In This World That Favors Men, I... ~Starting a Sweet School Life in a World With a 1:8 Gender Ratio~ - 156

Chapter 156: The Night Before Valentine’s Day

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February 14th—Valentine’s Day—was coming tomorrow. This time last year, the school had been in an uproar, and on the actual day, I received one confession after another from classmates and girls I didn’t even know.

They had confessed with a passionate and sincere intensity that was completely different from our usual friendly chats. Several girls had told me directly that they liked me, and I’d been at a loss over how to respond.

Now, though, it was just another fond memory. That tense atmosphere where it felt like you could hear each other’s heartbeat… The sweet, innocent moments we had shared…

Maybe, once you became an adult, it was no longer possible to lay your feelings bare like that. Even if it was for someone you liked, it took a lot of courage to expose the soft, vulnerable parts of your heart.

Thanks to the confession events of Valentine’s Day and White Day, which came as a set, I’d ended up with three adorable girlfriends. Because of that, I was now a bit troubled about what I should do this year.

“Are you going to school tomorrow, Onii-chan?”

“I’m still thinking about it. Why?”

“Because the girls in your class were really wondering about it.”

Seniors in high school currently had optional attendance. Most of the girls were still in the middle of their university entrance exams, and even for the guys who had already secured their spots, attendance outside designated days was optional. Thinking back to last year, going to school could easily turn into a huge ordeal for me.

“If it were just something casual like giri chocolate, it’d be easier for me to accept it…”

But the chocolates I got were almost always packed with genuine feelings—heavy-duty declarations of love.

“Would it be a problem if it’s a honmei chocolate?”

“Yeah… kind of. My current girlfriends are working hard preparing for their future, seriously taking their exams. So to be accepting confessions from underclassmen right now… Honestly, I’d feel guilty.”

“They understand that, so you don’t need to worry.”

That was what she said, but to me, it still felt like I’d be betraying my girlfriends. And there was something else… I didn’t know why, but something just didn’t sit right. Like I shouldn’t have gotten too excited or made a fuss about getting chocolate that year. There was some kind of strange brake holding me back.

“By the way, Onii-chan, did you see the news?”

“The news? What news?”

This time of year, every channel was running Valentine’s Day specials. Segments recommending luxury chocolates and gifts that men would appreciate were everywhere. Everything was so expensive—it felt like a statement of seriousness for another step in a relationship.

But were there any major news stories besides that?

“Um… They said there’s a protest going on against the tradition of girls giving chocolates to confess on Valentine’s Day.”

“Really? Why are they against it?”

After all, the custom of giving chocolate confessions wasn’t global. I’d heard it started as a commercial event pushed by Japanese confectionery companies to boost winter sales. Maybe they were reacting against that?

“There were a few reasons, but the main one was that men are being ‘harvested early.’”

“‘Harvested early’?”

“It means their marriage slots get taken before they even enter society.”

“Even with twelve slots available?”

So, before they even start working… Like during their student years, basically? There’s no way all twelve would be taken that early though?

“Except for arranged marriages with elder partners, most pairings happen during school days.”

“Yeah, I can see that.”

“At our school, the number of boys is still relatively high, so confessions get spread out, but in some schools, there might be zero or only one boy in an entire grade.”

“Isn’t that way too few? Even though the male-to-female ratio is 1:8?”

I knew Eika Shuuei was a special case, but still. There were girls’ schools like Saint Catherine’s, sure, but I didn’t understand why there were so few boys in other schools.

“Male students tend to be concentrated in just a few schools, and younger boys—while enrolled—often don’t attend school at all.”

I was curious, so I asked why younger male students didn’t go to school. Apparently, boys were usually raised at home through elementary school, and typically only started attending school from middle school. The reason being, immature elementary school girls often treated them like rare animals, making it hard for them to make friends and often resulting in them developing a dislike for people due to stress.

Once they started going to school in middle school, romantic dynamics started coming into play.

But middle school romance was still immature. Girls would get competitive and tense with each other, or in some cases, they’d even corner boys with what could be seen as coercion in an attempt to lock in a future promise.

“Middle schoolers using coercion!?”

“Well, precisely because they’re still middle schoolers. They don’t yet understand the importance of respecting others as individuals, so they just do whatever they want without fear.”

Boys who were only just starting communal life in middle school were basically like newborn hamsters. They’d get toyed with by stronger girls, like leaves tossed on stormy seas. Boys who were bad at resisting pressure would get swept up in it, and as soon as they became of marriageable age, slot after slot would be claimed.

“Wait—don’t the guardians say anything?”

“Of course they intervene. But in many cases, it looks like the boy is attending school normally, and when the truth finally comes out, it’s already too late—he’s made all sorts of verbal promises. Taking it to court would be too difficult, so the thinking becomes, ‘as long as they don’t move in together yet, maybe it’s fine.’”

Even guys who were naturally inclined toward harems—if overwhelmed at a young age—might become overly cautious about female confessions or hesitant to marry at all. Because of all that, many boys would skip middle school and “re-debut” in high school.

“This is way more cutthroat than I thought.”

“By the time they’re in high school, girls have learned not to go overboard, so it’s not that bad anymore. But… It might already be too late.”

From the boys’ families’ perspective, they had their pick of schools. So boys would gravitate toward schools with systems in place to support them, filled with excellent and respectful girls like Eika Shuuei for example. 

But outside of those schools, many girls would find themselves surrounded by no boys their age at all. So during the most romantically charged time of adolescence, there were no encounters to be had. Even if they pinned their hopes on university, most guys had already had their marriage slots filled before then, or they were highly sought after because they understood their value.

The marriage market for women was extremely competitive.

“And that’s why the anger ended up targeting the Japanese-style Valentine’s Day. Despite the Male Protection Act in place, everyone can still confess to a guy during Valentine Day. Everyone puts so much effort into it, and most pairings are decided right then and there.”

Unless a guy had an extremely difficult personality, it was almost unheard of for him to want chocolate and not get any. It was a romantic event, after all, and even if a guy was on the passive side, the girls would come at him assertively. Naturally, they were all passionate about romance.

Unlike in middle school, the girls now suppressed their animal instincts, acting kind and gentle, exuding a sweet, feminine fragrance, and pressing their soft bodies against the boys—subtly or not. For boys who had been sheltered, had little experience with real relationships, and were just entering puberty, this had a devastating effect. If that kind of environment continued all through high school and university—seven full years—then yeah, it made sense that the pairing rate during that time was high.

“By the way, Yui, what are you making?”

“Ehehe, it’s a secret!”

I had casually checked the things Yui brought home earlier, and besides ingredients for dinner, there had been couverture chocolate and heavy cream. Those were ingredients for chocolate sweets, weren’t they?

I was curious. Who was she planning to give them to? Even though she was small and a bit forgetful sometimes, Yui was already at that age, after all.

“By the way, Onii-chan, I have a question. Is choco pudding a pudding, or is it chocolate? What do you think?”

“That’s kind of sudden, but… Let’s see. Based on the texture and shape, I’d say it’s pudding, right? At least for me, chocolate gives off a hard image.”

There was something called nama-choco, but that was really a different kind of food altogether. A chocolate muffin was still a muffin, and a chocolate cookie was still a cookie. They just used chocolate as an ingredient; they weren’t chocolate itself. So in that case, choco pudding should have been considered pudding.

“Right?! Yui thinks so too. Let the circle of pudding spread across the world! ♪Puririn puririn! Bean bean bean!~♪ I’ll make sure to add a nice vanilla flavour to it  too.”

I didn’t really get it, but yeah. I’d decided what I was going to do tomorrow.

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