I, Hiroshi Nohara, the star of Japanese cinema!

He glanced at his partner in a blue suit, who was packing up his equipment with an indignant look on his face, and chuckled self-deprecatingly. "As you can see, I'm not cut out for the hospitality industry. I just wanted to take a good photo, but the moment the customers saw my face, they were like they'd seen a gangster. This month, our combined sales are once again the worst in the company."

"Actually..." He extinguished the cigarette butt in his hand on the ground, his cloudy eyes looking towards the distant sky dyed golden by the setting sun. In his eyes, there was a trace of pure yearning that was almost childlike.

"Actually, my real dream is to go back to my hometown, Kasukabe, and open a small kindergarten there."

"Kindergarten?" Nohara Hiroshi's eyebrows raised, a hint of amusement flashing in his clear eyes. "Why kindergarten? With all due respect, Mr. Takakura, with your looks, running a kindergarten would probably be more challenging than being a photographer, wouldn't it?"

"Do you think so too?" A bitter look appeared on Takakura Bunta's face.

He subconsciously wanted to take out a cigarette from his pocket again, but when his hand was halfway out, he seemed to remember something and stopped abruptly.

He looked at the finger that had held the cigarette, an expression of embarrassment and regret on his face. He quickly threw the cigarette he had just lit to the ground and stomped it out with his foot.

"You see, that's just me. I can't break these bad habits." He smiled bitterly and shook his head. "Actually, I don't smoke. It's just... in this big city, if you don't smoke, don't drink, and don't socialize, it's like... like you're an alien. You can't fit in."

"I hate this." His voice was filled with suppressed boredom and exhaustion. "I hate wearing a mask every day, saying things I don't mean, and doing things I don't like. I... I just want to go back to that little place, back to Kasukabe, where there are the streets I'm familiar with and the friends I've played with since childhood."

"The most important thing is..." He paused, and a hint of almost gentle, sacred light appeared on that ferocious face.

"There are children there. When I'm with them, I feel like I'm a... clean person. I don't need to pretend or please others. I just need to play with them and laugh with them, that's enough."

Nohara Hiroshi looked at him and was silent for a moment.

Then he pulled out a ten thousand yuan bill from his wallet and handed it over.

"Today's photo shoot fee, and... a tip for you."

"Huh?!" Takakura Bunta was stunned. He looked at the brand new Fukuzawa Yukichi, which exuded the fragrance of ink. A look of disbelief and horror instantly appeared in his cloudy eyes: "No, no, no! This... this is too much! Mr. Nohara! I can't accept it!"

"Take it." Nohara Hiroshi's voice was calm, yet it carried a force that brooked no argument. "Just think of it as a small advance payment for my future child's tuition."

He paused, then smiled brightly under the man's astonished gaze. "If I have a child in the future and happen to live near Kasukabe, I will definitely send him to your kindergarten."

Takakura Bunta's body trembled violently.

He stared blankly at the young man in front of him. In those clear eyes, there was no trace of sympathy or charity, only the purest respect and recognition for a stranger's dream.

He thought of himself, on countless drunken nights, when he boasted about his "great dream" to those so-called "friends", but all he got in return was roars of mocking laughter.

"You? You're running a kindergarten? Don't scare the kids into tears!"

"Gao Cang, you should go collect protection fees, that's more suitable for you!"

But this young man in front of me, whom I just met for the first time, this "big shot" who seemed to have an extraordinary status, he... he actually... believed in himself?

"I..." Takakura Bunta's eyes turned red in an instant.

He could no longer hold on. This man, whose edges had been smoothed out by the pressure of life, bent down towards Hiroshi Nohara.

A standard ninety-degree bow full of gratitude and respect!

"Thank you... sir... really... thank you so much!"

Nohara Hiroshi just smiled calmly, but was thinking secretly in his heart.

It seems that this future headmaster really didn't recognize me.

That's good.

Now Hiroshi Nohara also understands the helplessness of celebrities.

……

When Takakura Bunta and his partner left with profuse gratitude, the depressing atmosphere finally dissipated.

"Phew—I'm scared to death!"

Misae was the first to let out a long breath. She patted her still-pounding chest, and her delicate face was filled with relief at having survived. "Guangzhi-kun, you were so bold just now! I thought... I thought he was going to pull out a knife!"

"Who said it wasn't!" Beichuan Yao and Nancun Xing also nodded repeatedly, and their two young faces were also full of fear.

"I just... my legs just went weak! You didn't see it, his eyes were exactly the same as the gangsters who collect protection fees in our hometown! Beichuan and I almost... almost hugged each other!" Nancun Xing said with lingering fear.

"Oh? Hugging each other?"

When Nohara Hiroshi heard this, a hint of playful mischief flashed in his clear eyes.

He turned his head, half-smiling at the two young men who had subconsciously huddled close together out of nervousness, and said slowly, "I remember that Tokyo TV's personnel manual clearly prohibits...office romances, right? You two should be mindful of the implications."

"Eh?!"

Beichuan Yao and Nancun Xing's faces turned red in an instant, and they bounced three feet away in an instant like two cats whose tails were stepped on.

"No...no! We didn't!"

"Section Chief, please don't misunderstand me! We are just...just simply scared!"

The two of them were explaining in a hurry, and their embarrassed look made Mei Ya, who was standing beside them, cover her mouth and laugh like a silver bell.

