Tokyo: Earth Online Manga Artist

"Shiping, I need to go out for a bit to visit Professor Kaga at the hospital, and I'll pick up Professor Riko's manuscript on the way."

He said it directly.

Lin Shiping looked up. "Mr. Kaga? You're the newcomer who's going to be on this issue's short story list. What's wrong?"

"He's been admitted to the hospital. I'm going to check on him."

Masaya Sakurai was also very troubled, saying, "If the manuscript isn't finished, there might be problems with this issue's short story section."

Lin Shiping's expression also became more serious. "Then you should go quickly. I'll call you if something comes up in the editorial department."

"Row."

Masaya Sakurai nodded, picked up his coat and briefcase hanging on the back of the chair, and strode toward the elevator.

As he walked, he mentally planned his route: first, to collect the manuscript from Eri Aragaki's house, and then to visit Kaga at the hospital.

Both places are within the reach of the tram, so I should be able to get back to the editorial office before the end of the workday.

When the elevator doors opened, he pressed the button for the first floor, leaned against the elevator wall, and glanced again at the note with the hospital address written on it in his pocket.

Chapter Fifty-Five: Surfing Back Home

At the Aragaki Erii family's house.

Eri Aragaki just finished her artwork for this week with the help of Akane Natsume, Ayane Takeda, and Erina.

Even with the help of Ayane Takeda and Erina, the workbench was spotless. The halftone paper and scraper had been put back in the drawer, the ink bottles were tightly capped, and the brushes were washed and hung up.

The completed artwork was stacked together in page order. Eri Aragaki checked each page one by one, and after confirming that there were no problems, she put them into a kraft paper file bag.

"Thank you for your hard work, A-Qian and Ayane. I'll prepare dinner later and treat you to a good meal."

Eri Aragaki sealed the file folder, placed it on the coffee table, and then spoke to Akane Natsume and Ayane Takeda.

Ayane Takeda was rubbing her neck, which was a little sore from looking down for a long time, when she heard the word "dinner" and her eyes immediately lit up.

"What are you cooking tonight, senior?"

She said expectantly, "I want to eat the Mapo Tofu that the senior chef made last time!"

They are now very familiar with each other and are not polite at all.

When ordering, Ayane Takeda didn't even think twice and immediately named the dish she had eaten last time that she couldn't forget.

When Eri Aragaki made Mapo Tofu last time, she ate two whole bowls of rice, which shows that she really liked it.

So Eri Aragaki walked to the refrigerator and opened the refrigerator door.

She glanced at the ingredients inside: scallions, cilantro, onions, a few pieces of ground beef in the container, and several plump saury at the bottom of the refrigerator.

"I want to eat Mapo Tofu, but there's no tofu left."

Eri Aragaki closed the refrigerator door, turned around, and said, "There's still some fermented soybean paste and stuff."

After all, Eri Aragaki is now wealthy, so she has developed a taste for fine dining.

She no longer eats discounted convenience store bento boxes every day like when she was penniless. Instead, she makes a special trip to Tokyo's Chinatown every week to buy all kinds of Chinese seasonings and spices.

To her surprise, Chinatowns and Chinese supermarkets were not hard to find in this era, and there were quite a few. There were several in Ikebukuro alone, and Yokohama Chinatown had them all over the street.

This is very convenient for her. She buys oyster sauce, broad bean paste, Lao Gan Ma chili sauce, Sichuan peppercorns, thirteen-spice powder, and other spices and keeps them at home. The spice rack in the kitchen is full of them.

Although it was significantly more expensive than what she bought in China in her previous life—a small bottle of Sichuan pepper oil could cost four or five times more—she could easily afford it with her current income.

It has all the sauces and minced meat, but no tofu.

Ayane Takeda immediately raised her hand, her movements as quick as if she were answering a question in class, and said, "Then I'll go down and buy it!"

Eri Aragaki smiled helplessly at Ayane's eagerness and said, "Alright, but since you're going down to buy things, could you also buy me a few bottles of tea?"

She has a great need for tea drinks, and it's perfectly fine for her to stock up on a little bit of this food-like product.

"no problem!"

Ayane Takeda had already reached the entrance and started changing her shoes.

She slipped her feet into her canvas shoes and bent down to tie them when she suddenly remembered something, and her hand stopped on the shoelaces.

