The place was near Takadanobaba in Shinjuku, Tokyo, and the date was the last day of March.
A second-year high school student from the private Toyogasaki Academy, Tomoya Aki, was, as usual, full of energy and up early.
He put on his signature black round glasses over his delicate face. The boy was currently on the street, vigorously pedaling his bicycle, busy with his usual morning newspaper delivery route.
All of this was to support his hobbies.
Tomoya Aki loved anime, games, light novels, galge... almost everything related to ACG. In other words, he was a textbook otaku in most people's eyes.
Unlike other countries that were more tolerant of two-dimensional culture, in Japan, due to incidents like the Tsutomu Miyazaki case, the reputation of otaku was terrible, even shameful in the eyes of the general public.
Prejudice against otaku ran deep.
However, although Tomoya Aki was an otaku, he was different from those stereotypical NEETs who dragged the reputation of otaku down, freeloading off their parents without a shred of initiative.
Initiative and diligence were some of his rare advantages.
If he were to take off his glasses, he would reveal a rather handsome, fair-skinned face.
Now, in order to buy his favorite figures, special editions, and games, even during the rare spring break, he was constantly working hard at his part-time job.
"But is this enough?"
"Can I really be satisfied living like a consumer pig forever?"
Handing out newspapers with both hands, Tomoya even took the opportunity to passionately preach about his favorite anime to the uncle who clearly did not understand a word he was saying.
Leaving under the uncle's confused gaze, Tomoya Aki pedaled forward, pushed by the fresh morning breeze, a thought stirring in his heart.
It was not a sudden impulse.
It was a long-standing desire for change.
All it needed was a trigger. Then this thought would grow out of control.
And so, a harem romantic comedy that would make people envious and jealous was about to begin.
(Yeah, right.)
"What is that white round thing? A UFO?"
Tomoya Aki looked up, staring at the unidentified object floating unsteadily in the air, moving faster than his bicycle.
Before he could figure out what was happening, he let out a bewildered shout.
At the same time, the slope he was riding down steepened, and under the pull of gravity, his bicycle automatically picked up speed, descending the slope known as Detective Slope.
Then, a voice reached his ears.
A female voice so beautiful and melodious that Tomoya Aki was certain he would never forget it for the rest of his life.
"My hat..."
It was an anxious voice, but to any bystander, it did not cause impatience or tension.
Rather, it carried a sense of pure, ethereal beauty.
"Oh, that was a hat..."
In an instant, he understood the true nature of the white object.
"What kind of person could the owner of such a beautiful voice be?"
In his heart, like a cat smelling fresh fish, ripples stirred.
"It is like bumping into a beautiful girl with jam-covered bread in her mouth at a street corner... the flavor of an encounter."
His brain, seasoned with countless galgame scenarios, quickly processed the information and made that judgment.
And then...
Well, sorry. Tomoya's part of the story ends here.
Before he could even turn around to see the girl, someone else moved.
At the bottom of the slope, a tall figure burst into motion.
The force in his running shoes pushed him off the ground, launching him into the air with a height that Tomoya had never seen before.
A hand stretched out with perfect timing, catching the white beret before it could fly across the road and fall to the dusty ground.
Thump.
The figure landed with a muffled sound.
Still without even glancing at Tomoya Aki, the person holding the hat turned towards the sidewalk, offering a polite smile to the girl who had lost it.
His previously blank face softened instantly.
Brushing past Tomoya without a word, he headed straight toward the owner of the white beret.
"Uh, my encounter..."
Losing all reason to stop, Tomoya blankly and slowly pedaled across the road.
That brief glimpse earlier had allowed him to see the other person clearly.
Judging from his outfit, he was probably out for morning exercise.
He wore a black-trimmed tracksuit, with beads of sweat visible on his forehead, back, and elsewhere.
He was at least a head taller than Tomoya Aki, probably around 1.9 meters.
Definitely the type to be scouted by any sports club the moment he entered a school.
His face looked youthful. Tomoya Aki had a strange sense that the other person might be around his age.
He had short black hair, the kind commonly seen among Japanese youth.
His shoulders were broad and powerful, even compared to Toyonosaki Academy's main sports club members.
Curiosity overcame him. Tomoya stopped his bicycle and turned to look back.
Under the tracksuit, shaped faintly by the morning breeze, the muscles on the man's back were visible, sharp and agile like a leopard's.
He gave off the aura of someone not to be messed with.
On the other side of the road, the tall man and the petite girl stood facing each other.
Across the sidewalk, Tomoya Aki could hear their conversation faintly, a pleasant and harmonious tone that brought a strange bitterness to his heart.
"Here, Katou-senpai."
The young man said, handing the pure white beret back to the girl.
Finally, Tomoya's attention shifted from the man to the girl.
She was around his age too, a true girl, not a woman yet.
Fair skin, a simple and elegant outfit, a clean shoulder bag slung over her arm.
She was the image of the heroine Tomoya had always dreamed of.
The girl took back her beret without putting it on immediately.
After thanking him, she seemed to recall something, and her usual calm expression changed slightly, showing a trace of confusion.
"Thank you... eh, senpai?"
"Um, excuse me, but who are you?"
The girl, Katou Megumi, asked shyly.
The man simply smiled warmly, not offended in the least.
"Ah, sorry, I have not introduced myself yet."
"My name is Kitahara Sousuke. I am a freshman at Toyogasaki Academy. I happened to spot your name when I was visiting an acquaintance who is a teacher there."
The young man who introduced himself as Kitahara Sousuke surprised Tomoya.
His eyes were drawn once again to the girl opposite him as if he were magnetized.
"So, she is a student from our school too..."
Just as Tomoya was thinking this, Kitahara Sousuke seemed to notice his gaze.
His face, which had been gentle when speaking to the girl, turned cold and clearly displeased when he looked at Tomoya.
Feeling guilty for eavesdropping, Tomoya flinched.
Awkwardly pretending to adjust something on his bicycle, he hastily pedaled away, escaping from the scene.
The sound of the man and woman's conversation still drifted faintly behind him.
It was like a scene straight out of a game.
A dreamlike girl, a fateful encounter, a sweet conversation.
Only this time, he was not the protagonist.
Trying to shake off the depressing thoughts, he shook his head violently.
"Those are three-dimensional women. Do not fantasize about them too much. You belong to the two-dimensional world, Tomoya Aki!"
Muttering incomprehensible nonsense, he pedaled dangerously fast through the morning streets, completely ignoring the bewildered looks of the passersby.
Finally, he managed to convince himself.
Regaining his spirits, he held the handlebars with one hand and clenched his fist tightly.
"Forget about those irrelevant things."
"E Entertainment will release 'My Girlfriend is a Blue Collar Worker' next month. To get it as soon as possible, I need to work harder at my part-time job!"
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