If Magia hadn’t said anything, Mugeon probably would’ve walked right past them without even realizing who they were.
But those two sharp, unmistakably Korean syllables—
No way anyone could ignore a sudden “What the fuck.”
His eyes imdiately snapped toward the source of the curse—Magia.
And once that happened, of course he glanced at the person sitting next to her in a male cosplay outfit.
Wait a sec. Those faces look familiar.
“Holy shit, what the—fuck.”
A curse flew out from his end too, completely reflexive.
Magia’s staff—shaped like a rounded hook—snaked out and yanked Mugeon by the back of his collar.
He had been about to step away with the chair, but instead stumbled and wound up awkwardly seated next to the two of them.
Do-hee brought a finger to her lips, signaling him to shut up while glaring at him like she might end him right then and there.
Magia, staff still hooked around his neck, glared at him with thin, narrowed eyes.
The tension was beyond awkward.
Head bowed, eyes peeking from under the brim of his cap, Mugeon was the first to speak.
“Wait—look, I know what this probably looks like, but I ca with Ronze. He asked to buy the stuff for him. That’s all.”
It wasn’t a bad excuse.
Everyone knew Ronze was a Parallel fan.
It wasn’t crazy to think he’d co all the way here to scoop up Parallel rch.
And maybe he didn’t have enough hands, so he enlisted Mugeon—who wasn’t exactly familiar with these kinds of events—to help out.
But there was a flaw in that story.
Ronze, as a Naore second-string pro gar, had been called up to sub in for a first-string match. There was no way he could’ve co here today.
So the excuse was a lie.
If he really wanted to play it smart, he should’ve said he ca on behalf of Ronze, not with him. But caught off guard, he ssed up the phrasing.
Still, pressing further wouldn’t do much but make things ssier.
Magia decided to let it slide for now.
I an, wouldn’t anyone be flustered if soone they’d been cautiously keeping at arm’s length suddenly showed up out of nowhere with a bag full of your rch?
Do-hee seed to catch on to Magia’s thought process and chose her next words carefully.
“So, what exactly did Ronze ask you to buy? Mind if we take a look?”
“Go ahead. Be my guest. It’s not like I bought it for myself.”
Right on cue, the food truck called out their receipt number.
“I’ll grab it.”
Not wanting to personally witness what he’d bought, Magia stood up and headed over to collect their food.
Do-hee seized the opportunity, pulling item after item out of the shopping bag and laying them across the table to inspect the haul.
Magia in her office outfit – acrylic stand.
Magia in her witch outfit – acrylic stand.
Magia Crazy Shot ver. – acrylic stand.
Magia and Ena – couple stand.
Magia and Maru – couple stand.
Magia and Momo – couple stand.
Even the forbidden Magia and Taro – cross-company couple stand.
At that point, Do-hee stopped checking, carefully repacked all the rch, and slid it back into Mugeon’s bag.
After all, fandom is about respecting personal tastes.
This wasn’t so ideological interrogation.
What was the point of judging him piece by piece?
There was still ti before Gia returned with the food, so Do-hee casually tossed out another line.
“Wait, Ronze’s part of the Slug Squad?”
“He’s not just a slug—he’s the slug. He wipes out rch at every event.”
Said Mugeon.
About himself.
“Isn’t he busy with his pro career? Impressive he still keeps up with fandom stuff.”
“Why not? He watches every stream, apparently.”
Also said Mugeon.
Still about himself.
“But Gia’s stream schedule is a ss. If you’re tied up with practice, no way you’d keep up with that. He must be seriously dedicated.”
“Well, yeah. That’s how you know he’s a true fan...”
Again, referring to himself.
Yup. Mugeon, confird Slug Squad.
But seriously—when the hell did this guy beco a slug?
With questions stacking up in her head, Do-hee tossed out one more.
“Gia’s cute. Totally worth stanning.”
“Exactly. She’s got that kind of cuteness that makes you wanna bonk her on the head.”
“...”
“What?”
Mugeon didn’t even realize it, but that was a trap question: “So... are you a lolicon?”
Liking Magia based on her model alone wasn’t anything weird. So people just preferred cute, youthful 2D characters.
But if you knew Magia—and still stanned her for real—it was a bit more... dicey.
Fortunately, Mugeon’s choice of words—“makes you wanna bonk her”—clearly conveyed a chaotic gremlin-type affection.
Not anything creepy.
Do-hee relaxed.
Sa as when she’d been protecting Magia from cara flashes earlier—
Today, Do-hee was in turret mode all day long.
“Alright. Fine. You’re in the clear.”
