(Chastity Reversed) The Legitimate Wife War: How I, a Harem-Hater, Ended Up Creating an Ultra-Eccentric Harem with a Villainess, a Sadistic Beauty Teacher, a Scheming Classmate... etc.

That alone probably wasn’t enough to convey my meaning.

Smiling wryly at my own lack of words, I continued.

“Well, I went to an amusement park with Shiraishi-san before too, and that time it was mostly thrill rides.”

“……Ayaka likes that kind of thing. Usually she’s mature, but she has innocent sides too.”

“Shiraishi-san rode the roller coaster so many times I honestly questioned her sanity.”

And then the haunted house after that.

That time I was truly exhausted to the point of spiritual depletion.

“What is Ayaka doing, really?”

Akizuki-san looked at the scenery outside with an exasperated smile.

But that smile quickly disappeared, replaced by a melancholy expression that bothered me strangely.

“But I think I understand Ayaka’s desire to go to high places a little.”

“Her desire……?”

I didn’t understand at all.

“Yes, because when you go to high places, small things don’t matter anymore. Ayaka was doing spy-like work, right? So she must have had lots of stress she couldn’t tell me about.”

“W-well, it might be stress relief.”

Especially roller coasters might be good for stress relief. Not for me though.

But I wonder—I feel like Shiraishi-san was simply enjoying herself rather than dealing with stress. I won’t say there wasn’t that aspect, but it felt much lighter than what Akizuki-san was thinking.

“……A lot has happened in these past three months.”

Three months—so it hasn’t even been three months since this fiancée system started.

“Thinking about it now……I was an unpleasant woman.”

“No, that’s not……”

“You don’t have to force it. It’s the truth. Even when I think about it myself, I think ‘no way.’ I was supposed to be the most mature among the fiancées, but I was the most childish.”

Akizuki-san laughed self-deprecatingly.

“It’s true that at the time I thought you were difficult to deal with, and I was troubled. But thinking about it now, you were also caught in the middle back then, weren’t you? Between your own feelings and your feelings toward your parents.”

Some people might be able to avoid that situation.

But at least she was clumsy and couldn’t do such things.

That wore down her heart even more, like thorns.

That’s exactly why the clumsy her could only lash out at those around her to protect her own heart.

She could only curl up like a hedgehog.

Akizuki-san’s tendency to try to do things perfectly at work and such was probably because she was timid.

Because she was timid, she pursued perfection and tried not to show any openings to anyone.

In other words, Akizuki-san probably lacked confidence in herself. That’s why she couldn’t and wouldn’t show openings to people.

And the one who found her opening and entered was probably Shiraishi-san.

“Hey, Takeda-kun.”

“Yes.”

“About that conversation the other day?”

“About you two becoming my fiancées?”

That was the only conversation I could think of being mentioned at this timing.

But the next words were completely unexpected.

“Yes……about that. You don’t have to force yourself.”

“Eh?”

Akizuki-san was laughing more cheerfully than seemed fitting for this situation.

“So if Takeda-kun doesn’t want to, I want you to call it off. You don’t have to force yourself—I’ll definitely make sure I don’t leave any resentment.”

“……May I ask why you think that?”

“It’s true that I think favorably of you, Takeda-kun—there’s no lie in that. If you asked whether that’s love, I still don’t know, but it’s true that I want to ‘protect you’ and ‘be with you’—it’s not a lie.”

“……This is just a simple question, but while it’s true I acted to help Akizuki-san, whether that leads to liking someone, and whether you could come to like someone when you have a lover like Shiraishi-san—I just can’t understand it. If I’m going to marry, excluding things I have to do, I want it to be a love marriage if possible—I think it should be.”

I couldn’t understand why Akizuki-san, who had disliked me so much, would come to like me.

If she offered her body as thanks, I could understand that—whether I’d accept it or not aside. But truly coming to like someone from the heart—I didn’t really understand that.

“You’re doubting whether I really like you—well, it would seem that way from Takeda-kun’s perspective.”

“It’s a bad way to put it, but yes.”

“For me it wasn’t such a sudden thing. I could tell ‘you’re a good person’ just from living together. I knew you were considerate in small ways and tried to make things easier for us to live. When you accidentally barged into Tachibana-san’s bath, you didn’t just try to get through it—you properly apologized to make amends, right?”

