Side Chapter 1 - Story

Note: this story does not affect the main story, so you can skip it if you want. But maybe you should read it if you want to get to know Kawajima better. Thanks for reading.

This is the story after the day Kawajima exchanged contact numbers with Ryousuke...

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At night, 22:30. Midori Kawajima's house.

Inside a cozy room, with the light of a laptop lamp illuminating her face, was Kawajima working on a story. With the sound of constant typing, she continues typing...

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[Merchants and Adventurers]

On a sunny day in the heart of Kradisha, with various activities already starting, Katherine began her day. She was an ordinary merchant who worked at the monster meat shelter every day. With her ordinary face and status as an ordinary person, no one really noticed her.

A girl, 15 years old. Orphaned and now working alone for The necessities of life. Fortunately, her parents gave their house to her as the last thing they could give. A simple little house.

"A new day, I'm ready!" she encouraged herself.

Katherine optimistically walked towards her workplace. Once there, she was immediately accosted by her boss, a stern old woman. She ordered her to do various jobs that were not suitable for her age, the portion of work that should be done by men, she did alone. However, this was the only way to live, so she had to endure it.

All the work, starting from eight in the morning until five in the evening, always made her muscles and body ache. Coming home exhausted and with little money, she buys some necessities along the way and finishes the day. The tedious day of survival continued.

'I hope someday there will be a time when change comes to me... Oh moon goddess, give me your blessings'

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Typing quietly, Kawajima can clearly feel what her character Katherine is feeling. Her life, with her parents only concerned with work and money, was filled with loneliness. Everything goes with a sense of sadness. Starting from her childhood, to elementary school, to middle school. Everything was the same.

At first, she had some friends who didn't notice her ugly face in elementary school. But starting from the fourth grade, they started teasing her about it and shunned her. Junior high school was even worse. No one even tried to get close to her, and if there was a group activity, then the group containing her would feel like it had bad luck for them.

Remembering this, Kawajima's face turned grim. It was for this reason, because of this solitude and loneliness, that she came to know about her current hobby, which was reading and writing stories.

Kawajima was a smart girl. She was bound to rank in the top ten in each of her classes, and because of this, she started reading books and novels until she became obsessed with them. Reading other people's life stories, both fictional and real, made her feel like she was seeing a new world. Everything was so different, so romantic, so dangerous, and so sad. All of them.

Her obsession with other people's stories, after a while, started to change. She thought, if she couldn't have a fulfilling life in the real world, why didn't she create her own stories? Stories that would make hee satisfied, stories that would distract her from the cruel reality.

So, she started writing. She has written many stories. Fantasy, romance, and battle. All of them she created, and it turned out that she really liked this new hobby of hers.

So, even now, until she became a high school student and made friends, she didn't stop writing.

Today, she happened to want to create a new story. A story about Katherine, an ordinary girl who has to struggle to continue her life. She had reached a place where Katherine was currently praying to the moon goddess for a better life.

So far, the story was a little depressing. But she didn't stop typing, because she was already thinking of the continuation of this story that would make her happy. Thinking of this, Kawajima smiled. Because after all, the inspiration for the continuation of this story was someone who had recently come into her life.

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"Katherine! Here, I'll help you carry it."

The same few days passed by just like that. Her life was still the same. Only, two days ago, their place had just received a new employee. A big woman who was somehow nice to her. She, whenever she saw Katherine carrying something big and heavy in her hands, would definitely help carry it. Truly, she was a good woman. And Katherine admired her very much.

"ah, thank you very much. Alice."

Her name was Alice. A tall girl with curly hair and a free personality.

Taking the heavy monster meat in Katherine's hand, she only smiled in return. Carrying the monster meat towards the slaughterhouse, and continuing her own work. 'Alice... Thank you...', she thought.

The day goes faster when you have someone to talk to. Alice was a good conversationalist, Katherine would never get tired of hearing the stories that would come out of her mouth. They laughed together, and enjoyed their work time without any bad feelings.

Going home with a happy face, Katherine thought, 'goddess-sama. Thank you very much, you seem to have granted my wish'.

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Kawajima smiled happily as she wrote the continuation of the story. Alice, the new character she wrote, was inspired by her female friend who was also very kind to her. Just like Alice, she would help her if she was having a hard time, and school days were made more enjoyable by her presence.

She is Sayaka Mayu, her friend.

Kawajima smiled, feeling both grateful and happy at the thought of having a friend like her. She had even invited her to visit her house last Tuesday. Sayaka was very kind.

Although...

"fufufu... "

Sayaka wasn't the only one, she still had one new friend, and he was just as nice as her. Although the difference was, he was a boy...

