Chapter 20. Let’s Draw a Comic!
“Khehehehe!
Another success! Another success!”
“Oh, seriously! Wade!
I told you not to laugh so shamelessly!
Think about the image all those readers have of you!”
Hearing my frivolous laughter, Rena started nagging me again, telling me not to ruin my image.
But even so, I couldn’t stop laughing.
Because the response to my new work, [The Genius Mage of the Slums], was hotter than anything before it!
“As expected, the refreshing high that genius-protagonist stories give you works here too.”
Well, when readers have no choice but to immerse themselves positively in a protagonist who advances triumphantly while showing overwhelming talent...
There probably aren’t many people who would dislike that.
Unless, like the readers in my previous life, they’d already had so many genius-protagonist and overpowered-protagonist stories that they’d gotten sick of them.
To people who had lived their whole lives drinking bland water, this was like feeding them a soda packed full of carbonation.
Of course the reaction would be explosive.
‘Just look at Zhuge Kongming, who could be called the ancestor of these genius stories. He kept countless fans obsessed for thousands of years, didn’t he?’
A genius like that, from the perspective of the person on the receiving end, is an absurd existence capable of making you cough blood and die after leaving behind famous lines like:
“Graaah! Why did heaven give birth to me, and also that bastard?!”
“Shit! What kind of fucked-up way to fight a war is this?!”
“Farewell, mediocre man born in the same era as I.”
But if you’re just watching from a third-party perspective, there’s nothing that makes your dopamine explode more.
And so, after injecting people with that thrilling dopamine they were tasting for the first time in their lives and leaving them unable to come to their senses...
At the very moment when people were most curious about what came next, I introduced long-form serialization and cut it off with, “Continued in the next volume...”
“Author Wei, wake up! Why can you not write and release one volume a day?!”
“If Author Wei and the Publishing Guild do not release the next volume containing Tian and Elise’s love story right this instant, I will scour the kingdom’s laws and have you arrested under something, no matter what!”
“Did I ask for much?
All I asked was that you modestly release one volume a week, so I could slowly savor a single volume over seven days!”
The people struck by the Cliffhanger Demon Art began going mad.
“Whoa... This is way more serious than I expected.”
Seeing that fiery reaction, which far surpassed my expectations, I was slightly appalled.
No, it was good that the response was heated.
But somehow... it was heated in a different direction than before, should I say?
Unlike the enthusiasm for my previous short works, which had been filled only with impressions and discussions about the stories.
This enthusiasm contained a will to capture me at all costs, feed me nothing but dumplings, and film an obsessive confinement drama.
“Mm, if I step forward here trying to draw aggro again for no reason, it’ll get out of hand, won’t it?”
“Of course. If you don’t want to get dragged off by those people, Wade, your only choice is to release the next volume quickly.”
“Figures.”
It seemed I had really set a massive fire this time.
But honestly, I did feel a little wronged.
‘Compared to the Cliffhanger Demon Art I suffered through while following daily serializations in my previous life, this is actually very mild.’
Well, the people of this world were experiencing the Cliffhanger Demon Art for the first time, so it couldn’t be helped that their resistance was low.
In any case, thanks to that fiery response, most of the people who had opposed the slum reforms, which had been my original goal, disappeared.
I heard that full-scale construction had begun not long ago.
“I never imagined you would produce such a perfect... no, more than perfect result.
Thanks to you, we can push the reforms through without any problems, and the royal family is pleased as well.
You may look forward to your reward for this matter.”
Duke Lucid, after confirming the results of the theatrical adaptation and the new work [The Genius Mage of the Slums], was deeply impressed and promised me a definite reward.
...To be honest, it did seem like he had taken the opportunity to stir things up a bit among the enraged populace.
But it wasn’t as though he had led them in a bad direction, and it was for a good cause, so I decided to let it pass without nitpicking.
“Ah, and also. They asked me to tell you to please prepare the next volume of [The Genius Mage of the Slums] as quickly as possible.
It seems there are many people in the royal family waiting for it as well.”
“...I’ll do my best.”
That said, Duke Lucid had slipped in a bit more pressure by saying it was a request from the royal family.
No, the new work is really that popular?
If the duke went out of his way to mention it, then there must truly be someone in the royal family who wants to read it.
To think the influence of the Cliffhanger Demon Art had reached that far.
As an author, it was naturally a good thing that the royal family, the highest class in the kingdom, was taking an interest in my work.
But honestly, it was also a little burdensome.
‘In a world where the status system is alive and kicking, do you really think a “request” from the very highest people, with power on the level of the state itself, is just a request?’
Even if the person in question only tosses it out casually, to the one receiving it, each and every word is a killing move.
“You should’ve just released it as a short story like your previous works. Why did you make it a long serialization?”
“Because there’s too much content to write for a short story.
And dividing it into volumes makes it easier to develop new plotlines.”
“Hmmm. Well, I’m sure you have your own plan.
I’ll keep giving you advice on magic, so ask me again if you need anything.