“In the clear? Oh—you believe ? Thanks.”
“Sure. Must be tough. I’m sure Ronze’ll appreciate it.”
“Eh, he’s a good kid. You help out when you care, y’know? I an, hey—at least this way I got to co see the event. Not bad.”
Just then, Magia returned and placed their food down between them: a hot dog sliced into bite-sized pieces and a roll of kimbap.
Do-hee leaned in toward Gia and whispered,
“He’s definitely a slug. But not a lolicon.”
“...Thank god.”
Honestly, Magia didn’t really care if Mugeon stanned her or not—but she did hope it was limited to her model.
And now that Do-hee had confird that, Gia let out a sigh of relief.
“I honestly thought Mugeon had finally lost it.”
“Hey now. What do you an, lost it?”
“Keep your voice down. We really can’t get spotted here.”
“Oh. Right, sorry. Ahem. But still, what do you an by lost it?”
“I always appreciated how he supported Parallel. But I figured all that stuff on stream was just him doing performative fanservice. Y’know, playing the part. He’s like the poster child for normie public figures. But showing up to Mafe to buy rch? That’s not sothing you do unless you’re dead serious. I thought he finally snapped.”
Mugeon narrowed his eyes and looked at Magia, deadpan.
“Sorry to disappoint, but I’m still just a business partner. Helping each other out. That’s all. Don’t throw around words like performative.”
“First ti you’ve ever said that, though.”
“Really? Guess I never had a chance. Hard to say anything when you clearly hate my guts. Anyway, now that we’re talking, how about you stop treating like a friendly-fire target?”
“Fair enough. Glad we cleared that up.”
Whether he really believed they’d bought the excuse about Ronze or not, Mugeon leaned back and slipped into his usual exaggerated bravado.
“Man... today really tested the purity of my soul. Tough crowd.”
If you had to sum up Do-hee and Gia’s reaction in one word?
Psycho.
But at least the tension had broken.
From there, the conversation flowed a lot more smoothly.
“By the way, why don’t you guys do sothing like that? The corporate booths look sick. Parallel’s got a reputation to uphold—you should set up a booth already.”
Most people wouldn’t dare say sothing like that—but Mugeon had played a big role in Parallel’s growth and was still one of Do-hee’s business partners.
And since it was already in the works, she decided to let him in on it.
“That’s what today’s scouting was for, actually.”
“No wonder. You two went all in on cosplay. I honestly didn’t recognize you at first. Did your own makeup, too?”
“Nu-nae helped us.”
“Oh, DingSam’s wife? No wonder it looked decent—for you, anyway.”
“...You wanna die?”
"Hey, turret's locked on you. Maybe dial the friendliness back a bit."
Do-hee scoffed under her breath, while Mugeon just chuckled and kept going.
"So, are you guys actually doing a booth? If you are, I’ll go live and drop by or sothing."
"Appreciate it, as always, but it's still just in the planning stage. No date yet. I’ll let you know once it’s set."
It was unclear whether he ant to ss with them or was being completely serious, but then Mugeon dropped this little gem:
"So if you guys set up a booth, are you gonna sell official Magia rch?"
"...Why do you ask?"
"Well, y’know, Ronze might ask to buy more. Would be nice to know ahead of ti."
Do-hee sighed and shook her head.
"No clue. That hasn’t been decided. Gia’s not a VTuber, rember?"
Magia nodded in agreent, like she was saying, “We’re okay with fan works and doujin, but there’s no real reason to put out official rch.”
But Mugeon looked pretty serious—especially about online sales.
We’re in the age of mass rch drops and streamlined e-comrce, and he still hadn’t quite shaken the "normie" label, so showing up alone to a place like this was probably nerve-racking.
"Wait—have you guys even checked out the general booths yet?"
"We were swamped this morning scouting the corporate side."
"Then go check them out after lunch. You’ll see just how much Magia rch is out there at the Parallel booths. She’s insanely popular. There are sets where you have to buy other characters just to get her, and the price easily goes over 100,000 won—but even then, they’re selling out instantly. Sure, high price ans low stock, but still."
"Alright, we’ll keep that in mind."
"And one more thing. There are Magia cosplayers. Not just one—several."
"...? We haven’t seen any."
"I’ve seen at least three. One {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} woman working behind a booth table, one big dude clearly doing it for laughs, and one girl who looked just like Magia. I almost asked if she was the real deal."
Magia blinked slowly and muttered,
"This is the end of days..."
"Hey, it just ans you’re that popular. And one of them? Her resemblance was unreal. I was this close to asking if she was actually Magia."