Kawajima continued writing the story, this time with a red face...

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Two months later.

Katherine had a more fulfilling life than before. She had a new friend at work, and every day, the work that used to be boring and tiring became more fun and easier. Although, the old lady boss still gave her a lot of work to do...

Walking past several people, Katherine was currently carrying a fowl-type monster meat in her hand. It was the meat of a monster called fire little Phenexz, a fire bird monster classified as a tier one monster with a difficulty rating of A. She was currently walking towards the meat slaughterhouse, which would later become the consumption of the townspeople.

Katherine couldn't imagine what life would be like as an adventurer. She was just an ordinary girl who had been brought up and taught all kinds of chores. She didn't know a thing about fighting techniques, and she would probably even lose if she had to fight a random dog on the street.

So, he couldn't help but admire their type of work. Despite the risk of being killed, they still dared to risk their lives in order to continue living.

"uncle, this is fire little Phenexz meat, I put it here", reaching the butchery, she placed the monster meat on the table full of other meat.

The meat cutter uncle just nodded, not even looking at her and just focusing on continuing to cut. Katherine was used to it, so after placing the meat, she immediately went back to her place.

Supposedly, she only worked to carry the various monster meats to the slaughterhouse, which was supposed to be a man's job. But today, one of the female employees in charge of receiving the meat was sick, and Katherine had to fill in for her due to orders from the old lady boss. Despite being told to fill in, she was also forbidden to quit her usual job, so she now had to do the work of two people.

Walking towards the meat reception area, she sat down and waited for the adventurer to come by to exchange the meat for money. She waited, and after a few hours, she was already very tired from receiving various meats from adventurers as well as having to deliver them to the slaughterhouse. She was very tired, and her work was still not over.

"I'm sorry sir, but this is definitely not wolf meat. This is rabbit meat."

She was currently dealing with a hairless adventurer who kept saying that the meat in her hand was wolf meat. They were the type of asshole adventurers who usually threatened employees with their power. And unluckily, it happened to Katherine today.

"haaa?! Are your eyes blind?! Look carefully, this is wolf meat! And you're holding it anyway, so no matter what happens you still have to pay, which one! Hurry up and give me the money!" the bald adventurer threatened.

"B-but" Katherine was very scared at the moment. She did not know how to deal with the adventurer in front of her and was too scared to think of anything.

Until...

"hey, what's going on...? "

An adventurer, with a cowboy hat and a valiant face, asked them about what happened.

'O goddess?! Is he going to help me?! ' Katherine felt great hope towards the man in front of her.

"haa?!!! What the hell are you doing?! Stay out of it!" the bald adventurer replied by pushing the cowboy adventurer's shoulder so hard that he took a few steps back.

And the cowboy adventurer proved not to let him down, he immediately retaliated by punching the bald adventurer to knock him out.

"Fuuh, what an asshole!" he said, blowing on his clenched fist as if it were a weapon.

"T-thank you so much!" Katherine bowed to him, thanking him for helping her.

"It's okay, never mind. I want to sell ice buffalo meat, here. Oh yes. And in addition, this too. Fresh rabbit meat. Just got it from a fool, hehe"

That was the beginning of their relationship.

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Kawajima was currently blushing up to her ears. She wrote the events in his story based on a true story, the story of herself being helped by the man who became her friend, Ryousuke Toru.

Despite that, she smiled happily. Toru-san was her other friend, and just this afternoon, they had exchanged phone contacts. Even earlier, they had just decided to do a book exchange this weekend.

Kawajima, still smiling embarrassedly, continued her story.

'yosh, a little more'

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One year later.

Katherine recognized the adventurer who helped her as Alex. He was a fairly strong B-level adventurer, and they had just become friends. After a year, the two became even closer. And today...

"Katherine, will you marry me?"

"Yes, Alex. Of course!"

END

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"Kyaaaaaaaa~~^^!"

Somehow, the story ended with Alex proposing and marrying Katherine. Kawajima, extremely embarrassed by her own writing, immediately turned off the laptop and closed it.

Of course, she felt very ashamed of her own writing, but anyway... It wasn't that she wasn't satisfied with the ending.

'It's okay right? It's just a fantasy after all, Fufufu'

Feeling satisfied with the story she had just finished, she looked at the clock and it showed that it was already 1:30 in the morning. She was too focused on her writing and didn't notice the time passing so quickly. As a result, she was late for bed.

Knowing that tomorrow, she would probably have bags under her eyes, she immediately decided to lie down on her bed and sleep.

Smiling contentedly, Kawajima fell asleep quickly.