Though I think I’ve more or less explained everything I know by now. If need be, I can ask a professor after I enter the academy.”
After saying that, Rena went back to studying magic.
Rena was currently in the capital to prepare for her entrance into the Royal Academy.
And since I had just gotten a house in the capital anyway...
If she was going to be staying in the capital regardless, I gave her a room and told her to live here instead of wasting extra money elsewhere.
As for rent, I received it in the form of her advising me on the magical knowledge needed to write [The Genius Mage of the Slums].
“By the way, I know I advised you, but didn’t you give the protagonist way too excessive a setting?
I didn’t think you’d make him such an absurd genius.”
“That’s the whole point, enjoying that genius.
You say that, but you had fun reading it too, didn’t you?”
“Ugh, well, if you put it that way, yes.”
Just as they say that if you’re going to take something too far, you need to take it all the way for it to become art.
The genre of genius-protagonist stories is more entertaining when the protagonist is made into an incomparable, greatest-in-history, GOAT-level genius.
Well, because of that, some people who didn’t know much about magic misunderstood and thought all mages were like that.
Others picked fights with mages, saying, “It works in the novel, so why can’t you do it?” and fights broke out.
There had been small disturbances like that, but as rumors spread and relevant information circulated, things soon calmed down.
“So don’t worry about that and just focus on preparing for academy entrance.
If by any chance you fail to get in, I won’t recognize such a pathetic girl as my little sister!”
If she really did fail, I planned to tease her about it for at least a year.
But despite my threat, Rena answered with a snicker.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you while you’re so excited at the thought of making fun of me, Brother, but you don’t need to worry about me failing.”
“Huh? Why not?”
“What do you mean, why? Because there aren’t that many people entering the academy these days.
Especially among nobles.
So if I just apply, I’ll be accepted without any issue.”
“Whaaaat?!”
Shockingly, the academy was suffering from a lack of students.
“Nobles above a certain level don’t really need to come to the academy. It’s more efficient for them to just receive private education at home.
Even you didn’t go to the academy, Wade.”
“That’s true.”
Well, in my case, it was because until very recently I had been fully intent on living as an idle good-for-nothing, and because I hated the idea of going to school again after my previous life.
“Right. There are people like you who don’t go because it’s a hassle.
There are also cases where they don’t come because their finances aren’t good, or because their territory is far from the capital, or because they don’t think there’s anything in particular to learn at the academy.”
“I see.
Ah, come to think of it, commoners can enter the Royal Academy too, right?
And there still aren’t enough students?”
“Commoners aiming to rise in the world do come.
But naturally, they’re limited too.
For a commoner to come to the academy, they need that much knowledge or wealth.
And the problem of it being difficult to come from other territories is the same.”
Mmm. I felt like one of my fantasies had been shattered.
So, in terms of my previous life, it was like there being only one school in the entire country, located in Seoul.
And since it wasn’t even that exceptional, everyone just made do with online lectures or private tutoring at home.
If that was the case, then building connections at the academy and whatnot didn’t have much meaning either.
Their mindset must be that it was better to attend social gatherings or parties with that time instead.
No wonder there wasn’t much news about the academy. So this was the problem.
Then again, from that perspective, the academies in novels where princesses, saintesses, and all sorts of important figures gathered were the strange ones.
Isn’t there that joke?
Did everyone agree to have kids in the same year?
Leaving that issue aside, as Rena said, receiving private education at home was naturally more efficient than coming all the way here to receive public education.
And from the professors’ side, if they had the ability, taking on private tutoring would be more comfortable and pay better than getting a job at the academy.
In other words, people like my older brother, who had already graduated, or Rena, who was going to the academy, were actually the unusual cases.
“No, then what about my fun, youthful academy stories by proxy?
I wasn’t going to go, so I was planning to hear them from you!”
“You were thinking that, Brother...?
Anyway, that’s why they say the academy is worried too.”
“Of course they would be.
Students aren’t coming to the school.”
To put it extremely, it could be called a crisis of school closure.
Since the Royal Academy was, as its name suggested, a school directly operated by the royal family.
If I exaggerated a little, this was a matter related to the dignity of the royal family as well.
“Hmm... Huh? If I handle this well...”
When my thoughts reached that point...
A good idea came to mind.
If it went well, I might be able to grind some favorability with the royal family once again.
Above all, my fantasy of an “otherworld fantasy academy” might also be revived.
In the long term, the academy flourishing more would help the cultural revolution too.
‘But I’ll keep that on hold for now.’
It hadn’t been long since I released my new work, so I still needed a bit of rest.
‘And right now, I have another interest that takes priority.’
While proceeding with the media mix of a theater play last time, I had properly experienced the fun of spreading culture through means other than writing.
So I wanted to introduce another cultural medium to this world besides novels and theater.
What was it?
The thing I had thought about the most since deciding to start a cultural revolution, and the thing I myself wanted to see the most.
“Comics. Should I start trying?”
I decided to challenge myself to making comics.