"Mio, what's wrong?"
Mashiro Shiina looked somewhat puzzled at Mio sitting on her bed. Ever since coming in, Mio had looked like she had something she wanted to say, but until now she hadn't said a single word.
Although Mio knew that Mashiro Shiina was, in a certain sense, also a veteran in this area, looking at her innocent appearance, Mio really couldn't bring herself to broach the topic of doujinshi.
"Even though the host is planning to get close to Eriri by drawing doujinshi, why can't you speak up now?" The system's voice sounded full of confusion.
"Eriri is different from Mashiro. Eriri herself draws doujinshi, so discussing doujinshi topics with her shamelessly is fine. But Mashiro is a proper manga artist—how could I possibly say it out loud!" Mio said through gritted teeth.
She was clearly the only one in her house, yet this wretched system could still pop up to cause trouble.
It seemed that even staying at home without interacting with anyone couldn't stop the system from issuing tasks.
Mio glanced at the time. There were only ten minutes left until midnight. If she didn't speak up now, this task would end in failure.
A flicker of conflict passed through Mio's eyes. She sighed and said: "It's nothing, I just came to see if there's anything you need help with."
"Not right now."
"In that case, I'll head back first. Even though you don't have class tomorrow, don't stay up too late. If I find out you've stayed up until three or four in the morning again, I won't write the script for the next chapter."
"I'll go to sleep right away."
Mashiro suddenly stood up, then threw herself onto the bed. With a practiced salty-fish flip, she wrapped herself in the blanket, leaving only half her little head exposed.
Adorable was the perfect way to describe Mashiro right now.
The corners of Mio's mouth couldn't help but curl up slightly before she turned and walked out of Mashiro's room.
Sengoku Chihiro, who had gone to the mixer, had already returned. After drinking quite a bit of alcohol, she was lying on the sofa without any semblance of dignity, occasionally muttering strange things.
After finding a blanket to cover Chihiro, Mio returned to her own home.
Before she could even enter her room, the time reached midnight.
The world before her eyes instantly froze, and the system's lazy voice echoed in her ear: "Task failed. The host's conquest rating with Mashiro Shiina has decreased by 1 point."
Hearing the notification of the affection decrease, the corners of Mio's mouth curved up slightly. It seemed her guess was correct—as tasks failed, affection would also decrease accordingly.
But very quickly, Mio couldn't smile anymore.
[Masochist Constitution]
This card will mess with your preferences AND change how future tasks work. Stack it for even more "fun."
[Do As You Please]
Gives you a tiny chance of actually acting on random thoughts. Stack it to increase the odds.
[Delicate Body, Soft and Easy to Push Down]
Changes your physical constitution. Stack it for bigger changes.
At first glance, [Do As You Please] looked like the safest bet. But Mio knew herself—she was the kind of unlucky bastard who only ever hit pity in gacha games. That "extremely small probability"? Yeah, with her luck it'd become "happens every five minutes."
And people thought about all kinds of things throughout the day. Some thoughts were fine to act on. Others... really, really weren't. If this thing triggered while she was thinking something she absolutely shouldn't do? Yeah, no thanks.
[Do As You Please] was out.
But the other two sucked too. [Masochist Constitution] would warp her preferences and future tasks. She could already imagine it: "Make Mashiro step on you" or some shit.
...Actually that didn't sound terrible, but it would be mortifying.
The last option barely had any description, but that name said enough. Compared to the other two? Probably just as bad.
This was exactly what the system warned her about on day one—bad luck could turn her into a walking H-game protagonist. She hadn't believed it then.
Looking at these cards now? Yeah, she believed it.
Just as she was agonizing over the choice, the system's voice cut in: "Oh, almost forgot! You can pick your own punishment card, but you've only got five minutes to decide. Three of those are already gone, by the way~ If time runs out, I'll randomly pick one for you!"
"Why didn't you say that earlier?!"
"Oopsie, slipped my mind~"
Mio's eye twitched. Like hell the system could "forget" things. This asshole was doing it on purpose.
No more time to deliberate. After a brief moment of hesitation, Mio selected [Delicate Body, Soft and Easy to Push Down].
Her reasoning: it probably just weakened her physically or something. And she wasn't exactly in a dangerous environment, so the impact should be minimal.
If this were an actual adult game world? Yeah, she'd pick one of the others instead.
After confirming her choice, time started moving again.
Regaining her freedom, Mio moved her body slightly. Compared to normal, there didn't seem to be any difference.
But thinking about it made sense—after all, this was only the first time selecting this card, so the effect probably wasn't very strong.
It looked like she'd chosen correctly.
However, she couldn't feel happy about it at all right now. After all, this was a punishment card. Even if she'd chosen correctly, there was nothing to celebrate. Besides, she'd clearly discovered a method to reduce conquest ratings, but reducing them meant task failure, which meant having to draw punishment cards. If her luck was bad, she might very well end up becoming the female protagonist in a doujinshi.
Having read countless doujinshi, various scenes from ones she'd read before floated through Mio's mind.
Her entire mood instantly plummeted. Doujinshi were great and all, but if she became the female protagonist in one...
No way, she didn't want that!
Was there really no way to control conquest ratings?