“What were you two talking about earlier that you didn’t come to class?”
The moment I entered the classroom during break, the girl with dark green hair came up to me and began interrogating me.
Like a detective questioning a suspect, the girl’s approach carried considerable pressure despite her small frame.
To be honest, if she hadn’t been a heroine, I might have ignored her no matter how cute she was.
A heroine was usually someone chosen by the world to possess a certain “individuality.” They said that even complete ordinariness, with no individuality at all, could become a form of individuality and turn someone into a heroine, but in exchange, the orthodox rule was to give her some other charm.
If someone with clear charms in both appearance and individuality became a heroine, then the reason Inna was a safe woman despite my fully sensing the danger the system had warned me about was also because she was a heroine.
A heroine usually meant someone who had “room” to be captured by the protagonist. If she could not be captured, then no matter how beautiful she was, she could not become a heroine; she would become what was commonly called an uncapturable heroine, whose route I had no way of opening.
In other words, the very fact that she had the role of a sub-heroine told me that Inna’s obsession, or whatever it was, would end at a cute level.
A heroine who was dating the protagonist, yet showed obsession by tormenting other girls? That wasn’t a heroine. So the title of sub-heroine was a form of proof. Proof that she might not keep obsessing over this body forever.
Since she was a sub-heroine, they said she wouldn’t be captured by another man, but she also wouldn’t keep obsessing only over me forever.
“We just talked for a bit and came back.”
“Really~? It must have been a pretty long talk. What did you talk about? Could you maybe tell me? I might be able to help, you know.”
The girl was blatantly trying to interrogate me about the conversation I had had. I considered not telling her, but then I saw the black silhouettes watching Inna, who had brought her face close to mine, with worried gazes, and changed my mind. My reputation might not be all that good, but Inna was different.
If I asked Inna, I could probably get even the information the other students in class had. If her flaw was that she lied out of possessiveness toward this body, then I could just lie as well.
“The Queen of the School forcibly approached me, kissed me, and ran away. So I had a lot to think about…”
“What?!!!”
Before I could even finish speaking, Inna slammed her hands on the desk with a shocked expression and stood up. The sound was so loud that even the silhouettes who had not been watching her with concern during break turned to look at her.
But as if she cared nothing for other people’s gazes, her eyes remained fixed on me the entire time. At her reaction, which was exactly what I had expected, I opened my mouth while doing my best not to let my smile show.
“You told me it was the student council president, so I was on guard in that direction, but she came in from a completely different side. I was surprised.”
“R-Really? I’m sorry. It’s my fault for giving you the wrong information and making you unable to guard against that filthy, shameless, selfish, trashy woman. Back when I had the upper hand last time, I should have trampled her to death. I’m sorry I didn’t.”
The murderous intent mixed into her apologetic voice made my body tremble for an instant. Inna, too, looked kind, but she was a resident of a world where superpowers existed.
Even if murder was taboo, unlike me, had she fought a few times before? The moment I heard her voice, I felt as if she might really kill someone.
Even though there was no way a sub-heroine would murder a villainess just because that villainess had stolen another heroine’s lips.
“It’s fine. But after that, she said she’d definitely take everything next time and ran away, so Kim Haneul chased after her.”
“…Huh? I understand the part about the woman who suddenly ran away like a thief, but why is Kim Haneul suddenly coming up?”
“Because he was there with us.”
Seeing Inna react as if this was the first time in her life she had heard about Kim Haneul, I gained one certainty. As expected, she hadn’t gone as far as wiretapping.
People said that tracking the location of a same-sex friend or wiretapping them was not something a normal person would do, but heroines couldn’t really be called normal people.
“Aha, so he was there too? Hmm, I understand what you’re trying to say. You want me to find the Queen of the School who ran away, right?”
“Can you? If possible, I’d like you to find her quietly, but since I’ve been talking about it so openly, maybe that won’t work.”
The closest person was about three desks away, but even if I had spoken in an ordinary voice, at that distance, they could have heard me if they strained their ears. I might have to prepare myself for the rumor to spread to some extent.
Contrary to my thoughts, however, the girl with long dark green hair smiled mischievously.
“Did I not tell you this? It’s not an ability that works even on superhumans, but even if ordinary people hear our conversation, they forget it. They’re influenced by my desire for others not to hear our conversation, so even if our classmates eavesdrop, they forget it right away. So don’t worry too much about our conversation spreading.”
Perhaps because superpowers referred to abilities ordinary humans could never obtain no matter how hard they worked, I was sure I had heard an explanation from Inna, but I still couldn’t understand how that worked.
Still, I had thought it was strange that she spoke so easily about her ability in places where other people were present. Now I could at least accept one thing about her that I hadn’t understood: it was because she had the ability to make people forget our conversations almost immediately.
