The Burner Account Girl (4)
The dinner party had a fantastic atmosphere.
"Whoa, you've seen that one too? The barrier to entry is seriously high."
"I've never met a girl besides us who's watched it."
Since it was an anime club, everyone naturally loved anime. With so much common ground, the new members and the existing club members grew close incredibly fast.
Among them, the one who really stood out was Areum.
"If you don't know Reincarnated as an Unemployed, you're basically a spy! The art is amazing and the fight scenes are insane! All the hyped-up stuff!"
Areum flailed her arms around, describing a battle scene, and honestly, it was just adorable.
The sunbaes watched Areum with fond expressions. A tiny girl moving around so energetically must have looked like she was putting on a cute little show.
Meanwhile, from my perspective, knowing Areum's true nature, it was utterly bizarre. A girl who acts this cute on the outside is a sex parrot. If I told anyone I picked up a vibrator the first time we met, not a single person would believe it.
As we chatted about anime, it naturally led to everyone bringing up their absolute favorites. That was the expected course, given a bunch of weebs were gathered.
Unexpectedly, Seora nuna, who seemed like a normal person, went first. As it turned out, she was the club president before Yu-bam nuna.
"For me, it's the Reincarnated as an Unemployed I just mentioned. I like isekai and I tend to be pretty picky about the quality of fight scenes."
"Mine's Cherry Blossom Dormitory's Pet Girl. I love slice-of-life stuff~!"
Mmhmm. Cherry Blossom Pet Girl gets my seal of approval.
I nodded my head in agreement with Areum's opinion.
"What about you, Saebyeok unni?"
"...Yoru Camping. I like healing-type series."
Healing? I thought she'd be into apocalyptic or dark fantasy stuff.
"Oh, unexpected... eep."
I snapped my mouth shut in a hurry, but my eyes had already met Han Saebyeok's. Her glare was fierce, like she had some kind of problem with me.
I scrambled to make excuses.
"Y-Yoru Camping is great. The camping vibes are nice, but the food art is top-tier too. All those landscapes and that whole feel paired with high-quality food—watching it at night is straight-up food torture. I've seen all of season 2 as well."
I ran my mouth off desperately, practically giving a review, but—
"......"
There was no reply.
But it wasn't a complete failure. Her eyes seemed to have softened just a bit. Did this mean I was forgiven?
Han Saebyeok passed the turn to Ju Hana next to her. Ju Hana, who'd been eating meat, flinched in surprise and spoke.
"I-I like One Fox."
"Oh, I like One Fox too!"
Seongju hyung, who'd been listening blankly, quickly chimed in. He looked happy that a topic he finally recognized had come up.
But Ju Hana glanced at Seongju hyung and added:
"J-just so you know, I'm not a fashion otaku. I've watched all the anime mentioned earlier."
A subtle line drawn in the sand.
"......"
Seongju hyung shut his mouth again. Probably because, unlike Ju Hana, he didn't know any of the other anime.
"Bam nuna, what do you like?"
"Hmm, mm. It's hard for me to pick just one. I like everything you all have said. What about you, Cheol-jin?"
In an instant, thousands of anime titles scrolled through my head and then vanished. Yeah, if I have to pick just one, this is it.
"Fullmetal Alchemist."
I said it with total confidence.
It's an older series, but I consider this anime the GOAT. From its characters and storytelling to its ending, not a single part of it falls short.
But for some reason, the reactions were weird. And then, someone actually said this:
"That one was boring. Dropped it after episode 1."
It was Han Saebyeok. What, was she asking for a fight?
I looked straight at the Smoking Woman, whom I normally would have averted my eyes from. 'Say that again, you bitch.'
But Han Saebyeok wasn't the only one. Even Areum, whom I'd trusted, made a sound of disgust, going "Ehh~?!"
"I heard Fullmetal was good, but the art is way too ugly. The fight scenes are bland too."
"There aren't any pretty female characters either. The male characters aren't particularly cool..."
'Th-these brats? They're disrespecting Fullmetal Alchemist? Pretty female characters... maybe there aren't any! But there are plenty of cool male characters! Flames burst out with a snap of his fingers, and Dreadray swings his sword around—how is that not cool?!'
My face turned bright red and I trembled with rage.
"Y-you fashion otakus! You're judging it without even having seen it?! Is there even one person here who's finished Fullmetal? Especially you—you say it's boring after watching only the first episode?!"
I shot to my feet and pointed my finger. Han Saebyeok flinched and shrank back. People at the other tables were looking at me, too.
I stood there fuming for a moment.
...My sanity returned.
I quietly sat back down.
"I'm sorry......"
