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
After getting home, I was in despair.
I stopped Shinori from being bullied.
She’s feeling better now.
She probably won’t jump off anything for a while.
But I made a mistake that cracked the most crucial part.
Namely—the pairing with Akito.
“What do I do? What do I do? She found out I saved her. Now I can’t guide her smoothly into the Akito route like in the original story. What do I do? What do I do?”
I paced around the room, flustered.
My first plan, ‘Operation Guide Him to Shinori Route,’ had failed.
No, I know.
If I’d thought calmly, I should have executed the plan more discreetly.
I forgot to turn off the recording after barging in, and then I walked home watching it.
I could have taken a different route home, considering the possibility Shinori might still be at school.
That was my mistake.
As for the recording mistake, even if I edited it to avoid incriminating myself, if it went viral online, the police might get involved.
Then they’d inevitably investigate the original data.
If they found out I’d conveniently altered it, I could face new charges.
That would be going way too far, even for me.
No way.
Besides, edited footage is weak evidence anyway—it lacks credibility.
Honestly, I never intended to expose it in the first place. That was just a bluff.
But since I messed up gathering evidence, it can’t even serve as a last-ditch trump card now. That stings.
If Ami and the others hadn’t agreed to negotiate back then, things could’ve gotten dangerous.
My oversight.
The same goes for Shinori .
I never imagined Shinori would be searching alone until that hour… But making excuses like that would only expose my own stupidity.
I won’t say it.
I sighed, staring at the pencil case I’d left on the desk.
In the end, I never got it back to Azunori.
Since she knew I had it, making her return it through Akito would be pointless.
Then, I looked at my phone.
There was the exchange I’d just had with Shinori .
―――
‘Toyono-kun, what do you do at home?’
‘Watch anime, play games, read books, stuff like that.’
‘Ah, so you really are an otaku.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘Because you’ve always been rumored to be an otaku.’
‘And what about you, Shinori ? What do you do?’
‘Secret.’
‘Hmm.’
‘Ah, no losing interest! Dig deeper!’
“That’s impossible!”
“Ehh, then tell me your recommended anime!”
“Girls are bugging me again today, so I’m escaping to sleep.”
“Eh, that’s harsh!”
“No, it’s the title.”
“Eh, gross.”
“I’m sleeping.”
“Which one is that?”
“Seriously sleeping.”
“Isn’t that sudden? Good night.”
“Good night.”
“See you tomorrow.”
―――…
Do you understand?
“I totally messed up my likability adjustment, didn’t I?”
It was clearly off.
Sure, we’d gotten closer lately, but we definitely weren’t at the point of being this playful with each other.
What the hell was that “goodnight” for?
Like we’re a newly dating couple.
—Hey, cut it out with that joke! It’s not funny!
I scolded myself silently, panting.
It seemed today’s incident had significantly closed the distance between me and Shinori.
This was a serious problem.
In the original scenario, the only way Shinori avoids ruin is by dating Akito and living a wild, s*x-filled youth.
She can’t afford to be bothered by a mob character like me.
In reality, we’ve already completely deviated from the original story.
Even if we tried to correct things from here, there’s no guarantee the original happy ending would still be waiting.
Still, I want to steer things toward a future as close to the original as possible.
I only acted freely in parts I judged wouldn’t affect the scenario progression.
I’m not messing things up because I enjoy it.
“In that case, the problem starts here.”
Actually, in ‘Sakuchiru’, setting a flag for just one heroine isn’t enough to enter any individual route.
Only after setting all four individual route flags in the common route, and the player selecting one of them, can you finally enter an individual route.
In short, this is just the beginning.
Even if I want to put Akito into Shinori’s route, the issues with the other heroines still need to be resolved.
“Next is Shichikajo Yukimi’s event…”
That woman I saw at this morning’s award ceremony.
The high-and-mighty heroine from a good family.
If events follow the original story’s order, we should have some kind of contact around right after Golden Week.
This time, I’ll make sure Akito acts with the awareness befitting the protagonist.
…Though he probably couldn’t care less about that.
As for the other two, there’s still no particular connection.
One’s in a different class, so I haven’t even seen her face, and the other has no connection to me personally.
Though the latter is Akito’s childhood friend, so I do see her face frequently enough.
This time, I’ll try my absolute best not to get involved in the scenario.
Seriously.
I jot down today’s events in that notebook.
I write ‘Event Execution Failure!’ in big letters and sigh.
Lately, it feels like all I do is sigh.
Happiness seems to have slipped away so much that nothing seems left anymore.
Thinking that the ultimate result might be a death by falling end where I get dragged down too, I couldn’t help but chuckle wryly, feeling somehow connected to it.
“Tomorrow again, huh?”
At least, just knowing Shinori will come to school cheerfully tomorrow too is enough for me to be satisfied for today.
Maiban
Interesting, would read if released. Will share with friends if can