At the time Kazuki had arranged, Jhin sat down in the café's rest area and opened his personal terminal, ready for a video call with Eromanga Sensei.
He didn't have to wait long before an unfamiliar call request popped up on the virtual screen. Jhin accepted, and found himself looking at a small, slight figure wearing a cartoon mask and a green tracksuit. Before he could say anything, the other side greeted him in a voice as timid as a baby bird's.
"N-nice to meet you, big brother."
"You... call me big brother?"
"Is... is that not okay?" Her tone turned flustered at once, as if she hadn't expected Jhin to dislike the title. "Kazuki-neesan told me to call you that."
"Sorry, I was just a little surprised — I don't mind at all," Jhin said, letting the surprise fade from his face into a gentle smile. "Nice to meet you, Eromanga Sensei."
"I... I don't know anyone by that weird name."
"Then, would you tell me your name?"
"Izumi... Sagiri."
"Sagiri — that's a lovely name."
"Th-thank you for saying so."
Behind the cartoon mask, Izumi Sagiri's pale blue eyes were sparkling. Ever since her mother had entrusted her to Kazuki's care, she'd heard nothing but praise for this brother she'd never met — but only now was she actually seeing him for the first time.
He looks just like a manga hero...
The fact that he'd complimented her given name instead of her surname only raised her opinion of him further. She had no real affection for her stepfather, after all, while her first name was the one her mother had given her.
I really want to see what kind of underwear he wears.
Startled by her own bold thought, Izumi Sagiri began shaking her head hard.
What am I thinking? Sure, I always want to see cute girls' underwear, but why would something this weird pop into my head the moment I meet my brother? What if I accidentally say it out loud and he gets the wrong idea?
Still... he really is handsome... I want to see his underwear!
Utterly unaware that he'd already been marked as underwear-viewing material the moment they met, Jhin noticed her sudden head-shaking and asked with concern, "Sagiri, are you all right?"
"I-I'm fine, thank you for worrying, big brother."
"You don't mind if I call you by your first name like that?"
"Mm, if it's you, big brother, it's fine."
Saying something like that so casually is asking for misunderstandings, little Sagiri.
Jhin swallowed the urge to shout "that's exactly what I wanted to hear" and steered the conversation toward business. "You've looked into Kashiwagi Eri, right? So, do you want to collaborate with her?"
"If it's just communicating by video call... that should be fine."
"Hmm, I recall she's not too fond of that method of communication." Jhin remembered how, when he and Eriri had worked on doujinshi together, she'd hated discussing things over the phone — she believed face-to-face talks got things done faster.
"I'm... not very used to meeting strangers." Izumi Sagiri had already put it as gently as she could — if a face-to-face meeting was required, this collaboration would be dead in the water, no question.
This is Bocchi-chan number two...
Jhin sighed inwardly, then placed a video call to Eriri. The instant Izumi Sagiri saw an unfamiliar person joining the call, she switched off her camera and flipped on her voice changer.
"Hello? Jhin, what do you want?"
To her surprise, no man appeared on screen — instead, a stunningly pretty girl with blonde twin-tails!
What would her underwear look like, I wonder?
Izumi Sagiri felt her drawing hand start to twitch with anticipation.
"About that collaboration I mentioned before — the one on the black screen right now is Eromanga Sensei."
"Wait, why didn't you tell me about this ahead of time? Give me a few minutes at least!" Eriri fumbled to hang up the call, and only rejoined a moment later — now sitting up straight on screen, adjusting her black-rimmed glasses, and introducing herself with great formality. "Hello, Eromanga Sensei. I'm Kashiwagi Eri."
Seeing that the other person was a pretty girl, Izumi Sagiri switched off her voice changer and turned her camera back on. "Hello, Kashiwagi Eri-sensei. Also... I don't know anyone with that weird name."
"No way, seriously? You're that young?" Eriri leaned back slightly, startled by how young the other's voice sounded.
Is this really the artist who's been going wild racing me on social media?
But then again, she thought, hadn't she herself started drawing doujin at an early age too? It wasn't really that strange, and she let it go.
That alone was enough to make Eriri feel a certain closeness toward Izumi Sagiri.
"There's something I need to tell you first, Eriri."
"Hm? What is it?"
"The person you've been chatting with on social media isn't Sagiri — it's her mother."
"WHAT?!" Eriri's twin-tails bounced as her voice shot up sharply. "Are you kidding me?"
"Huh? So Kashiwagi Eri-sensei was the kindred-spirit friend Mom used to talk about online?" Izumi Sagiri looked Eriri over again, a flicker of admiration rising in her chest.
To think she was talking dirty topics with Mom years ago — you really can't judge a book by its cover!
Eriri's head was starting to ache. She rubbed her temples and asked Jhin, baffled, "So you're saying I was chatting with her mother, and now I'm collaborating with her daughter?"
"Basically, yes — though there's a bit of background you two don't know that I need to fill in."
Jhin laid out the tangled timeline clearly, sorting the sequence of events for them.
In short, the person Eriri had been chatting with back then was the original Eromanga Sensei — Izumi Sagiri's mother. Kazuki had already found her at that point and begun sponsoring her, followed by the original's remarriage and later her death from illness, after which Izumi Sagiri was entrusted to Kazuki's care.
The two timelines never intersected — Eriri had been chatting with the original all the way up until the temporal disruption ended, while on the other side, Kazuki had already taken over guardianship and had been training Izumi Sagiri, preparing her to inherit the title "Eromanga Sensei."
As the sole anchor point across the timelines, Jhin was the one who, in this moment, wove together everything that had happened across both threads — which was why Eriri had never gotten a reply from the original, while Kazuki had been able to reach Eromanga Sensei all along.
"Something this supernatural actually happened?" Eriri's first instinct was disbelief, but after Izumi Sagiri pulled up chat logs from years ago, she had no choice but to accept it.
"Sorry about that, Eromanga—"
Izumi Sagiri cut her off instantly. "I don't know anyone by that name!"
"Then... Sagiri?"
"Mm."
"Sorry for bringing up a painful memory for you."
"It's fine. Mom was happy during that time."
Jhin cleared his throat. "So, shall we get back to talking about the collaboration, you two?"
____
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