Rei had had it.
No, really.
After surviving a hot spring ambush, a garden vow ceremony with celestial lightning threats, and Goddess Eris giving him a romance tutorial that doubled as an emotional hostage negotiation, Rei decided to take back control of his life.
Or at least one room of it.
"I'm getting a job," he declared one morning, dramatically slapping a recruitment flyer against the breakfast table.
The five women around him froze.
Seraphina's fork stopped mid-air, her poached egg trembling like it feared what was coming.
Lilia's teacup made a dangerous clink.
Rosette's knife gleamed ever so slightly in the morning light.
Drakana dropped a whole chicken leg and growled softly.
Faye blinked owlishly from behind her reading glasses, then turned a page in the "Love Horoscope: Stalking Edition" magazine.
"You're doing what?" Seraphina asked in that voice that was sweet, lilting, and laced with nuclear-grade possessiveness.
"Getting. A. Job," Rei repeated slowly, as if he were teaching a foreign language to highly unstable explosives. "At the city library. As a clerk. Filing books. Quietly. Alone."
Drakana narrowed her eyes. "Alone?"
"Yes."
Faye gasped. "But... without supervision?"
"Yes."
Rosette folded her napkin with all the menace of a folding guillotine. "I see."
"I need space!" Rei shouted. "I need... something that's mine. Something safe. Something—"
System Notification:
New Mission Available: "Get A Job (Good Luck, Idiot)"
Objective: Secure part-time employment without triggering homicidal affection.
Reward: +10 Sanity (Temporary), +5 Freedom (Delusional), +1 Bookmark.
Penalty for Failure: Application Firebombed.
"This is supposed to be a normal world," Rei muttered.
System Response:
Correction: This is a yandere romantic comedy fantasy action slice-of-life isekai. "Normal" died in Chapter 1.
Two hours later, Rei arrived at the Grand Maribelle City Library.
A beautiful, multi-tiered structure with marble columns, enchanted bookshelves, and best of all—no visible yanderes.
He had worn a disguise. A loose gray cloak. A fake mustache. A pair of glasses with one lens cracked for tragic realism. His alias?
"Raymond Bookman."
It was terrible.
But it gave him hope.
He walked up to the head librarian—a severe woman with bun-tight hair and owl-shaped earrings—and slid his resume across the counter with all the charm of a desperate man fleeing for his life.
"I'd like to apply," he said calmly. "Quiet clerk position. No interaction with people. Or girls. Preferably in the archives basement."
She adjusted her spectacles and eyed his résumé. "Duke's son, huh? Aren't you the one with the five—?"
"No," Rei said quickly. "That was another guy. Very dead. Terrible luck."
"Hmm." She nodded. "Well, we do need help reorganizing the Demon Language archives. It's dark, damp, and the books bite back. Interested?"
"I've never been more interested in anything in my life."
"Good. Come back tomorrow for orientation."
A thrill of victory surged through Rei's veins. He did it. He finally found an escape hatch. A job! A place where girls weren't allowed to wrestle over his hand in marriage or feed him cookies shaped like his own severed head.
He came back the next morning early. Cleaned. Dressed modestly. Mentally prepared.
The head librarian greeted him with a clipboard and a tour.
"This section is where you'll be working," she explained, leading him into a dusty, shadowed corridor with shelves taller than buildings. "You'll be shelving, logging inventory, and avoiding cursed tomes. Just knock if you find one screaming."
"Yes, ma'am."
She paused. "Also, we had some… unexpected applicants this morning."
Rei's blood froze.
"Applicants?"
"Five young women. All claiming to be your... 'work wives'?"
"Oh no."
"They said you insisted they help. Something about 'group literacy therapy.'"
"Oh no no no."
"They're very... enthusiastic. One brought a clipboard. One brought a scythe."
Rei turned the corner and came face to face with his worst nightmare.
There, proudly wearing "Library Assistant" sashes—handcrafted, color-coded, and bedazzled—stood all five of them.
Seraphina had a golden book cart and a matching tiara. "We're here to support you, darling~"
Lilia wore white gloves and had already alphabetized an entire shelf by titles beginning with "Marriage." "Think of this as our honeymoon internship!"
Drakana had already eaten a scroll labeled "Prohibited Spells." "Books taste weird."
Faye was sitting atop a floating grimoire, humming an ancient love ballad and sketching "Mrs. Rei" in the margins of a library ledger.
Rosette was standing beside a flaming trash can. Inside it: another applicant's résumé.
"Whoops," she said gently. "Paper fire hazard."
Rei grabbed the nearest wall to stop from fainting.
System Notification:
New Mission Update:
Objective Failed: "Secure Peaceful Employment"
New Objective: "Survive Workplace Romance Ambush"
Reward: 1 Tension Migraine
Punishment: Eternal Workplace Bonding
Orientation devolved into chaos.
Seraphina tried to declare herself "Chief Romantic Archivist."
Lilia corrected every cataloging term into wedding language.
"'Return to Shelf' is now 'Post-Honeymoon Placement,' dear~"
Drakana renamed the Demon Archive to "Rei's Treasure Trove" and left claw marks on anything alphabetically after R.
Faye refused to handle any book unless it contained a love poem. "Information without passion is soulless."
Rosette laminated the employee handbook in blood-red plastic and carved "Rosette ♥ Rei" into the side of a bookshelf with a throwing knife.
Rei was assigned to Inventory Closet C, the most secluded corner of the library. A haven. A prison. A therapy bunker.
There, he sat clutching a feather-duster and his ruined dreams.
Eris appeared in the reflection of a windowpane.
"Called it," she said with a grin.
"Why do you even exist?" Rei asked the glass.
"To mock, observe, and snack," she replied, munching on a cinnamon roll. "Also, this chapter's dramatic irony is delicious."
Rei opened a cursed book just to see if it would devour him.
It coughed politely, then whispered: "She's behind you."
Rei froze. "Which one?"
A hand slid onto his shoulder.
"Lunch time~" Seraphina cooed.
Lunch was a disaster.
Five separate picnic baskets.
Five flavors of poisoned affection.
Seraphina brought royal truffles. Lilia brought heart-shaped sandwiches. Drakana brought grilled wyvern. Rosette served knife-cut apples in the shape of Lilia's face. Faye brought "ethereal biscuits" that glowed ominously.
The head librarian tried to intervene.
She now wears an eye patch and refuses to speak in sentences longer than three words.
By the end of Day One, the library had:
* Three ruined sections of shelving
* One melted ladder (dragon fire)
* A romantic poem stuck in the ventilation system
* A missing historian (last seen near Rosette)
* And a shrine labeled "Cleric of Book Love: Our Beloved Rei"
Rei submitted his resignation.
It was returned with a stamp: "REJECTED — YOU'RE A LIFETIME MEMBER NOW ♥"
He slumped over a pile of dictionaries, defeated.
System Notification:
Achievement Unlocked: "Employed (Technically)"
Title Gained: "Harem Archivist"
New Passive Skill: "Dodge Affection in Tight Spaces"
New Perk: "Book Fort Construction Speed +10%"
Rei screamed softly into a volume of Demonic Grammar Vol. II.
Outside, the girls rearranged the Romance section into the shape of a wedding aisle.
Eris clapped from her window pane. "Bravo. Best job attempt yet. Nine out of ten breakdowns!"
Rei whimpered.
And so ended his brief, doomed career in public service.
To be continued…