Rewrite Note: (08/10/2024) From 6k to 7k

Rewriting this fic's initial chapters isn't my biggest focus right now, I'm currently still working on the react fic (for those in fanfiction, yes, I have one that can be found on either my Wattpad or AO3 account).

One of the changes I made was consistency, be it dialogue that didn't make sense based on the time and space the actual story takes in and also how it's written (Changing the usage of I to He/Issei, I think I did that unconsciously) and also added a shit ton of foreshadowing.

Lastly, I found out that the image used (if ur in Wattpad) that I used in this chapter has been deleted by the original author, I am currently using a safe from an aggregator site.

Just like before, if you enjoyed this, remember to comment, fav or leave your kudos, I've sort of decided to start saying this, though I still havent on my other fics lol.

Issei woke up still tired, thankfully not tired enough to arrive late at school. Though, then again, he'd probably wish he could skip it.

That being said, he wouldn't miss going to the Literature Club, he's got his poems, and he wanted to show them off.

He made sure to bring at the very least one poem of each rarity, it's impossible to know when they'd come handy.

Arriving at Kuoh Academy, there didn't really seem much of a change, despite the Justice increase he obtained from his Magnum Opus, there wasn't any immediate distinction regarding how people treated him.

When he entered the class, all he could see were the typical students chatting while waiting for the professor to enter the class. As he took his seat, his two friends came up to him like they usually did.

"Dude you look really tired, did you stay up playing any video games?" Motohama asked him like he normally did, the only change was his curious look.

Matsuda added his two cents as well. "Especially on a school day, you've got some guts you know?"

Issei responded groggily. "You could say that in a way..."

He was very sleepy, but not enough to really blast his mouth saying he had a system, he didn't want to be sent to an asylum.

He continued talking to them casually until the bell rang, signaling the start of class, his two friends left to sit down onto their seats.

Issei continued to zone out, unable to concentrate on the lessons due to how tired he was, maybe spending many hours trying to get the Magnum Opus was a bit too extreme, but he still thought it was worth it even though he felt extreme pain from suddenly having an out of body experience.

Speaking of which, he found out that he now could use Epistemophobic's Nightmare for the first few seconds without problem.

Guess using it over and over again did make him get used to the initial pain, the pain increased the longer he spent using it, but he theorized it was due to his Sanity getting depleted slowly.

His thoughts kept going back to stuff related to the Writer's System. The many questions he had still plagued his thoughts, which made him unable to concentrate on the lesson, but the Literature Club was the biggest of them, were they actual people or were they created by the system?

Such an odd but very intriguing question, they were never students of this academy, yet they somehow appeared and no one seemed to notice.

It did creep him out in a way, the fact that this system could simply decide to make a person exist just like nothing.

At the end of the first lesson, he didn't get up to talk with his friends immediately, he went on to wonder how the Justice stat worked, since he saw as everything seemed the same, there was nothing different to a normal day at school.

Did he need to actively interact for others for it to actually take effect? Or did he actually need a higher Justice stat? He wouldn't really be surprised if his reputation was so bad to the point that he actually needed to make a bigger impact.

Another question he had was how the girls of the club and Cordis would interact inside the academy, he was pretty sure many of the girls would be treated as celebrities.

And honestly? He wouldn't be surprised if in the next few days they started being so popular.

The first few classes finished and a small break started. He looked around the place to see if he could see any of them around the halls, thankfully he saw Cordis passing around a corner, he decided to go greet him before the next lesson began.

"Hey Cordis! How's it going?" Issei asked in a friendly manner, despite not getting to know him much. He overheard his conversation with Monika and the others during their first meeting, and felt that they could be decent friends thanks to their similar interests in video games and such.

"Uh? Oh it's you, Hyoudou." Cordis greeted him with a pretty calm expression, it did however remind Issei about the fact that none of the members of the club seemed to have a surname or at least they seemed like they'd prefer being referred to with their first name.

