She didn’t formally confess to him, but she admitted her feelings, while he rejected her with sincerity… The result was okay like this, wasn’t it?

Seiji felt like he had made the right choice by responding truthfully to her feelings.

Kaede’s future actions were up to her.

If she gave up, then that was that. If she didn’t give up… since she had just been rejected, she probably wouldn’t do anything immediately. Even if she continued living in the apartment building, her actions probably wouldn’t be too proactive… probably.

If Kaede wasn’t proactive, then Mika would be calmer, and she wouldn’t explode or anything. This way everyone could get along… at least for the time being.

‘Forget it, I shouldn’t think about it anymore.’ Seiji sat down in his chair; now all this was over, he thought that he could finally rest.

After he relaxed for a while, he opened up the [gifts] option in his system.

The dinner at the Uehara family gave him 15 points, and as for the moving-in present cake that Kaede gave him…

[Stat increase card—"Admiring Heart!"]

[This card contains the pure feelings of admiration a girl has towards you. For a girl in love, the target of her affection seems perfect in her eyes. After using this card, you can choose a specific stat and increase its value permanently. The lower the stat you choose, the greater the increase.]

Seiji was rendered speechless by this.

Even though he just rejected her politely, he had received such a good [gift]. No, he should reverse what he just said; he just received such a good [gift], but rejected her.

Okay, whatever it was, he felt guilty… as if he hadn’t done right by her!

Seiji clutched his face.

He didn’t really want to use this card… But according to the explanation attached, it had a greater value if used while his stats were lower. Wasn’t this just asking for him to use it right now!?

He felt that his system was toying with him!

He didn’t want to use it, but if he let it sit there, its value would decrease, and he would feel like he was ignoring Kaede’s feelings, which seemed even worse.

‘System, you’re making me feel so conflicted inside… You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? Answer me!’

Naturally, there was no response from his system.

Seiji imagined a devilish fairy chuckling at him behind his back, and after that he imagined beating up the fairy with his own hands.

After deliberating for a few moments, he came to a conclusion. The card reflected Kaede’s true feelings, so he should accept them by using this card.

In that case, which stat should he increase?

He instantly eliminated [physical ability] and [charisma] as they were too high. [Academics] could be eliminated as well, so he was left with [communication], [music], and [art].

From these three choices, [communication] wasn’t terribly low, while [music] and [art] were both about the same. Those two were his lowest stats, so he decided to pick one of them.

So, [art] or [music]?

Seiji considered it for a while.

It surely had to be [art]!

Considering his increase in writing ability after activating the [writing] card, as long as he increased his [art] stat and activated the [drawing] card, he could create his own manga! Manga! Manga!! Important things should be repeated three times.

Although it also sounded nice to improve his [music] stat and write his own songs, Seiji was more interested in manga, and he wanted to create his own awesome manga in the future!

And improving his drawing ability would come in handy for the game he promised to create together with Hisas.h.i.+ Juumonji.

After all, if they were unable to come up with their own original music for the dating sim they planned on creating, they could draw heavily from popular songs on the internet to create a soundtrack.

The art for the game had to be absolutely unique, though, since it would affect the first impression the user received from the game!

Although Hisas.h.i.+ promised to find an artist, Seiji believed that it wouldn’t be a bad thing to make his own preparations.

Okay then, [art] it was.

He’d barely focused on this stat at all, so his [art] stat was currently at a paltry 19 points.

Seiji chose the [Admiring Heart] card, and a s.h.i.+ning card of light appeared and floated up in front of him. A certain blonde-haired girl was depicted on the card. Her hands were clasped together in prayer, but the image could also be construed as her thinking of somebody.

Seiji looked deeply at the card before choosing to [use] it as he selected [art].

The card of light instantly disintegrated into motes of dust, which promptly entered his brain.

Seiji’s head felt slightly heavy as a warm feeling spread through his brain. It didn’t hurt; on the contrary, the process was quite comfortable.

His mind stopped working, and he was unable to make conscious thought as he fell into a trance-like state…

After a long while, he recovered his senses.

When he checked his system again, his [art] stat had increased to 27 points!

An increase of 8 points.

‘Pretty nice…’ Seiji nodded to himself. ‘I should exchange for the [drawing] card now, but before that…’

He slowly looked towards the reward he had been trying his best to ignore for all this time.

The reward his system gave him for Hos.h.i.+ Amami’s "love confession!"

Until he opened up his [gifts] option, he had completely forgotten that such a reward existed…

When the system opened up the [friends.h.i.+p] option, it had informed him that whenever a male character with friends.h.i.+p rating of over 60 points gave him a present, he would also be rewarded.

Since Seiji had been so shocked by the rewards he’d received from the twin sisters as well as Hos.h.i.+’s character card, he completely forgot about this "love confession."

Or perhaps it should be said that he was unconsciously trying not to think about it!

But his system was just and fair (and evil!). A reward was a reward; no matter how he felt about it, it would be in the system.

Seiji was destined to face the dark shadow which had loomed over his mind since the morning.

That’s right; it was a dark memory! How could receiving his first ever confession from a boy dressed in female clothing be anything otherwise!? It didn’t matter even if this boy was cute enough to pa.s.s as a girl!

Maybe some people would be happy about receiving such a confession, but Seiji definitely wasn’t included in that category.

Be sealed away forever, dark history!

System: "I won’t allow you to forget it!"

Seiji failed to come up with a response to his own imagined words for his system.

‘Fine, I’ve even already inspected the character card! I can handle some [gifts]!’ Seiji steeled his resolve as he checked the rewards.

[I’m willing to do anything for you]; [Forbidden Love]; [Promise to meet after reincarnation]…

Turn off!

Seiji instantly decided to stop looking at his system.

‘I saw nothing, I saw nothing, I saw nothing!’

Seiji tried his utmost to self-hypnotize himself into forgetting everything he just saw.

Hos.h.i.+ Amami! Just what were you thinking in your head at the time!?

Seiji’s mind was filled with forceful comments for his junior. He even felt a sense of fear from what he had just witnessed in his system.

Hos.h.i.+ had given him even more rewards than Rion and Kotomi Amami…

Seiji definitely had a dark memory within his heart now.

He wondered what the three siblings would think if they were aware of their information in his system.

His self-hypnosis attempt… was ineffective.

How could such a hopeless self-deceiving effort possibly work!?

Seiji imagined the system fairy evilly cackling at him again.

‘Okay, b.a.s.t.a.r.d system! I’ll take a look eventually… but not now!!’

He’d wait till his mental resistance was improved before checking out the details of those rewards.

Seiji attempted to banish these harmful thoughts from his mind as he opened his system again and exchanged 35 points for the [drawing activation card].

A card of light appeared in front of him once more. A shadow drawing something swiftly was depicted on this card. Various life-like pictures appeared in front of the shadow as its hands moved dexterously.

Seiji lay down on his bed before activating the card.

The card turned into a bright light which drilled into his brain, and just like the previous few times, he had to endure a somewhat painful learning process.

After he woke up, Seiji rubbed his temples as he got out of bed.

He walked towards his desk, opened up a notebook, and picked up his pen…

‘Hmm… What should I draw?’ he contemplated, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.