As the great Teacher Hachiman once said: Marriage is the grave of life.
Kuroba Akira agreed with both hands raised high.
Coming home only to catch fleeting glimpses of your wife and child's sleeping faces—that just meant you were trapped in overtime hell with no escape.
Those married folks who preached about "happiness" had the same dead eyes as Hachiman. Like zombies, dragging others into the swamp.
Is that really happiness?
No. No. Hell no.
Having lived—and died—through the grind of overwork in his past life, Akira was more determined than ever not to end up a sacrifice at the altar of marriage.
But more than that, he knew himself all too well—when it came to family, he had no backbone.
The only reason he'd worked himself to death in his previous life was to help support his household. Otherwise, with his personality, he would've quit the first time a boss tried to PUA him or a coworker tried to bully him. He would've picked a lower-paying but less toxic job instead of working himself into an early grave.
He just… couldn't watch a "wife" work herself to exhaustion while he mooched off her in good conscience. That kind of "free lunch" gave him acid reflux.
And from the wife's point of view? A lazy, jobless husband who just sat around asking for money all day—how could that be anything but despair?
Could anyone truly be happy marrying someone like that?
Only if they were delusional.
Marriage, at its core, was supposed to be a kind of life "co-op"—a way to share risks and lower costs. Like when one person gets sick, the other steps in to care for them. A system of mutual support.
But if one side carried all the burden, it was no different from those "little fairy" types who demanded the man pay a dowry, buy a house, a car, and still foot the bill for every meal and outing. Just gender-swapped parasites.
Especially in Japan, where most households still relied on the man's income alone. Dual-income homes were rare. Stay-at-home husbands? Practically unheard of.
Akira couldn't stomach the idea of letting someone he loved bear all that alone.
So in the end, it was better not to get married at all. Staying single and self-sufficient suited him best.
Even if his dream was to lie flat, Akira had no desire to do so by stepping on others.
Those Kabukicho hosts who peddled fake affection just to bleed women dry—they had no moral bottom line. After draining them financially, they'd even push those women toward selling their bodies just to keep the cash flowing.
It might look like sweetness, but it was all poison. Hosts were demons in human skin who didn't even bother spitting out the bones after feeding.
So it was no surprise that stories kept popping up of hosts being stabbed by deranged clients. But really, who pushed those women to the edge? Was it life? Or was it the smiling hosts who used them up and tossed them aside?
Akira wasn't a host. And he didn't want to be one.
He didn't want to juggle ten backup girls, didn't want to manage ten phones, didn't want to live a life one bad day away from being stabbed by a yandere.
He didn't sell love.
He sold dreams. And a plan to make those dreams real.
He would help geniuses find the right path and reach success quickly. In return, he'd charge a modest "friendship fee."
You win, I win—win-win was the ideal outcome.
But to make that happen, he needed to maintain a certain level of affection—just enough to make the girl listen.
Too much… and things got dangerous.
Because once the affection value crossed the threshold, only three outcomes remained:
① All his effort up in smoke.
② Forced into marriage and an honest career.
③ Stabbed to death.
Fuck, none of those sounded remotely appealing!
Sure, Shiginomiya Shion was the thickest, juiciest leg he'd latched onto so far—but Akira knew better than to bet everything on a single branch.
He still needed to scout more talent. Open up Mine #2, Mine #3…
That way, if one "project" failed, he could shift resources and recover.
But if she fell for him, things would get complicated. He couldn't just call it quits and cash out.
Akira didn't want a web of entanglements in his personal life. He definitely didn't want to spend his retirement constantly on the run from love-struck women with knives.
So now that he had Shion's sweat-scented towel in hand… should he use it?
Of course he should.
If her affection was too high, he'd just have to do something disgusting—something pervy—to lower it.
Time to manage the meter.
Besides, Akira was pretty sure Shion was testing him too.
Just like when the class rep had "accidentally" offered him her panties—she'd been testing whether he could resist temptation. If he'd taken the bait back then, she probably wouldn't have invited him to the literature club.
So now, Akira brought the towel to his face and deliberately inhaled—hard. Loud enough to make sure Shion could hear every exaggerated sniff.
The towel didn't actually smell bad.
It had only been used briefly, and still carried the scent of soap from when he washed it earlier. Mixed with the faint trace of a girl's body heat, it formed a subtle but unmistakable feminine pheromone cocktail.
Kind of addictive, honestly.
Combined with the flash of skin he'd just seen, it was almost too much.
Mentally he was thirty. Physically, still fifteen. The primal instincts of his teenage body were harder to suppress by the day.
Across from him, Shion froze at the sound of his very deliberate inhalation.
He's seriously enjoying this…?
But looking at the blissed-out expression on his face, she had to admit—he really seemed to like it. Like it liked it.
So this counts as a reward, huh…
Akira hadn't realized it, but for a teenage girl who'd never had real contact with men, Shion also had her share of fantasies.
So instead of being grossed out by his over-the-top display, she felt… oddly excited.
In fact, it triggered a weird misunderstanding in her mind—she started thinking, Ah, so that's just normal guy behavior…
And if this was a reward to him…
Then maybe…
She should offer a little extra.
"Akira…"
"Hm?"
Akira figured the bit had gone far enough. If he kept sniffing, something else would start rising. He lowered the towel and turned toward her.
Only to see Shion standing there, head down, hands clasped behind her back—looking nervous, almost shy.
"Um… I didn't feel anything off during the run, but after we got back, my feet started to ache a little…"
"Oh, probably because of those shoes. We really should've gotten you some running sneakers first. You didn't get hurt, did you?"
"No, no injury. It's just the soles… they're still kind of sore…"
"Well, that's good. You should rest for today."
Guess the convenience store run would have to be postponed.
"It's not that bad. I think if I rest a little, it'll get better…"
She slipped off her house slippers and delicately pressed her toes to them, sliding her feet forward, stretching her calves.
"So… would you mind… giving me a foot massage?"
"…Huh?"
Shiginomiya Shion had just—entirely on her own—learned how to seduce a man.