“And you asked me to find Seo Yuri… I hate saying this, but for that, you’d be better off going to the president rather than me. Even if we borrow the strength of ordinary people to find her, she’ll just use her ability and run away right away.”
“What changes if I bring the president along?”
I had thought the president was the Queen’s natural enemy because she could see through the Queen’s identity even if she covered herself with a false appearance. Was there something more?
As if she noticed my eyes waiting only for her answer, Inna sat down in the seat beside me and gave me the answer straight away, without drawing it out.
“The Queen’s ability doesn’t work in front of the president. Reality manipulation that turns everything into a lie is a powerful ability, but the reason people were able to drive the Queen out at one point was also thanks to her ability.”
The student council president’s superpower was wisdom. I had thought her ability was simply that she became smart and had excellent insight, but befitting the name of a superpower, it seemed there were more ways to use it.
The more I saw the heroines’ applications of their abilities, the more I felt that as someone who could not even use my ability at will, I was still far from standing on equal footing with them.
When would I be able to stand on the same level as them? It wasn’t because I wanted to stand at the starting line of heroines chosen by the protagonist.
But if I wanted to live in this world without my chastity being threatened, I simply felt that, at the very least, I would need to be able to use my ability freely like the heroines and even apply it properly.
“To be honest, I don’t like you asking the president for help, but if the Queen is targeting you, it’s also true that she’s the only one who can respond.”
As if pretending to speak casually, Inna’s fingers coiled around my hand like a snake. When my left hand was firmly bound and unable to move, the girl beside me smiled in satisfaction.
“In exchange, hold my hand for a while. And if the student council president finds the Queen, call me too. I’m sure I’ll be helpful.”
“Of course. If I don’t call you, who would I call?”
“Even if those are just words, I’m really happy.”
They weren’t just words; I meant them. A superhuman with the ability called influence. She seemed like a woman who would not be helpful in combat, but against Kang Yuri, who gained power from the subjects who believed in her, as befitting the name Queen, Inna could certainly play a role in shaking that belief.
With one of my hands captured, unable to lie down on the desk and sleep or do anything else, Inna and I reached the end of break.
*
“I’m sorry, but this is quite urgent.”
A boy barged without hesitation into the president’s office, where a woman had been investigating personal information without achieving any better results than yesterday.
Unlike his usual relaxed expression, his face looked extremely tense. The woman skipped the question of why he had entered without knocking and got straight to the point.
“What happened?”
“The Queen declared that she would torment Erika, the one you like, and ran away into the city. She probably won’t come to school until she’s prepared. We need your help, like last time.”
The Queen, whom she had thought had chosen the life of a mischievous prankster—someone who tormented others but stopped when they told her to—had declared that she would torment someone again.
What the Queen had experienced was not a simple defeat. The retainers she had believed were following her had clicked their tongues and said they had merely been using her, and the subjects had also sneered that they had only pretended to believe in her in order to use her ability.
What she had experienced was the sight of the country she herself had created laughing at her.
After that, the reason she had gone around tormenting others listlessly was all just a kind of revenge against them for laughing at her. And the reason she had touched Erika this time was probably to take revenge on herself and Inna, who had become the reason her retainers and subjects laughed at her. She should not have genuinely intended to torment her properly.
What on earth had fanned the embers of a Queen who had even lost the will to torment anyone?
The woman’s wisdom once again pointed to Erika, but the student council president lightly dismissed it as her ability misdirecting her because she had been thinking about Erika too much lately, and stood up from her seat.
“Then please guide me right away.”
Now that Erika was involved, this was no longer something she could simply brush aside.
The city was wide, and unless the opponent was caught by the insight of wisdom, she could run away somewhere else as much as she pleased. But even if this action ended up being meaningless, she would find and stop her. Protecting the person she loved was naturally something she had to do.
“—You must have come knowing where I should search.”
“Haha, I’m not that certain, but there are three possible candidates. —Let’s go to the abandoned factory. That place seems a little suspicious.”
According to Erika, after time stopped for a moment and then began flowing again, the boy mentioned the [abandoned factory]. The abandoned factory where the criminals who had burned down an entire village had gathered and then disappeared. Was the fact that he had mentioned that place coincidence, or fate?
Not knowing that fact, they immediately opened the internet on their phones and headed toward a nearby abandoned factory.
Scenario 1: Subjugation of the Queen of the School, First Part: Finding the Queen.
Erika may have thought it ended with discovering the Queen’s identity, but she had still not received the affection points that were the reward for Scenario 1. Naturally, that was because even finding the Queen had not yet ended.
The Queen who had disappeared from school.
And the people who set out to find that Queen before it was too late.
Whether they could find the Queen in time would all depend on luck.