I Was a Loner Who Tried Finding an Otaku Friend on a Matching App and Ended Up Matching with the Number-One Beauty Who Won the University Miss Contest - Chapter 2

Chapter 2: I’m Sensing Some Rom-Com Vibes Coming from This Matching App

After my shift ended, I stopped by the supermarket on the way home to buy ingredients for dinner, then headed back to my apartment.

Once I got there, I immediately put the groceries away in the fridge.

I’d been feeling really irritated all day, so I was in the mood for something spicy.

“…Still, a matching app, huh.”

While changing into my casual clothes, I sank into thought.

The app called ‘Pair♡ing’ that Tamura-senpai had half-forced me to download because she wanted the referral bonus money.

I’d seen ads for it on video sites before and never had the slightest interest, but now that I actually had it installed, I felt a strange kind of curiosity.

I’d told Tamura-senpai, “I’m only signing up for the campaign reward, that’s all,” but… since I’d already paid the fee, it felt kind of wasteful to just leave it alone.

“Wait, wait. Let’s think about this calmly. There’s no way you can actually make real friends through a matching app. Even if you do, friendships made online are always shallow and end up fading away.”

I muttered that to myself to cool my head, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that someone like me—who hadn’t even managed to make friends in real life since starting university—had no right to complain about online friendships being thin.

According to Tamura-senpai, the app could match you with people of the same gender who shared your hobbies… but was that really true?

For some reason, I was getting strangely curious… Was I really this desperate for friends right now?

Sure, it was way easier than trying to join a club at this point.

“…Fine. I’ll just treat this like an experiment to see if I can find someone with the same hobbies. I’m not planning to get obsessed or anything.”

Without really understanding why I was making excuses out loud to myself, I opened the app.

I’d already done the age verification and ID check with Tamura-senpai after work (well, she made me do it), so my account was set up.

But I still hadn’t filled out my profile or written anything about looking for friends.

The first screen showed two modes: LOVE mode and FRIEND mode.

LOVE mode seemed to be for people looking to date or hook up (in my biased opinion), so I chose FRIEND mode for friend-hunting and started creating a profile for that.

There were a lot of pretty private questions—gender, age, university or job, where I lived, height, weight, and so on. I filled in whatever I felt okay sharing, then paused at the most important section: 【Hobbies】.

“I could just safely write ‘anime and manga,’ but… the thing I really want to talk about most is—”

Suddenly, my eyes drifted toward the bookshelf in the corner of my room.

The shelf packed with dozens of light novels that I’d gone out of my way to bring all the way from my family home in Shikoku to Tokyo.

That was the hobby I’d started back in high school when I began reading them online, and then I gradually started collecting them… light novels.

I’d been drawn in by those free, anything-goes stories.

That’s why, more than anime or manga, what I truly wanted was a friend I could talk about light novels with.

“Okay… I’ll just put ‘Light Novels’ in the hobbies section.”

This was just an experiment anyway. Even if I didn’t match with anyone, it wouldn’t really matter.

What I wanted was someone I could actually discuss light novels with.

I typed “Light Novels” into the hobbies field and even added a photo of some of my favorite ones.

Once the profile was finished, the app used that information to suggest a few people it thought might be a good match.

Now it was up to me to decide 【OK】 or 【NG】 for each one.

If both sides picked OK for each other, that was a match, and we could start chatting.

For the next several dozen minutes, I kept doing that OK/NG thing… but then—

“Hey, wait… there are hardly any people on this app who list light novels as a hobby.”

There were a few who put anime or manga, but when it came to light novels specifically? Zero. Not a single one.

I felt genuinely shocked, but more than that, I started wondering—maybe this app just wasn’t meant for someone with otaku tastes like me?

“Yeah… guess it’s no good after all…”

I let out a sigh and closed my phone.

I really was an idiot for getting my hopes up even a little.

Of course making friends by tapping around on an app and taking the easy way out wouldn’t go that smoothly.

“Sigh… guess I’ll just whip up some mapo tofu quick. I’ve got rice too.”

I stood up, phone in hand—and at that moment.

『Notification: User “amayuuu♡” sent you an OK with comment』

“Huh?”

Suddenly, Pair♡ing sent me a notification saying someone had given me an OK.

And not just any OK—it was the special “with comment” one that you could only use once a month.

It was a feature meant to show extra interest in someone you really wanted to connect with… but I never imagined it would be used on me.

I quickly opened the app, and right away the comment appeared…

『amayuuu♡：I like light novels too! Would you like to match?』

“Hey, hey… no way… this is a lie, right?”

What shocked me wasn’t just that her hobby was light novels.

Her first-person pronoun… w-w-watashi!?

Eighteen years old, spring of my first year of university.

That was the moment I felt, for the first time in my life, the unmistakable wave of a rom-com coming my way.