145. A Promise with Umaru

Question: What happens when a person finishes a project, finds themselves in a state of post-completion clarity, surrounded by silence, and sipping water, when suddenly a voice breaks the quiet?

Answer: Just look at Jiang Yu.

"Pfft—cough, cough... cough, cough... P-Please come in."

Coughing somewhat flustresdly, Jiang Yu set down his barley tea, picked up a nearby tissue, and began wiping the floor.

Fortunately, after finishing *My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected*, out of habit after working long hours in front of the computer, when he stretched his back, his feet would give a strong push against the floor, causing his wheeled chair to naturally roll back away from the desk.

This meant that the tea he had accidentally spat out in a sudden fit of coughing only landed on the floor.

"Ah, then I'm coming in?"

With those words, Doma Umaru pushed the door open and stepped inside, only to be greeted by the sight of Jiang Yu with a hunched back, leaning forward and wiping something on the floor.

Her face flushed crimson in an instant, and she stammered, "I-It seems I-I've come at a bad time! I'll head out first, Big Brother, call me in when you're done. I won't tell anyone—or rather, I'll forget all about this! Well then, goodbye!"

Having said that, Umaru made to retreat out the door, but Jiang Yu hurriedly shouted, "Hey—! Wait! What on earth are you imagining?!"

Umaru poked half her head out from behind the doorframe, cautiously eyeing Jiang Yu's tearful, exasperated expression, and said awkwardly, "I-I know, you know! Big Brother is a boy, after all! I understand!"

As if to demonstrate the credibility of her words, she vigorously nodded her head, and her forehead promptly... bumped straight against the door.

"Ow... That hurts." Umaru clutched her forehead, instantly deploying the long-lost art of the defensive crouch with her head in her hands.

Seeing this, Jiang Yu couldn't help but laugh. He put down the tissues in his hand, pulled out a few fresh ones, wiped his hands clean, and walked over to help Umaru up.

Pulling her hands away from her forehead, Jiang Yu examined it closely. There were no obvious injuries, just a slight redness and swelling.

Relieved, he tapped his younger sister's head and said with a helpless sigh, "You, oh you~ What am I supposed to say? After learning your lesson last time, you're doing it again? Are you afraid the door in our house is going to turn into Umaru's ultimate nemesis?"

"Mmph... Big Brother, what are you talking about? I don't understand at all!" Hearing Jiang Yu's cryptic words, Umaru pouted in dissatisfaction.

"Alright, it's no big deal, stop crying out in pain over there. Now then, tell me, what did you want me for just now?"

Jiang Yu led Umaru over to the bed in his bedroom, had her sit down, and then knelt on one knee to finish his unfinished cleanup work on the floor.

Then, seemingly remembering something, he added, "By the way, regardless of what you were thinking just now, the stuff on the floor was just some barley tea I accidentally spilled."

In order to spare his little sister's blushes, Jiang Yu really went to great lengths.

Umaru rolled her pretty eyes and looked around Jiang Yu's bedroom—the last time she had stepped foot in here was on her very first day. Then she remarked, "Eh~ It's been so long, Big Brother, your room hasn't changed at all..."

Hearing this, the corners of Jiang Yu's mouth twitched. He tossed the tissues into the wastepaper basket, stood up, dusted off his hands, and retorted playfully, "If you put those figurines back where they belong, it really wouldn't have changed at all, would it?"

"Ehehe~" Umaru began to play dumb, attempting to cutely gloss over it.

Afterwards, Jiang Yu fetched a mop from the bathroom, gave the spot a thorough going-over, and put the mop away before returning to his chair. Looking at Umaru sitting on the bed opposite him, he said, "Alright, spill it. What do you need me for?"

"Ah—! Cough, cough, right, does Big Brother have any free time tomorrow?"

Umaru wore an expression of sudden realization, followed by a few dry coughs to cover it up as she clapped her hands together.

...Who on earth forgets the whole reason they came here in the first place?! That expression you just made definitely means you only just remembered!

Thinking to himself with an inward sigh, Jiang Yu began to carefully consider his schedule. After a moment of silent deliberation, he said, "I'm free. What's up?"

"That's wonderful! Play games with me, Onii-chan~~"

Umaru instantly looked overjoyed, or rather, her eyes and brows were brimming with delight. She leaped off the bed, threw her arms around one of Jiang Yu's arms, and coaxed him playfully.

Dragging out the ending of "Onii-chan" ought to be illegal! This kind of behavior is a violation of the rules, and yet... what else could he possibly do?

"Fine~ Fine~ I promise you. But can you let go of my arm first?" Jiang Yu helplessly (and secretly enjoyably) agreed to his sister's request.

"Hooray! Then thank you, Big Brother! Goodnight!"

Umaru released his arm as requested, then skipped happily out of the bedroom.

Watching his sister's bounding figure, a gentle smile involuntarily surfaced on Jiang Yu's face. Come to think of it, ever since Umaru moved in here, it seemed he had never spent a single weekend alone with her. On weekdays, he was always busy with his own affairs and never played games with her.

When he thought about it that way, as an older brother, he really was somewhat neglectful.

Shaking his head, Jiang Yu let out a long breath, straightened his chair, and prepared to dive into the main bulk of his work for the night.

No matter what, *My Youth Romantic Comedy* only had the latter half of the final chapter of volume two completed, which hadn't taken up much of his time.

Now that the character designs for *Steins;Gate* were still unfinished, there was only one thing left to do.

Thus, Jiang Yu opened RC and continued building the scenes for *The Witch's House*. Because he had imported assets earlier, the scenes he constructed this time retained at least a touch of the original work's charm.

After all, *The Witch's House* wasn't a particularly large game; it was, at its core, a compact horror game that won through creativity and attention to detail. In Jiang Yu's memory, the file size was only around 20 to 30 megabytes.

Moreover, there were many reusable tiles in the game, such as castle walls, corridors, windows, and so on. The only troublesome part was that depending on whether certain trigger conditions were met, the details in certain areas would change.

For instance, the Witch's House when first entered versus the true Witch's House at the very end—aside from the general layout remaining unchanged, subtle details everywhere had shifted.

As an indie-style horror RPG, it naturally featured the crowd-pleasing chase sequences. Naturally, the protagonist Viola had two states: walking and running, which doubled the number of sprite sheets required for the character. Even so, none of it was overly difficult; absolute beginners might find it a bit tricky at first, but aside from the final chase between the witch Ellen and Viola, nothing in the game was truly difficult.

Once character movement came into play, there were naturally issues like map collision, movement speed, and matching sprite directions that needed to be resolved.

However, having independently completed an RPG production once before, Jiang Yu found himself handling it with ease.