"By the way, about the VPN tools you mentioned earlier, senior..."

She immediately said, "The senior students all say that you don't actually need a VPN to log into the Republic's network..."

Eri Aragaki stood in the kitchen doorway, paused for a moment, and then said, "Huh? Is that so?"

She didn't know that.

In my previous life, I was indeed a country bumpkin who had never been abroad. I only knew how to use a VPN to access foreign websites or log into games.

Ayane Takeda tied her shoelaces, stood up, and said, "That's right, senpai, you can just enter the website address from the Republic."

Eri Aragaki nodded thoughtfully.

Her computer was always on, the screen was still lit, and it was still on the forum page from before.

"Alright, senior, I'll go downstairs to buy things now."

Ayane Takeda opened the front door and turned around to say something.

Eri Aragaki turned her head from in front of the screen and gave a thumbs up. "Thank you, Ayane."

The door closed, and the sound of Ayane Takeda's footsteps descending the stairs could be heard in the corridor, fading into the distance.

Eri Aragaki turned back to the front of the screen. Since there was no need to bypass the firewall, she decided to go directly to that side and take a look.

She wanted to see if there were any comments about the Titans over there.

She has read a lot of reader feedback from Japan since the beginning of Attack on Titan's serialization, and she checks the discussion threads on the forum every week, sometimes several times a day.

However, they are almost all the same, mainly because there is really not much work in this area in Japan.

Eri Aragaki was still looking forward to seeing what the Republic's feedback would be... or rather, what the current situation of the Titans within the Republic was.

After all, Attack on Titan hasn't been adapted into an anime yet, so its popularity isn't necessarily that high...

Even Eri Aragaki doubted whether anyone in the Republic was reading her manga at this moment.

Natsume Akane and Erina also came over at this time.

Erina stood behind Aragaki Eri, her hands resting on the back of the chair. She looked at the connection icon that was still spinning on the screen, and then at Aragaki Eri, who was staring at the screen without blinking.

She couldn't help but ask curiously, "Sis, why do you seem so excited?"

Eri Aragaki nodded, her mouse already hovering over the browser icon, and said, "I'm mainly curious to see what foreign readers think of my manga."

Natsume Akane leaned back on the sofa armrest, crossed her arms, and said, "But I remember that in the Republic, there are still mostly pirated copies..."

Eri Aragaki's finger paused on the mouse for a moment.

That's right.

She opened her browser and said, "But their love for comics is real, and I don't think we should let that dampen the enthusiasm of these readers for comics."

Furthermore, they were only watching pirated content because they temporarily lacked the channels and capabilities, not because they didn't want to spend money.

She said very seriously, "But once they are able to support legitimate products, I believe their support will far exceed expectations."

No one knew as much as she did that when the Republic's market opened up, even if not everyone supported genuine products, there were still some pirated copies.

Even though only a small group of people support the official version, the profits are still astonishing, even far exceeding those in the Japanese domestic market.

After all, the population base of 1.4 billion people is what it is.

Chapter Fifty-Six: A Familiar Taste

Upon hearing this, Natsume Akane looked thoughtfully at Aragaki Eri's profile.

Erina tilted her head, seemingly lost in thought.

The room was quiet for two seconds, with only the sound of the computer cooling fan spinning.

As Eri Aragaki spoke, she successfully opened a new browser window.

She first entered the URL of the search engine that she remembered so well.

Press Enter.

A simple search page appeared, with the same logo she had seen since childhood.

She stared at the logo for several seconds, feeling a strange sense of disorientation that transcended time and space.

Eri Aragaki shook her head, bringing her attention back to the present.

Then she thought about it and went to the official website of a Chinese input method and installed it.

Then she put her hands on the keyboard and typed five words in pinyin.

Attack on Titan.

Press Enter.

"Eri, do you speak Chinese?"

This piqued the curiosity of Natsume Akane and Erina, who then asked a question.

"I've learned a little bit on my own..."

Eri Aragaki immediately gave a vague answer.

On the computer, after a brief delay, the search results page also appeared.

At the top is a forum, with a banner at the top of the page that reads "Anime Home," and below are rows of post titles updated today.

She scrolled down and saw another forum called "Roaming," which had a simpler page style with a dark blue background and white text.

Scrolling down further, a link to the forum appeared, and several posts in the title list contained the keyword "Attack on Titan".