"So, did you make the poem?" Issei initiated with some small talk to get the conversation going.

It seemed to work as Cordis replied to him "Yeah, honestly, I didn't know what to write, I went through many different topics and meshed them all together, the results seemed decent enough for me to show it to the others."

"I see, well, it's hard doing it for the first time, I know the girls won't be too hard on it, especially since it's meant for fun!" Issei tried being optimistic with it, mostly because he himself was sure that it would work out for him since he had many poems created.

"Mmm, maybe you're right, I'll just get going then, the bell is about to ring so we should get to our corresponding classes." Cordis gave a small smile as he appreciated that Issei tried to see the good side of things, while departing from their conversation, it seemed like no one else noticed Issei or Cordis talking or at least no one who would start accusing Cordis of being affiliated to the Perverted Trio.

As Issei saw Cordis slowly disappear in the masses of students, he could only help but still feel a bit jealous about the guy.

Not just that, he himself felt like his interactions with him seemed a bit forced, be it because of his own reputation as the Perverted Beast of Kuoh or because Cordis just simply didn't want to talk to him.

He wished to get closer to him and the others, it was the least he could do to truly fit into this club.

As he continued walking back to his classes, he stopped for a moment. " Since when did I start thinking like this? "

He scratched the back of his head, not really understanding why he even thought much about what others saw him as. " I guess writing poems does weird stuff to you. " He sighed.

The last class finally concluded and many of the students started packing their stuff to go to either their corresponding club or home.

In Issei's case, he was about to pack and go to the Literature Club until his two friends arrived.

It seemed as they came to ask to hang out again. "So Issei, how about we go to check at the bookstore to see if there is anything new we could buy?" Matsuda inquired.

He seemed pretty relaxed as today's class finally came to an end, he and Motohama were waiting for his answer.

"Oh, uh, sorry but I'm going somewhere else today." He excused himself.

Right, he forgot to tell anyone he was now in another club, this was gonna take awhile to take care of.

"Really? What are you doing then? Is it the game you've been playing last night?" Motohama said surprised. "Dude, mind if you tell me which one it is, it seems to be fun if it can get you that addicted to the game."

To him, the idea of the trio not doing their usual shenanigans was akin to drifting apart from the brotherhood.

"Well, ehm, you see, I kinda joined a club now." He responded truthfully, not expecting them to really believe him, these three were blacklisted in most clubs thanks to their perverted acts.

"Oh really? And what club may that be?" A new voice came from behind the two boys, it was Aika Kiryuu, she must have overheard the conversation and decided to join in.

The two other boys seemed on edge the moment she entered the conversation, in Issei's case, he was just too tired to really care.

"The Literature Club." He bluntly answered, there was no real reason to lie about it, if anything he could just pull out the poems he has made to prove it.

"Wait, there's a Literature Club in the Academy?" Motohama asked as he himself was confused.

There indeed was never a Literature Club despite one existing now for mysterious reasons, so he wasn't surprised about the fact his friend was confused over the existence of such a club.

"Well. it does exist, but it was pretty small to really be known by many, I think only the Student Council really knew about it." Kiryuu explained, she seemed to be knowledgeable, although that did bring up another question, how the hell did she know it existed?

As she continued, she said something that activated the boys' jealous system. "Oh by the way, it is composed of only women from what I've seen, so I must say, are you thinking of making it your harem?"

That comment somewhat annoyed Issei knowing that it was meant for Cordis, the amount of attention they gave him made it pretty obvious, and he didn't like that.

"You really think we're gonna believe it? Listen, we know Issei enough to see that there is no way he could have joined it, he's probably bluffing." Matsuda seemed confident in his answer but it did irritate Issei a bit.

"Like seriously, it took me a long time to finally get into the Photo Club, and that was only because I could take good photos of girls." Matsuda revealed.

While Matsuda kept talking, Issei pulled out the Well Written Poem he made yesterday from his backpack.

