Chapter 4
I kept my head buried in the dirt and refused to look up, doing everything I could to avoid eye contact.
“Ms. Ria…! Wake up!”
I thought they might leave me alone if I stayed like this, but Acard must have assumed I'd passed out and started feeling me up.
“I'm awake, so don't touch me.”
“Oh.”
I turned my head just enough to glare at him with murderous intent as I told him not to touch me, then buried my face in the dirt again.
Why was I groveling like this because of that man?
Considering Acard's personality, he was obviously going to apologize for what had happened yesterday.
On top of that, those women would probably start chattering about me being a wife and all that.
So I decided it would be more efficient to endure a moment of humiliation and let this pass, and acted on it.
Thud, thud—.
As all kinds of footsteps drew closer, the three women approached me where I lay on the ground.
“You can't just leave a pretty woman lying on the ground like that.”
“Whaaat!?”
They grabbed me by both shoulders and hoisted me up, leaving me dangling.
“Ow…!”
“…I misjudged my strength. I'm sorry.”
Karina's crushing grip on my shoulders as she lifted me made me imagine my bones being shattered, and tears sprang to my eyes.
…No, why was this woman so strong?
Wasn't she practically as strong as an orc or something?
As I teared up from the pain in my shoulder, Acard and the others surrounded me, creating an atmosphere that felt like a group beating.
“Ms. Ria…! Your leg is bleeding!”
“Where do you think you're touching?!”
“…Urk!”
Acard tried to cast a healing spell on the place where I'd scraped my knee when I fell, so I kicked him in the chin.
“You guys…! Don't follow me!”
I boldly declared that the three women standing there were to keep their distance, then turned around to run away.
Tap—.
“…Shit.”
My pathetic body failed to notice the stone jutting up by my feet, and I tripped again.
Crash—! I launched into such painfully embarrassing slapstick comedy that I wanted to die.
…….
They say a man cries three times in his life.
The first is when he's born.
The second is when he finds out that the woman he met in a game is actually a man in his thirties posing as a woman online.
And the grand finale, the third time is….
“Guhhh….”
Right now.
“…Waaaaah.”
…I was so embarrassed that I wanted to die.
I had tried to run away with dignity, but what the hell was this?
The scraped knee hurt like hell after I slammed it into the ground again, but more importantly, what was I supposed to do about this atmosphere?
“Ms. Ria!”
“…Damn it.”
“W-what do we do?!”
…….
Could you please stop making things so solemn?
Please just pretend you didn't see me and walk past.
Contrary to my wishes, they came closer instead of keeping their distance.
“Waaaah….”
They carefully helped me up and brushed the dirt off me, despite my face being covered in tears and snot.
“It's okay, shh…!”
The surprising thing was that Vika, who had seemed the least interested in other people, worried about me the most.
I'm sorry for misunderstanding you….
I thought everyone who looked like a gyaru had a bad personality….
“Sniff…. Achoo!”
Just as I swallowed my snot to keep from crying, the dirt mixed into it was pushed into my nasal passages, and I sneezed painfully.
“Achoo!! Achooo!!”
Damn it, this is driving me crazy.
What kind of humiliation was this because of meeting these people?
I should've stayed beside Roxanna and studied doctrine instead of going out for a walk….
“Here, sniff!”
“Sniff…!”
Vika pressed a handkerchief over my nose, and at her signal I blasted out a huge wad of snot to get rid of the foreign matter.
“Haaah….”
Only then did I feel like I could breathe again.
…
Once the handkerchief came away from my nose, I could breathe freely, and the surrounding scenery came clearly into view.
“Are you all right?”
“Are you okay?”
“Be careful not to fall again.”
…
Because everyone in Acard's party kept showering me with concerned words of comfort,
“I'm not all right, so please let go of me….”
I burst into a flood of tears born of sheer embarrassment.
Hwangshin. (Ria at present)
…I'd cried more than four times, so I was disqualified from being a macho man.
“Um…. I'm sorry.”
“I'm sorry.”
“…Sorry.”
…
As I shed tears over creating an unforgettable dark chapter in my life, the harem party took a step back from me.
“Sob….”
With my world in ruins, I turned around to return to the church.
Tap—.
Because I once again failed to check what was at my feet, my pathetic body tripped over yet another stone and fell.
…At the church, they said God would watch over us today and all that, but clearly not.
I'm not going to be a nun anymore.
My theism had turned into atheism; I closed my eyes, completely resigned, and waited for the impact.
“Watch out!”
Grab—. Acard, who had been keeping a close eye on the ground ahead, swiftly caught me as I fell.
Wow, how romantic.
Seriously.
Wow.
“…Th.ank. you. ve.ry. much. Then I'll be going.”
“Hey…!”
By the time Acard called out to me, the blonde beauty who had been in his arms had already fled far into the distance.
“Huff…! Huff…!”
My leg was starting to hurt, perhaps because blood was still oozing from my scraped knee, but escaping was more important right now.
Was Acard some kind of walking mass of flirtation or what?
I shuddered at the audacity of trying to seduce me when he already had three official wives.
I kept running, occasionally looking back to make sure he wasn't following me.
To reach the church as quickly as possible, I ducked into a dark alley known only to me and sped through it.
