I'm Not A Master, I'm A Director
Chapter 408: Your Shamelessness Reminds Me of Your Sister
The film version of Garden of Sinners, unlike the novel, doesn't use chapter divisions or a lingering note after the Boundary of Emptiness arc to signal the start of the next story.
However, viewers can clearly sense that the film's plot enters a new phase, with Shiki's invitation to join Touko's agency as a starting point.
The reason was that on his way home, the male lead, Mikiya Kokutou, encountered Fujino Asagami.
The meeting between the male lead and the female antagonist clearly signaled the start of the main plot.
From a screenwriting perspective, the film's central narrative should have begun by now. After all, the main characters had already been introduced. If they didn't start telling the story, would the audience just watch the protagonists goof around in the agency?
This wasn't Carnival Phantasm!
As a gentle and gentlemanly person, Mikiya Kokutou would naturally approach a girl wearing his sister's school uniform, walking alone late at night, clutching her stomach in pain, and ask if she needed help.
Many people criticize Japanese media for its endless supply of yasashii (kind/gentle) male protagonists, arguing that mere gentleness isn't a real virtue.
But in reality, few men in Japan can truly achieve the level of tenderness depicted in those stories.
After all, it's genuinely difficult for someone to treat another person with genuine, selfless kindness and consideration.
And if you're not careful, you might cross a line and become a simp.
Not to mention, in a patriarchal society like Japan, finding a man who is both gentle and consistently attentive to his partner is no easy feat.
Sakamoto Maaya, the voice actress for Shiki, once complained on a TV show about her husband. During one of their arguments, she stormed out in anger and checked into a hotel to protest.
But he showed no reaction. In the end, Sakamoto Maaya had to return home and pretend nothing had happened.
When the host asked Suzumura about it, he simply replied, "Did that really happen?" feigning complete ignorance.
Some interpreted this as the couple playfully flaunting their affection. Given their busy careers, their banter and teasing could be seen as a sign of their love.
Some interpreted this as Sakamoto Maaya complaining, but when she realized she wasn't getting sympathy, she could only laugh it off.
Regardless of the interpretation, it was clear that Kenichi Suzumura fell far short of the ideal man in the story, one who would wholeheartedly focus on and gently treat a woman.
Just try imagining this in The Garden of Sinners.
Even a child could guess how Shiki would treat Kokutou if he ignored her.
Of course, it's truly too difficult for men in reality to always put women first.
Even Shinji couldn't guarantee he'd be considerate of a girl his entire life; at best, he could play the perfect boyfriend during the pursuit.
Perhaps this is why all stories end abruptly when a relationship is confirmed, and the details of married life are left vague.
The mundane realities of daily life—food, money, misunderstanding—are always love's greatest enemy.
Mikiya Kokutou on screen certainly wasn't thinking about all that. He simply saw a girl in need of help and invited her to stay at his place for the night.
This should have been a classic romantic scene, overflowing with pink bubbles, but because of Mikiya's overly proper (or rather, less than beastly) demeanor, the audience couldn't fantasize about it at all.
It's worth noting that Fujino didn't just stay overnight at Mikiya's place; she even took a bath and ate breakfast with him the next morning.
Despite such easily misleading circumstances, no sparks flew between Mikiya and Fujino. All that remained was the warmth of a good person helping a vulnerable girl.
One has to admit, Shirou is a master at playing the saint.
He managed to turn such an inherently ambiguous scene into something so straightforward and wholesome that the audience could only marvel at the radiant glow of human goodness.
However, the audience's attention had long since shifted away from whether the male lead would fall into an emotional crisis over the female villain.
Because while they were eating breakfast, the living room TV broadcast an utterly bizarre news report.
Four young bodies, dead for nearly two weeks, had been discovered in an abandoned underground bar. All four had their limbs torn off, and the scene was a sea of blood.
The news soon revealed the identities of the victims.
All four of them were high school students. According to the report, they were delinquent youths who loitered around the nearby streets all day without doing anything productive.
And they weren't the harmless kind who only engaged in school skipping.
They were the real deal, delinquents who had actually committed crimes. Some of them even had records of involvement in drug dealing.
Naturally, people like that had long since cut ties with their families and only hung out with others in the same circle. That was also why no one had reported them missing after they disappeared.
As for why the four corpses—dead for nearly half a month—were only discovered now, it was because a similar murder case had recently occurred in a small single-person apartment.
