The Story Of How I, A Gloomy Guy, Ended Up Surrounded By the Top-Tier Beautiful Girls In Class After A Seat Change - Chapter 205-206

Chapter 205: Kanade Tanaka Starts Doing XX.

I arrived at the classroom to find Airi and Yuria sitting at my desk without permission, staring intently at a smartphone.

“What’s up with you two?”

“Ah, Ryota! Hey, look at this!”

“This?”

Airi urged me, so I peered at Yuria’s phone too.

There, a video played with text-to-speech software reading an article aloud.

A mysteriously bespectacled beautiful girl stood as the avatar… wait, what the hell was this?

“Uh, did you make this video, Yuria?”

“No way. This is…”

“Hi there, everyone. On election day, please vote for ‘Kanade Tanaka.’ That’s all for now—cheerio!”

The video ended with that line.

“T-Tanaka! She said she wasn’t doing any campaigning, but she’s made a video like this for the election! Where’d you find it?”

“You know it too, right, Ryota? The anonymous bulletin board for our high school online. It’s posted as a limited link on a video site, but it’s already got hundreds of views.”

“Hundreds!?”

That was minuscule compared to views from full-time internet creators, but for a video made to promote a high school student council president election—and one hidden behind a link that general users couldn’t access without knowing—it was insanely high.

Back when I was in middle school, I uploaded a video called “[Hilarious] I Tried the Mentos and Coke Thing,” made it fully public, and it only got fifteen views. Then someone commented “Summer vacation kid lol,” which made me cry and delete it in a huff. That’s why I knew how abnormal this number was.

Even if it was on an anonymous board, drawing this much interest was impressive…

“Tanaka-chan’s amazing. She’s using all sorts of recent tech evenly. And her artwork’s good too.”

“Well, Tanaka’s got high specs for indoor hobbies on Rui’s level—she’s just a bit creepy in social skills and personality.”

“No, this isn’t the time to admire it. In this video, Tanaka’s laying out some really solid policy promises.”

“Policy promises? From that Tanaka?”

“Yeah, look here.”

Yuria showed me the list of Tanaka’s promises summarized a few seconds before the end.

“Increasing study rooms by utilizing empty classrooms, expanding the cafeteria terrace seating, opening and repurposing the old annex building that’s just become a storage dump for stuff… for a student council president election, these have a pretty big scale.”

“But she’s putting out promises that seem surprisingly feasible. None of them are pie-in-the-sky new builds without any realism—they’re more like cleaning up unused spaces and putting them to good use.”

As Yuria said, all of Tanaka’s promises addressed nagging issues that had gone untouched, things that could probably become reality with just a bit of effort.

The empty classrooms in particular had multiplied lately due to shrinking class sizes, and the one where Airi and I had secretly eaten lunch before was one of them.

I’d thought someone should do something with them, but I never expected her to include it in her platform…

I’d assumed Tanaka spent all her non-class time on the rooftop, but maybe she observed this high school more closely than we did.

“From the reactions on the bulletin board, it looks like she’s already gaining a fanbase. Well, since our alumni check it out too, it’s hard to say for sure.”

“No, Tanaka’s probably aiming for buzz, so this might be exactly what she wanted. No one ever thought of using the anonymous board for campaigning before.”

“This is bad… which means we definitely have to do that thing.”

“Yeah, Yuria.”

“That thing?”

Yuria and Airi exchanged glances and nodded.

I had a bad feeling about this again…

“What are you all talking about?”

As we huddled around the desk, Rui returned to the classroom after finishing her track team meeting.

“Ah, perfect timing, Rui. I have a little favor to ask.”

“Hm?”

Yuria whispered something in her ear.

“Hehe, that’s a great idea, Yuria. Ryota-kun, see you after school?”

“Wh-What do you mean, see you?”

Things kept advancing without my input.

What the hell was I supposed to ‘see’ them about after school! All I felt was dread!

—

Chapter 206: Election Campaign Starts!

And so, after-school time arrived.

Since the election campaign officially starts today, this after-school period marks the very first campaign activity for the candidates.

However, Rui has track and field club practice, so she’s not participating.

Of course, Tanaka also has no intention of doing any campaign activities except online, so she’s also absent.

That means, inevitably, Himesaki would end up completely monopolizing the after-school activities alone — and we all felt that would be way too unfair. So even without Rui here, the three of us decided to go ahead and campaign on Rui’s behalf… or so we thought.

“Why the hell do I have to end up with my crotch feeling all breezy like this again?”

Yes, for some reason — I was wearing that old wig again, dressed in a girls’ uniform, and had Kuroki Rui’s campaign sash draped over my shoulders.

Let’s go back a few dozen minutes earlier.

