Rinko's usually proud eyes were now filled with shock, shame, and panic all tangled together.
She bit down hard on her lower lip, the soft fullness drained of color, while her chest rose and fell sharply with her quickened breathing. The curves tightly wrapped under her shirt drew a dangerously captivating arc with every breath.
She wanted to yell, "You are talking nonsense!", wanted to swing her hand and slap this foul-mouthed bastard across the face.
But the certainty in Tanaka's gaze, and that soul-piercing question of his, left her powerless to argue.
Because yes, she really did not understand.
She had drawn over a hundred erotic graphics, knew human anatomy like the back of her hand, could probably sketch eighteen different types of boobs and twenty-four styles of panties with her eyes closed.
Yet all of that was still just cold data and lines on paper.
Every pleasure she portrayed came from dissecting and imitating other people's works. She was nothing more than a top-tier tailor, stitching together gorgeous outfits out of someone else's fabric, with nothing that truly belonged to her.
The air in the office felt as if it had solidified.
The teasing look on the blonde writer Ayase Miki's face had vanished completely, replaced by something complicated and hard to name.
In the corner, programmer Mochizuki Shizuka finally tore her gaze away from the code on her screen. She pushed her glasses up her nose, the eyes behind the lenses flickering uncertainly, as if Tanaka's words had hit a blind spot in her knowledge as well.
The one who broke the suffocating silence was the president.
"Waaah..." Hugging her rabbit plush, she gazed at Tanaka with sparkling, worshipful eyes, completely missing the tension in the air. Instead, like a curious child, she bounced over to him. "Tanaka-kun, you are amazing! How do you know so much? Could it be... you are one of those legendary hands-on masters?"
Tanaka was roaring with laughter on the inside, but kept a deep and mysterious smile on his face as he waved a hand modestly. "I know a thing or two, that is all. As a veteran player, I just have a teeny tiny bit of obsession with game quality."
In that instant, Yua's favorability toward Tanaka skyrocketed .
She spun around and grabbed the still-petrified Rinko by the arm, shaking her enthusiastically. "Rinko-chan, Rinko-chan! See, I told you Tanaka-kun is not just some random guy. He can see problems we cannot even notice. He must be the heaven-sent savior who will rescue our Flower Company!"
Being shaken back to reality, Rinko looked at Tanaka's face, that harmless smile plastered on it, and the anger and humiliation in her chest were quietly replaced by a fierce unwillingness to accept defeat.
She could tolerate failure, but she could not tolerate someone saying her work had no soul.
"Hmph!" She snorted heavily. She did not take back her resignation, but she also stopped packing her things.
Instead, she sat back down, picked up her stylus, and started jabbing the tablet with far more force than necessary, as if she were stabbing Tanaka's face instead.
And just like that, the crisis of the company disbanding was temporarily suppressed in this strange, roundabout way.
Tanaka had also successfully kept hold of this "divine job".
...
Over the next few days, Tanaka officially began familiarizing himself with the company's operations.
Or rather, instead of working, he was observing.
Because this company really could be described as stripped down to the bare bones.
Aside from the four beautiful girls, each with her own distinct charm, the most valuable thing in the entire office was probably Rinko's top-of-the-line drawing setup.
According to the books, the company only had enough funds left to keep the lights on for two months. If their next game tanked like the previous ones, they would all be drinking cold wind for dinner.
Yet this supposed last-hope, save-the-company title was still stuck in the planning stage, progressing at a pace that could only be described as infuriatingly slow.
The problem became glaringly obvious during the next meeting for the new project.
In the tiny meeting room, the four girls and Tanaka sat around a small table.
"Ahem!" President Yua cleared her throat, trying her hardest to look dignified. "So, about our new game, 'The Chaste Flower of the Monastery', how is the planning going?"
Writer Miki rubbed her forehead and listlessly pushed a stack of draft pages toward the center. "Terrible, absolutely terrible. The lines I wrote for the scenes read like 'you are a bad boy, now I must punish you'. Even I feel secondhand embarrassment. There is no sinful, heart-pounding thrill at all."
Rinko slapped a few character design sheets onto the table. The art style was still exquisite, but the irritation on her face was obvious. "I still cannot nail the micro-expressions. I have studied over a hundred different works and tried all sorts of techniques, but the result is still... exactly what he said!" She shot Tanaka a vicious glare. "Fake. Like a doll with no emotions."
In the corner, Shizuka quietly raised her hand and added, in her usual economy of words, "The hit feedback on the characters... the animation does not flow smoothly. The physical jiggle lacks realistic dynamics."
Listening to their complaints, the corner of Tanaka's mouth twitched.
Good grief. A scenario writer who cannot write dirty talk, an illustrator who cannot draw lewd details, and a programmer who cannot code proper boob physics. The fact that this company is still alive at all is nothing short of a miracle in the adult industry.
Yua hugged her rabbit plush, brows knitted in distress. "Then... then what should we do? Maybe... we should just study more reference material? I bought a new batch of the latest teaching aids recently, all kinds of genres!"
As she spoke, she proudly dragged out a huge box from behind her. It was stuffed full of neatly packaged DVDs and game discs, each cover more outrageous than the last.
Miki took one glance and immediately turned her head away in disgust. "Do not remind me, President. I tried writing a scene last week based on that 'Chikan Train Final Stop' you recommended. By the time I finished, I felt like I was going to puke. Those men are disgusting."
Rinko nodded vigorously, sharing the pain. "Same here. I studied reference images all night just to get the ahegao right. Then I spent the entire night having nightmares about being chased by tentacles."
Shizuka adjusted her glasses and calmly analyzed, "The data is not universally applicable. Different character body parameters mean that under the same external forces, the frequency and amplitude of chest movement should differ. Our existing materials do not provide enough sample diversity for proper modeling."
Sitting there listening to their academic discussion, Tanaka finally could not take it anymore.
He felt as if he had accidentally unearthed a world-shattering secret, one absurd and unbelievable enough to go down in eroge history.
He cleared his throat cautiously, testing the waters. "Um... I have a question. It might be a bit rude."
Four pairs of beautiful eyes turned toward him at once.
"Everyone..." Tanaka swallowed, feeling like he was about to ask a group of nuns whether they understood rock music. "Could it be that... none of you have ever... been in a relationship before?"
The moment the words left his mouth, the air froze for the third time.