I’ve Been Reincarnated as the Childhood Friend of a Doomed Heroine. Since I Don’t Want to Get Caught up in Her Bad Ending, I’ll Make Sure She Ends up Happy
As a mob character, my actions raise the heroine’s affection for me—.
This logic itself has held true before.
Saving Shinori brought us closer, and I’ve become friends with other heroines too.
That much has happened before.
But honestly, I couldn’t understand why Yukimi’s affection for me would rise because of this incident.
Think about it.
Up until now, my words never reached Yukimi.
No matter how much I tried to persuade her, Yukimi never let go of her burning desire for revenge.
Knowing the relationship between Akito and Yukimi in the original Sakuchiru story, I thought she saw me as nothing more than a disposable pawn.
In the end, the whole incident couldn’t have been resolved without Akito’s help.
It was Akito who ended Yukimi’s revenge.
No matter how much I was involved in the plan, what mattered to her was the protagonist who ended her revenge right before her eyes.
In other words, only Akito should have been in Yukimi’s field of vision.
After all, within the scenario ‘In the Season When Cherry Blossoms Fall’, the two of them were destined to be drawn to each other.
Yet, when it came down to it, she didn’t tell Akito to ‘stay by her side’—she told me.
If there was a flaw in this plan, it might be that I misjudged Yukimi’s level of interest in the person known as “Kyota Toyono” within her.
But enough with the self-reflection.
It’s clear Yukimi’s feelings for Akito have grown.
The way she looked at him earlier held warmth and interest.
For this cold-hearted woman, that’s quite an unusual attitude.
Getting her to that point is a significant achievement.
Even though a sense of failure hung in the air, the operation itself succeeded.
First off, if Yukimi liked Akito too much, it could become an obstacle when trying to pair him with Shinori later.
For now, the event is complete, and scenario-wise, it should be fine.
Personally, I just need to finish the common route events and steer this world line towards a normal or bad ending.
Yeah.
So, I switch gears.
Escaping Yukimi’s words, I finally joined Akito and the others at their study session.
As soon as I sat down at the desk, Ujiya laughed at me.
“Oh, so you don’t need to be the senior’s right-hand man anymore?”
“Who said I was her right-hand man? Just a servant and errand boy.”
“Same difference.”
He was laughing heartily, but actually, he was the only one here who didn’t know about the earlier commotion.
I never intended to make that whole thing public anyway.
I only called Shinori and Yukimi because they were involved.
As for dragging Akito into it, that was entirely my own decision. But for the sake of the plan, the protagonist’s involvement was essential, so I made that call.
That’s all there is to it.
Then, at my arrival, Akito raised his eyebrows meaningfully.
“Hey, Kyota. Can you clear your schedule after the test?”
“Huh? Sure, no problem.”
Caught off guard by the sudden question, I was confused.
But when Akito prompted Shinori with “Right?”, I got even more confused.
…Huh?
This… doesn’t feel right.
As I started to panic, Shinori gave me a strange smile and said.
“Anyway, just for a sec… Can we talk now?”
“—Huh?”
Shinori stood up and pointed outside the classroom.
Seeing that, I got another bad feeling.
◇
That day, Hanesaki Shinori saw it.
She witnessed not only Kyota, but even Akito, confronting the person who had bullied her.
And at the same time, she realized.
Kyota had gotten himself involved in something dangerous again.
Lately, he’d been acting strange.
One moment troubled, the next rolling his eyes back, or his expression darkening as if depressed.
When she tried talking to him, he’d ask about revenge or other things completely unlike him.
Shinori had been perplexed by her childhood friend’s bizarre behavior.
But today after school, the answer to all that became clear.
His worries were about Yukimi’s dark past.
His strange behavior stemmed from trying to stop her revenge.
And because of that, he had become a target for Hayase and Ami.
All the mysteries finally fell into place for Shinori.
Then, before Shinori could even spare a thought for Kyota, Akito began speaking.
What should they do now? How should they reconcile with the problems they’d faced so far?
Unlike Kyota, he didn’t use threats based on weaknesses or pressure them to quit school. His methods were brilliant.
The conversation progressed without a moment to catch her breath, and in the end, Ami and the others gave in smoothly.
He settled it cleanly, leaving no hard feelings behind.
Shinori was astonished by Akito’s flawless maneuvering.
When the pencil case went missing, only Kyota had stepped up.
Akito had offered comfort, but it was Kyota who searched for it and punished Ami.
Yet, witnessing his actions today, Shinori saw Akito in a new light.
For the first time in ages, she thought he was cool.
Left alone in the shadows behind the abandoned school building, Shinori pondered.
She still hadn’t fully processed the situation.
