Living in Tokyo, all I want to do is laze around.

Synopsis...Akizuki, a disillusioned young man who has struggled in Tokyo for ten years, finally meets the right person for him at the lowest point in his life. He has a successful and healthy family, and a love he can entrust his life to. He thought these things were out of his reach until she appeared...a mysterious girl with a bright smile on her face. Perhaps, through her, he can return to the world he once knew.

"The introduction is fairly standard."

Nakata Kazuya gently rolled the ballpoint pen on the table with his fingers, patiently continuing to read.

###Chapter 530 "Love Amidst Fireworks"###

Living in Tokyo, all I want to do is laze around.

Nakata Kazuya breathed a sigh of relief and patiently read the submitted novel in the email.

[Akizuki Katayama was listless on the streets of Shinjuku. Loneliness crept into his mind little by little with the music from his headphones. His gray eyes looked at the city that young people longed for.]

He didn't know how many people in the city were like him, their minds clouded by alcohol, and in a daze, they were even about to forget their own names.

Ordinary, cowardly, useless, even lying on this neon-lit street would go unnoticed.

Money, money, money.

I'm so poor now that I've been kicked out by my landlord... How can I afford to treat my mother, who is suffering from a serious illness in Hokkaido?

A sense of powerlessness arose spontaneously.

Qiu Yue touched his pocket with his withered hand, took out a rolled cigarette, and weakly put the folded cigarette into his mouth. He took out a lighter and twisted the spark plug hard before finally lighting the only cigarette.

He stared at the flashing neon lights, gradually losing himself in thought, a jumble of emotions swirling within him.

.......

"The opening is alright, directly describing the predicament and putting pressure on the male protagonist."

Pressure can be a motivator.

A classic opening technique.

It's not exactly amazing or not, but at least it doesn't make me frown like the previous ones.

He seemed to have a certain feeling about this description, a sense of weariness and desolation, as if he had come to Tokyo and tried his best but failed.

When I graduated from the Faculty of Arts at Waseda University, I always wanted to rekindle my childhood dream and even wanted to enter the animation industry at all costs.

But with his mediocre skills, he studied art for several years without any results.

The rejection letters dealt him a severe blow.

Back then, he had no money, no friends, and was wandering the streets of Tokyo all he had. The only thing he had to use was a few coins in his pocket.

It's heartbreaking to think about.

The male protagonist in the book, Akizuki Katayama, seems to be in an even worse situation. He has lost his job and has a mother at home to support. Everything requires money, but he has no money.

Life seemed to darken from that point on.

Recalling his past, Nakata Kazuyasu couldn't help but reminisce about his former self.

Sigh, it's all tears when I talk about it.

He collected his thoughts and continued looking down.

The scene takes place in a hotel, where a woman of similar age to the male protagonist hands him a bottle of beer and says something that seems quite profound:

"People are always going through cycles of confusion, self-deprecation, and hope, only to lose faith in what they've done soon after. I said, Katayama, you've been in Tokyo for eight years now, you should have made a name for yourself by now, right?"

......

After reading a few lines, Nakata Kazuyasu understood.

"Is the female lead her childhood sweetheart?"

Kazuya Nakata is now considered a middle-aged man, but as a light novel editor at Kadokawa Sneaker Bunko, he naturally spends his days immersed in various youth and school novels.

He was certain that in light novels where the female lead isn't explicitly stated as a childhood sweetheart from the very beginning, the childhood sweetheart would most likely end up as the loser.

I don't know if this can be considered a strange consensus that has developed in the industry.

If you just glance at the light novel charts, you'll find that there are a lot of romance novels with the "childhood friend" tag.

But in the end, very few of them were able to win.

Weird.

Getting back to the main point, he has found "Love of Fireworks" to be a very enjoyable read so far.

However, the more I looked at him, the more he frowned.

It's not that I can't stand watching it.

Rather, it's the author's writing style that doesn't seem like that of a newcomer, nor like that of a typical light novel author.

It has a... literary feel to it; the last time I felt this way was in "Hyouka".

The plot is written in a simple and easy-to-understand way. The male protagonist is fired and his life falls into difficulties. He is invited out for drinks by his childhood friend at a bar. His childhood friend is clearly a spendthrift, but she sells her small apartment in Tokyo to lend money to the male protagonist.

This part of the emotional interaction is handled very delicately. The male protagonist did not accept it casually, but struggled with it for a while. His childhood friend patted him on the back and explained the pros and cons before he finally accepted the money from his friend of more than ten years.

