To be honest, one chapter won’t be enough to explain what I want to explain about this “New Religion” but I’ll try my best to give you the idea of what I meant to say

“Mr. Harima”

“what’s up Mr. Martinez”

“you missed a number on this invoice”

“sorry, I will pay more attention next time”

“Mr. Harima, you missed a letter on the name of this client”

|damn, this QA is worse than Mr. Deodan and I don’t know what he is doing on his phone, is like he is playing while reviewing my work, how can he do both things at the same time? |

Lunch Time

“Finally, where are you going for lunch Mr. Martinez”

“just call me Ralph, and I’m not going anywhere, I need to catch up with SAO”

“sorry but what is SAO?”

“Mr. Harima, how old are you”

“19 years old”

“what have you been doing during your childhood?????!!!!!!!”

“c’mon Ralph, not everyone that have the same age of you is an otaku”

A girl with white skin and deep black hair saved me from a lecture from Mr. Martinez, she was just passing by and left, she was kind of cute…

“Mr. Harima…. Mr. Harima!!!”

“sorry Mr. Martinez”

“I heard that you are fast learner from Casar so I will give you an advice, not as a coworker but as a friend, don’t trust 3D Girls”

“huh?”

“they will make your life a pain”

Well I can relate

“a person like you should be watching Anime, reading Manga and Light novels”

“are not those activities what dirty otakus does?”

“ok, I will have to go from scratch and teach you because your life is going to waste if you don’t follow my advice”

Charlie was passing by

“Ralph has a point, you have to learn new things like Joaquin Sabina”

I saw that coming

At Lunch

Mr. Martinez was showing me all the things that involved being an otaku, he was explaining it better than the actual processes at work

“so, Mr. Martinez”

“call me Ralph, can I call you Jin?”

“sure, so when is this concert going to happen?”

Ralph mentioned that there were good musicians on the otaku industry so I decided to start with that, Saori Hayami was going to have a concert on the building crossing the street from our building

“is going to be this Friday, make sure that you save time on your schedule”

“sure, I’ll let my parent know that I will be late on Friday”

“don’t worry about buying tickets, I have 2”

Friday

We went to the concert, Ralph was holding some neon sticks and waving like crazy while I was trying to figure out what was happening then Saori Hayami entered the scenario and there were so many lights

“…………. hello everyone!!!!!..............”

It was kind of crazy to see everyone say hello at the same time, she started with a song called Doukoku, there was a huge screen with the names of the songs that she was singing, I memorized them for no reason |Harima has photographic memory| It was electronic music so I don’t know why people call this people good musicians, they are just people touching buttons, you could easy tell if it was playback instead of live performance, then Ralph went crazy, the following song was “Heart Message” from his anime SAO, I didn’t know why Ralph loved the song until…..

“am I supposed to walk through life all by myself……”

When I heard she singing those lyrics something started to ache on my heart, I had yet to watch SAO but that song made me pay more attention, she sang Michael Ka Belial after and then a piano appeared at the scenario and she started to sing Kokoro no Senritsu, it was a complete Live Performance!!!!!!!

Harima went crazy after noticing how amazing Saori Hayami was and then to close the concert….

“and my last song, hope you like it: Omou Koto….”

Harima felt that the lyrics of that song were the ones that he wanted to hear from Marisa heart, he then understood that this otaku life was not bad at all, it showed him that he could dream of the things that he could not tell in real life

“so, what do you think Jin?”

“IT WAS AMAZING!!!”

“told you that she was amazing”

“YEA, Michael Ka Belial WAS AMAZING!!!!”

“Which song was that?”

“c’mon, were not you reading?”

“OH, THE OPENING FROM EDEN OF THE EAST”

“huh?”

“I don’t memorize the name of the songs but I memorize the anime where they play”

“dude you have to recommend really good anime so I can learn more about this”

Saturday

Harima went to an electronic shop, he made a research about being an Otaku and found out that they use to play online games so he started searching for a game and then, in a corner, a song was playing, it was love at first sight, a game that was a mix of good graphics and good music, the song was Prelude Discoveries and the game was Final Fantasy XIV and a message on the screen that said

"but as one bright star shines through the clouds at night and as one song rings clear above the roar of beasts we hold to one hope in these darkest of times, that star is you, and the song is yours........you are important, never forget that...."

Harima then felt a tear running on his cheek, what was this feeling, it may have been the piano sound that he missed so much? Or it was a memory from the past? What was it, he bought the game and went home

Next Monday

“Good Morning Jin, hey, did you get any sleep at all?”

Harima had a sleepy face

“Good Morning Ralph, I spent all weekend watching anime and playing FFXIV”

“really?”

“I didn’t know this could be addictive”

“Well, is time for me to teach you something too” Charlie joined the conversation

“do you play soccer Jin?”

“yeah, I used to play at school”

“we will have a match tomorrow, we go every Tuesday after work to play soccer to a nearby stadium, join us so we can evaluate if you will be part of our team “Aston Beer” this year”

“You mean Aston Villa”

“our team is called “Aston Beer”, because we go for beers after the match”

“I don’t drink alcohol”

“that is something that you will learn too”

It was nice to see everyone making Harima life better, he will miss these days in the future

Tuesday

I should have kept my mouth shut, it happened that these people were stronger than the teams at school, Japan has never been good at soccer and since BiOS was a half American company, it happened that I realized that some of my coworkers were from different part of the world and not exactly from USA, Charlie was from Spain, no wonder he liked Joaquin Sabina that much, he wears a shirt of the Athletico de Madrid, I don’t know what team is that but is supposed to be on the same city as Real Madrid, Casar was from a place called El Salvador, I can’t even find that place in the map, he was wearing a shirt with a big A, the team name on that shirt was supposed to be Alianza, Ralph was from Mexico, later I realized that he uses Ralph which a variation of Rafael, the rest of the team were from mixed cultures.

“dude, go to the defense instead, you said you were an authentic nine but you have yet to score”

“I scored 44 goals at school”

“yeah right, but this is not school anymore, you are not playing with kids”

Charlie was an authentic 10, while Ralph was the 9 of the team, Casar was the goalkeeper so yes, I was sent to the back as Defense, on the stadium stands there was someone who I saw at the company before

“don’t stare at her too much”

“why not”

“she is the girl from the other day, the one that I told you it will make your life a pain if you talk to her”

The girl at the stands was Erica