Why wasn't I the one who got the male lead's script?

She didn't seem to notice that her "thank you" meant more than just this.

Hayasaka didn't seem to care about the strange glint in Hoshimi's eyes, and she skillfully brushed off all the dust on Hoshimi's body. Finally, she raised her head and met his eyes calmly and peacefully.

"Well, you're going to meet your friends next, right? So hurry up."

Hayasaka gently lifted her hair that was scattered behind her, and then looked away thoughtfully.

"Well, after making sure you're okay, Xiaoqing, I'll leave first."

"Hmm... is there any work scheduled after this?"

"Not really. I took the whole afternoon off today."

"In that case...I say, sister."

"Uh-huh?"

Hoshimi touched the back of his head as if he had come up with a good idea. After hesitating for a short moment, he told his idea to Hayasaka, who looked a little puzzled.

"It just so happens that I'm planning on bringing some friends home for dinner today—why don't you join us?"

The black-haired boy, who rarely invites others to "come to my house", looked away awkwardly and pretended to be indifferent.

Hayasaka, who had never been invited like this before (not counting the hot girls in school), was stunned by the unexpected development.

"Well...if you have other plans, just ignore me. I just wanted to..."

The boy lowered his head somewhat embarrassedly, a hint of embarrassment showing on his childish face.

"Thank you so much, sister. You have helped me so much all along."

"..."

The blonde girl, who had her hands quietly placed behind her back, stood there for a long time, unable to recover, as if she had heard something incredible.

To be more precise, what made her unable to recover was the boy's slightly embarrassed mumbling of the word "sister".

This word seemed to carry some kind of magic, lingering in her mind and unable to be shaken off.

"Cough, cough——"

But of course, this awkward silence was broken by the sound of her clearing her throat after a few minutes.

"Ahem...like I said before, I took the whole afternoon off."

Miss Hayasaka pursed her lips in an effort to appear calm and looked away.

"In other words... there is no reservation."

She gently covered the slightly red cheeks with her hands, unwilling to admit that she was moved.

What? Is it so difficult to resist the attack of the tough "sister" of the pretty boy?

No - it must be because this guy looks so harmless that he subconsciously arouses the maternal instinct in every girl.

It's scary. A childish boy who shyly says "sister" (it would be even more powerful if it's a little boy) is really scary.

Today's victory or defeat was a small defeat that made Hayasaka Ai's desire even more obvious.

----

Today I can open the third volume~

I'm typing, I'm typing, I'm running out of drafts orz

Kasumigaoka Utaha is unlikely to be out of ideas: Prologue: The freeloaders arrive at the scene

"so slow."

At Kashiwagi Eri's stall.

The girl with long gray hair, who was using the billboard as a support pole and lazily leaning her arms on it, keenly caught the figure of the boy walking out of the crowd, and revealed an unhappy expression on her pretty face without disguising it.

"Xingjian, did you have a bad fall in the restroom, or did you go to the cosplay exhibition area and harass the pretty girls and get caught and interrogated by the security guard?"

She stood up from her seat unhappily, complaining about Xingjian who took so long to come back, and stretched lazily - thanks to the loose sweatshirt, her figure was not highlighted too obviously.

“Ah, well…”

Feeling very guilty, Hoshimi gave up on making excuses and could only endure Miss Futaba's sharp tongue attack with a wry smile. Then, she looked at another figure beside Futaba with some confusion, who shouldn't have been there.

"By the way, why is Kato here?"

The girl with short black hair who was sitting in front of Kashiwagi Eri's stall, drinking the herbal tea she had just bought from the vending machine obediently, looked up when she heard this.

"Ah, Hoshimi-kun, you're back."

She seemed to hear the boy calling her name, so she showed a faint but gentle smile.

"Welcome back."

"...This Kato-san seemed to have been planning to look for you guys earlier, but couldn't find you. So he came to me from the venue and sat down to rest for a while."

Futaba folded her arms in front of her and explained with a cold expression.

"Ah... so you two know each other?"

"Not really, it's just that Futaba-san is the head of the science club at our school, so I just have a slight impression of her."

Ms. Kato smiled faintly and took another sip of her herbal tea.

"To be honest, I was a little surprised to meet someone from the same school here. So, I was wondering if Futaba-san happened to know Hoshimi-kun - but I was lucky enough to guess right."

Of course, Kato's biggest memory about Futaba is actually the fact that she is the only member of the entire science club - Kato has no intention of saying this.

"Yes, and I also explained to Kato that I came here with you, Hoshimi."

Futaba nonchalantly spun the large billboard in her hand.

"Well, I don't know where Aki-kun went, so after helping Ikai-chan clean up her stall and separate them, I came here to rest for a while."

After swallowing the last sip of herbal tea, Kato patiently and in detail explained.

"Okay, it looks like we've asked most of the questions here, so now it's my turn to ask you, Xingjian."

Then, Futaba narrowed her eyes slightly and shifted her gaze to the blonde girl standing next to Hoshimi with a pure and elegant smile.

"Who is this person?"

When she noticed an intriguing pair of eyes looking at her, Miss Hasaka consciously and cutely jumped out from behind the black-haired boy.

"Hello, Futaba-san!"

Ms. Hayasaka, who was concentrating on interpreting the role of Hasaka, showed a gentle smile that did not seem too distant.

"My name is Hasaka, and I'm currently attending a girls' high school. I came to the comic convention today—just like Ms. Futaba and Ms. Kato over there, I'm also a friend of Haru-kun's!"

She extended her right hand as a symbol of friendship, as if hoping to have a good relationship with Miss Futaba in front of her.

"...Rio Futaba, the head of the science club who often gets her coffee with this guy at school."