Nohara Hiroshi looked at them and finally couldn't help but burst into hearty laughter.

"Hahahaha! Just kidding!"

He waved his hand, his eyes filled with the cunning and indulgence of a successful prank.

"TV Tokyo has its own rules, that's their business."

Nohara Hiroshi paused, and under the astonished gaze of the two men, he slowly uttered a domineering declaration that would make them savor it for countless nights to come.

"But in my department, Nohara Hiroshi, I am the rule."

……

Takakura Bunta and his partner, Suzuki, were walking one after the other in a dimly lit alley near Ginza. The air was filled with a unique smell that was a mixture of the aroma of food wafting from high-end restaurants and the sour smell emanating from garbage cans.

"Woo woo woo—" A brand new, futuristic black Crown Majestic drove past at the nearby intersection.

The two of them stared with their eyes wide open.

Men all like luxury cars.

However, with their combined salaries, they couldn't even afford an ordinary sedan, let alone a luxury car!

"I say, Bunta."

Suzuki, who was walking behind, finally couldn't help himself and broke the silence with a tone full of resentment. He kicked an empty can at his feet, making a sharp "clang" sound. "Tonight... is all we made that 10,000 yen? If we split it between the two of us, it would only be 5,000 each. This... this isn't even enough to pay for our drinks tonight!"

As he spoke, he scratched his already sparse hair in annoyance. His face, which always had a shrewd and calculating look, was now filled with anxiety and dissatisfaction with reality.

"The newspapers boast all the time about how prosperous our Japanese economy is, how our stock index is creating new miracles every day. But why do I feel like money is getting harder and harder to make? Prices are rising day by day, but our incomes are still stuck at the level of three years ago. This world is really getting more and more confusing."

Suzuki's complaint, like a lit fuse, quickly pointed the finger at the man who remained silent from beginning to end, like a moving low pressure.

"In the final analysis, it's all your fault!"

He pointed at Takakura Bunta's broad back, his voice suddenly rising, filled with undisguised disdain: "How many times have I told you! When I tell you to laugh, please hold back! Your face, when you're not smiling, looks like a gangster, and when you smile... it's like a devil just crawled out of hell! Which customer wouldn't be scared? Today, only that young man named Nohara was brave enough. If it were anyone else, they would have called the police long ago!"

“…” Takakura Bunta’s footsteps did not pause at all.

He just walked in silence, and under the dim street lights, his burly figure cast a long shadow full of loneliness and depression.

Wherever he went, it seemed as if he had a clearing effect.

Several young office workers who had just come out of the bar, were arm in arm, drunkenly bragging, and the moment they saw his face, they sobered up instantly and scattered like rabbits seeing a ghost.

Even the nightclub guards in front of a nearby pachinko parlor, who were wearing floral shirts, showing tattoos, squatting on the ground smoking and looked tough, subconsciously put out their cigarettes when they saw him coming, stood up with their backs to the wall, and trembled as if they were looking at a real "big boss" from another dimension who was even tougher to deal with than them.

The awe that came from the bone marrow did not seem fake at all.

"Look! Look!"

Suzuki pointed at the nightclub guards who had instantly become obedient. His voice was filled with a sense of gloating, a kind of mirthful pleasure, yet also tinged with a hint of fear that he himself hadn't even noticed. "Even the real gangsters are like mice seeing a cat when they see you! And you still say you're not part of the gang?!"

Takakura Bunta finally stopped.

He turned around slowly, and his hideous face, which was enough to make a child cry at night, looked even more gloomy in the dim light.

He didn't say anything, but took out a pack of Seven Star cigarettes from his pocket, which had been squeezed so hard that they were a little deformed.

He pulled out a cigarette and put it in his mouth, then took out his lighter.

"Click."

A tiny flame flickered in his deep, inky black eyes.

Seems angry.

The firelight illuminated the deep wrinkles on his face and the deep fatigue in his eyes behind his sunglasses, which had been worn down by life like a stone.

He wanted to take a puff.

He really wanted to take a puff.

Use the pungent smoke to numb your already broken heart.

but……

Uncontrollably, the image of the young man's calm and sincere smile on his face when he handed him the 10,000 yen emerged in his mind.

"Just think of it as me paying in advance a small amount of tuition for my future child."

"If I have a child in the future and happen to live near Kasukabe, I will definitely send him to your kindergarten."

child……

kindergarten……

Takakura Bunta's lips, which were holding the cigarette, began to tremble slightly uncontrollably.

He thought of the children in his hometown of Kasukabe who always gathered around him, giggling and calling him "Uncle Bunta".

Their pure eyes without a trace of impurities were like a clear spring, which could wash away all the filth and fatigue of this big city.

He knew that children didn't like the smell of smoke.

'Snapped. '

A soft sound.

Under Suzuki's gaze filled with astonishment and confusion, Takakura Bunta tightly grasped the box of Seven Stars in his hand, along with the cigarette that had just been lit, into his palm!

The hard cigarette box was instantly deformed in his big, iron-like hands, and it groaned under the weight.

The burning cigarette butt burned his palm, making a slight "sizzling" sound, and the smell of burnt flesh quietly filled the air.

But he seemed to feel no pain at all. All the expressions on that ferocious face had faded, leaving only a deep gloom, like the dark clouds covering the city before a storm.

"Wen...Bunta...you...what are you doing?" Suzuki's face turned pale in an instant.