episode_0136

Continuing to tease Kim Taehyun, Ju Hyemin. After a while of laughing and enjoying it one-sidedly.

“So, what’s your name after all?”

Oh my… after beating someone like a sandbag for 20 minutes without a break, now she’s finally asking for his name. This is completely… as expected, she must be a clear-eyed madwoman.

“It’s Kim Taehyun.”

Whether this guy is thick-skinned for answering the name she casually asked after teasing him for 20 minutes, or just innocent like a fool…

“I actually knew. I noticed when I got your business card earlier. Hahaha~!”

“Ugh! Really!”

“Tsk! Are you lying again, Taehyun!”

“Ugh, seriously… can’t even punch you.”

As he got up from his seat.

“Careful. You might get hurt.”

I tried to stop Kim Taehyun by grabbing his shoulder, but he just plopped back down without any resistance. There’s no will to fight, as expected.

For reference, Ju Hyemin was bigger in size and taller than Kim Taehyun.

I’m 176cm tall, and Kim Taehyun, who seemed a little taller than me, looked about 180cm tall. Compared to that, she was probably about 10cm taller than me. She was tall for a woman, but also had a rare bone structure, so she just looked overall big.

So, if she just grumbled, it felt like she might hit someone, whether they were a man or not, making people naturally humble.

“Tsk. Anyway, even though we chatted for a long time, you must be curious. Why did I ask to see Doyeon and why are we getting along so well.”

After entering this store and meeting for the first time, it took a whopping 40 minutes for the main topic to come up.

Well… commonly known as ice-breaking? It was enough time to melt the awkwardness, so I think she might have intentionally exaggerated herself more. Hmm, seeing her do this naturally makes me think she must have the qualities of a heavenly leader.

“Of course, I’m curious. Why would the famous chief editor of a well-known magazine, someone like you, want to see me? I have no idea. Haha.”

“Oh, you know our magazine?”

It was a magazine that many people, even among men, thought of as a perennially unknown existence, and even those who didn’t know it were not few. Especially women, and people like me who don’t even use SNS, probably thought that way.

Because they wouldn’t know that I was a man.

“Well, I happened to find out. I’ve seen it a few times by chance.”

Really. I never bought it with my own money, I just saw it because Oh, the head of the next department, handed it to me to take a look.

“Haha, no special meaning, just found it interesting. Since women don’t usually know our magazine. In the first place, young people don’t even buy magazines to read. Our business is also being buried in this era, right?”

“Well, these days, it’s more common for young people to gather information through videos rather than magazines.”

Kim Taehyun chimed in with her words.

“That’s right. So we’re trying to quickly adapt by starting a new YouTube channel. Hmm, it’s not bad.”

It can be said that men’s magazines ultimately deal with stories that mainly stimulate men’s sexual desires.

However, what era are we living in now? It’s not like the old days when we would sneak a peek at erotic stories when we were young, or get shocked like an electrically charged fish when we had just one picture. With just a few clicks of a finger, we can easily access much more stimulating and harmful content.

It’s a generation that is oversaturated with stimulation, unable to be stimulated. And so, it can be said that the young generation today seeks even stronger stimulation.

“Anyway, that’s why I’ve decided to launch a new magazine.”

Huh? What…?

“Wait a minute.”

“Huh?”

“No, not ‘huh?’! Just a moment ago, we were talking about how our business was failing, how our industry was doomed, and suddenly you’re saying we’re going to launch a new magazine. What kind of… no, it’s just nonsense!”

Before I could even retort, Kim Taehyun, who had been nodding along with her just moments ago, stood up first in protest.

But why is he so worked up?

“Okay, calm down. I’ll explain now.”

At her words, I also calmed down Kim Taehyun, who seemed overly excited, and waited for her explanation.

“Ahem, so our company is actually not the main headquarters of Metropolis.”

According to her explanation, Metropolis is just a branch of a larger headquarters. It’s like they’re the Galaxy phones of Samsung, the Gram of LG, or the TopTun of TopCo, or maybe even the NobelPia.

Not that it’s hidden information, but since we haven’t even started the main topic yet, she continued with her explanation.

She went on at length, but to summarize:

It was determined that it was already too late to compete with mainstream methods to do something that could overcome or at least not result in a deficit. So, the executives and department heads gathered to discuss and came to the conclusion that if it’s difficult to compete in various fields, it might be better to focus on a core area.

So, focusing on a specific core area that men would be interested in. For example, in terms of toys, drones instead of supercars, or in terms of cars, pickup trucks, or in terms of fishing, only freshwater fishing! The idea was to target a specific core area and focus on that.

Of course, this comes with many risks. Being too focused means it’s narrow and the material can quickly run out.

“So, after much debate on which core area to create a new magazine with….”

After a long three months of debate on this topic.

“It’s an aging society, right? The age group is going to keep getting older.”

“That’s right. Nowadays, not many kids are being born.”

“So the idea came up to increase the expected subscribers to over 30.”

“Isn’t the default subscriber age for MeXim already over 30?”

“Listen to the end. Do you know where the site that caters to men’s biggest sexual desires is?”

Since I occasionally look at links my friends send in our group chat, I didn’t know where it was, so I turned to Kim Taehyun. He looked visibly flustered and hesitated before finally saying in a hesitant voice.

“…PhonHep.”

“Huh? PhonHep?”

“PornHub.”

What’s PornHub?

I was thinking that when Ju Hyemin quickly searched on her phone and showed me the logo.

“Oh, here.”

It was the logo that always appeared when you clicked on the adult content links sent by friends.

“So, this PornHub is currently the most popular AV streaming service site in the world. Anyway, since it’s also a company, we release statistics every year.”

When I asked what kind of statistics, she said.

“Search rankings. We compile statistics by ranking the most searched keywords each year. Aren’t you curious about the rankings?”

Before listening, I had no interest at all, but after listening, I became curious. What sexual fantasy do men around the world most interested in?

“As of 2021. Number one is Hentai.”

“Oh.”

It’s a word that often appears when watching adult content. It is a term that refers to 2D character-related pornographic content, with the pronunciation of the Japanese word for pervert written in English.

It seems to be in high demand than I thought. Well, it allows for much freer expression than reality.

“Second place is Japanese, third place is Lesbian.”

Japan is one of the largest producers of AV in the world, so that makes sense, but I didn’t know that Lesbian was such a popular tag.

I read through the search terms that ranked up to 10th place. Among them, four were related to race (Japanese: Japanese, piney: a racial term related to Thai culture, Asian: Asian, ebony: black people appearing in porn), two were about buttocks, and one was about Lesbian.

“The remaining two are interesting.”

She pointed to the two words in the chart with her finger.

“Milf and step mom? What are these?”

“Stepmom.”

“Huh? How does Nam Gung know that?”

In response to my question, Kim Tae-hyun answered, and Ju Hye-min asked him in surprise.

“Oh! That, that’s….”

Kim Tae-hyun was embarrassed, not knowing if he answered unintentionally.

Well, maybe he’s just interested in sex. Yeah, he’s in his 20s. It’s not something incomprehensible, so I gently patted his back to reassure him.

“It’s okay. I understand everything.”

“Oh, Director….”

He tried to explain that he just knows a little English, but he soon realized that his excuse was embarrassing and fell silent.

And in the awkward silence that followed, only Ju Hye-min, looking around cautiously, asked softly.

“Is it… a few months…?”

“12 months….”

Kim Tae-hyun answered softly.

“Oh, I love you. Customer.”

I see. That’s why he’s been so excited since earlier.

He must be a passionate subscriber of Metropolis.