I Became a Genius Swordsman in the Pretty Girl Game

“W-Wow… T-This is, um, really embarrassing. Way more than I thought…”

Shin Se-hee hastily pulled away, speaking incoherently with a face flushed red.

Without realizing it, my own face was burning up. The warmth of her lips still lingered vividly.

“Y-You just now… That was…”

First kiss.

Seeing me fumbling with my words and touching my lips, Shin Se-hee frantically waved her hands with an even redder face.

“N-No! T-That just now! Um, it just happened by accident—no, not by accident, it was deliberate, but…!”

The calm and elegant demeanor she usually carried had completely vanished. She clutched her cheeks with both hands and shook her head vigorously.

“Agh… This is so embarrassing, I feel like I’m going to die… I-I’ve never done anything like this before.”

The light of the setting sun pouring through the restaurant window illuminated her reddened face even more vividly.

“Um, well… I also…”

I tried to string some words together, but my mind had gone completely blank, making it impossible to form a coherent sentence.

Silence followed. In the quiet, only soft jazz music played in the background, as neither of us dared to look at the other, both blushing deeply.

“S-So, uh, the food’s probably cold by now! L-Let’s eat first!”
“Y-Yeah, yeah. Sure, let’s do that.”

We hurriedly returned to our seats. Though it felt like we should say something, the awkwardness kept us from speaking.

Clink, clink.

The only sound in the otherwise still space was the faint scraping of utensils on plates.

“Um, Jin Yuha.”
“Sh-Shin Se-hee.”

Our voices overlapped.

“Ahem, Shin Se-hee, you go first.”
“Well, uh, what were we talking about again? Oh, right! I wanted to hear more about the world where you used to live!”

Eager to dispel the awkwardness, we continued speaking, our faces still red.

I talked about my past world and how I had lived there. Though I’d mentioned it briefly before, today I delved into more concrete and realistic details since I couldn’t fully explain the unique situation of being transported here before.

“It must have been tough living like that in the past.”
“Yeah, kind of. Back then, there wasn’t anything like mana to help me turn my life around. Unlike here, where getting into Velvet Academy was a game-changer.”

“So, in your world… there were no hunters? No monsters or demons either?”
“Nope, it was a world without mana. The level of civilization was about the same, though.”
“Sounds like it must have been a peaceful place.”
“Hmm, not exactly. Money ruled the world instead of mana, and there were constant wars between nations because of conflicting interests… Not so peaceful.”

“A-a world where the roles of men and women are reversed?”
“Yeah. Men were physically stronger than women, so men went to the army, men were more active, and women were better at managing daily life. Even online, most crude comments came from men.”
“Wow… This finally explains the distance I felt with you and the way you act…”
“Huh? My distance? My behavior? Was something wrong?”
“Jin Yuha, did you have a girlfriend back then?”
“No, I didn’t. Sometimes I’d get calls from women I wasn’t close with, but they always said weird things.”
“Weird things?”

I frowned, recalling those women whose names I could no longer remember.

“Yeah. Things like, ‘The light bulb in my house is broken, can you come fix it?’ or ‘My cat is cute, do you want to come see it?’ or ‘Don’t you want to do something more fun than gaming?’ There was even someone who insisted on teaching me how to cook and kept pestering me. They were all weird.”

Indeed, they were all strange.

If their light bulb was broken, they should have called an electrician. Why call me? I wasn’t a technician. What would they do if I got electrocuted?

Sure, I liked looking at cats, but I preferred watching them online rather than in person.

As for doing something “more fun” than gaming, I was a bit tempted, but knowing that woman liked clubs and parties, I declined. Being an outsider by nature, I wasn’t a fan of such places.

And the cooking thing… Even thinking about it now made me annoyed. Who was teaching who?

As I recounted all these events, Shin Se-hee’s expression darkened.

“So it wasn’t about distance; it’s just how you were…”
“Huh?”

And so, despite our continued inability to meet each other’s eyes, we awkwardly carried on with our conversation and meal. Oddly enough, the awkwardness wasn’t entirely unpleasant.

.

.

.

“Did your rank-up happen back then?”
“Yes, it happened when I learned and accepted Jin Yuha’s secret. Suddenly, light poured out.”
“Really? Hmm, so… should I tell the others too?”