Oddly enough, after waking up again, the poems started morphing into something that wasn't just a sheet of paper, the Good Grade one he made turned into a clean sheet of paper. It however lacked any of the lines or stains it had from when it was still an old notebook paper.

The Great Grade poem on the other hand turned into a small notebook with a hard cover and had various trinkets decorating it, most of which were bookmarks and stickers with notes on them, the poem itself was small, and he actually realized that there were some very sexy drawings on the rest of the pages.

Lastly, the Poem of the Black Swan became a genuine book that was incredibly thin. It turns out when he didn't have control of his body, it made a 5 page poem, which, while he doesn't know much about poems, knew that it was a bit overkill. Which further made him curious as to what it actually was about.

"Here's the one I've written yesterday, it took me a long time to actually finish it, hence why I was awake at night." Issei stated as he dropped the small notebook on his table.

While his friends looked at it, Kiryuu took it and opened it to start reading.

A few minutes passed and she suddenly closed it, she then proceeded to ask Issei a question. "Have you ever thought of becoming a screenwriter?"

"Uuuh, no? Why do you ask?" Issei asked in confusion, this was just a simple poem, what the hell was inside that made her say that?.

"Well, because if all porn had this kind of writing, I think it would make a fortune, this shit is better than all the smutty books that you can buy near here." Kiryuu vulgarly expressed, surprising the perverted trio.

Oh right, the Well Written poem was about erotica, maybe he shouldn't show that to the club.

"Issei, you bastard how the fuck did you get in the Literature Club?!" Motohama and Matsuda cried out loud as they were completely taken over by their jealousy. They both grabbed Issei by the shirt as they shook him, making him feel dizzy.

"Wait the pervert got in a club? What kind of club would allow him in?" The screams of his friends were loud enough to get the attention of other students, some of which were Murayama and Katase, they all started either whispering to themselves or trying to ask him questions.

"The club was low on members, I got interested in it and got in easily." Issei tried clearing any questions that would come up, since this seemed his chance to make it less of a big deal.

"Well I am surprised about that, I've also looked at the members and the 4 girls in it are smoking hot, you must have a lot of fun just hanging out with them." Kiryuu revealed as she took out her phone that had photos of each member, which, again, begs the question on how she got them.

"ISSEI, YOU LUCKY BASTARD!" Motohama and Matsuda completely went berserk after seeing the photos, which made him hop out of his seat and sprint out of the class' door, all the while the rest of the students looked in confusion while the duo of perverts attempted to try and catch up to him.

"Sooooo, you think we can join the Literature Club?" One of the students asked his friend.

"Dude, we're having a match next week and you're thinking of dipping out? Not cool, man."

"Hey, didn't Kiryuu say that he wrote well? Maybe that's why he was able to join!" Another student suggested, making many of the students there either think it was true or that it was false.

Unknowingly this would be the first Justice point he'd get aside from the ones he had from Poem of the Black Swan.

"Damn it, I think I need a drink." Issei stopped running moments ago after looking at each corner to see if the coast was clear. He went to the closest Vending Machine and bought a can of Cola.

He was already tired enough, there was no point in making himself even more tired, perhaps a bit of sugar would help him stay awake.

Making his way to the club, he realized that the hall was pretty quiet, it seemed like the club was far away from the other ones.

Opening the door he saw that only a few members were already in the room, so he took the closest desk he could find and sat down while waiting for Monika, Cordis and Sayori.

He took out Poem of the Black Swan and looked around, he saw Yuri reading a book while Natsuki was rummaging through the club room's closet. He could barely see her thanks to her petite stature.

That being said, he did check her out for a bit.

Surprisingly, he decided to stop to go check on the menu again, this time however, he saw as his Justice went up by 1, he was confused as to what had caused this, but didn't mind it as it was a good thing.

As more and more members came in, only Monika seemed to be missing. At this point, Cordis decided to sleep while waiting.

