Dreaming of Becoming a Harem Master
Victory in the exchange match.
It had been a spur-of-the-moment event, but I'd carved through it the way a thoroughly rotten Legend Route veteran should. Landing that first win against Gio with Critical Stacking had been the key.
Gio Strandal.
The Chapter 1 boss was never meant to be this soft a target. The Gio standing here now had sealed his power to hide his identity. That was the only reason this victory had even been possible.
Even if we cross paths again later, the result will be the same.
Gio revealing his true colors was a problem for another day. Not something I needed to worry about right now. This was a moment to savor winning the exchange match.
"We wooon...! I believed in my students the whole tiiime...!"
"Wow~! Landing a hit on those stuck-up Spear Department kids! That's the best~!"
Professor Reyna and Elly were bouncing in place, over the moon. They even threw in a high-five. The two of them had surprisingly good chemistry.
"D-defeat...? To the Thievery Department...?"
Professor Zenia, on the other hand, stared at the celebrating Professor Reyna with a dazed, disbelieving look, as if she couldn't quite process what she was seeing.
She clearly hadn't even considered the possibility of the Spear Department losing. And why would she? Their roster ran so much deeper.
But the world has never been in the habit of rolling the way you expect it to. Even a genuine endgame veteran like me kept getting blindsided by variables that sprang up out of nowhere. Sierra, standing right over there, was one of them.
"Johann!"
Sierra came running and threw her arms around me. The sweet scent of her shampoo brushed the tip of my nose.
"I knew you could do it! I believed in you!"
Maybe it was because she was too close. A certain third sword threatened to unsheathe itself whether its master willed it or not.
"Ah! Was that too close?"
Sierra flinched and stepped back. It had been very close, sure—but it had also been a pleasant experience. A bit of a shame, honestly.
"I didn't smell like sweat, did I!? Uuugh...! I just couldn't help myself!"
She brought her arm up to her nose to check. The sight of her fussing like that was almost painfully cute. I wanted to save that anxious little expression as a screenshot.
"Nnnngh.... D-defeat, of all things...."
Professor Reyna strode forward, radiating triumph, to stand before Professor Zenia, who was still busy denying reality.
"Ohoho...! This is the Thievery Department's victoryyy...!"
Her volume seemed to have jumped about five percent above usual. A reliable measure of just how thoroughly Professor Reyna's chest had swelled with pride.
"Kh...! I concede...."
Professor Zenia bowed her head and declared her defeat. She didn't want to admit it, but the result was the result. She had no choice.
"Then.... I'll be claiming the victor's riiights...! From now on, the Spear Department's training grounds are for the Thievery Department to use as wellll...!"
The stake on the exchange match had been the right to use the training grounds. Professor Reyna put that right to excellent use.
"You there. Where do you think you're slinking off to?"
Professor Reyna wasn't the only one collecting on the victory. Sierra planted a hand on her hip and addressed a Spear Department student in a voice far sterner than the professor's. It was the same student who had torn into me earlier.
"Apologize to Johann. Right now. On your knees."
"O-on my knees!? I am the second son of House Valian! A commoner dares to—"
He invoked his noble rank. The old Sierra would have folded right there—but the Sierra standing here now didn't show so much as a flicker of it.
"And so what? Apologize to Johann. This instant. I guess nobles don't even keep their own word?"
They say the scariest person in the world is the one with nothing left to lose.
Listening to Sierra unload that combative, high-handed barrage, you'd have thought she was dying tomorrow. She could raise her voice like that, most likely, because this was about me.
Sierra's affection for me was 80 at an absolute minimum.
Factor in the yandere streak in her character, and it was obvious she would walk through fire for my sake without a second thought.
Wait. If Sierra keeps this up... is a harem ending even possible?
By the nature of Transcendent Copy, I had to raise other girls' affection and trigger kiss events. If Sierra planted herself in front of that like a fortress gatekeeper, it got a lot harder. In Legend Route, locking in a yandere character first made the harem ending brutally difficult to see.
Difficult, sure. Not impossible.
Who did they think I was?
I hadn't poured ten years into Legend Route to come out as anything less than the rottenest of the rotten veterans.
A spicy difficulty like this was something I actually welcomed.
"Zavorg...."
Pinned under Sierra's glare, the Spear Department student shot Born a look that screamed for rescue. Born shook his head, unmoved.
"Keeping the words you throw is a noble's honor."
Born was vain, and there were plenty of hills he would die on—but this time, surprisingly, he'd said the right thing. The entrance-ceremony duel seemed to have taught him something real.