I gained some courage from Shin Se-hee’s reaction today. Of course, it was a task that required even more bravery.

As I was seriously pondering this, Shin Se-hee shook her head.

“No. I’m probably the only one who could achieve a rank-up this way. As for the party members, I’ll handle the timing. You’re not planning to keep this secret forever, are you?”

I nodded at her words.

“Yeah… If I hadn’t told you today, maybe. But now that you know… Wait, didn’t the others hear everything too? I was rambling a lot back then.”
“I sent a reverse frequency through the gate cameras and muted your voice. Neither the people outside nor the party members heard a thing.”
“R-Really?”
“Yes, and since you were wearing a mask, no one could read your lips either. I meant to conceal your face, but it ended up helping in this way too.”

I was left speechless in astonishment.

Indeed, Shin Se-hee is extraordinary. Even in a situation confusing enough for her to accept, she immediately acted to preemptively block certain things from happening.

Had Shin Se-hee existed in my previous world, she would have undoubtedly held a prominent position.

‘Hmm, if she had failed her college entrance exams and missed getting into art school, things might have turned dangerous…’

The story of the most famous person who committed suicide after failing to get into art school came to mind for a moment, but well, Shin Se-hee isn’t someone like that.

“That’s why you should leave that part to me.”
“Yeah, got it. I trust you.”

.

.

.

In Utopia, there is someone obsessively fixated on Jin Yuha.

Of course, almost everyone there has a tendency to obsess, but if one were to point out the most extreme case, one name would undoubtedly come to mind.

A mixed-race model with a slim, elegant figure.
Golden blonde hair.

A founding member of Jin Yuha’s fan club, “Flower on the Cliff”.
Someone who was kidnapped during an interim evaluation and found herself in Utopia.

Sophia.

Sophia was lying on a spacious hotel bed in Hawaii, looking at a holographic screen with a giddy smile she couldn’t show in front of Jin Yuha.

“Hehehe…”

Who knows how many times she’d replayed it?

“Aah, it doesn’t even come close to the real thing…”

The scene of Jin Yuha defeating the Spider Queen while wearing a mask.
Jin Yuha at that moment was nothing short of the phrase “a cut above the rest”.

Suddenly, Sophia frowned.

-1-star trash, physical─

Bzzzt─ Bzzzt─

Out of nowhere, Jin Yuha’s voice broke up and became inaudible.

“What could that mean? Hmm— Was it because the Spider Queen emitted some weird mana at that time? But if that’s the case, why was it only Jin Yuha’s voice that couldn’t be heard, while everything else was fine?”

After that, the interference worsened until she couldn’t hear a single word.

“Hmm, I know that when Jin Yuha uses Muah mode, he tends to ramble incoherently…”

Still, she wanted to know.
Because fandom works that way.

The desire to know everything about the person—their breathing, their movements, even their unconscious thoughts.

“If he hadn’t been wearing a mask… I could’ve at least read his lips…”

Hmm.

Suddenly, she thought that if she removed the interference disrupting his voice, she might be able to hear it.

“Oh! Like removing MR from a song!”

Her eyes sparkled.

“Alright, let’s give it a shot!”

Rubbing her hands together, Sophia got up from the bed and pulled out a laptop from the dimensional tattoo on her arm.

Her efforts bore fruit.

…Albeit in an unintended way.

“Aside from a few words… I can’t make sense of anything…”

Looking at the words she managed to salvage from the noise, she tilted her head.

[Trash] [Reset] [Beautiful Girl] [Male] [Ordinary] [World] [Screen] [Resentment] [Annoyance] [Advantage] [Free] [Face]

“…?”

These words alone provided no clue to what was said.

She wanted to know.
She desperately wanted to know.

‘There must be some way…’

She didn’t feel like sharing this with other party members.
But figuring it out on her own was too much.

After pondering for a moment, Sophia suddenly exclaimed.

“Ah! What if… I use the collective wisdom of the crowd?”

The thought struck her out of the blue, but it didn’t seem like a bad idea.

“If I collaborate with the members of the fan club, Flower on the Cliff, maybe we can figure out what Jin Yuha unconsciously said!”

Sophia immediately logged into the fan club, “Flower on the Cliff”.