Issei looked at Sayori for a moment, oddly enough, she simply stood in front of Cordis' sleeping body with a serene look, though a smile, it did seem to have a different feel to the one he expected from such a cheery girl like her.

Shortly after Monika ended up entering the room, a few minutes later Cordis woke up only to see Sayori in front of him.

Issei realized he still hadn't finished drinking his Cola, perhaps from distracting himself with other stuff.

While drinking it he took his attention to Cordis and Sayori again as the former helped keep the latter's look checked while listening to them talk.

"Why do you think you don't have a boyfriend yet?" Asked Cordis.

Issei clenched his soda can with frustration over how dense Cordis seemed to be. " It's because she's interested in you dumbass, I may not have any romantic experience, but this Romance story just screams cliche and generic. "

Issei categorized all the other members, Cordis was the protagonist, Sayori was the childhood friend Deredere, Natsuki was the loli Tsundere, Yuri was the beautiful Dandere... but Monika? He couldn't really put his finger on any that he could remember.

" These two are pretty close. " He mentally noted.

It was pretty obvious from how close they acted with each other, however, he knew that Cordis simply saw her as his friend, it was typical for the childhood friend to lose after all.

As Issei took a sip of his crumbling can of cola, he then suddenly heard Sayori say. "It means that my boobs got bigger again."

Upon hearing that phrase Issei completely spit out his soda due to how surprising that sentence was. This action was not ignored as the others noticed him and looked at him.

Cordis was completely red while Sayori sheepishly smiled, Yuri looked over her book but quickly got back to hiding her face behind the book to avoid any kind of interaction or perhaps even ask, Natsuki hit her head with the club room's closet as she was startled by the noise, she looked back and glared at Issei.

"You're cleaning that" Natsuki commented as she got a broom and gave it to Issei.

"... Not a mop?" Issei asked.

"... Shut it." She continued glaring.

While cleaning up the mess he made, he continued eavesdropping on the two, wanting to face palm due to the obvious hints Sayori was giving of which Cordis either ignored or was too dense to realize.

At this point, he just felt bad for Sayori. If only he had a childhood female friend like her, he'd absolutely accept her feelings.

Then again, he did say that he'd accept any love confession from any girl, but he rejected it the moment it truly happened, perhaps he should hold his tongue when it came to that sort of hypothetical scenario.

After cleaning the mess, Monika decided that now was the perfect time to show our poems. Issei had Poem of the Black Swan in hand, while looking around to see who to share it with.

He saw as some of them were a bit more reluctant to pull them out, he noticed the different quality of paper and wondered if Artistic Appraisal could give him a description on them.

Issei saw as Yuri completely blended into the background, standing up and still meshing with the blue sky and the curtains made her look serene and natural, he immediately went towards her to show his poem.

It was totally not because she had the biggest breasts in the club.

"Hey Yuri, I saw that you still didn't have anyone to share your poem with, so mind if I become your partner for this current sharing?" Issei asked nicely as he knew Yuri was quite shy.

"Uhm, sure, please give me yours first then." As she put her hand in front of her, Issei gave her the poem, he was really nervous, he did not know if it would work or if it was even good the poem could be too graphic or too dark to really be enjoyed, but his thoughts were cut short at the sudden loud sound of his notebook being closed aggressively, he looked at Yuri's expression waiting for a reaction.

"This... is quite the complex poem, it's really long I must say, but the meaning behind each single verse has so many different ways of interpreting them, though chaotic, it also seemed quite well written, I am quite impressed, the style doesn't change even if it was a mess and you're able to mix various rhymes, this isn't your first time writing, right?" Yuri said as she seemed quite surprised over the poem, she waited for an answer as he started to respond.

"Actually, it is my first time writing, I just didn't know how good it would be but, I guess it must be good if it impressed you?" Upon hearing this Yuri's eyes looked sadder as if it was something she didn't want to hear, this confused Issei, but before he could ask what was wrong, Yuri took out her poem.

