For 40+ advance chapter: patreon.com/Snowingmelody2
The rhythmic clack-clack-clack of Leo's mechanical keyboard was the heartbeat of the room, steady and relentless. But even through the flow of his writing, his Qi-enhanced senses picked up the shift in air pressure behind him. The faint, expensive scent of lavender and old paper drifted closer.
Kasumigaoka Utaha was standing right behind his chair.
Leo finished the paragraph he was working on—a particularly brutal monologue where his villain dismantled a hero's philosophy—and stopped. The sudden silence in the room was louder than the typing had been.
He spun his ergonomic chair around, offering a relaxed, easy smile. "Can I help you with something, Senpai?"
Utaha blinked, startled. She hadn't expected him to stop. She was used to being the one people waited on, not the other way around. "I... I'm sorry to disturb you. I wasn't prepared to interrupt."
"Disturb? Please," Leo said, leaning back and crossing one leg over the other. "You look like you're carrying a heavy load. Did you hit a wall?"
Utaha hesitated for a second, then pulled a chair over. She sat down with a grace that seemed practiced, crossing her legs and smoothing out her skirt. "I have... encountered a problem. It won't take long. Five minutes should be enough."
She was polite to a fault. She knew the cardinal rule of creators: never break someone's flow. The fact that she was breaking it meant she was desperate.
"Don't be so formal," Leo said, waving a hand. "Ask whatever you want. Besides, I actually have a favor to ask you later, so consider this a trade."
Utaha nodded, her wine-red eyes scanning the text on his screen for a brief second before locking onto his face. "Leo-kun, reading your work... you seem to emphasize the narrative architecture over the characters. How do you balance the two?"
Leo raised an eyebrow. Straight to the theory. Nice.
"Me personally?" Leo rubbed his chin, thoughtful. "I'm a plot-first guy. To me, characters are pieces on a chessboard. They serve the story. If a character's feelings get in the way of the pacing, I cut them. If the plot requires them to suffer, they suffer. It's about the engine, not the paint job."
"I see," Utaha murmured, looking down at her hands. "We're opposites, then. I'm... weak on plot. I can't control the rhythm. When I write, I feel like an observer. I build a stage, put the characters on it, and just transcribe what they do. If they want to derail the story, they derail it."
"That's not a weakness," Leo countered. "That's 'Gardener' style writing. It makes the dialogue feel hyper-realistic. It creates twists that even the author didn't see coming. Readers love that organic feel."
Utaha let out a long, heavy sigh. It wasn't a sigh of relief; it was the sound of deep-seated exhaustion.
"I appreciate the comfort, Leo-kun," she said, her voice dropping to a bitter whisper. "But the results say otherwise. My style isn't suited for the light novel market. My first series... it almost got axed in the second volume. If a certain blogger hadn't hyped it up, it would have ended in a train wreck."
Leo feigned surprise, his eyes widening just the right amount. "Wait, you're an author? A published one?"
"I don't deserve the title," Utaha said with a self-deprecating smirk that didn't reach her eyes. "I'm just a third-rate hack whose debut work barely scraped by."
Leo stared at her. Third-rate? Scraped by?
He stayed silent for a beat, letting the tension hang. "Senpai... would you mind letting me see it?"
"I don't have the physical book," she said, standing up. "But I have the manuscript files on my laptop. Is that okay?"
"Lead the way."
Leo saved his work and followed her to her corner of the room. He was genuinely curious. In his old life, Love Metronome was a legend—a cult classic. But watching anime was one thing; reading the raw manuscript of a "real" person standing next to you was another.
Utaha opened the file, the blue light of the screen illuminating her sharp, beautiful features. "Here. Be harsh."
Leo sat down, his hand covering hers on the mouse for a split second before she pulled away. He began to scroll.
"I'm new to the Japanese market," Leo muttered, playing the part of the ignorant foreigner. "But this title... Love Metronome... wait. Isn't this that award-winning newcomer series? The one that sold, like, half a million copies?"
Utaha leaned against the desk, crossing her arms. "I only wrote the first two volumes the way I wanted. The last three... I had to take advice. I had to compromise to get a 'good' ending. It feels like a failure."
Leo stopped scrolling. He looked at the sales figures in his head, then back at the girl who looked like she'd just lost a war.
Five hundred thousand copies.
In the publishing world, selling fifty thousand was a hit. Selling a hundred thousand was a career. Selling half a million for a five-volume series meant she was moving a hundred thousand units per book. That wasn't a success; that was a retirement fund. That was "buy a yacht" money.
And she was calling it a failure?
This woman, Leo thought, fighting the urge to laugh, is the queen of the humblebrag. She's pulling a total Versailles maneuver. 'Oh no, my diamond shoes are too tight.'
"Senpai," Leo said, turning to face her, his expression dead serious. "In what universe is half a million sales a failure? Do you know how many authors would kill—literally kill—to move ten percent of that?"
"But the artistic integrity—"
"Forget integrity for a second," Leo cut her off, his voice firm. "The market voted. Five hundred thousand people put their money down because they loved your 'character-driven' style. You're not a failure, Utaha. You're a powerhouse who just needs to learn how to drive the car instead of letting the passengers steer."
Utaha stared at him, her mouth slightly open. No one spoke to her like this. They either fawned over her sales or critiqued her plot holes. Leo was looking at the numbers and telling her to wake up.
"You really think... there's no need to change my style?" she asked, her voice quiet.
"Don't change it," Leo said, standing up and towering over her. "Sharpen it. And maybe... get a better editor."
Internal Monologue: Step two complete. The Ice Queen's ego has been stroked and challenged in the same breath. Now, she's listening.