The victim of that case just happened to be a drinking buddy of the four unlucky guys.
The crime scene was so bizarre that it looked as if a typhoon had passed through it—everything was completely destroyed. The police couldn't find any useful evidence at all and could only start investigating the victim's acquaintances.
That was when they discovered that several of his "friends" had gone missing half a month ago.
At first, the police thought they had found their culprit.
But after digging deeper, they realized those four guys had already gone ahead and died first.
One could only imagine what the police were thinking when they saw the four corpses twisted like wrung-out towels.
Was it the surprise of an "unexpected bonus discovery"?
Or the frustration of "damn it, more overtime again"?
Or perhaps the dread of "wait… are we going to find more and more bodies the further we investigate?"
The audience, however, didn't care what the Japanese police were thinking.
What they cared about was the reaction of the two people currently watching the news.
Thanks to their god's-eye view, the audience clearly knew that the murderer from the news report was the beauty sitting at the dining table, rubbing her stomach while eating spaghetti.
They were practically dying to see a conflict erupt between Fujino and Kokutou.
For example, Kokutou might accidentally discover some clue about Fujino's killings, forcing the girl to silence him to keep the secret.
But to the audience's disappointment, Kokutou's only comment about the news was:
"Wow! This is exactly the kind of thing Touko-san likes."
If Touko herself heard that remark, she would probably smash a slipper right into his head.
As for the culprit, Fujino herself seemed to have barely listened to what the news was saying at all.
She was far more concerned about her stomach.
"Why…?"
Amid her ragged breathing, the girl suddenly murmured those words.
"Even though it was already cured… why…?"
The next moment, Fujino abruptly stood up from her chair. Her hair was disheveled as she hurried toward the entrance.
"Wait!"
Seeing that she had barely eaten half her breakfast, Kokutou hurried after her.
But Fujino lowered her head and raised one hand, stopping him from coming any closer.
"You should calm down first…"
Kokutou could see the turmoil in her heart and tried to soothe the visibly shaken girl.
"Enough. I knew it… I can't go back anymore."
Leaving behind those cryptic words—and a face twisted in pain—Fujino Asagami walked out of Kokutou's house.
Just like that, the first exchange between the film's opposing sides came to an end.
The moment the audience had been anticipating the most—Fujino's murders being exposed—didn't happen.
Of course, they also understood why.
The movie hadn't even reached one-third of its runtime yet. Revealing the culprit so early would've been rather dull.
That being said, quite a few viewers still felt a little disappointed.
The Garden of Sinners certainly wasn't a detective film, but it did contain some elements of suspense.
The master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock, once explained the difference between a "suspense film" and an "ordinary film" like this:
In an ordinary film, the audience doesn't know there's a bomb under the table—it suddenly explodes.
But in a suspense film, the audience knows there's a bomb under the table and can even see the countdown timer… yet they don't know whether it will explode at the last moment.
By placing that "bomb under the table," the audience is drawn into the story, experiencing the tension alongside the characters. It's a classic technique used by most suspense films.
Shinji, like those suspense directors, understood this principle very well.
In the story of Garden of Sinners, Fujino's identity as the murderer was that very bomb hidden beneath the table.
That was precisely why, during the conversation between Fujino and Kokutou—set against the backdrop of the murder report—the audience felt such intense tension.
However, Shinji had no intention of detonating that bomb so soon.
Instead, he deliberately pushed it a little further down the timeline.
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"Shinji Matou's twisted sense of amusement."
Aoko gave that evaluation without hesitation.
The moment she saw Kokutou heading to the office on the screen, she already knew that revealing Fujino's identity this early was out of the question.
There was no way that the director didn't know what the audience wanted to see. Deliberately delaying the moment when the killer would be exposed was obviously intentional.
Aoko didn't know professional terms like "the bomb under the table," but she at least understood one thing—
Dragging things out to tease the audience wasn't exactly something worth praising.
Alice, on the other hand, remained calm.
"Wouldn't it be boring if Fujino were exposed so early? We've barely gotten started."
Aoko puffed out her cheeks.
"I still think it'd be better if things were more straightforward!"
"Stories with twists are more interesting, aren't they?"
Alice clearly had different expectations for the plot than Aoko. But she didn't dwell on that topic and instead brought up something else.
"By the way, Aoko."
"Hm?"
"Was Touko always this… goofy?"
Alice's impression of Touko was still frozen at the time before she had been expelled from the Aozaki household.
