"Oh yeah, did I never send you a link to it - I guess I didn't! It started as a school club project, I was never big into clubs but you basically have to be in clubs so I just joined the English club planning to coast, but I got kind of into translation, and I like famous old classic fiction that has all already been translated, so I thought I'd start a bilingual blog about something that actually interested me - there was an espers club but it was cringe beyond belief - and then I just kept going."

"'Cringe beyond belief'?"

"It was all about espers as celebrities and not as magical phenomena, I just really don't get some people. At least sports fans usually also care about the game prior to caring about the players even if it's an alien interest to me. And I think it's especially unhealthy in the East without the secret identity buffer, I'll take selfies with people anywhere because of who I am as a backlashed person but there's definitely an element of it being less weird to do as Traceless than as my real name."

"Do you wear a mask as Traceless?"

"No." Jaeha already knew that, he isn't wearing one in any of the pictures. "If I don't want people to see me they won't anyway, the problem is the wanting. I've never been recognized in public in Canada, though, for reasons such as that white people suck at telling Asians apart, I carry myself very differently if I'm not backlashing and am just buying groceries, and also I don't spend that much time there so I'm very minor even among the intense esper fans."

"I don't really know how it is in the West, I suppose, but at least in Korea it's very strongly borrowing from the K-pop culture, focusing on people having parasocial relationships with their espers... I'm not sufficiently famous to be the target of too much of that but I can't imagine it must be pleasant."

"Well, that's all well and good for me, there are times when I'm able to read people's internet comments about me even if I can't read a book, but it seems questionable as a widespread cultural institution."

"Yeah, I don't disagree. Although... Quasar's contract had some interesting clauses related to that. We could, if we wanted, refuse any and all interviews and let them deal with that, if they're to be believed, which is very much not how it was at Juno."

"You had obligatory interview quotas? Fucked up."

"Only if they were actually requested by the media, but yes."

"I hope I don't count as the media, I don't think I was pushy when I called people up and asked them to tell me about their work or their powers or whatever for Eventualities but if they weren't allowed to turn me down that's unfortunate and there were Koreans in the mix a few times once I learned the language."

"I think you probably don't count? But there were also clauses in the contract about, hmm, managing our image? Reputational damages to me being reputational damages to Juno, so I need to present a good face, and so on, which probably other espers would be keeping in mind even when dealing with regular non-media people."

"Well heck, maybe I should send 'em apologies. I actually had you on my list, you know."

"—really? Well, I'd love to be interviewed by you."

"I will probably be about the right amount of backlashed to be able to conduct an interview after we have dinner, if you'd like!"

"Sounds good to me. You need to be less-than-fully backlashed, then?"

"Ehh, I can sort of do it in my immediately post dungeon state but I like being able to consult notes and take notes even if I'm also recording the conversation for later editing and translation."

"And if you're backlashed taking notes is too non-social?"

"Yeah. I could probably route around it if I were texting the notes to a person but it'd have to be the person having any interest in the interviewing process and being likely to read the text, if they're just letting me use their messages as a scratchpad my brain'll quit on me about it."

"Hmm, I wonder if I can convince your brain that I'm always interested in everything you have to say?"

"I wouldn't count on it but you can try!" The draping-himself-over-Jaeha position affords opportunities for cheek-kisses. Mwah.

Jaeha is interested in everything Haru has to say, so, maybe it won't be so hard. He can demonstrate this while he makes dinner with a cute boy draped over him.

Is he sure, Backlashed Haru sometimes runs out of interesting things to say and winds up saying things like, "every time I notice that a meal in progress smells good, it's because someone's frying an onion" and "do you have cleaners in here on a routine basis, I can't see you personally dusting the whole thing and it's huge".

He can cook more things in the future with fried onions in them if Haru likes them, and yes he does, at least once every couple of weeks, sometimes more often, though he doesn't actually use most of this enormous house so it's not that big of a chore to clean.

"It's going to get worse, Cricket sheds. Fur and feathers."