"Here's mine, I hope it's good, sorry if the writing is a bit of a mess, I hope you can give some insight on the poem." Yuri gave me her poem with a forced smile, looking at it, he had to admit that the writing was incredibly stylized to the point it was hard to read. He ended up activating Artistic Appraisal.

Item

Poem Ghost under the light

Grade: Good

Description: This poem is meant to express Yuri's love for Cordis, as the Streetlight, represents Cordis, while sickening blue-green represents Sayori and Monika, as they are seen as the biggest threat for his love, Natsuki is omitted as she is seen as a non threat, the flicker represents the interaction between both of them.

Well, Issei would have never thought of that, it seemed like the girls were indeed going for Cordis' Love, while he was here to play as a supporting character, truthfully, he couldn't but feel jealous, but in a way, thinking about just making connections with others was a breath of fresh new air.

Having friends outside of Motohama and Matsuda was a plus, he knew that there was the off chance that they ended up stopping hanging out due to choosing different careers.

Yet... what about him? He never really thought about what to do in the future. He temporarily frowned, to which Yuri took as a bad sign.

"So, how do you think it was? Was the calligraphy too much of a mess?" Yuri said anxiously, she was starting to feel a bit nervous as she awaited Issei's answer.

"Well, uh, the calligraphy is beautiful, but yes it is a bit hard to understand." He chuckled while saying this to first calm her down a bit.

He proceeded to ask a bigger question. "Yuri, did you by any chance find your special someone?"

"Wha- What?!" She got completely embarrassed over the question as she realized Issei had caught on to the meaning, but she quietly told him her response "Ye-yes, but please don't tell anyone."

"I won't, don't worry I'm not the kind of person to meddle into a girl's relationship." This was true he fucking hated it when some bastard decided to sabotage a perfect couple, well in this case it may not be perfect, but the point still stands.

Just as they finished, Issei couldn't help but cry in his thoughts, he blew it, not like he even had a chance to get with Yuri, but he really fucked up his interactions with her.

They then decided to switch partners, this time his partner was Natsuki, while Yuri ended up with Cordis. Issei looked at Natsuki as she seemed to still be cautious around him, it didn't really bother him much, but right now he needed to break the ice.

"Here's my poem, let's just get this over with." He bluntly dropped his poem on the desk while waiting for her to pick it.

Out of all the members, right now Natsuki was the one that he liked the least, not because she was small or lacked developed features, but rather because of her personality.

"Ugh fine, I'll do it, but not because I want to." At this point he didn't know if this was her Tsundere personality or if she really didn't like him, but Issei waited a bit to see what she would say.

"It does seem like those fairytales with a moral of the story kind of thing." Natsuki read through the poem as she flipped to the next page.

She then continued commenting about it. "You know, it does remind me of the ugly duckling a bit, but instead of accepting others for who they are, it is about accepting oneself for who they are and stop pretending to be something else."

As she finished reading it she handed it back to Issei. "It's surprisingly good, I must say, while it isn't my kind of story, it does make me want to ask, is there by any chance something you want to talk about?"

Silence reigned as Issei was trying to find his words to answer, Natsuki quickly cleared any misunderstanding by quickly adding. "N-Not that I care much, but there has to be somewhere where you gained this sort of emotions come from."

Surprised by her hospitality, he responded by lying. "I don't think so? It was really late for me when I wrote it so I didn't really think about it much, I simply wrote what I felt was good."

He couldn't find any other way of telling her. Natsuki's comments about his story did give him some understanding of the book, but not enough to really see the entire thing.

"Well no matter, I guess I have to give you mine now then" Natsuki looked away as she gave her poem to him, just like with Yuri he decided on using Artistic Appraisal on it.

Item

Poem Eagles Can Fly

Grade: Good

Description: The poem is straight forward, it expresses a person's inability to do things when others accomplish many things.

" That was quite a short description. " Issei then gave the poem back, they didn't really exchange words after that.

