The Protagonist's Party is Too Diligent-Chapter 369

But listen.

The goddess we were dealing with was the goddess of “Order,” right?

She’s the one who even prepared resident registration cards for us individually, anticipating that we wouldn’t “blend in” properly after coming to this world.

Not only that, she made sure we could seamlessly fit into this world's system just by having those IDs.

You can imagine how insanely difficult that must have been if you think about it for even a second.

Selecting birthdates for us, faking the official birth registration through a government worker...

And the reason we could behave like normal adults was because we were accepted as people who had properly graduated school!

This country mandates compulsory education — elementary and middle school. If we didn’t have records for those nine years, we wouldn’t have been able to move around normally. People would have immediately started asking questions about our nonexistent parents.

If we had landed in a country without mandatory registration, it would have been different, but of all places, we ended up in a country where issuing an ID card includes mandatory fingerprint registration — a country where creating fake administrative records is brutally difficult.

Honestly, it would’ve been way easier to fit our genetic information into this world’s databases. That just requires fiddling with our physical bodies a bit.

If there were any diseases in this world that could seriously endanger our lives, or if, conversely, we carried a disease that could trigger a pandemic here, it would’ve already exploded into a major crisis.

We’d already been walking around busy tourist areas and staying at hotels packed with people.

"......So, you’re saying donating blood isn’t going to cause a big problem?"

"Exactly."

Because the goddess was a goddess of "Order."

Tampering would be easier, but the consequences would be way more serious.

Would the goddess have allowed that to happen?

The very fact that these two worlds were compatible in the first place was already strange.

If the goddess hadn’t prepared for that, she wouldn’t have tossed me here to begin with.

......And if she had hurled me here out of pure spite without thinking things through, and was now tearing her hair out in regret — well, that would just be her karma.

"If you’re feeling really uneasy about it, we can postpone the blood donation for now. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to go for a full medical checkup first, just to be safe."

"Hmm."

While Alice was still hesitating, I noticed Claire standing a little ways off, looking visibly disappointed, so I gave a wry smile.

"There’s no need to worry that much. Movie tickets aren’t so expensive that we can’t afford them."

Sure, it would’ve been nice to get them for free, but it’s not like we were priced out of going.

And—

I pulled out my smartphone and opened the movie theater app.

Right.

Regardless of the showtime, the earliest screenings usually qualified for early bird discounts.

It was still only 10 AM, and since it was a weekday for office workers—

"Yep, found one."

Monday was the busiest day of the week, so naturally there weren’t many reservations for morning movies.

There was a 10:30 AM movie available with a discount, and the theater wasn’t far from where we were.

"There’s a discounted movie showing. Shall we go?"

"Yeah!"

Claire’s eyes sparkled as she nodded eagerly at my question.

So cute.

I wonder if Claire and Alice had ever watched a horror movie back in Azerna?

*

And—

I forgot something important.

It had been years since I’d last watched a horror movie too.

I liked all sorts of genres, and had built up a fair bit of resistance to horror films, but if you don’t watch or play those kinds of “jump-scare” media for a while, your tolerance naturally declines.

The problem was— I was the only one who actually found the movie scary.

"......If enemies attacked us that sloppily, we could easily deal with them with our skills, don’t you think?"

Alice said seriously as we came out of the theater, carrying our empty popcorn containers.

Exactly.

The technology in movies — the cinematography, makeup, CGI — had advanced so much that everything looked incredibly realistic, but because of that, people who were really familiar with reality could feel an uncanny gap.

If we had gone to see a stage play, we could’ve brushed it off more easily, thinking, “Oh, that’s all fake.”

ut for Alice, who had actually fought with real swords, a “civilian” man running at her with a mere kitchen knife was nothing worth fearing.

"Click, click."

Claire made a tongue-clicking sound — not actually clicking her tongue, but making the sound effect with her mouth — and said confidently to Alice,

"Movies are just an extension of theater. Even if some scenes are a bit much, you're supposed to accept them with a generous heart."

Rather than picking at the movie’s realism, Claire seemed genuinely happy just to have experienced a movie in a theater. She was all smiles.

The problem was — we had just watched a horror movie where not a single character survived.

Was I seriously the only one who got scared?

I started to seriously wonder.

Because, during the movie—

"Hey, sis, you totally shrieked, ‘Eek!’ at one point, remember?"

......

"And after that, you kept trembling just at the sight of the killer’s knife!"

Alice chimed in from beside me.

"......I—"

"Oh, right!"

Claire said excitedly, cutting me off.

"But you still like horror movies, don’t you? You’re the one who bought the tickets, after all."

"......"

Well, yeah, I did buy the tickets.

And I do like them, sort of.

Even if you get scared in the moment, that’s part of the fun of horror movies. Sure, there are horror films that build dread without jump-scares, and I actually preferred those, but ironically, those kinds of movies were the ones that divided opinions the most. Some people didn’t even find them scary because they lacked sudden shocks.

Anyway, regardless of my feelings about horror, the expression Claire was making right now was a little worrying.

What on earth was she plotting?

Were we about to binge-watch horror films nonstop on a streaming site or something?

"Oh, right."

But Claire switched topics just as I started getting nervous.

"It’s lunchtime now, right?"

"......Weren’t you about to say something else?"

I asked, wary, as Claire suddenly changed the subject, but she just tilted her head innocently.

"Uh~uh? Nope, nothing like that."

"Well... it is lunchtime."

Alice chimed in, listening to our conversation.

"So, what do you want to do for lunch? Eat out? Or head home?"

"......"

I didn’t think Alice had actually read Claire’s mind. They might be sisters in spirit, but because of their different upbringings — and maybe different mothers — they weren’t so alike that they shared minds.

Still, there were times when their thoughts weirdly lined up.

Specifically — when it came to making me suffer.

I’d noticed it after living practically glued to them for the past few weeks.

They didn’t literally share thoughts, but if one of them had a “fun idea,” the other caught on really fast. And while they didn’t openly collude, they subtly set things up together.

Just like now.

Sure...

They’d secretly fed me spicy foods disguised as harmless, or tricked me into thinking something wasn’t spicy when it was, but at least they hadn’t /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ crossed the line into anything seriously bad.

I had bought them plenty of sweets too, after all.

"......Alright. I don’t know what you two are scheming, but for now, we should prioritize filling our stomachs."

Fine.

I’d let them have this round.

As long as it wasn’t anything that truly crossed the line. At least we all seemed to silently agree on that rule.

"We’re already out anyway. Let’s just grab something outside before heading back."

"Yay!"

"I’m in too."

The two of them immediately showed just how happy they were.

......Well, their IDs might say they’re adults, but they're still just sixteen.

It’s fine if the oldest one gets dragged around a little.

*

And I quickly found out what Claire had been plotting.

"......You mean a horror game?"

"Yeah."

"On stream?"

"Yeah!"

When I stared at Claire in horror, she looked up at me with a face like that famous orange cat in sneakers from that one animation.

"......Can’t we?"

"......"

I just stared silently for a moment, then let out a deep sigh.

"......Do you already have a game in mind?"

"Of course!"

Well, I had played plenty of horror games before too.

Keeping the stream from getting stuck in the same pattern forever was important anyway.

Even if I couldn't help but sigh about it.

Haa...