Reincarnated as the Protagonist of a Legendary Depressing Eroge – I Paired Up My Two Childhood Friend Heroines to Avoid the Bad End, But Their Possessiveness Completely Broke Through the Limits - Episode 00: Third Year of High School / Winter

Episode 00: Third Year of High School / Winter

“Which is better, 0.01 millimeter or 0.02 millimeter?”

That was a real tough question for us.

“Does a tiny 0.01 millimeter difference actually change how good it feels?”

“But the 0.01 millimeter ones come three in a pack for 980 yen. They look about 100 yen more expensive than the 0.02 ones.”

The drugstore lights shone down on the two of us with that cold, white glow.

“Thin ones probably make Keiji happier, right?”

Standing in front of the shelf, I—Yoru—along with my battle buddy Rena, kept talking seriously even though we were both dying of embarrassment.

Normally we would have looked away and walked right past this aisle.

I could feel my cheeks turning red like ripe apples.

My ears were burning hot all the way inside.

Still, we couldn’t just give in to the shame and settle for less.

This was our way of proving our sincerity to Keiji, the guy who had pulled us both out of the darkness.

“So, how many times does it usually happen in one night, anyway?”

I asked Rena to move the discussion forward.

“From the stories in magazines, it sounded like ‘all night long’ or ‘over and over again.’”

There weren’t many that gave an actual number.

“If I do it six times and Yoru does six, that makes twelve altogether. How does that sound?”

Rena’s gut feelings usually hit the mark at times like this.

I decided to go with her idea.

“That should be enough to satisfy Keiji, probably.”

Since it was our first time for both of us, our calculations were pretty rough.

But we both agreed that because we loved Keiji so much, we should pile up the numbers as high as we could.

“One box has three, so four boxes? …But if one breaks or we run out halfway, that would be awful. Let’s get eight boxes including spares, okay?”

Rena dropped eight boxes of “those” into the basket.

“Yeah, good call. Oh, shouldn’t we get this too?”

I picked up a bottle of lubricant jelly from the shelf.

“You’re right, it might hurt at first, so having plenty would be smart. Look, this one’s a really big bottle, doesn’t it look perfect?”

What Rena was holding looked like a giant shampoo bottle.

She slid it into the basket right next to the boxes of the same brand.

Just then, light footsteps approached.

It was the most important person in the world, the one who had been seriously picking out “healthy cooking tools” for our new life in another aisle.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. What were you two looking at?”

He smiled at us, completely unaware, just wishing for our happiness.

I quickly stacked a big pack of sale kitchen paper on top of the mountain of “those” to hide them.

“N-nothing, Keiji. We were just picking out some ‘essentials’ for our new life, that’s all.”

He still had no idea that an endless “pure love” ready to swallow him whole was waiting at his feet.

◆

December.

Mio City in winter felt quiet and lonely, like an umbrella someone had forgotten at a bus stop.

The streetcars running through this seaside town pulled up to the salt-worn stops with a heavy sigh-like creak.

This was the world of the legendary depressing erotic game “Bitter Kiss” that I had once watched through a screen.

Every cold scene had been a cruel stage set to highlight the heroines’ despair.

But now.

The world spreading out before my eyes was completely different from that hopeless story’s ending.

“Hey, next time we come to that store, let’s check out the spring coats. We could look for matching light-colored outerwear for all three of us~”

“Sounds nice. …Oh, but Rena, you’re a model, so don’t match us. Pick whatever looks best on you, okay? Keiji and I will choose something that won’t look embarrassing next to you.”

After finishing our shopping at the drugstore, the two girls walked ahead of me.

They were lovers. A super lovey-dovey couple walking arm in arm.

The one clinging tightly to the right arm was Rena.

Her bright brown hair, like sunlight melted into winter, swayed gently.

Her gorgeous looks were now on many magazine covers, enough to make people on the street stop and stare.

And the one being held by Rena was Yoru.

Her glossy black hair, like the deep quiet sea at night, rested softly on Rena’s arm.

She was gently holding the hem of Rena’s coat with her slender fingertips, like a little girl afraid of getting lost.

There was no longer any space between them for a guy like me to slip in.

I matched my pace to the two walking ahead.

“Yeah. Let’s take our time finding stuff that fits our new life.”

I kept a careful distance while still saying something considerate.

These ordinary little exchanges.

The time we spent walking side by side like it was the most natural thing in the world.

That was exactly what I had spent the last ten years building, literally carving away at my life to achieve.

Memories from my previous life.

I had been an adult who had tasted both the sour and sweet sides of life, yet somehow I was reborn into this hellish depressing game world.

The legendary depressing erotic game “Bitter Kiss.”

It was a messy, gloomy story about the protagonist Keiji Kageyama and his childhood friends Rena and Yoru caught in a messy love triangle.

Keiji and Yoru had mutual feelings, but Rena, who was shining in the modeling and entertainment world, approached him and he ended up becoming her boyfriend, falling deeper and deeper until there was no turning back.

The futures of the heroines who weren’t chosen were all tragic.

The girls had their dignity stolen by scum of men and then jumped to their deaths.

A game with over twenty bad ends that were way too depressing.

Players back when it first came out were screaming in agony.

It even became famous as “the erotic game that punches holes in your stomach from the mental stress.”

And of all things, I got reincarnated into that world.

…Even I had to admit it was just too pitiful.

But luckily, my second life didn’t start at the game’s high school beginning. It started from middle school.

In front of me were two still-small girls who looked like they might break from trembling.

One was young Rena, who had been pushing herself too hard while facing jealousy and misunderstanding from everyone around her.

The other was young Yoru, who cursed her own background and had fallen into self-loathing, believing dirty blood ran through her veins.

I made a vow.

I would never let these girls reach those horrible endings.

I sat beside them, shared the mud with them, and kept protecting them from the raging blizzard.

It wasn’t anything noble like “saving” them.

I just wanted to be their “battle buddy,” walking together through the snowstorm until they could believe it was okay to love themselves.

And this is the result.

Rena had gained confidence and the strength to look straight at the world.

Yoru had found her place and learned what peaceful sleep felt like.

The two of them were now closer than anyone, acknowledging each other as irreplaceable halves.

What I was aiming for was an ending that didn’t exist in the game.

The heroines become lovers with each other, and I fought alongside them—the “Battle Buddy End.”

The ending I reached on my own, one that shouldn’t exist in the original story.

Not codependency, but a future where they become independent and happy.

It was almost here.

“Hey, Keiji. Is it okay if we stop by that store over there?”

Yoru pointed at the big department store next to the station building.

“Sure, go ahead. We need to get everything ready for your new life after high school graduation. Why don’t we make a list of what you’ll need while we’re here?”

Their new life where the two of them would live together.

I stepped into the store with the pure feeling of an older brother simply accompanying his little sisters on a shopping trip.

The inside was filled with bright fluorescent light.

I thought about the brilliant everyday life the two of them were about to live.

They looked at the shelves together, occasionally glancing at each other and laughing.

Just watching them filled my chest with a deep sense of fulfillment that only someone who had fought through it all could feel.

They were going to be okay now.

Even if I disappeared, they could support each other.

When this winter ended, I would quietly and honestly slip away from beside them.

That was my final duty, the one I had sworn to fulfill to protect them.