Chapter 100
Chapter 100
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 100
Chapter Title: I'm Not a Stalker, For Real (4)
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Baek Su-in's mealtimes are never short.
She eats a ton, after all, so that's no surprise.
But she also chews her food slowly and thoroughly.
It's a lifestyle far removed from acid reflux territory.
Maybe it's because her main gig as a writer gives her the leeway to take her time at meals.
By the time she'd polished off her thirteenth bowl.
Most of the customers had cleared out.
And there was nothing left that needed cooking.
So, I finally had my chance to approach her.
"Ooh...! Today Eonni lotsa tasty food eat!"
It was business as usual, but ordering a variety of dishes today made her table look especially abundant.
"Is the food to your liking?"
*Crunch crunch... gulp.*
*- Asking a customer on her thirteenth bowl if she likes the food? Really?*
"Well, yeah. But I just wanted to break the ice a bit."
*- Don't tell me this is about that thing from earlier?*
"Something like that."
*- Sigh. I'll talk if you have questions. But there are still other customers around—can it wait a little?*
That novel.
*I Became the Daughter of the Demon Archduke.*
The story inspired by me and my sister.
There was something about it that bugged me enough to ask.
I waited quietly for Baek Su-in to finish eating.
Skimming through the novel on my app in the meantime.
It wasn't the content that gnawed at me so much as the sheer volume.
It wasn't finished yet, but it was up to chapter 161, with updates four times a week.
"No matter how I look at it, something's off."
That word count was seriously bothering me.
Soon enough, Baek Su-in emptied her fifteenth bowl and rubbed her belly. Yoon-seule watched from the side with wide eyes, her face saying, *What kind of monster is this?*
The customers at the balcony table were just as stunned.
They were regulars, but they looked shocked to see Baek Su-in shatter her personal record.
We'd opened up the balcony for the Seongbuk Stream view, and this big eater was stealing all the attention.
*- Whew, been a while since I came, and it all went down so easy. Nothing beats the food here.*
She muttered to herself, like she was explaining it to the stares.
First things first, I cleared the bowls.
That's when Yoon-seule poked Su-in's belly with her finger. Poke poke.
"Whoa?! What's this? It's all taut!"
*- Don't poke her belly, sis. You'll embarrass her.*
"Aww... mianhae. It looked so fun, so Yunseul-i poked."
Fair enough—seeing fifteen portions crammed into one person would make anyone want to give it a prod.
And yeah, "taut" probably meant it was packed full.
I'd heard somewhere that the stomach can stretch like rubber depending on the situation.
As the customers started heading out, I pulled up the novel on my phone screen and showed it to Baek Su-in.
"Hey, I've got a question. It's up to chapter 161 now, right?"
*- Yeah... yep, that's right.*
"But no matter how I think about it, it's weird. I don't remember the exact day you first came to our place, but it was around late April or early May, yeah?"
I didn't remember the precise date.
But unlike Suyeong or Ji-ah, or Yeon-woo-ssi and Hye-won-ssi the couple.
Among our regulars, Baek Su-in was one of the later ones to start coming.
"If you used us as inspiration, wouldn't that mean you wrote it crazy fast? It's almost the end of August now."
Let's say she started from then—generously, that's about four months. That'd be forty chapters a month.
That didn't sound easy at all.
And on top of that, revisions, plus dealing with the platform and publisher during that time?
Was that even physically possible?
*- Th-that's...*
"Feels like there's something you haven't told us."
*- Eek, Joo-hyun-ssi. Didn't peg you for someone so sharp.*
"Oppa always been smarty-pants. That's why got second place at quiz too~."
Baek Su-in let out a deep sigh after my prodding and spilled everything.
About me and my sister—no, about the day she first saw me.
**
Racing aimlessly into the wind.
Ever since becoming a writer, she'd spent more time gripping her bike's handlebars than her keyboard.
Whenever ideas wouldn't come or she hit a block, she'd head out.
Riding through city streets calmed her mind, and suddenly, ideas would flow.
That was Baek Su-in's personal reset method.
It was one of those days.
Trying to sort the jumble in her head into a solid commercial concept, she was cruising on her bike.
And then—serendipity struck.
By pure chance, she spotted the Joo-hyun and Yoon-seul siblings.
Visuals straight out of a comic book, no exaggeration.
Their snappy back-and-forth banter.
