That evening, after having hotpot for dinner, Ichin first dropped Eriri off at her home before driving Yukino back to her apartment.
Together with Utaha, he went upstairs to Yukino's place—where they were finally reunited with Peppa, who had been temporarily fostered there.
Even though Peppa had been living there for a week, the moment he saw Ichin and Utaha, he immediately jumped down from the cat tree and ran over with soft pattering footsteps, rubbing himself affectionately against Utaha's legs while meowing.
Utaha smiled and picked Peppa up, looking at the little furball and saying, "At least you've got a conscience. You still remember to come over to us."
As Peppa came over, the small white cat Sesame, who had been resting on the cat tree with him, also padded over and began circling Utaha's legs, as if sensing that Peppa was about to leave.
Seeing this, Ichin chuckled. "Looks like these two got along pretty well."
Yukino nodded. "Yeah, they bonded really nicely. They always cuddle together during naps. Now Sesame doesn't even stick with Mochi anymore."
That made sense. Once you have a boyfriend, you naturally start ignoring the rest of the world.
That said, judging by how things looked now, the two furballs probably weren't at breeding age just yet—it might still be a little while.
They didn't stay long. After relaxing for a bit and letting the two cats play together one more time, Ichin and Utaha packed up with Peppa in carrier and got ready to leave.
Outside the apartment, Ichin looked at Sesame, who was being held in Yukino's arms, and said, "When this semester ends and we're on break, if you've got time, Yukino, bring the cat over to our place. These two are getting older—who knows when they'll go into heat."
Yukino nodded. "I know. I'm looking forward to it, actually."
"Alright then, we'll get going. No need to see us off."
After saying goodbye, Ichin and Utaha drove home.
Once inside the living room, they let Peppa out of carrier.
Even though he was finally back home, Peppa clearly seemed a bit down. Ichin picked him up and chuckled, "Still young, yet already such a lovesick fool. Don't worry, you'll have plenty of chances to see your little girlfriend again."
Utaha walked over, petting the cat's head as she asked, "Ichin, what do you think the kittens between Peppa and Yukino's Sesame would look like?"
"No idea. But based on what I've read, they usually have about one to six kittens. If the mother's small, the litter's usually smaller too. Judging by Sesame's size, probably two or three."
"Two or three, huh? That sounds about right." Utaha smiled more brightly the more she thought about it. "Maybe by summer, we'll have some new family members in the house."
"I think so too. But don't forget—Eriri's already claimed one of the kittens."
"I haven't forgotten. We'll definitely set one aside for her. Otherwise, she'll totally flip," Utaha said with a laugh. "Honestly, I thought she'd want to raise a dog. Turns out she wants a cat after all. She's basically a golden retriever herself—especially when she's angry."
"Maybe we rubbed off on her."
Ichin put Peppa down to let him play, then took Utaha's hand and led her to the couch. "But hey, don't go saying things like that to Eriri's face. She will go full golden retriever on you."
"Relax, Ichin, teasing her is my specialty."
Soon, Utaha went to take a bath, while Ichin returned to the bedroom and opened his laptop to check on the newly released fourth PV's performance.
On Bilibili, PV4 had already surpassed one million views, with over ten thousand people watching live. The engagement was strong, with likes and coin donations steadily climbing.
After skimming through the comment section discussions, Ichin opened YouTube to check the PV's stats there. It had already broken the one-million mark as well.
He even checked Steam's backend and saw that in just half a day, Persona's preorder numbers had jumped by over 30,000.
Rubbing his chin, Ichin muttered, "This momentum's kinda insane… it's making me a bit nervous."
The situation reminded him a bit of Cyberpunk 2077's pre-release hype. That game had also generated massive attention and preorders—only to crash and burn in reviews after launch.
Of course, Ichin didn't think Persona would meet the same fate. Cyberpunk's downfall was entirely self-inflicted—mismanaged development, chaotic internal processes, and overhyped marketing with zero regard for consequences.
Sure, CD Projekt Red still made a ton of money off it thanks to the goodwill built up by The Witcher series—but that reputation was severely damaged in the process.
As for his own Persona project, there was no way it would follow the same path. On the project management side, whether it was himself or his assistants Rin and Hazuki, they were all extremely diligent. From the start of development until now, there hadn't been any major issues. Even minor problems were usually resolved within two or three days, without affecting the timeline at all.
In fact, Persona had been developing ahead of schedule. The original release target was summer, but now they were ready to launch in May—and not with a bug-ridden mess like 2077 either.
After checking the presale status on the NS and Epic platforms, Ichin stretched with satisfaction and said, "Alright, in March, let's send review codes to all the game media outlets we can reach. This is a real large-scale project—time to go all out. I refuse to believe they'll dare give us low scores. And if they do? I'll roast them to death myself."
After a good night's rest, Ichin and Utaha finally returned to school.
And today happened to be the day the Center Exam results were released.
Just as they arrived, they were immediately stopped by Hiratsuka-sensei, who had been waiting outside the classroom. After putting down their bags, they followed her to the office.
Inside, they found all the third-year teachers present—along with the grade head and even the principal.
Damn. This was quite the turnout.
Ichin and Utaha exchanged a glance. No doubt, this was all because of their scores.
*
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