Don’t Let Me Leave You Behind

After leaving the maid cafe, the three returned to the bustling streets of Akihabara.

Confirming that her friend had not been deceived by a scumbag, Kirishima Shirono excused herself, saying she had other things to do.

After seeing her middle school classmate off, Kazakami Ritsu began to count the characters she had voiced on her fingers.

She had only voiced three characters in total… and all three basically received their bento boxes.

Thinking of this, Kazakami Ritsu looked at Umemiya Hiro, who had debuted a year earlier than her.

“Senior, what was your situation like back then?”

Hearing this question, Umemiya Hiro also reviewed her experience when she just debuted.

First, she voiced several bit-parts with no names and only one or two lines.

With the help of the agency, she got an important female supporting role in an original anime and gained considerable popularity because of it.

Finally, it became like now, a life of constantly rotating between female supporting roles and female lead roles.

After a brief review, Umemiya Hiro looked at her junior with some sympathy.

“Kazakami, my experience is the same as most industry seniors’. On the contrary, you…”

‘Me? What about me!’

‘Isn’t it just that my first character was a named bento, my second character was a female lead bento with screen time throughout, and my third character is a villain bento with a lot of screen time in the future?!’

Kazakami Ritsu muttered in her heart, deciding not to discuss this topic that made her sad anymore.

“Senior, where are we going next?”

“That is, of course… going on a date. First, I’ll accompany you to buy the original novel of Isekai Reincarnation.”

Umemiya Hiro’s lips curled up slightly, and she added a sentence in a suggestive tone.

“Now it’s a date time for just the two of us. How is it, are you happy?”

Regarding this senior’s constant teasing, Kazakami Ritsu just rolled her eyes.

“Okay, then let’s set off for shopping now.”

With that, the two walked toward a bookstore not far away, following the slightly crowded flow of people on the street.

Walking into the medium-sized bookstore named Mokuen, the display shelves outside were filled with various current magazines.

On the bookshelves near the entrance were various kinds of manga arranged by popularity. Glancing at the content, most were shonen battle manga and shojo manga that even she had heard of.

But soon, Kazakami Ritsu saw a familiar work on the bookshelf.

Tales of the Ten Thousand Blades, the anime of the same name is currently broadcasting to great acclaim!

Kazakami Ritsu raised an eyebrow, walked forward, and took down the first volume of the manga from the shelf.

The character on the cover of this volume was a very cute girl with black hip-length hair, wearing a black kimono.

So who was this flawless, extremely lovable girl?

That’s right! It’s me!

After automatically playing this line in her mind, Kazakami Ritsu put the manga back on the shelf with an expressionless face.

“You really like Meihime, huh? Still thinking about her?”

A certain senior’s voice suddenly rang in her ear. Kazakami Ritsu began to defend herself without turning her head.

“After all, she’s my first character, and I just happened to see it, so I was a bit interested.”

Umemiya Hiro let out two suspicious huffs and walked straight toward the novel section inside.

As soon as she reached the novel section, Kazakami Ritsu was shocked by the incredibly long book titles on the shelves.

After searching on the shelf for a while, Umemiya Hiro took down a book titled Isekai Reincarnation: World Conquest from Zero!.

“Leah’s main plot is in the first three volumes, so you only need to read the first three volumes.”

Senior-san said this while taking down the other two volumes from the shelf.

After receiving the books from her senior, Kazakami Ritsu first looked at the cover.

On the cover, a handsome young man dressed in gorgeous clothes sat at a conference table, with two lovely maids of different styles standing by his side.

Judging from the illustration alone, this work undoubtedly had enough appeal.

With this thought, Kazakami Ritsu slowly opened the first page and started reading.

A long time later, Kazakami Ritsu silently closed the book, her expression quite strange.

A standard Isekai harem novel with an overpowered protagonist, but it also included elements like war and strategy.

“How should I put it… just looking at the early plot, I never would have thought Leah would be a strategist character.”

Umemiya Hiro nodded in approval of her evaluation.

She reached out and pointed to the maid on the other side of the cover.

“This is me, Lim, the maid who was adopted at the same time as Leah.”

One of the two maids was responsible for protecting the young master’s safety, while the other served as the young master’s pawn, running around.

Finally, in the fourth volume, Lim died in front of the young master she wanted to protect.

Leah, as the young master’s agent, also paid with her life due to one of the young master’s misjudgments.

It was somewhat cruel to say, but they both became nourishment for that young master’s growth path.

“Senior, I never thought you would receive a bento box with me this time.”

After roughly understanding the plot related to Leah, Kazakami Ritsu retorted to her senior with narrowed eyes.

Umemiya Hiro silently clenched her fists and waved them in front of Kazakami Ritsu with a smile.

‘This junior is really asking for a beating. After understanding the original work, did she only capture this kind of thing?’

She put on a straight face, looking very serious.

“Kazakami, light novel adaptations are different from manga adaptations. You need to combine some descriptions from the original work to assist in judging the lines.”

“Because you have to carefully ponder the details in the text, the recording cycle may be relatively long, and the emotional requirements will be higher than for manga adaptations.”

After a long explanation, Umemiya Hiro held the novel in her hand level with her eyes.

Looking at the high-spirited protagonist on the cover, the corners of her mouth curled up slightly.

“If our characters can be remembered by helping the protagonist grow, isn’t that a form of successful portrayal?”

Looking at the senior whose eyes were filled with light, Kazakami Ritsu swallowed back the inappropriate words in her heart.

After paying for the three books at the counter, Kazakami Ritsu, who had successfully completed today’s outing mission, let out a long sigh of relief.

“Thank you, Senior, for asking me out. If it were a normal day, I probably would have just been lying at home watching videos.”

Umemiya Hiro waved her hand, seemingly not interested in her polite words at all.

Senior-san suddenly reached out and gently patted Kazakami Ritsu’s shoulder.

“Kazakami, I told you, meeting you makes me very unwilling.”

The girl said this very seriously to the other girl, but her eyes were filled with a joyful smile.

“Your talent makes me very jealous, but your hard work makes me unable to find any fault. But there is one thing you need to pay attention to…”

Speaking to this point, the senior girl leaned forward slightly and came close to her junior’s ear.

“Don’t get too complacent. Even for a small role that you are very confident about, you need to invest one hundred percent of your spirit to perform.”

“I really like co-starring with you, so… don’t be left behind by me, understand?”