Issei simply looked at her face as she supported her face with her arm as she looked at Cordis and the others, he couldn't help but find her cute.

As they waited for the rest of them to finish, it looked like Cordis didn't really get the meaning of Yuri's poem, this time Issei didn't blame him, he too couldn't understand it if it wasn't for the system's help.

Changing partners again, this time Issei partnered with Monika, as she went up to him while smiling, Issei felt himself getting a bit nervous, this was the Literature Club president and the girl that Issei knew the least of, but also one of the ones that he found more attractive.

"So, I've overheard from the other two that you've brought quite the poem." Monika initiated the conversation as she closed the gap between them. "I hope that it does live up to what they've said, mind if I take it from your hands?"

As she grabbed the book, Issei felt as if he let go of it without much objection, nervously waiting for her to finish reading it.

Once she finished reading it she commented. "This is quite good! And you said this is your first time writing, right? Maybe you should join a writing competition some day, I know you'll make the club proud."

Monika closed the notebook while taking out her own. "Here's mine, it may be worse than yours but I do hope you still enjoy it." The interactions were swift and Issei kept quiet, as he simply marveled at her beauty.

He realized what he was doing and quickly activated his skill.

Item

Poem Hole in Wall

Grade: Great

Description: Curiosity killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back, with this epiphany it now knows more than what it is supposed to know, just as it looked through the hole, the other side stared back.

"That is strange." Issei thought. He didn't understand anything that was written.

Perhaps it was possible that the higher grade the poem, the less straightforward it was. Poem of the Black Swan's description had a last part that he still couldn't figure out.

He was sure there was meaning behind it, just like any other poem, he just needed to figure it out. Just like he did with Well Written Poem, which had an explanation that was too out of his field to understand at first, but gave him an idea of what it was possibly showing to others.

"I don't get this one." Issei said nonchalantly as he really didn't want to think much of it, it was just a poem, he could get more ideas the more poems he read, perhaps he'll finally understand in the future what Monika wanted to convey with this poem.

"Mmm, well that wasn't really what I was looking for, do you have any feedback then?" Monika seemed a bit disappointed with the answer.

"Not much, I don't really know about poems, I am just as surprised about how well the one I wrote turned out." Issei wholeheartedly responded.

He wondered if he needed to start actually studying literature to go forward, Epistemophobic's Nightmare wouldn't cut it with its drawbacks, and it felt too much of a cheat.

Issei really questioned what he wanted, he originally expected to use the Writer's System and its abilities to the fullest, yet here he was, feeling like he didn't accomplish anything because of it.

Once again, he was confused as to why he was acting like this, it was as if something was telling him that this was not the way to things.

They then switched partners once again, this time his partner was Sayori, while she was the first one Issei talked to, she was the one that he didn't expect much from, especially since the poem was created this morning.

"Mind if I read yours first? It might be faster this way since I don't know how long reading mine might take." He asked.

She proceeded to accept it. "Sure! You seem to have gotten the hang of it!" She quickly gave me her poem which was on a badly ripped piece of paper from a notebook.

I proceeded to use Artistic Appraisal yet again to see what the poem was about.

Item

Poem Dear Sunshine

Grade: Good

Description: The sunshine represents Cordis as he is the one who helps her the most, there is a hinted thought of suicide en the last few lines as if it weren't for Cordis, Sayori would have ended her life, bringing upon her to an endless slumber.

Issei remained frozen as he finished reading the description, he glanced at Sayori for a moment, who was smiling at him.

Finding out that her smile was fake despite being so genuine... It made him uneasy, but more than anything, it made him sad.

" This... I did not expect this. " Issei was now really worried about Sayori.

This poem cemented that this story was more than a generic romance story, the hidden messages in these poems would have easily gone unnoticed until it was too late had it not been for Artistic Appraisal.

He noticed that he kept Sayori waiting for too long for his response. "I-it is quite nice! Especially for something made this morning" Issei lied to not alarm anyone.