I bowed my head low. I was mortified beyond belief that the otaku energy I'd been hiding all along had exploded like that. The mood was completely ruined because of me......
"I-it's okay, Cheol-jin. That just shows how much you enjoy it, right? Right? I'll give it a watch sometime soon, too."
Bam nuna, as generous in heart as she was in chest, comforted me.
"You haven't seen it either, Bam nuna......"
Whoops, the words just slipped out of my mouth on their own.
At my remark, Bam nuna got flustered.
"I-I'm not that familiar with old anime......"
"......"
Should I just die? I felt it in my bones—this was what it meant to die of embarrassment.
*
At some point, I quietly slipped away from the table. I absolutely could not stay in that spot. No one said anything, but I was way too embarrassed.
'I was doing so well keeping a normal-person front. Uwaaaaaaah!'
A silent scream swirled at the back of my throat.
The problem was that I'd let my guard down just because it was an anime club. I couldn't help myself when my all-time favorite anime got insulted. Honestly, everyone has their own tastes! It wasn't even a big deal!
I blamed myself inwardly and slipped over to a different table. I grinned awkwardly at the ghost members staring at me blankly and picked up the tongs.
"Haha, I'll grill the meat. I'm good at grilling meat."
Please just let me grill the meat. As I looked at them with that expression on my face, they all burst out laughing.
"Euhahahak! You're seriously hilarious."
"Wow, I've never seen someone's inner otaku explode like that."
"You came over here because you're embarrassed, right?"
I pretended I hadn't heard anything and carefully placed the well-done pieces of meat onto plates one by one.
"These are all cooked—why didn't you take them off? They're perfectly rare, just right for eating......"
For reference, the employee who had been grilling the meat had left a long time ago. They'd been sent away so the club members could talk freely among themselves.
As I set aside the meat, a female sunbae sitting next to me cackled and patted my head. This was Jeong Mi-na, who introduced herself as a fourth-year in the Digital Content department.
"Aww, are you embawassed?"
"...Shall I wrap some lettuce for you? Beef and veggie wraps."
"That means 'shut up,' right? Ahahahahah!"
How'd she figure that out?
Face still red, I focused hard on grilling the meat. The embarrassment hadn't faded yet. If there was a silver lining, it was that the other table, perhaps out of consideration for me huddled over here, wasn't trying to drag me back.
'They're not avoiding me because they think I'm weird, are they?'
...No way. At least Areum and Seongju hyung wouldn't do that. And if Ahn Seong-hyeon just ghosted me again, I'd actually kill him.
"Have a drink, our weeb Cheol-jin."
"...I'm on a diet, so I'll pass on the alcohol."
"What? Did you just come to a dinner party and start spouting nonsense? You gonna ruin the mood at this table too?"
"...I'll drink."
Everyone was already drinking except me. Even Seora nuna, my personal trainer. If she was drinking, a little for me would probably be okay, right?
*
The dinner party stretched on, and green bottles piled up like mountains under the tables. People started getting drunk, one after another. Look, Ahn Seong-hyeon was already wasted.
"I heard you had a hard time because of those three?"
"Three? Ah, the sunbaes who dropped the lecture? How do you know about that?"
"Heard it from Soyeon. She was cursing them out something fierce, calling them crazy bitches. But why were they talking behind your back, saying you were ugly? You're on the good-looking side if anything."
"They didn't say I was ugly, they said I wasn't handsome..."
"Same difference."
Meanwhile, I was still at the table with the ghost members, grilling meat. Whenever I was diligently grilling, Mi-na nuna next to me would sometimes feed me a piece of meat, and she poured me drinks far more often than that.
As I emptied my glass without fail every time,
"Oh, Cheol-jin can drink well? You don't seem drunk at all?"
Mi-na nuna, her cheeks flushing pink, poured me another glass. This nuna's drinking pace was no joke. Her face was red—was she okay?
"Do you normally hold your liquor well?"
"I think I'm a bit on the strong side. I've never been totally wasted before."
"Really? Then I should give you that first experience tonight."
"...Excuse me?"
Startled for a second by her choice of words, I asked again, and Mi-na nuna looked at me with a lecherous expression.
"Why so startled? I meant your first experience getting completely wasted. Were you thinking of something else?"
"Ah, n-no. I just didn't hear you right..."
"Ah-ha. Didn't hear me right. What could you have possibly misheard~?"
"No, I mean, I meant the words didn't sound right..."
"Pfft. Mi-na unni, stop teasing the kid~."
As I floundered, Yoo Hyeon-jeong, another ghost member, stepped in. But I couldn't tell if she was stopping Mi-na or just joining in making fun of me. Please stop laughing at me.
