“…Hey, Mars!”
“Ah, geez, you scared me. What?”
“I’ve been calling you for a while and you didn’t answer. Get up, we’re almost there.”
“Already?”
I thought I was just going to rest my eyes for a bit. Did that much time really pass already?
Opening my eyes after a nap, I found myself face to face not with a beautiful childhood friend blushing after watching me sleep… but he was just some guy born with a dangling stick just like me. It was a little disappointing, but I stretched without letting it show.
“Mars, judging by that look on your face, you were having weird thoughts again.”
“…What are you talking about?”
He’s annoyingly sharp at times like this.
If only he had that kind of awareness in the original story, too.
“Mars, look! It’s the Academy!”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it, so stop sticking your head out the window.”
My name was Mars Noctus.
Second son of a humble rural baron and a new student at the Imperial Academy.
Also, the childhood friend of the male protagonist named “Pollo”.
An utterly insignificant extra who transmigrated into the world of a dating sim game.
***
I died.
I transmigrated into the world of a game.
Those two lines sum up my entire life.
And just from those two lines, you can probably tell how turbulent my life has been.
As for why I transmigrated….I have no idea.
The day before I got hit by a car and died, I didn’t criticize the gameplay, I didn’t send a 5,700-character-long letter of complaint, and I certainly didn’t wish to date a character because I was so charmed by her.
I had simply noticed a dating sim game on a 99% discount and decided to give it a try.
Even then, I quit in less than 30 minutes and got a refund.
To think I got transmigrated into another world because of a refund.
If I’d known this would happen, I would’ve gone and refunded a bunch of those steamier and more suggestive games gathering dust in my library instead.
The game I transmigrated into was called Love Academy.
Yeah, just from the name alone, didn’t it reek of low effort?
<Love Academy>, or Love Aka for short, was practically advertising itself as a trash game with a title like that. And it lived up to every bit of that expectation with its pitiful gameplay.
Cliché characters, a cliché story, and cliché content…
Sure, the character illustrations were clean and nice to look at, but no one wants to eat something that only looks good if the inside is rotten.
And yet, despite that, the game didn’t cater at all to the demands of its main demographic. That is men who play dating sims. There were no explicit service scenes, no fanservice, just a wholesome and textbook romance storyline. Unsurprisingly, it failed to get any traction and was slowly fading into obscurity.
Whether the developer was some old guy or just a pathetic otaku in a flannel shirt who only ever studied Japanese culture through anime, I couldn’t say…. but every event in the game felt like it was ripped straight out of a boring 1980s anime.
Then again, it probably went on that 99% discount because it was selling so poorly.
In any case, I only realized I had been transmigrated into that sorry excuse for a dating sim ten years after being sent into this world.
“Ah… h-hi? I’m Pollo.”
Polo, the son of a count whose estate bordered our barony.
For some reason, his face looked familiar, and as I searched my memory, it didn’t take long for me to realize that he looked exactly like the male lead from “Love Aka”, the game I had played.
Of course, in the game he had the appearance of an adult, but even in the original work, he had a rather youthful face. So even at the age of ten, recognizing the protagonist wasn’t all that difficult.
Since the character I had possessed, Mars Noctus, didn’t even appear in the original story, it did take me a while to realize that this world was actually the world of Love Aka.
I felt resentful toward the so-called god who had sent me into this trash dating sim game without even giving me a status window. This was the basic privilege of any reincarnated person. But soon, another possibility crossed my mind.
After all, Pollo was the game’s protagonist.
And the heroines who fell for him were all noble daughters from prestigious families, like royalty and dukes’ households. So I had this brilliant idea…. maybe if I stayed close to him, I could catch some of the crumbs that fell from their tables.
Some might call it shameless, but in this world, status was everything.
As the second son of a baron with no land to inherit, the only way I could enjoy the wealth and luxury I had never tasted in my past life was by licking the soles of my well-connected friend’s feet and getting in the good graces of my future sister-in-law.
“Mars, hurry up!”
“Let’s take it slow. There’s still plenty of time before the entrance ceremony.”
After that, I did everything I could to get close to Pollo, no matter what it took. Thanks to that, I landed the role of his best friend and entered the academy alongside him. I was one step closer to securing my retirement plan.
