Chapter 123 There is a wolf in front and a tiger behind, is it a disaster or a blessing?

Chapter 123 There is a wolf in front and a tiger behind, is it a disaster or a blessing?

Chapter 123 There is a wolf in front and a tiger behind, is it a disaster or a blessing?
1996 1 Month 1 Day.

"Hideki~ It's time to get up and go to Asakusa Shrine's 'Hatsumode'~"

The sweet voice of Mengzi gradually entered Kitagawa Hide's ears from far away and woke him up from his sleep.
"I've prepared breakfast too~"

"Well, I'll get up now. Yumeko-chan, you've worked hard." Kitagawa Hide rubbed his eyes, patted his slightly swollen cheeks, and slowly got out of the kotatsu.

Last night, Mengzi and I stayed up late to watch the Red and White Songs Festival. As we chatted, the topic turned to the subject of the new book. We both expressed our opinions, and before we knew it, we were chatting until after four in the morning.

After falling asleep, Kitagawa Hide's mind did not stop. He started brainstorming on his own, all of which were messy dreams about writing books, sales and competition among publishing houses.

He had forgotten the specific content of the dream, but he vaguely remembered that at the end of the dream, Bungeishunju's President Ueno Toru and Kodansha's President Noma Sawako stood with their hands on their hips, looking down at him with sarcasm and ridicule on their faces, then pointed at his nose and laughed, saying, "You think you can write a social novel that will make a sensation across the country?"

Kitagawa was so handsome that he reached into his arsenal with both hands, picked up a copy of "Snow Country" in his left hand and a copy of "Norwegian Wood" in his right hand, and threw them hard in their faces.

But it did zero harm to them.

Because these two novels have little relevance to society, although they are awesome, they are not appropriate at this time.

The theme should be social and meet the psychological needs of the current public, and it is best if it can also take advantage of the current events.
Kitagawa Xiu scratched his head and was about to search the arsenal in his mind when the sweet smell of roasted rice cakes suddenly wafted over.

"Hideki, can we have grilled rice cakes and miso soup for breakfast?" Yumeko, wearing a light pink apron and with her hair tied up high, held a tray and knelt down next to him, virtuously helping him set the tableware. "Would you like to fry another egg?"

"Thank you, Yumeko-chan~" Kitagawa Hide turned his head towards her. My wife Yumeko closed her eyes obediently and skillfully, tilted her head and stuck out her tongue, "This is enough."

"Hmm~" After a bold kiss, my wife Yumeko loosened her hands around Kitagawa Hide's neck and took out a few new newspapers from behind her buttocks, "This is the latest issue of the newspaper."

In the era of traditional paper media, newspapers were the window for most people to understand society. Although Kitagawa Hide had a computer at home, the number of Internet users was too small, resulting in great limitations in forum news. It was easy to miss some big news by only relying on that to understand current affairs.

Kitagawa Hide picked up a piece of roasted rice cake and put it into his mouth, while his eyes quickly browsed through several newspapers.

There is a custom of eating grilled rice cakes on the first day of the Japanese New Year, which means that the new year is full of hope and tenacity. However, Kitagawa Hide got tired of it after eating a few pieces.

These rice cakes were sent by Shizuko Kawaide from Osaka. They are all red bean rice cakes, which is a blessing for those who love sweets, but a nightmare for those who love salty food like Hide Kitagawa.

Japanese rice cakes are very sticky and the softest in the world. It is said that every year there are Japanese people who choke to death while eating rice cakes. It is magical that the first business of many hospitals in the New Year is to rescue people who are almost choked to death by rice cakes.

There is no interesting news in the newspaper, just as boring as the Red and White Songs Contest last night.

If I have to say, Kitagawa Hide feels that this New Year is a bit depressing. From TV programs to newspapers and magazines, the overall social atmosphere is even more depressed than last year after the outbreak of a new wave of financial crisis caused by the Nishin Group incident (a financial bank went bankrupt due to a run) and the Housing and Urban-Rural Development Zone incident (a state-owned real estate company collapsed).