However, Miss Futaba looked closely at the bright smile of the blonde girl in front of her, with a dull expression, as if she was not very interested. In the end, she just took out her hand from her pocket and shook hands with her out of courtesy.

"My full name is Kato Megumi. Well, as for our relationship... I'm just Hoshimi-kun's classmate right now."

The girl with short black hair smiled and tilted her head slightly towards the blonde girl. She looked ordinary, non-aggressive and without any special features.

After a brief self-introduction, Futaba cast an intriguing look at Hoshimi standing beside her.

"Xingjian, I didn't realize you were so capable. You can even hook up with a student from an all-girls school and get along so well with her."

"Ah, well..."

It felt like it would take a while to explain Hayasaka's affairs to Futaba, and since Hayasaka didn't want to reveal her identity here, Hoshimi could only stand awkwardly between the two of them, avoiding Futaba's attempts to test Hayasaka with an ambiguous attitude.

Miss Hasaka on the side was like one of those silly and cute characters often seen in girls' comics. She blushed and smiled foolishly, as if she hadn't heard the hidden meaning behind Futaba's words at all, and touched the back of her head awkwardly from time to time - it was obvious that this guy definitely couldn't have failed to sense some hostility from Futaba.

Professional actors are truly terrifying—this is the sigh of a young star-seeing boy who can only be considered a beginner in this area.

"...Forget it, let's ignore these trivial matters for now."

Futaba's eyes swept back and forth between the two of them, and finally she stopped focusing on this topic and naturally pushed the conversation in another direction.

"Just now, Sawamura said she was going to look for you and left immediately. Why didn't she come back with you?"

"About this...actually."

Xingjian looked around and when she realized that there were still a lot of people passing by her and that Kato was sitting next to her drinking herbal tea naturally, she showed a complicated look.

Futaba keenly caught his hesitant expression and his expression gradually calmed down.

"…She's back, isn't she?"

She expressed her guess in a very low voice.

As expected of Futaba, her intuition in this area is unmatched.

"Ah, that's true—just now I went to find Tomoya Aki and we even got into a fight, but in the end it was Eriri who took control of the situation."

Xingjian lowered his voice and explained the whole story as briefly as possible.

"She must have finally resolved her issues, so she's back to normal. I asked Hasaka to find her a cosplay costume. Now she's going to the mall next door to change into some normal clothes, and she'll probably be back soon."

Hoshimi, who had been watching the direction of the gate to see when Eriri would come back, did not notice that Futaba frowned slightly after he said "I had a fight with Tomoya Aki".

She looked at the boy's face with a hidden gaze, and finally found a tiny wound at the corner of his mouth, which looked like a broken skin.

If you look closely, you can notice that there is an imperceptible stain on the cuff of his originally clean white shirt.

"........."

She was silent, with an inexplicable emotion flashing in her eyes. She wanted to say something, but in the end she kept silent.

She slowly took her hand out of her pocket, unable to help but want to touch the boy's hand - but she suddenly stopped after a brief moment, and then wordlessly withdrew it.

"...So that's it."

The gray-haired girl straightened herself slightly, and her facial expression returned to her usual lazy, calm, yet trustworthy, state of aloofness.

"I didn't expect that after just a few days of vacation, you've already become so aggressive."

She swallowed back the caring words that were about to come out of her mouth, and finally replaced them with nonchalant teasing.

"...Forget it. You're the type who acts impulsively when your blood rushes to your head."

Futaba smiled and shook her head. The complex emotions that had filled her eyes had completely disappeared at this moment, leaving only the care and tolerance that a friend should have.

During their conversation, Ms. Hasaka was boredly looking at the special guests singing and dancing on the stage in the nearby exhibition area, seemingly completely unaware of Futaba's subtle behavioral changes.

Miss Kato, who was sitting next to her, drinking her herbal tea with her head down, remained silent. She just stared at the little liquid left in the can and blinked slightly.

"As a friend, I'm saying this—you should just beat up that kind of person and don't overthink it. Anyway, I think it's time that guy learned his lesson."

It was not until Futaba said this that the short-haired girl raised her head, and there was a rare hint of surprise and surprise in her eyes when she looked at the black-haired boy.

"Eh? Hoshimi-kun...did you fight with Amaki-kun again?"

“…Yes, that’s right.”

Hoshimi looked away a little embarrassedly - the last time she punched that guy mercilessly in front of Kato.

How should I put it? Most girls probably wouldn't have any interest in boys who love fighting.

Ms. Kato's slightly furrowed brows also indicated that she was not very happy after hearing the news.

When a person who usually responds to others in a friendly manner no matter how they treat her shows a slightly unhappy expression, it is enough to show that the degree of her anger is far from as mild as it appears.

"Hoshimi-kun, I'm asking you to help me... but I don't want you to get yourself involved in this matter."

She stood up, took out a handkerchief from her bag, handed it to Xingjian and pointed to the corner of her mouth to signal him.

Kato pouted as if he was still a little angry, his eyes looking extremely serious.

"Ah... um, thank you."

Xingjian, who originally didn't think this minor injury was a big deal, had no choice but to take Kato's handkerchief and gently wipe the corners of her mouth that were stained with dust after seeing the serious look on her face.

Ms. Hasaka turned her azure eyes and looked at the two girls in front of her - Kato with a natural look on her face and Futaba who was drinking her coffee as if she was oblivious to the scene.

In the end, she just looked away silently, with a subtle expression.

"Speaking of which, where are you guys going next, Hoshimi-kun?"

"Ah, straight home."

The black-haired boy wiped his mouth with a handkerchief and turned his gaze to Futaba who was standing aside and looking away.

"Then I'll treat a certain Futaba A-mon to dinner."