I also made a point of acting friendly and well-mannered in front of Pollo’s parents, the count and countess, showing them how close we were. Eventually, even they acknowledged our relationship and officially recognized me as Pollo’s true friend.
“Mars, look at that! The chandelier’s huge! The windows are big, the paintings are big…. everything’s big!”
“…Aren’t you the guy who’s been to the imperial palace? Why are you so surprised by this?”
Sorry, kid, but the place I lived in during my past life had buildings dozens of times bigger than this all over the place.
Well, he was a kid after all.
At my current age of 20, or nearly 40 if you counted my past life, my mental age made Mars’s wide-eyed wonder feel more like watching the cute antics of a nephew.
Well, considering that both Pollo’s and my territory were far from the capital, out in the countryside, we’d hardly had any chances to see such grand architecture.
Pollo’s father, the head of the count’s family, certainly had the ability to secure a position in the central government at any time, but since he hated hassle, he stayed holed up in his rural territory. Because of that, Pollo had grown up no different from a country bumpkin.
He hadn’t even formally debuted in high society, so neither of our faces were well-known.
It seemed Pollo’s innocent behavior had started to attract attention, as I could feel the gazes around us gradually focusing in our direction.
“Whoa, look at that face. Unreal…”
“Who is that? I don’t recognize him from any of the noble houses.”
“Is he from some foreign noble family? Judging by his looks, he’s got to be at least a marquis.”
“Is that his servant next to him?”
I’m a noble too, you jerks. That last bastard… I swear I’ll find him and get my revenge.
The whispers coming from all around made my blood boil for a moment, but I managed to keep my cool.
Pollo’s biggest trait was his looks.
Even if he walked around looking like a top-tier actor or idol from my past life, his ridiculous good looks could be forgiven thanks to the setting. Right now, his face was actively turning the surrounding male students into sea creatures in real time.
Of course, being the one closest to the aquatic aura, I had long since devolved into a cuttlefish.
Was that ink running down my cheek?
Well, I guess with a face like that, he could actually manage to charm those high-and-mighty noble ladies.
Honestly, it ticked me off quite a bit, but I reminded myself that if I endured this humiliation, the future would reward me….with an introduction to a beautiful and well-bred noble lady. And so, for the 9,125,560th time, I engraved the character of “patience” deep into my heart.
“Hmm? What’s wrong, Mars? Something up?”
“Nah. Let’s hurry and find our seats.”
Unfortunately, when it came to romance, Pollo was completely clueless. So much so that he probably didn’t even realize all the attention he was getting was because of his looks.
I always told him it was because he was handsome, but Pollo would just deny it, insisting that I was the cooler one.
Was it possible that being too good-looking actually made him seem unapproachable, and that’s what made people admire him from afar?
Pollo often showed the classic signs of a dense protagonist, always going, “Huh? Me?” But since I knew that was just his genuine self, I couldn’t even feel jealous.
All I had to do was take care of him like a babysitter, wait for him to get paired up with one of the heroines, and then quietly pick up the crumbs left behind.
If it meant reaching that point, I could endure this level of humiliation anytime.
***
Before I knew it, the auditorium where the entrance ceremony was being held had become packed with people.
“Mars, how many people do you think can fit in this place?”
“Not sure. But I’d say it’s big enough to fit everyone from our entire territory and still have room to spare.”
Amor Academy.
The Empire’s pride. It was a prestigious educational institution that produced countless talents every year and was regarded as the best school on the continent.
It wasn’t mandatory by law to attend the Academy, but we needed to socialize with kids our age, and more importantly, it was necessary for Pollo to meet the heroines. That’s why I convinced the count and countess to let us both apply.
“First, we’ll have a congratulatory speech from the student council president.”
Click-clack-click-clack—
At the same time the announcer gave the introduction, a girl began walking to the center of the stage.
When the lights hit her glowing blonde hair, it created the illusion that a divine glow was spreading out. Like an angel had descended on the stage.
“Ooh, that must be her!”
“As expected. The rumors didn’t do her beauty justice.”
“She’s like the reincarnation of a goddess.”
Even with such irreverent words comparing her to a goddess, no one dared to argue.
After all, that girl was not only a princess of the Empire—
She was also one of the heroines in the game.
Leave a Reply