Sawamura Spencer Eriri.
This was the name of the little blonde... that is, the golden twin-tailed girl beside Machida Sonoko.
Initially, Mutou Judai thought she was an oversized elementary student, but after Machida Sonoko's introduction, he learned that this person was actually a high school student the same age as him.
And this high school student had another name...
"This is also the fairly famous Kashiwagi Eri-sensei in the industry."
Hearing Machida Sonoko's introduction, Mutou Judai was stunned.
Kashiwagi Eri...
Mutou Judai instinctively thought he had misheard.
Although his understanding of otaku culture here wasn't particularly deep, he had seen the name Kashiwagi Eri several times.
Of course, this wasn't because he specifically went to look at that kind of thing...
But Kashiwagi Eri was really that kind of super famous R18 doujin artist!
Basically, if you read doujins, you would definitely see this name... cough cough, actually even if you didn't read doujins, you could know this name.
When Mutou Judai had seen doujins she drew before, he thought this person must be some perverted old otaku man or that kind of former playboy who was afraid of kitchen knives and had to stay home doing side jobs...
But now you're telling him that Kashiwagi Eri was actually this petite girl with natural blonde hair and pure blue eyes in front of him...
This...
Mutou Judai was stunned for quite a while before reacting, barely forcing out a smile characteristic of the Hanma family.
"Kiryu Setsuna-sensei, that's quite an ugly smile..."
Not only Eriri, even Machida Sonoko was startled.
But she had professional ethics and quickly reminded Mutou Judai.
After being reminded, Mutou Judai calmed down somewhat.
"Anyway... um, Kashiwagi Eri-sensei, right? You're the illustrator the publisher found for me?"
Hearing Mutou Judai ask this, the petite girl named Eriri spoke for the first time.
"Yes."
She looked very nervous.
"Um... I've already read Kiryu-sensei's work... it's excellent. And I've already drawn some character designs. Would you like to take a look first?"
"Mm..."
Honestly, Mutou Judai had originally planned to tell Machida Sonoko today that she didn't need to arrange an illustrator for him.
After all, his sign-in system was quite modern.
The "A Certain Magical Index" he received was a complete set, including illustrations and covers—even after receiving it, some writing and drawing techniques were included.
So he had originally planned to write and illustrate himself.
After all, he already had the illustrations.
But he hadn't expected that Machida Sonoko had already found an illustrator for him.
And although this Kashiwagi Eri was nervous, she had already drawn the illustrations—in such a situation, not looking would be unreasonable.
Seeing Mutou Judai nod, Eriri handed over the illustrations, and Mutou Judai looked at each one.
It had to be said, Kashiwagi Eri was Kashiwagi Eri.
Her artistic skill should be acknowledged.
But...
After looking through them, Mutou Judai sighed slightly, then took out the illustrations he had prepared in advance and printed out, handing them to Machida Sonoko and the others.
Initially, they were somewhat puzzled, but after looking, they understood.
—Mutou Judai had already found an illustrator.
This was a bit awkward.
Especially since the illustrations Mutou Judai brought out obviously matched the character traits better than Eriri's illustrations, which made Eriri instinctively purse her lips.
"Um... Kiryu-sensei... your illustrator indeed understands your characters better than I do, but in terms of artistic skill, I'm confident that I'm more..."
Before Eriri could finish, Mutou Judai raised his hand to stop her.
"I drew these illustrations myself..."
Ah, this...
The novel author and illustrator being the same person—although they had heard such legends, when actually meeting the real person, both Machida Sonoko and Eriri were obviously stunned.
Then Eriri sighed inwardly.
She probably knew—she had failed to become a regular again.
Machida Sonoko thought the same.
Although she felt that using Eriri, this Kashiwagi Eri's illustrations might bring some additional traffic to the newcomer author Mutou Judai, if Mutou Judai became willful, it wasn't something she could control.
After all, Mutou Judai was different from other newcomer authors—he was a friend of her top boss, so he had the right to be willful.
Just as they both thought this, Mutou Judai exhaled.
"Kashiwagi Eri-sensei?"
"Ah... yes."
Eriri looked up, and Mutou Judai looked at her and spoke again.
"About the illustration issue you mentioned—what you drew before probably won't work, it doesn't quite match the character images in my mind. But you've also seen what I drew myself. I think this image is fine, but my artistic skill is indeed inferior to yours, so I have no objection to you being my illustrator, but do you see any parts of the character images I brought out that need modification?"
Drawing was a very personal matter.
Artwork was basically linked to the artist's personal aesthetics.
—That's why Mutou Judai was surprised that Kashiwagi Eri was a high school girl!
But one thing was one thing. After thinking carefully, although there wasn't much problem with him handling both author and illustrator roles alone, it also meant he had to do illustrator work.
He had the illustrations and covers, but if he needed to make promotional images or something, he would have to think and draw them himself.
So after thinking carefully, he felt that having this tool with good artistic skills... cough cough, having Kashiwagi Eri-sensei do the illustrator work was indeed fine.
But the prerequisite was—the character images couldn't differ too much from his original impression.
This was his bottom line.
"No... basically just detail modifications, the overall won't change!"
Eriri completely hadn't expected the conversation to turn and she seemed to have succeeded in becoming regular, so she was so excited her eyes widened—but she still thought carefully before giving this answer.
Although she didn't expect to directly become a real illustrator by leveraging the newcomer novelist's fame through this first job, she was still very serious about her first regular job.
Even if the novel's sales didn't turn out well, for her it was at least a good start!
Mutou Judai was quite satisfied with the serious attitude of this little blonde in front of him, so he directly nodded.
"In that case, let's settle it like this—regarding illustrator income, Editor Machida definitely understands better than me, so I'll leave this matter to you and the publisher."
Mutou Judai originally had no intention of spending too much thought on such matters, and with his relationship with Okuya Ken, he wasn't afraid of this Machida Sonoko cheating him, so after briefly explaining, since there was nothing more for him to do, he planned to go back.
Eriri was still immersed in the joy of successfully becoming regular, nodding to Mutou Judai, and Machida Sonoko also indicated that she could handle the rest.
For Mutou Judai, this matter was more like a small episode—once it passed, it passed.
It was just side income... oh wait, this might become one of his main income sources in the future.
So after simply adding Machida Sonoko and Eriri's email addresses, Mutou Judai bid farewell to them.
He thought today's matters would end here, and next would be him going home to lie down... no, to calmly think about the Kengan match with Tiger in a few days.
But just as he walked out of the coffee shop, Erina's call came through.
"Erina, did something happen?"
"Mm..."
Erina's voice was somewhat heavy.
"Judai, do you remember what I told you before about Toyo Electric sending a chef to put great pressure on Totsuki through Shokugeki?"
"I remember. Did something go wrong here?"
"Mm..."
Holding her phone and looking at Shura Saiba Seiichiro who had been completely defeated by Saiba Asahi with a huge score difference of 5:0, Erina sighed slightly.
"Sigh, we might really need you to deal with him."
Because...
Erina narrowed her eyes, watching the opponent pick up Saiba Seiichiro's kitchen knife, and spoke to Mutou Judai again.
"—The opponent also possesses a strange ability called Cross Knives, where just by picking up another chef's knife, he can master that chef's culinary skills."
So.
"We're counting on you again this time, Judai."
Hearing Erina say this, Mutou Judai slowly smiled.
"An ability to master a chef's skills through their kitchen knife... interesting—alright, come pick me up at my house, I'll head over right away!"
...