Whack—.
Suddenly, a huge club sprang out of the darkness and struck me in the back of the head.
“Ugh….”
My vision flashed for an instant, followed by a sharp ache, so I cautiously touched the back of my head to check it.
“…?”
Bright-red blood was smeared thickly across my palm and dripping onto the ground.
‘Hey, little bro. Doesn't hitting someone on the head normally knock them out?’
‘I know, right…?’
I prodded the split place on my head a couple of times to see whether this was really blood, and a voice came from the darkness.
…Ah, so I'm being attacked by thugs right now.
Once I had a rough grasp of the situation, dizziness began to wash over me.
“Haaah…. Haaah….”
I leaned against the alley wall and tried to flee while calming my pounding heart.
“Hey, pretty lady, you remember me…?”
The club-wielding man chuckled and revealed himself from the darkness.
“…I don't know you, asshole.”
“You don't remember me? We hit on you yesterday at lunch.”
“…I don't remember men.”
Even back when I lived on Earth, I didn't bother remembering men's faces unless they were my friends.
For the record, I remembered Acard only because he was among the very top tier of handsome men; my memory's formatting speed was just a little slow.
“Big bro, why bother talking to her if we're going to rape her?”
A hulking man appeared from the darkness after him—though calling him the thug's younger brother hardly seemed right, since he gave off much more of an older-brother vibe.
“Little bro, you're supposed to ask if she remembers me first in situations like this. You don't know how revenge works?”
The smaller man called the older brother was holding an iron club as long as his body,
while the larger man called the younger brother was holding a tiny dagger despite his size.
What a pair of thug brothers whose weapons were completely at odds with their appearances….
“…Fuck.”
The harder I struggled to move, the blurrier my vision became, and prickling sensations spread through my body as my strength drained away. It seemed escaping was no longer an option.
“You look like a sharp one, so you know what we're going to do to you now, right?”
The larger one, the younger brother, approached me and pressed the dagger against my chin.
“…Ptooey.”
I immediately spat in the younger brother's face.
This wasn't the first or second time I'd faced a situation like this in the two months since possessing a woman's body in this world.
…To hell with you.
“Pfft, what a cute bitch.”
The one I'd spat on paused for a moment, then wiped away the sticky saliva, put it in his mouth, and began savoring it.
“…Huh.”
…I hadn't expected that.
Until now, whenever I'd spat at someone like this, they had always gotten angry or shown their displeasure.
If I'd known he enjoyed that sort of thing, I shouldn't have done anything at all….
“Hey, little brother, big bro goes first, okay?”
The slender older brother set down his iron club within arm's reach and approached me, grabbing my clothes.
“Now…! Time to unveil those ti—.”
Just as he tried to tear my ragged clothes apart,
Bam—! I summoned every ounce of strength in my body and swung my long legs, making him permanently incapable of fathering children.
“Guhk…!”
Having received the greatest punishment a man could suffer, he sat down on the ground with his legs shyly pressed together and pissed blood.
“B-Big bro!! This bitch did—?!”
Crack—!
When the younger brother panicked and rushed to his brother, I picked up the iron club lying on the ground and brought it down on his square head, playing a game of brick breaker.
“Die, you perverts!!!”
Bam bam!! Bam!
I kindly rendered the brothers permanently incapable of ever getting back up.
“Haaah… I'm dizzy….”
My belief that I would never be threatened with rape in this town shattered completely.
If I'd simply walked openly down a crowded street, nothing would have happened.
It was largely my fault for taking the back alleys to shake off Acard and the others, even though they weren't following me.
Clang—. I threw away the iron club and slumped down on the ground.
My vision gradually turned gray.
Even though my mouth wasn't bleeding, I could smell blood.
Before I knew it, the world that had turned gray had become bright red.
“Am I dying…?”
Even as I was dying, my voice sounded remarkably cheerful.
“I haven't even married into wealth yet….”
Maybe because I had never held complicated ideas about death, it wasn't as bad a sensation as I'd expected.
As all the strength drained from my body, it felt like the peculiar, chilly thrill of donating blood.
The sensation of becoming a sickly pretty girl wasn't half bad….
…I should stop thinking like this.
“I should've just grabbed anyone and rubbed up against them….”
I should've approached some pretty ladies and openly asked for a one-night stand.
Whether on Earth or in a fantasy world, pursuing a natural encounter was such a foolish thing to do.
“Please come out…!”
It seemed like it was about time, so I snapped my fingers like a TV-show host.
“…!! Hey! Wake up!!”
The red-haired, ponytailed knight Karina appeared at exactly the right moment and found me dying while blood streamed from my wounds.
“Ria!! Wake up!”
Obnoxiously handsome Acard appeared next.
“Gasp…!”
Then kind-hearted gyaru Vika appeared, visibly shocked.
“…!!”
Finally, Mira, the astrology junkie, appeared, completing the harem party.
“……Wow.”
I'll be honest.
“I really didn't expect them to come….”
I'd only played a little prank before dying, so I never expected them to actually show up.
“…This thing they call the Star of Destiny or whatever really does exist… haa…gh….”
Thud.
I had lost so much blood that I passed out and slumped limply to the ground.