The image of Akito calmly talking even while surrounded by girls wouldn’t leave her mind.
On top of that, she couldn’t accept that Kyota had gotten hurt because of her problem.
She hadn’t sorted out her emotions either.
Admittedly, she had thought Kyota’s method of dealing with Ami was dangerous.
When she accidentally saw Kyota’s recording that day, Shinori was quite shocked.
She was incredibly happy, but at the same time, she genuinely wondered if it was okay to push things this far.
But knowing he got stabbed because of that, it was only natural she blamed herself.
And on top of that, something else bothered her.
—Why would Toyono-kun shield me even after being pushed that far?
Akito looked cool.
It was the first time in a while she’d felt her heart skip a beat.
Yet, she couldn’t stop thinking about Kyota.
—Normally, if you get stabbed, shouldn’t you just tell the police?
Shinori pondered this perfectly reasonable question, frowning.
Then, footsteps approached.
“Something troubling you?”
“…Shichikajo senpai?”
Startled by his sudden appearance, Shinori hurriedly bowed her head.
“You saw that exchange just now, didn’t you?”
“Well, yes. …So, something terrible happened, huh?”
“Yes. Something you didn’t know about.”
“! —But Suga-kun solved it.”
The phrase “behind your back” stuck in Shinori mind.
Feeling excluded by those words, Shinori couldn’t help but retort.
Even as Shinori spoke, Yukimi laughed.
“Hehe, ahaha. Well, yes. That’s exactly right.”
“Wh-What’s so funny?”
“You seriously think it was all Suga Akito’s doing?”
“Eh, well… He outargued everyone and came up with the solution, didn’t he?”
“Hehe, that’s true. He did do well. But no. …This whole situation was a scheme prepared by Toyono Kyota.”
“Huh!?”
Hearing that, Shinori realized it too.
Right.
It had been nagging at him all along.
Sure, Akito was amazing, but it was almost too perfect.
It felt like someone had written the script for it.
“Wh-what do you mean?”
“That was a message from him. You could say, ‘See? We didn’t need revenge. We took them down cleanly. Let’s all follow their example and live without thinking about revenge, right?'”
“……”
“He’s such a preachy guy, that man.”
Yukimi said this with a smile playing on her lips, while Shinori bit her lower lip.
The phrase ‘that man’ coming from her mouth irritated her inexplicably.
It was the same as the word ‘that woman’ that had come out of Kyota’s mouth so many times.
It made their intimate relationship painfully obvious.
And above all, she felt ashamed of herself.
She wanted to kill herself for failing to understand Kyota’s feelings, for not noticing his hidden actions or intentions, and for just admiring Akito.
On top of that, she felt jealous of Yukimi, who understood things she hadn’t grasped.
“Why doesn’t he ever talk to me about anything?”
Yukimi fell silent at Shinori’s muttered complaint.
“He always does dangerous things without telling me. On Friday night, Suga-kun asked me, ‘Haven’t you been in any dangerous situations?’ After that, he kept giving me this vague warning like, ‘Try not to leave the house this weekend.’ But I guess that’s probably because Kato-san and the others might have been targeting me too, right?”
“That’s probably it.”
“But Toyono-kun didn’t say anything to me. That’s weird, isn’t it? He should be the only one who could notice something like that since he was the one being targeted, but it was Suga-kun who called me, right? …It was like he deliberately created opportunities to bring me and Suga-kun together.”
As she spoke, it finally dawned on her.
—Ah, I see. It had been like that ever since that day.
The day her pencil case disappeared.
Seeing Kyota deliberately charge into the bullying group for her sake—it had already begun then.
Now she understand why Kyota never left my mind.
—I’ve always liked him.
Thinking about it, it was only natural.
But until now, I hadn’t sorted out my feelings.
I don’t know if it was just me being dense.
Maybe deep down, I’d built a wall, treating him like he belonged to a different dimension.
But I realized it.
Once I admitted I liked Toyono Kyota, all my past confusion and current feelings became crystal clear.
“I want to know more about him…”
My childhood friend, who’d always been a mystery.
Even when we shared the same space, he seemed like someone from another world.
Now, I desperately wanted to know him.
So—.
………
……
“Hey, tell me more about you. —Kyota-kun.”
During a break in the study session after the incident ended.
Grabbing Kyota’s hand as she led him out of the art room, Shinori drew close enough to hear each other’s heartbeats and called his name for the first time in ten years.
Maiban
WHAT THE HELL, BISH~!?
GO TO THE AKITO BRO, NOT HIMMM~!!
YOU’RE RUINING THINGS~!
I was just shipping him with Akito’s childhood friend… tsk~