To be honest, he really liked the description of his childhood sweetheart in the book. She seemed to care nothing about the male protagonist, dressed fashionably, and hung out in bars, which made her completely out of place with the honest man like the male protagonist.

She didn't seem like a good character, yet she unexpectedly produced 200 million yen.

It's very strange.

The male protagonist, who received this favor, did not show too much excitement on the surface. Instead, he silently raised his head and glanced at his childhood sweetheart beside him. The two began to talk about the past, the games they played and the experiences they had as children, which was another interesting memory.

As they were talking, they both looked up at each other, smiled, and then raised their arms to punch each other like they did in a TV drama when they were kids.

Her eyes shone in the flashing neon lights of the bar, and I was somewhat mesmerized. Even though she was wearing the kind of flamboyant clothing I usually dislike, it didn't diminish her beauty in the slightest.

Upon seeing this passage, Nakata Kazuyasu's fingertips kept scrolling the marker on the table.

He really liked the feeling of meeting his childhood sweetheart with a smile, where everything was understood in their eyes.

The female lead, holding a wine glass in both hands, looked at the bar with a warm, nonchalant smile, which was also very endearing.

This makes one wonder, what kind of friend would sell their small apartment, which they had saved up over 10 years of hard work in Tokyo, to support a poor and destitute friend?

Even brothers would find it hard to do that.

Having experienced the harsh realities of society, Nakata Kazuya no longer trusts the classmates who borrowed money from him.

Those classmates who borrowed money kept saying they would pay it back as soon as they got their salary.

As time went on, it dragged on day by day, and we couldn't get it back at all.

To say too much would only bring tears.

The expression and look in the eyes of the childhood friend in the book when she borrows money seem to be saying, "It doesn't matter if you really can't pay it back. What are we?" Why did we come to Tokyo from the same small village, work as waitresses together, struggle together, sit on the same street bench eating rice balls together, and have our dreams intertwined as childhood friends?

Therefore, Nakata Kazuyasu could fully understand the unspoken emotion that the male protagonist felt when he silently stared at the bank card after receiving the money.

It's so nice to have a friend like that.

He couldn't help but think that.

And keep watching.

......

......

"Snapped!"

Upon reading the last two chapters, Nakata Kazuya couldn't hold back any longer and slapped his thigh. Even the female colleague who was getting a drink of water on the other side couldn't help but look at him.

"Nakata! Your leg isn't healed yet!"

"Haha, sorry, sorry, I got a little excited."

Nakata Kazuya smiled and nodded to his female colleague, rubbing his thigh as he straightened up in his seat.

This plot, this plot, he should normally want to curse!

Others might not think it's anything special.

But he could really get into it, and he really wanted to curse!

The previous chapter was fine; it featured a childhood sweetheart he really liked. But in the next chapter, she's gone.

Furthermore, the male protagonist's spiritual pillar, his mother, had passed away before this.

Died at the speed of light?!

The male protagonist suffers a double blow?

Good heavens, I've never seen an author so cruel to their childhood sweetheart.

Those who write about "loser dogs" are a million times kinder than this guy!

These light novel authors are really good at creating something amazing! Who knows, one day they might even turn an NTR (Netorare) story into a pure love story!

For a moment, he didn't want to watch anymore, after all, one of his favorite female leads was gone.

No, since it ended so quickly, it probably wasn't the female lead.

Alas, what a pity, what a pity, what a pity.

Seeing the miserable male protagonist who was very similar to himself, Nakata Kazuyasu felt a little sorry for him.

There was a time when I was just as decadent as that, spending my days indulging in cigarettes and alcohol, staring blankly at the sky, doing nothing.

The key is that the author creates a wonderful atmosphere: a bustling city, passionate couples, and passersby walking past him without a second thought...

He's now just hoping someone will come and save this poor kid.

It's a pity, he didn't. Even his only childhood sweetheart who cared about him is gone.

Sure enough, this is what happens when people are in dire straits—they lose both motivation and hope.

However, he underestimated the male protagonist. The male protagonist did not completely give up on himself. Instead, he remembered the dream that his childhood sweetheart had told him that day—to open a coffee shop.

He didn't know where he was going; he just bought a ticket, got off when he was hungry, and got back on when he was sleepy.

After several months of this, he arrived at a small town whose name he had never heard of.

The plot of this book doesn't have any more exciting moments, but it's described in great detail, making it easy for readers to keep going and hoping that the male protagonist will fulfill his childhood sweetheart's dream.

......