Back then, Touko had been extremely serious, someone who treated magecraft with meticulous care and absolute dedication.
But the Touko in the movie felt completely different from the one in Alice's memory.
If the earlier scene where she gave Shiki a sort of "therapy talk" could be explained as her trying to open up the shut-in heart of Ryougi Shiki, then the Touko working inside the office was something else entirely.
She was a complete and utter goofball.
From earlier scenes, the audience already knew that Mikiya Kokutou was currently broke.
Otherwise, instead of letting Fujino stay overnight at his place, he would've simply called a taxi and sent her home.
Kokutou had originally thought that the next day was payday. Once he received his salary from his boss, his financial situation would finally become a little less tight.
But after arriving at the office, the news he received nearly made him collapse.
There was no money.
"Kokutou, regarding your salary…"
Touko calmly announced something that made Kokutou want to smash his head against a wall.
"I'm very sorry, but since there's no money, this month's salary will be paid together with next month's."
Her tone was so firm and decisive that it almost made it seem like Kokutou—the one asking for his pay—was the unreasonable one.
In that instant, Touko perfectly embodied the ruthless heart of capitalism.
"Wait a second! Didn't we deposit 1.12 million yen into the bank yesterday? Why are you suddenly saying there's no money now!?"
"That money… ah… it's already been spent."
Facing Kokutou's questioning, Touko leaned back in her chair, the frame creaking noisily as she rocked in it.
"What exactly did you spend it on, Touko-san!?"
Sure, the yen wasn't exactly worth much, but blowing through over a million yen in a single day was still outrageous, especially considering this office barely had any operating expenses.
"I bought a Victorian-era witch's divination board. It has traces of magecraft and some historical value, but overall it's not really worth much. You could say it's just a personal hobby."
"Who is supposed to understand that explanation!?"
At this moment, Kokutou had completely entered full tsukkomi mode.
However, the female magus proved to be even more shameless than he had imagined.
"Oh, don't be so angry~ I'm completely broke right now too~ So when I said there's no salary this month, I wasn't joking."
"Please tell me that was a joke!"
That line drew laughter from quite a few members of the audience.
Even Alice, who had been feeling embarrassed by Touko's behavior just moments ago, couldn't help but smile.
'So this is Touko…'
It was the first time Alice had seen such a side of her.
For a moment, she even thought that if the real Touko could act this goofy, maybe a bit of playful charm might actually smooth over the conflict between her and the Aozaki family.
Unfortunately, when it came to matters of magecraft ideology, Touko was unbelievably stubborn.
There was simply no way she could laugh things off and pretend nothing had happened.
In truth, the real Touko was still somewhat more serious than the one currently shown on the screen.
Even though Touko in the original Garden of Sinners novels could sometimes be unreliable, she wasn't nearly as exaggerated as the film version.
The reason Shinji chose to exaggerate his senpai's personality like this was actually quite simple.
Because the other two members of the main cast—Ryougi Shiki and Mikiya Kokutou—were just too quiet and reserved.
In a novel, the author could always fill the silence with rich inner monologues from the characters.
But on the big screen, things were different.
When characters who could barely squeeze out two sentences in three days had to carry the story through acting alone, there needed to be someone to liven up the atmosphere.
On the screen, Touko's shameless antics were still going strong.
She suddenly extended a hand toward Kokutou.
"Kokutou, I have something I'd like to ask you."
"What is it?"
Since Shiki was also in the office, Kokutou assumed it had something to do with her and suppressed his irritation as he asked.
"Could you lend me some money? I'm truly completely broke right now."
Touko showed a bashful little smile.
"I refuse with every ounce of my being!!"
With that, Kokutou slammed the door and stormed out.
"…This feeling is oddly familiar."
Watching the scene unfold, Alice couldn't help but feel a strange sense of déjà vu.
Wasn't that exactly the same expression Aoko always made when she begged her to buy her toys?
Alice slowly turned her gaze toward the girl sitting beside her and raised an eyebrow slightly.
"Aoko, the shameless look on your face really does resemble your sister's style."
Alice spoke with genuine sincerity.
"What kind of compliment is that supposed to be!?"
Aoko let out a pitiful wail.
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Tn: I updated the story once every 2 days, but if you want to see more chapter of this story ahead of time, please go to my Patreon.
Latest Chapter: Chapter 429: Another Poor Kid Who Gets Sold and Still Says Thanks[1]
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