"Even if she was, what would you do with that info? It’s basically asking soone to break character—what are you, red-pilling people now?"
"Ah, right. That's breaking VTuber taboo, huh. My bad. Apologies."
Still, Mugeon wasn’t giving up.
He wanted to convince them—Do-hee and Gia—that demand for Magia’s rch was legit.
That doujin booths were making a killing from it.
And that releasing official rch was the logical next step.
"Anyway, take a proper look around. Ronze said he really wanted to set up his second-gen official stand next to a Magia stand, but there just wasn’t one. Said it was a damn sha. So yeah—think about it."
This translation is the intellectual property of Novelight.
Do-hee glanced at Gia, wondering if all this persuasion was a bit much—
But surprisingly, it was Magia who responded positively first.
"Well, if there really are that many people like Ronze who want rch, it makes sense to make it. It all helps the company in the end."
Magia had been to enough Mafe events to know how fan event culture could sway a fandom.
Soone buys cool rch at an event, posts a photo, and boom—people start wanting it just from seeing it.
But if it’s not available online? No alternatives?
Then even if fans want to buy it, Parallel ends up just watching from the sidelines while wallets stay open.
Timing was everything.
Demand was high now—but who knew how long that would last?
Strike while it’s hot. It could benefit the company in a big way.
And since Magia was officially listed on the website as "staff," not a VTuber, there was no need to treat this like a perforr debut.
Just a response to demand.
"Anyway, is that all Ronze bought? Feels like kind of a weak haul considering how many booths and products there are."
Since Gia wasn’t pushing back, Mugeon replied cheerfully.
Still showing no signs of filtering himself, which earned him another round of exasperated looks from Momo and Gia.
"Well, you know . Whether it’s characters or people, I’ve got high standards. I’m basically the living embodint of visual elitism. Only picked the prettiest stuff."
"Uh... sure."
"Gia, are you interested in your own rch at all? Want to recomnd a booth or two?"
"Nope. I’m good."
***
After lunch, Mugeon happily snapped a few photos of the two of them, then split off to check out the rest of the corporate booths on his own.
As soon as he left, Magia visibly sagged in her seat.
"He’s really out here enjoying himself, huh."
"Right? That guy who always rants online is suddenly chilling at a fan event? Still feels unreal..."
"If an AI trained on Mugeon data tried to mimic him and malfunctioned halfway through, this is exactly what it would look like."
Now that the chaos had passed, the two of them planned to quietly make their way through the general booths—from A row to Z.
Technically, the VTuber-specific booths started at row U, but hybrid booths were scattered throughout, so the proper thod was to start from A and move in order.
There wasn’t a strict rule on how to explore them.
Since Magia was the veteran here, Do-hee followed her lead this ti.
The only exception: when it ca to Magia-related rch, Do-hee would handle it.
Magia couldn’t really be objective about her own character being turned into products—it was too surreal.
So they made their way through row A, then row B.
Unlike the limited-entry corporate booths, the general booths ant brushing shoulders with the entire crowd.
By the ti they hit row G, a few people had started following them.
By the ti they reached row O, that number had grown to over ten.
These were relaxed attendees who had already finished shopping, waiting for the mont Gia and Do-hee exited to pounce with photo requests.
"...Yeah, we’re not making it ho without so kind of showdown."
Do-hee glanced back and murmured under her breath.
"Right? They’re definitely plotting sothing. Don’t worry—I’ll try to block them. Su-nae said cosplayers aren’t obligated to allow photos, after all."
They finally reached row T—the start of the VTuber-specific booths.
And there, right in front of them, was the problem.
The trio of Magia cosplayers Mugeon had ntioned.
Beefy Magia, adult-female Magia, and suspiciously identical Magia.
All standing together in front of a single booth.
It’s common Mafe etiquette for cosplayers of the sa character to gather together.
But seeing these three side by side was... chaos. Pure chaos.
Gia’s brain short-circuited.
"Let’s just glance through this row with our eyes only and move along fast."
"Yeah... yeah, that’s probably for the best."
As they tried to slip past the clones—
Magia accidentally locked eyes with the one whose cosplay had the highest resemblance.
The cosplayer’s eyes went wide like saucers, and then—almost like she wanted Magia to hear it—she murmured softly,
"I knew I’d recognize you the mont I saw you."
The voice was cute, in a way.
But sothing about it was... sticky. Too knowing.
Magia didn’t stop walking, but her whole back tensed with chills.
Just like the cosplayer had instantly recognized her—
Magia, too, instinctively knew who this person was.
The one who gave life to her illustration.
Her "papa," her rigger—
Pino.
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