It has been four years since the bubble burst and the stock and housing markets experienced a hard landing. There is no sign of improvement in the social economy. Instead, the trend is getting worse. It is no wonder that people have lost confidence in the country and the government.

The literature section was promoting the "Social Novel Public Fundraising Contest" jointly organized by Kodansha and Bungeishunju. After more than 1000 years, the two top publishing houses were once again soliciting submissions from the public, and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and the Agency for Cultural Affairs were backing them up. The prize money was as high as million yen, and the topic was so popular that it overshadowed all new literary awards.

Sawako Noma and Toru Ueno deliberately set the opening date for the essay contest on January 1, which happened to be the release date of the first issue of "Wenyi" in the new year. Their evil ambitions were obvious.

This move was clearly a conspiracy by the two major publishing houses against Kawade Shobo. They used high bonuses and high popularity to erode the readership of the literary market, and even deliberately selected the extremely broad theme of social novels. They were just short of pointing at the nose of Literature and Art and saying, "I am stealing your readers."

As we all know, the main audience of "Wenyi" is the masses at the bottom of society.

"I heard from Brother Kinoshita that President Kawaide seems to be having a hard time lately." Agatsuma Yumeko leaned over and whispered, her eyes full of worry.

After several interactions, she became good friends with Rena Saito, Shizuko Kawaide and others. When her friends were in trouble, she, who was kind-hearted and innocent, couldn't help but worry.

Moreover, Shizuko Kawaide is still Kitagawa Hide's nominal boss. If Kawaide Shobo really goes bankrupt this time, both the lips and the teeth will suffer.

"Well, after the New Year, I will go to the company to have a chat with President Kawade." Kitagawa Hide nodded.

Not to mention her paper cooperation with Kawaide Shobo, Kawaide Shizuko made a lot of efforts in the publication and release of "Akira". When Kitagawa Hide left Kodansha, she was the first to extend an olive branch to him.

It is neither reasonable nor logical for Kitagawa Hide to sit idly by and do nothing about what happened in Kawaide's study.

We ended the talk about work here. Kitagawa Hide finished his breakfast in no time, changed his clothes, and while it was still early, he and Agatsuma Yumeko, who was wearing a bright red kimono, got on a Mercedes-Benz and headed straight to the Asakusa Shrine in Taito District, Tokyo.

The auspicious date for the opening ceremony of "Akira" and the enshrined goddess Benzaiten were both prayed for there.

Therefore, Kitagawa Hide gave up going to the Meiji Jingu Shrine, which had the most traffic, and instead went to the Asakusa Shrine to make New Year's wishes and fulfill his vows.

They set out early, and when they arrived at the parking lot outside the Asakusa Shrine, they saw families coming one after another to pay homage to the shrine and perform the New Year's "Hatsumode".

"Hatsumode" is one of the oldest customs in Japanese New Year activities. It refers to the first visit to a shrine or temple in a year. In anime works, "Hatsumode" is almost always mentioned as long as it involves the New Year plot.

Many film and television dramas also like to use "Hatsumode" as the beginning of the story, for example, the heroine who went to "Hatsumode" to pray for safety accidentally ran into her true love, the hero, in the temple.

Kitagawa Hide pulled Agatsuma Yumeko through the crowd and came to a side hall of the shrine, where there was something like a booth. A cute and playful shrine maiden stood there, with several men dressed as priests standing on both sides.

This is the "New Year Festival" venue specially set up by the Asakusa Shrine. The booths are full of extremely expensive exorcism props such as demon-breaking arrows, money-scooping rakes, amulets, etc.

"It's so expensive!" When Agatsuma Yumeko saw that a Demon-Destroying Arrow was being sold for 9999 yen, she was so scared that she couldn't help but exclaim.

This thing costs only 199 yen at the night market!
Kitagawa Hide didn't take it seriously. He smiled and greeted the shrine maiden, then took out a stack of banknotes and handed it over: "Happy New Year! Lord Miyamizu, please give me two of each of these things."

"Mr. Kitagawa, Happy New Year. I wish your new book will sell well in the new year." The shrine maiden named Mitsuha Miyamizu placed her hands on her belly, bowed slightly to him with a smile on her face, and then asked the "priests" next to her to pack up the exorcism props, and handed over the money and the goods.