I had been dragged to an empty classroom supposedly because there was “election campaign preparation” to do. But the moment I stepped inside, for some inexplicable reason Yuria immediately slathered depilatory cream on my leg hair, and while that was happening Airi started putting makeup on my face — and that’s how we ended up here.

“So basically, starting today and for the next week after school, we’ll be having Ryo-chan stand in for Rui.”

“Waa! Ryo-chan is so cute~!”

The two of them were teasing me right in front of the shoe lockers.

I wasn’t happy at all — nothing but complaints filled my head.

“Hey Yuria, Airi. You two planned this from the very beginning and decided to do campaign activities after school just so you could do this, didn’t you?”

“No way! Rui-chan even said, ‘The fans really love crossdressing Ryota-kun,’ so—”

Then I’m lumping Rui in with you guys too. Absolutely.

“More importantly, whose uniform is this? It smells kinda like Rui.”

“Ugh, gross. How can you even tell?”

“Wait… so this uniform… is Rui’s…?”

Oh. Since Rui has club practice, she lent me her uniform for the meantime, huh…

A calm, lavender-like scent.

Rui’s fragrance, hitting me directly.

“Hey Ryota, lower, lower, a bit!”

“Huh, ah! Sorry!”

The moment my mind started going in a weird direction, Yuria pointed at my skirt and called me out.

“No, seriously — getting excited down there while crossdressing? That’s straight-up pervert level.”

“Shut up! I don’t wanna hear that from the ones who forced me into this!”

“Ah! Ryo… wait, Ryota-senpai?”

Himesaki, who had come to the shoe lockers for election campaigning, spotted me.

This is bad… I had finally managed to maintain a cool, reliable senpai image in front of Himesaki all this time, and now it’s completely ruined!

Himesaki froze for a few seconds, but then she suddenly moved, pulled out her phone from her pocket, and for some reason — the shutter sound!

“Hey Himesaki! Stop taking pictures!”

“Kyaa! Ryota-senpai looks so good in girls’ clothes! Kyaa!”

She never makes those squealy fangirl noises when she’s with the normal me… Damn it, what is this crushing sense of defeat?

“Hey Ryota. Don’t tell me you’re also connected with that Himesaki girl?”

“Well… sort of, yeah.”

“Hmm. Nice to meet you, Himesaki-san. I’m Yuria Ichinose, second-year, and Ryota’s number-one supporter. Pleased to meet you.”

What kind of self-introduction is that… it sounds exactly like a “main wife” claim.

“Wow, amazing! You’re really Ichinose-senpai! I’m so happy to talk to you! I always look at your nail photos and fashion posts on SNS! I’m Nozomi Himesaki!”

“Eh, ah, yeah… You look at them? Thanks.”

The tense look on Yuria’s face from earlier completely melted away, and the easy-to-sway gyaru girl showed a slightly shy expression. Cute.

“Airi will introduce herself too~! I’m Airi Miyama! Nice to meet you, Nozomi-chan!”

“Yes! I know you too, Miyama-senpai! The boys in my class are always talking about you!”

“Talking? What kind of things?”

“Um… they say since you’re always having lunch with Ryota-senpai or going to Sno-To after school, maybe you two are dating or something—”

“Haha, ah, no no — Airi and Ryota aren’t in that kind of relationship yet! Geez!”

Airi denied it with a big grin on her face.

No, instead of grinning like that, I think it would be better for Airi if you just properly denied it… Wait, aren’t you forgetting you’re supposed to have a boyfriend setting?

“Hey Airi, don’t get so easily charmed. She’s technically Rui’s rival, you know.”

I decided to hold back the retort about how you yourself were blushing from the praise just now.

“Himesaki, since you’re wearing a sash too, that means you’re campaigning, right?”

“Yes, that’s right. Apparently the whole class worked together as a surprise to make this sash just for me.”

Himesaki squeezed her sash tightly, and the light in her eyes changed.

“I’m not going to lose… ‘Ryo-chan’-senpai.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Ahaha, did I make Ryota-senpai mad?”

“I see… so you’ve already made up your mind to fight, huh.”

We had no intention of getting into a prolonged verbal battle, so we quickly moved to a spot a little distance away from Himesaki and started our activities there.

“Airi, Yuria. Since I’m wearing Rui’s uniform and sash, I’m campaigning while carrying Rui’s feelings too. For the sake of Rui’s perfect victory — I’ll do whatever it takes, even crossdressing!”

“Finally showing some manly spirit. That’s the Ryota I know.”

“No, seriously — where exactly do you see anything manly about me right now?”

“Ryota, you look so cool — can I take a picture? I wanna set it as my LINE home screen.”

“Of course not! Come on, let’s just do the actual campaigning already!”

And so, Rui’s election campaign got off to a rather slippery start.