"Kh...! I'm sorry, Johann Baker.... I misspoke."
In the end he came and bowed his head in front of me. Sierra kept pouring on the pressure to make him kneel, but that, at least, appeared to be a bridge too far. Frankly, I hadn't wanted that much from him anyway.
"Hmph! Nobles really are all liars. Except for Miss Leoris and Miss Swordhorn."
"You're something else, Sierra. Aren't you scared of nobles holding a grudge?"
"Not even a little!"
That was her answer—and then, very quietly behind it, she added, "If it's for Johann...."
A dense love-comedy protagonist would have replied exactly like this:
"What was that?"
"Ah, i-it's nothing!"
Sierra waved her hands, her face flushed crimson. It was so precisely the reaction I'd pictured that a laugh slipped out of me.
The Spear Department students withdrew. Before I knew it, class was over.
"Today's class ends heeere...! Great work, everyoneee...!"
Our class was done too.
Time to head back to the dorms.
"Aaah! That reminds me, I have a question~!"
On the way back, Elly shot her hand straight up. She looked like a puppy bursting with curiosity. If she'd had a tail, it would have been wagging left and right.
"What's Johann's dorm like? I heard the valedictorian gets a special one~!"
"Ah. It's amazing, actually. Want to come see?"
"Ooooh~! We're allowed~!?"
"It's not a communal dorm, so yes. Fair warning, I haven't tidied up, so it's a bit of a mess."
"I'm so excited~! Miss Sierra, this is a golden opportunity! Let's barge into Johann's dorm~!"
"J-Johann's dorm...? I'm a little curious too...."
Well. Aside from it being an absurdly nice single dorm, there wasn't anything particularly special about it. Or maybe that in itself was the special part. Either way, we were having an unplanned housewarming today. Had the original game even had an event like this?
I don't remember one, so probably not.
And so we arrived at the single dormitory reserved for the Academy's incoming valedictorian: Seven Star Hall.
"Ooooh~! So this is the dorm for the top freshman? This isn't a dorm. This is a mansion."
"So this is Johann's dorm...."
Both of them looked overwhelmed by the place. For Sierra, who'd come up from the back alleys, that was a given—and even Elly, who came from a great merchant house, had been raised on the frugal side, so her surprise wasn't strange. Seven Star Hall was the kind of dorm that drew impressive reviews even from nobles.
Once Elly and Sierra stepped inside, they were even more stunned than they'd been by the exterior.
"The inside is incredible too! So this is where all those outside donations have been pouring into!"
The dorm was a bit of a wreck. I was not, as a rule, the type who lived neatly.
"Johann. You don't look the part, but you're not exactly the tidy-living type, are you? That face is so put-together, too."
"Ahem! Everything is exactly where it belongs."
"Ahhh! Mother told me never to marry a man who says that~!"
"Johann. Want me to help you clean up a little?"
Sierra started tidying the place, gathering things as she went. Inviting guests over and then cleaning house.
I felt genuinely bad about that.
"I'll do it later. Just sit and rest."
"No. I'm doing it because I want to."
"Oooh~! Miss Sierra. Trying to score points already, are we~!?"
Sierra set about the housework like a dainty newlywed. Watching her hum under her breath as she put the interior in order, I couldn't quite find the words to stop her.
"Heehee~! You two are dripping sweetness."
Elly nudged me with her elbow, wearing a wicked little smile. She glanced at Sierra, dropped her voice, and asked in a sly tone:
"Johann. Be honest with me. What do you think of Miss Sierra?"
Sierra was the first heroine I had ever gone after. The truth was, I'd targeted her in the first place because of her trait, Empress of Dusk.
Using Transcendent Copy meant raising her affection; that was how I'd won her heart and ended up kissing her. Ah—right. She'd gone and kissed me on her own while I was asleep.
Either way, what Sierra and I had wasn't shaped quite like an ordinary romance. Even a lifelong singleton like me could tell that much. But if the question was whether I thought of her as some throwaway one-night fling, the answer was not even close.
"I think of her seriously."
"Oho~! That's the most definite answer you can give while still being vague! So you're thinking all the way to marriage...?"
"If Sierra wants that."
"Instant answer. So cool~!"
Elly giggled like a little devil.
I had no idea what she found so entertaining.
"But your answer wasn't 'I'm definitely going to marry her~!' It was 'If Sierra wants that.' Johann. Are you perhaps aiming for... that?"
She checked Sierra again, then opened her mouth.
"A harem, I mean."