Even the doting gaze toward the little sister.
"This is it...!"
The moment she saw them, Baek Su-in sensed a hit. It was that sixth sense honed by five years as a writer.
To be precise, it was the day the siblings were heading to the mart to treat Kang Pil-jung and Jin Ho-yeon.
As the two rode off on their bike, the siblings muttered in unison to Baek Su-in's back.
*"Weird, weird!"*
In that instant, ideas for a parenting story erupted in Baek Su-in's mind like a volcano.
The blockbuster *I Became the Daughter of the Demon Archduke* was born.
But Baek Su-in was only twenty-seven now.
Never married, and her love life? Zilch. "Miraculously" zero experience.
No kids, obviously.
Only child, and the youngest of her cousins.
Zero clue about child-rearing.
Sure, novels were fiction.
She could cover for it with imagination.
"So no source material, and padding it out with imagination is tough."
Without a base, even fun ideas were hard to flesh out into a proper manuscript.
So she resolved.
"This... isn't stalking. Just borrowing a few ideas."
She'd observe the siblings and mine plot points for her novel. Tracking them down took a while.
She even considered just visiting a daycare for input instead.
"But it has to be those two."
A weird obsession took root.
Their looks and banter weren't something you saw just anywhere.
Especially Yoon-seule, the model for the demon archduke's daughter.
That girl's character had a uniqueness that set her apart from other kids her age.
As a writer, she was irresistible.
Appealing characters always boosted a novel.
Luckily, the siblings soon opened Onui Restaurant, and it was less than ten minutes from where Baek Su-in lived.
She became a regular.
Eating there gave her tons of ideas, plus top-notch meals.
She wasn't big on cooking, and as a singleton, she often ordered junky fried stuff.
But Onui served balanced plates—veggies, carbs, proteins, all covered.
So she ended up packing away massive amounts.
"Now I can't survive without Onui Restaurant food?!"
Somewhere along the line, priorities flipped.
What started as a stop for novel fodder became a routine—five-plus visits a week, her main food source.
And on top of that, the restaurant siblings had unknowingly fueled her hit novel.
She wanted to give a little back in sales.
That's how things led to now.
**
"You stalked us longer than I thought?"
"Eh? Stalker? That's not just you thinkin'. Yunseul-i knows too."
*- No! I didn't stalk. I-I just thought you guys were fun to watch. Got ideas from observing, that's all.*
"But you followed us around without asking permission, right?"
*- Yeah, that's true. Sorry again...*
Su-in bowed her head readily in apology.
But it wasn't that big a deal.
We could laugh it off.
No one got hurt.
Nothing illegal.
She just found us cute, wanted to put us in her book, and hadn't mentioned it till now.
Still, keeping it secret was kinda rude.
"Eh... Oppa, forgive her, okay? 'Cause Eonni comes lots to our shop. Eats tons of food."
"True that."
Straight up, no single customer boosted our sales like Baek Su-in.
I could say that confidently.
Part of me wanted to just let it go.
But think bigger picture.
Time to leverage this.
"Su-in-ssi, you got anything like an SNS author account?"
*- Author account? Nah, but readers send fan art. I run an SNS for displaying that. Manage it myself.*
"Perfect. Mind promoting our restaurant on that fan art account?"
*- Promote the shop?*
"Yeah, nothing fancy. Just say it's the restaurant that inspired the novel. Oh, not demanding it. Just asking."
But there was a subtle nudge.
She felt a bit guilty toward us anyway.
*- Hmm... No reason not to. I post random chit-chat sometimes too. Feels right to do it. I'm grateful to this place anyway. I'll get it up today or tomorrow!*
"Eonni helping make our restaurant super popular? Thanks so much!"
My sister hugged Su-in tight.
Yoon-seule looked a tad guilty as she hugged back.
And with that, our non-deal deal was sealed. Su-in headed home to work on her manuscript.
Break time hit, so I read her the hit novel, *I Became the Daughter of the Demon Archduke*.
The protagonist, the possessed character Liscia, is five, so her speech is off.
That's why she calls the demon archduke not "Appa" but "Appa."
Such a lively detail.
But Yoon-seule didn't like that bit, apparently.
Reading the line:
[Liscia: Appa, Liscia do this alone. Okay?]
She crossed her arms and huffed.
"Yunseul-i speak good. This not based on Yunseul-i. Right, Oppa?"