"Thank you for your patronage. A priest will be here to lead you to the main hall in a moment. Please wait a moment, Mr. Kitagawa." After seeing the coins being stuffed into the donation box, Mitsuha Miyamizu squinted and smiled, then leaned close to Kitagawa Hide and whispered.

My wife Yumeko's head was full of question marks. She was about to ask Kitagawa Hide what was going on when a familiar voice suddenly came from behind.

"Mr. Kitagawa, my wife's classmate, are you here to pay homage as well?"

Shizuko Kawaide, wearing a black kimono with black gauze hanging on her shoulders, came over happily.

"President Kawaide?" Kitagawa Hide hurriedly pulled Yumeko over to greet her, and nodded to the driver Kinoshita and others behind her.

Shizuko Kawaide walked quickly forward and asked driver Kinoshita and others to buy a bunch of exorcism props. Then she said "Happy New Year" to the two of them and invited them to go to the main hall to worship together.

Led by several priests, the group passed through the inner corridor and came to the relatively sparsely populated main hall. It was then that Yumeko Agatsuma realized why Kitagawa Hide and his group wanted to buy those exorcism tools.

Asakusa Shrine is one of the most popular places for "Hatsumode". In order to disperse the flow of people, the shrine puts up a sign outside calling out numbers, and only allows ten people to enter the main hall to worship at a time. Only after this group of people finishes their "Hatsumode" will another group of people be allowed in.

The side hall where Mitsuha Miyamizu is located is the "VIP passage" that leads directly to the main hall. As long as you buy those exorcism props, you can jump the queue to worship.

Kitagawa Hide is not short of money now, so of course he can't drag Yumeko outside to wait for her number to be called.

But to be honest, this marketing strategy made him feel like he was dreaming of returning to Disney.

Agatsuma Yumeko noticed that Kawaide Shizuko wanted to talk to Kitagawa Hide, so she quietly fell behind and went to the hand-washing house with driver Kinoshita and the others to wash their hands and rinse their mouths, and then followed another path to pay their respects.

Kitagawa Hide and Kawaide Shizuko came side by side to the main hall where Sansha Myojin was enshrined. They saw that two fishermen and a priest were actually enshrined as gods, and their statues were placed in front of Guanyin Bodhisattva. Kitagawa Hide did not know whether to laugh or cry.

The Japanese mythology system and concepts are really different from those of other countries.

Compared to Kitagawa Hide's travel-like behavior, Kawaide Shizuko is much more serious and rigorous.

It was obvious that she had a lot to say to Kitagawa Hide, but she resisted the urge and sincerely rang the bell in front of the altar of the statue, bowed twice, clapped her hands twice, and then made a solemn wish before she stood up and looked at Kitagawa Hide.

"Teacher Kitagawa, do you know the legend of the Three Shrine Gods?" she suddenly asked.

Kitagawa Xiu was stunned for a moment, then nodded.

The three gods are the three guys enshrined in the Asakusa Shrine, two fishermen and a wizard.

The reason why they are worshipped is also very simple.

During the Asuka period, two fishermen fished out a statue of Guanyin from the sea and handed it to a Taoist priest. The Taoist priest did some calculations and said that the statue should be enshrined. Thus, the Asakusa Shrine was established.

During the Heian period, demons were rampant. Guanyin appeared in the dream of the chief priest of Asakusa Shrine and told him that only by enshrining the two fishermen who fished out the Guanyin statue and the priest who guarded the Guanyin statue as gods in the temple could the demons be prevented from invading the shrine.

Then there came into being the Three Gods.

"The three gods are revered by later generations because they have the merit of 'knowing the wise'. Without them, this statue of Guanyin would have been covered in dust forever.

Therefore, when we in the publishing industry encounter difficulties, we like to come here to worship the three gods, hoping that the company's business will be smooth this year."

Kawade Shizuko gave a low, bitter laugh, revealing a rare look of worry.

"I'm sorry for ruining your good mood, Mr. Kitagawa."

