“Roar~ What’s with that expression, Koharu.”
Noticing the thoughts on Xiao Chun Miura’s face, the originally cheerful Yui Hori narrowed her eyes.
“It’s like you’re saying ‘How do you all know everything’~”
——How do you even know that?!
“N-no, it’s not… it’s not like that, I wasn’t thinking that at all.”
Xiao Chun Miura widened her eyes and hurriedly waved her hands.
“Mm……~”
She pouted with a slightly sulky face for a while, and just as Xiao Chun Miura was about to apologize, Yui Hori’s attitude made a sudden 180-degree turn.
“Hmph, impressive, right? There’s almost nothing happening at school that escapes us?!”
“Especially things about students in our year. If you want to know something, we can tell you anything.”
At this, Yui Hori lifted her chin proudly.
“Alright, alright, it’s just gossip, and you say it so proudly, like you’re showing off. Really shameless.”
Another girl with a single ponytail—Xiao Chun Miura now knew her name, Mio Sato—teased her friend and turned to Xiao Chun Miura.
“But Koharu, we really do think you’re amazing.”
“Not only did your grades improve so much, but you even… mm, became friends with someone like Kanzaki-kun.”
“Friends?” Xiao Chun Miura was stunned.
“We’re… not even friends yet, I think.”
“It’s just that we’re working the same campus part-time job, so there’s some contact… that’s all.”
…On this part, Xiao Chun Miura lied.
Her real feelings weren’t like that, but.
Looking at the faces of the girls, all red and excited with gossip, Xiao Chun Miura thought for a few milliseconds and decided it was better to keep the real situation a secret.
After all, if Yui Hori and the others found out about Saturday afternoon, with their current gossipy nature, it would definitely spread.
If it reached Kondo Haruka’s ears, who knows what it would become.
“Eh~ But… hmm, coworker?”
Yui Hori stroked her chin thoughtfully, her serious expression making it seem like she was pondering some grave problem.
“Hey hey, don’t you think this is just like those storylines——”
Then, she spoke out the thoughts she’d been mulling over.
——Xiao Chun Miura almost fell off her chair.
“The Heroine and the Main Character, who are only coworkers on the surface, study together for the midterm exam… With the help of the school’s top student Main Character, the Heroine’s grades improve rapidly!”
“Isn’t this the kind of scene that only appears in youth romance manga?”
Yui Hori was totally lost in her own fantasy.
Xiao Chun Miura could only stare in shock.
“To work hard for the one you like, and then achieve a stunning comeback with his gentle support… ah, so romantic! No, I’m sure I’ve seen this plot somewhere before!”
“Yui, you read too many manga!”
The girl sitting to her left, named Yuzuki Yasuda, laughed and hit her.
But then, with her fluffy bob haircut, she also looked at Xiao Chun Miura with curious eyes, chewing on her straw.
“——But Koharu, we really do think you two look su—per compatible!”
“……Eh.”
A completely illogical and sudden statement made Xiao Chun Miura freeze.
“It’s true!”
Mio Sato with her single ponytail agreed excitedly.
“Kanzaki-kun is the cool, calm honor student type, and you, Koharu, are quiet, hardworking, and have that literature girl aura…”
“Isn’t this a classic combo!”
“And you both wear glasses. It looks like you have lots in common!”
Yuzuki Yasuda added.
Xiao Chun Miura’s mouth twitched.
…No, leave everything else aside, but how does wearing glasses mean having lots in common.
“That’s right, that’s right!”
However, Yui Hori nodded vigorously as if she’d found the ultimate argument.
“See, see, this is what’s called ‘couple face’!”
“C-couple face?!”
Xiao Chun Miura was completely defeated by the term.
Is this what high school girls are like? She felt her brain had stopped working.
“Alright, alright, we’ll stop teasing.”
Seeing Xiao Chun Miura at a loss for words, Mio Sato stepped in to smooth things over.
But the smile in the single ponytail girl’s eyes betrayed her true thoughts.
“But Koharu, do you really… maybe like Kanzaki-kun a little?”
This question was more direct and unavoidable than all the previous teasing.
Xiao Chun Miura instinctively wanted to deny it, but looking at the sincere and curious eyes of the girls before her, the word “no” could only come out after a moment of inner struggle.
“Eh~ I don’t believe you——”
“You hesitated so long!”
The girls let out a knowing laugh.
“I knew it!”
Yui Hori slapped the table excitedly, like a detective who’d discovered a shocking secret.
“Koharu, you’ve fallen too!”
“What’s strange about that?”
Mio Sato, on the other hand, was calm. She propped her chin and spoke like a romance expert.
“A guy like Kanzaki-kun—liking him is only natural, isn’t it?”
“Yes, yes,”
Yuzuki Yasuda nodded like a pecking chick.
“I heard that in our year alone, there are enough girls secretly crushing on Kanzaki-kun to form a soccer team!”
“T-that many?”
Xiao Chun Miura looked up in surprise. This information was entirely new to her.
As an “Outsider” only concerned with survival, she’d never paid attention to Kanzaki Sō’s true popularity in the Academy—if anything, from the game’s perspective, it didn’t seem that exaggerated.
“Of course!”
Yui Hori became enthusiastic at once, counting on her fingers as she lectured.
“Why do you think Kanzaki-kun is called ‘Prince of Seiki Academy’? Look, the President of the Literature Club, that Senpai whose novel won the Newcomer Award, it’s said the Main Character of the novel is based on Kanzaki-kun;”
“Then there’s the First Chair Flautist of the Wind Instrument Club, that super elegant Ojou-sama, who blushes every time she sees Kanzaki-kun walk by the Practice Room;”
“And not to mention all those girls who secretly put chocolates and love letters in his shoe locker on Valentine’s Day and White Day, so many the Student Council had to send people just to clean up!”
“So,”
Mio Sato concluded,
“Koharu, your rivals are spread throughout the whole school.”
Hearing about these “rivals in love” she’d never known existed, Xiao Chun Miura felt a strange pressure.
——Eh, what.
So many girls secretly like Kanzaki Sō in the game world?
No, why didn’t this ever happen when I was playing the game??
It felt like walking through a dark minefield—Kondo Haruka was only the most obvious landmine beneath her feet, while countless other dangers were buried all around.
…But if, as the system says, the reason Kanzaki Sō can’t enter her Line is “because there is no such possibility, so the world cannot progress that way,”
Then no matter how many people in this world or school like Kanzaki Sō, there are only a few she truly needs to watch out for.
Those are just the original Heroines from the game, only they could possibly enter his Personal Route.
Thinking this, Xiao Chun Miura felt a bit more at ease.
“But.”
Yui Hori suddenly changed the subject, wearing a confident smile that said, “But that’s not a problem.”
She pressed her hands on the table and stood up, her eyes burning with the flames of gossip, as if she were performing some kind of sacred ceremony.
“All those people are just Cheer Squad on the sidelines! The only Player who’s actually entered the field so far is you!”
“Eh? Me?”
“Of course!”
Yui Hori pounded her chest righteously.
“Even if Kanzaki-kun is the Prince of all the girls at the Academy, since our Class (5)‘s Koharu was the first to secure the ‘coworker’ position, of course we have to support our own!”
“That’s right, that’s right!”
Yuzuki Yasuda chimed in quietly, standing up in excitement.
“Also, we’ve long since found that Kondo Haruka a bit annoying.”
“You two~ You two~ Sit down! Ahh! Too conspicuous~!”
Mio Sato tugged at her two excited friends from the side.