semester would begin in just over a week.
His father's assets had been frozen. Aside from temporarily staying in this apartment until it was auctioned off, Haruto had access to only one thing.
50k yen in savings from his old allowance.
If none of this had happened, he had planned to use that money during winter break to go on dates with his ex-girlfriend, a classmate and student council president named Rin, to deepen their relationship.
But now…
After two months of dating, Rin had learned about his family's bankruptcy a month ago. The moment Haruto fell from a comfortable middle-class background into poverty, she broke up with him without hesitation.
Before, he could shower her with gifts thanks to his father's money. Now he might have needed help himself. Of course she chose to leave.
He understood her choice, even if it still hurt.
There were many cultural differences between worlds, but one thing was exactly the same.
Society was cruel.
Even high school girls already paid close attention to family background when choosing a boyfriend.
Dating did not necessarily mean marriage, but without money, even romance was off the table.
After all, romance itself was built on spending money.
"No matter what, I have to endure the next year and a half of high school first," Haruto thought as he lay in bed. "Dropping out now, without even a high school diploma, would make life nearly impossible here. I have already spent over ten years studying, and I am more than halfway through. Leaving without graduating would be too much to accept."
As for whether he would go on to university afterward, he decided to take it one step at a time.
"But if I choose this path, I need to solve the problem of living expenses for the next year and a half. Food, rent after I am kicked out of this place… 50k yen is nowhere near enough."
Haruto's mental resilience was fairly strong. Otherwise, he could not have recovered within a month from his father's death, family bankruptcy, imminent eviction, and breakup.
Even the absurd experience of merging with the soul of a girl from another world barely fazed him. After enough blows, people stopped panicking and learned to adjust quickly.
"There has to be some way to earn money while still attending high school."
Despite his calm mindset, he could not think of a solution with his limited experience.
He sat up on his bed and looked out the window from the twenty-first floor, taking in the cityscape below.
"Sigh. Too bad I will not be able to see this view in a few months."
Feeling restless, he lay back down and turned his gaze toward the cabinet filled with anime discs, serialized light novels, and manga volumes.
His eyes suddenly sharpened.
He fell silent for a long moment, then began speaking to himself again.
"I cannot draw manga. I cannot make games. I cannot write anime scripts. But I can write novels. I am pretty good at Japanese."
"And that anime I saw last night, Blue Spring Ride, was really good. Way more interesting than most of the romance light novels I have been buying."
"There are several light novel publishers in Minamojo, right? If I rewrite it as a light novel and submit it, and if it gets picked up for serialization, the manuscript fees should not be bad."
A spark lit up in the boy's eyes.
He knew very well that within Japan's massive otaku industry, whether anime, games, manga, or novels, it was notorious as a graveyard for newcomers.
Competition was brutal to the point of absurdity, enough to scare most people away.
But no one competed that fiercely for security guard or restroom attendant positions.
The reason this industry was so cutthroat was simple. If you succeeded, the rewards were enormous, far exceeding most other fields.
From the perspective of a long-time otaku who had consumed countless anime, novels, and games, Haruto felt that the work he had seen through the girl's memories was genuinely special. It was far more engaging than many works already being serialized.
The original version had survived the ruthless manga market of that other world and gone on to be adapted into anime, novels, and even films. Its quality was undeniable.
Different worlds meant different tastes. What was honey to one might be poison to another.
Still, Haruto trusted his own judgment as a veteran fan. If it had drawn him in, there should be a sizable audience with similar tastes.
There was no reason his adaptation into a Japanese light novel would have zero chance.
He did not need it to become a massive hit. Earning enough manuscript fees to cover living expenses and rent during high school would be enough.
Most importantly, writing a novel would not interfere with attending classes or earning credits toward graduation.
Once school started, he could write during foreign language classes he did not understand anyway, or during math and physics lectures.
No other money-making idea he could think of offered that kind of advantage.
'I really am a genius.'
With that thought, Haruto sat up and looked at the stationery and pen on his desk.
However, the biggest problem remained.
He could only passively watch the girl's memories through dreams. He had seen only half of Blue Spring Ride before it was abruptly cut off. How long would that interruption last?
Would the dream continue tonight? Or would he never see the rest?
He let out a cold laugh.
Why was he worrying about that now?
The urgent issue was not whether the story would end up unfinished because he could not access the latter half of the memories.
That was too far in the future.
He had not even learned how to walk yet. Why worry about running?
That was a problem for readers after the novel was actually published and serialized.
As a prospective author, what he needed to think about was this.
If he wrote and submitted the portion of the story he currently knew, how would he pass the editors' review at a light novel publisher?
If it did not get accepted, all of this was meaningless speculation.
_______________________
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