"Nothing. Has the company been in such a difficult situation recently?" Kitagawa Hide waved his hand and asked the priest next to the statue for a fortune paper.

Shizuko Kawaide has always been nicknamed the "Iceberg Female President". Although she has broken down in front of him several times, she has generally maintained her proper demeanor and rarely reveals her true feelings so obviously.

She lowered her eyes and had dark circles under them. It seemed that she had a very bad New Year.

"Yes. After my father passed away, the family asked me to be promoted from acting president to official president, and at the same time issued a lot of performance targets." Kawaide Shizuko also reached out to the priest for a signature paper. When she spread it out, she found that it was a "Great Ominous" paper, and her expression became even more worried.

"Originally, this was nothing. The board of directors and some of the elders in the family had always been against me, but they couldn't do anything about it. But after Kodansha held that public writing competition a few years ago, a large number of the new writers we trained ran away."

"Are they the reserve players who haven't won an award yet to make their debut?" Kitagawa Hide frowned.

"Yes. This public essay solicitation is open to the general public, but it mainly attracts newcomers to our publishing house." Kawaide Shizuko nodded, "and our readers."

In addition, Kodansha and Bungeishunju shamelessly spent money to poach the core writers of Kawaide Shobo.

This has already fallen into the category of vicious business competition. To put it bluntly, it is just like the money-burning war between Didi Dache and Uber next door. One of the two sides must die.

It is foreseeable that when "Wenyi" is released on the 18th, if "Literary World" and "Group Portrait" launch a swift offensive and "Wenyi" cannot withstand it, it may start to perform poorly from the first issue of the new year to the end of the year.

Once the loss of key readers occurs, it is difficult to recover.

This would make all their efforts in the second half of last year go to waste.

"Has the layout of the new issue of "Wenyi" been finalized?" Kitagawa Hide frowned even deeper.

He thought that Kawaide's study must be having a hard time recently. After all, yesterday was New Year's Eve and Kawaide Shizuko didn't come to the party, but he didn't expect the situation to have reached this point.

It turns out that the public essay solicitation is just a superficial appearance, are there so many shady tricks going on behind the scenes?

"The publishing department and the editorial department said that the number of manuscripts that meet the quality standards is not enough." Kawaide Shizuko lowered her head, like a child who had made a mistake. "A group of writers who had originally agreed to publish their books suddenly said that they wanted to postpone the publication of their books."

"This is troublesome." Kitagawa Hide squeezed the signature paper in his hand. It seemed that his plan to take a break in January would be ruined.

"Teacher Kitagawa!" Shizuko Kawaide clenched the "very bad" paper and suddenly turned her head and bowed to him at a ninety degree degree.

The big boss suddenly did this in public, and Kitagawa Hide was so scared that he quickly helped her up.

But when his hands touched Kawaide Shizuko's arms, Kitagawa Hide was shocked to find that she was using almost all her strength to maintain the bowing posture and he couldn't help her.

"I'm sorry! I didn't bring you blessings on the first day of the new year, but instead caused you trouble! I shouldn't have said this to you at this time anyway.
But if the first issue of "Wenyi" this year fails, all last year's efforts will be in vain!
So please! Please start serializing your new work in the January issue of "Bungei"! "

In fact, Shizuko Kawaide had thought of all these words before she came here, but when the words came to her lips, she was too embarrassed to speak.

Such an excessive request, what if Teacher Kitagawa gets angry and runs away?
But thinking of the current situation of Kawaide Shobo, she could only grit her teeth and be very rude to find Kitagawa Hide on the first day of the new year to seek his help.

After she finished speaking, she felt much more relaxed. She continued to maintain her 90-degree bow, quietly waiting for Kitagawa Hide's "judgment".

"I see. This time, it will be our turn for Kitagawa Entertainment Co., Ltd. to help Kawade Shobo. Just like you helped me when we filmed and published "Akadashi"."

A white palm appeared in front of Shizuko Kawaide's eyes, and on the open palm lay a wrinkled "Good Luck" note quietly, which was completely different from the "Great Bad Luck" note in her hand!
(End of this chapter)