The last ghost member was the only male sunbae. Park Min-cheol laughed like he was about to suffocate and said,
"Euhaha. Cheol-jin's cute."
I don't really want to hear the word "cute" from a guy, though.
Mi-na nuna poured me another drink and concurred.
"Right? He's built like a mountain, but he's cute. I like you. You grill meat well, and you drink well too."
"Th-those last two are the more important parts than the first thing, right?"
"Ahaha. Busted? If you know that, hurry up and grill the next batch."
"Yesss."
It was about time to start grilling the marinated meat.
I skillfully grilled the boneless short ribs and let out a sigh to myself. The embarrassment had subsided a bit, but the problem was the two people sitting across from me were bothering me.
'Just go to a motel if you're gonna do that.'
Park Min-cheol and Yoo Hyeon-jeong. Those two had been subtly touching each other for a while now. They were trying to move secretly under the table, but honestly, it was totally obvious.
'Do they think no one notices?'
Well, Mi-na nuna seemed oblivious, but I could see everything perfectly. Those awkward movements. They were clearly stroking each other's thighs.
What the hell are they doing right in front of people, making me envious like this? Suddenly I feel like having sex.
But speaking of sex, something suddenly came to mind. A topic I'd briefly forgotten because of my embarrassment.
'Come to think of it, that person is here too, right?'
Backside Girl, Bback-sa.
If she really hadn't gotten the post-it from a friend, then she would be here at this dinner party. Especially since even the ghost members had all gathered.
Just who in the world was Bback-sa?
Driven by curiosity, I took a glance around the whole room.
First off, all the guys including me were excluded. And Areum, whom I'd actually been intimate with, was also excluded.
That left six people.
From there, the ones I could eliminate were Yu-bam nuna and Seora nuna. Why? Because their chests were big. Bam nuna was an F-cup or higher bombshell, and Seora nuna was a glamorous type who looked like at least a C-cup.
So through the process of elimination, four people were left.
The cold-faced heavy smoker, Han Saebyeok.
Ju Hana, who had an equally cold face but turned out to be a timid wreck.
Jeong Mi-na, the fourth-year Digital Content sunbae sitting beside me.
Yoo Hyeon-jeong, sitting across from me and feeling up a guy's thigh.
Which of these four could be Backside Girl, Bback-sa? Looking at what was visible above their clothes, their chests all seemed to be around a B-cup...
'Did they pad them? Everyone looks bigger than Bback-sa.'
At this point, the only way was to distinguish by waist or hips, but that didn't seem possible either.
Because everyone was wearing baggy clothes like hoodies or crewnecks.
The same went for their pants. Wide pants were in style these days, so unlike the past, their hips weren't strongly emphasized.
'And this nuna is wearing a dress, anyway.'
Yoo Hyeon-jeong, sitting across from me, was wearing a spring-appropriate dress and cardigan. I could hardly ask her to lift her skirt a bit so I could check how big and plump her ass was.
Just which of those four was Bback-sa?
The whole time I grilled meat and drank, my imagination ran wild in my head.
'Ah, should I exclude that one too?'
Han Saebyeok. That scary-looking nuna had a tattoo running from behind her ear down to her neck. On the other hand, in all the posts Bback-sa uploaded on her account, I'd never once seen a trace of a tattoo.
'You can erase it with Photoshop, but... Ugh, I don't know.'
On one hand, I doubted she'd go through such annoying effort, but on the other, I figured she wouldn't be above doing it to protect her personal information.
In the end, I couldn't reach a conclusion.
Was Bback-sa's true identity just going to remain shrouded in mystery like this...?
That was when Mi-na nuna next to me tapped my thigh.
"Cheol-jin, what are you thinking about?"
"Huh?!"
I spun toward her, startled. It was partly because I'd been spacing out, and partly because she'd suddenly touched my thigh.
Mi-na nuna's hand pulled away right away. Had she just touched me to get my attention?
Mi-na nuna looked at me with a face flushed red from drinking.
"I said, what are you thinking about? You suddenly just started silently grilling meat."
"Ah, I just remembered what happened earlier and got quiet. You know how cringy memories just suddenly pop into your head."
"Pfft. You were thinking about that again? You're seriously so funny."
She burst out cackling and patted my shoulder. I didn't think I'd said anything particularly funny.
"Cheol-jin, come here."
"Why?"
Mi-na nuna grabbed my ear and pulled me closer.
"Hey, you know...."
That was when it happened.
"Kkang-cheol-ah~!"
Areum came charging at me, crying. What was wrong with her now?