“Well, it was my fault.”

Of course. I’d have to keep living with Tachibana-san in the future, so I couldn’t leave any resentment.

“Just that gentlemanly aspect alone is enough to view you favorably. You might not know this, but there aren’t any men like that nowadays. Some even say things like ‘be happy you were seen.'”

Gentlemanly, huh.

For me, I was just doing what was natural in my previous world, but I guess that’s how it is in this world.

“So much so that I had to put on a front and say out loud that I disliked Takeda-kun, or I might have accidentally developed feelings. And when you saved Hosho-san, you were undeniably cool.”

So by that time, regardless of appearances, Akizuki-san had acknowledged me?

“I didn’t notice at all.”

“Of course not—I worked hard to hide it. But after seeing what happened with Hosho-san, I couldn’t reject you anymore in a way I could recognize myself.”

Certainly around that time, not just Akizuki-san but all the other fiancées seemed to become kinder.

I guess they acknowledged me.

“But that’s not when I fell for you. Thinking about it now, I think I completely fell for you when you forcibly took me outside and scolded me.”

“When I scolded you?”

I wonder if there were any elements there to make someone like me.

Even I think I was quite forceful. Entering someone’s house without permission, dragging them out, showing them their parents’ apology to spur them on.

Even looking back, it was pretty terrible.

That’s the reason she came to like me?

“You said it then, right? That I was like a ‘hedgehog.’ That’s exactly right. You were the only one who wasn’t afraid of getting hurt by those spines and instead broke them off for me.”

“But if you say that, Shiraishi-san also——”

“Ayaka was more like nestling close—you were the only one who hit me and scolded me when I was wrong. You said it, right? That it was refreshing.”

Looking back now, hitting her was probably too much.

What did I do to a woman’s face?

“Don’t worry about hitting me. You held back, and besides, what hurt wasn’t my body but my heart. But thanks to that, I was able to look forward—and you saved Rio. I won’t say you were like a prince, but you saved her in a gritty way. You protected what was precious to me. How could I not fall for someone like that?”

Isn’t she idealizing it too much?

I don’t think I did anything that cool.

“I give up, I give up. There’s no way I could put on a front after being shown something like that.”

But from her perspective, maybe that’s how it was.

Just like the movie we saw today.

“……I understand that you came to like me……but why does that lead to calling it off?”

I understood Akizuki-san’s feelings, but that’s exactly why I didn’t understand.

If you like someone, don’t you want to be with them?

“I like Takeda-kun, but that doesn’t mean I want to get in the way.”

“Get in the way……?”

I didn’t understand what she was saying.

“Yeah, think about it normally. Wouldn’t it be unpleasant to be liked by such an unfriendly woman with bad eyes? Like I said before, there were no elements to make you like me, right? I was an unpleasant woman from the start. When I was your fiancée, you probably endured it and continued because of your sister’s situation. But now I’m not even a proper fiancée. Besides, now there’s Ayaka, and Hosho-san is there for your sister’s treatment, right? So an unpleasant woman like me isn’t needed, right?”

“That’s not……”

“I know Takeda-kun is kind. I know you’re very, very kind and can’t refuse people’s requests. I thought that if things continued like this, you wouldn’t be able to refuse even if you didn’t want to, for Ayaka’s sake too. That’s why I said it first.”

“……!”

“And I think it’s unfair—having two people I love and becoming family with both. That’s not fitting for me. Today is a final memory. I want to end with at least one happy memory with me—that’s my ego. The shallow desire to have you know me, know what I like. But I have to end such memories, or I might keep dwelling on them……”

Sigh, Akizuki-san took a deep breath and looked straight into my eyes.

They were very beautiful eyes.

“Takeda Kyoya-kun, I love you. So please don’t make me your fiancée.”

She bowed her head beautifully.

Really, this person is just……

“Haha.”

I couldn’t help but put my hand to my head and laugh.

It was a truly unexpected confession.

What kind of confession is that?

It’s the worst confession ever.

But it was so earnestly like Akizuki-san.

But nobody wants that—not Hosho-san, not Tachibana-san, not me, and not Shiraishi-san either.