He knew that making a scene right now wouldn't be very wise, he planned on telling this to either Cordis as it seemed like he was the strongest anchor or helping her out himself.

"Aw, you don't need to flatter me!" Sayori rubbed the back of her head as she proceeded to pick up my poem.

"I guess it's my turn to read yours." She took the book as she proceeded to read, but as more time passed the silence became more present between them.

Issei started to get concerned and was about to ask her about it, but then as soon as he opened his mouth he noticed Sayori's expression.

Tears started dropping on the table,she rubbed her eyes to clear her eyesight.

At this point Issei was alarmed. "Hey Sayori are you alright?" He got closer to her, kneeling beside her while waiting for a reply.

"Ye-yeah I'm fine, just give me a moment." The tears still didn't stop flowing as they both noticed that the other members were starting to look at the two of them.

Reacting quickly, Sayori stood and went toward the door to exit before saying "I'll be back for a bit everyone, I-I just need some time to calm down."

As the door closed yet again, the lack of any following sound was awkward, and so, Issei said. "I'll go check on her, I'll be back soon as well."

Issei quickly stood up to follow her, as he felt guilty over something he was not expecting, with the poem still in hand, he looked at it momentarily. "Just what was written in this poem to make her cry like that?"

As he made his way through the halls, he made his way outside the academy.

Issei didn't know just how far or how long Sayori had been walking, but he continued looking for her.

He finally found her, she was sitting on a bench while holding her legs together looking down, her eyes were red and puffy, a clear signal that she had been crying for a while now.

He slowly went up to her and asked her again "Do you need to have some alone time or do you want to talk about it?"

"No, I think I am fine now." She calmed down a bit but didn't seem to stop hugging herself, she then proceeded to talk to him. "The poem was... too emotional, I felt like I was the black swan really."

Issei looked at her with an understanding look and kept silent, he didn't know what to do, but the least he could do was to listen to her talk about it, it would also help him know more on Poem of the Black Swan.

"I sometimes wonder what meaning I have for living. I felt comfort when seeing others happy, so I kept everyone like that, but it is sometimes too much for me to handle." Mentioned Sayori.

She then continued. "I want to be loved, but if I can't even do something as simple as keeping others happy, then I don't deserve it."

"Cordis has always been there with me to fix my problems, but now it feels like it is hindering his relationship with the other girls, I don't know if I should feel guilty for taking all of his attention, or happy that he's so willing to be by my side, it confuses me to the point it's making me crazy."

As soon as she finished telling him everything, it was Issei's turn to help her out "Sayori, if I could give you a piece of advice, you're being too selfless, there is nothing wrong with being a bit selfish if you want to be loved."

Issei didn't truly know how to help her but if anything he was actually willing to activate Second Take and try again. "There is also something else that I would advise you about, don't let Cordis go just because you feel like you're hindering him, just like you, he would be generous enough to spend his time with you without feeling any regrets, you'll never know when they truly are gone."

The last part that Issei told about was more of a personal experience, he hasn't seen his childhood friend for over a decade and he misses hanging out with him.

"I've read your poem and I know that you've thought about it, I don't know if you've tried it, but maybe trying to go to a therapist could help a bit, just know that everyone would be devastated if anything happened to you" He reassured.

Issei was a bit hesitant about saying the next line but he needed to make sure Sayori wouldn't try anything rash "Think about how Cordis would feel, if you truly want to continue with this charade, then at the very least try to unburden yourself a little, not always will you be able to help everyone, sometimes you will be forced to step back for a moment, at that is alright, because none of us are able to do everything perfectly."

"You deserve to be loved, you're trying your best to help everyone, and you deserve to be rewarded for it, and again, there is nothing wrong with being selfish and showing others that you are not okay." Finishing with the last sentence Issei hoped that what he said was enough to help Sayori cope for a bit.

A few minutes passed waiting for Sayori to respond, Issei was awaiting her answer as he wasn't sure if what he said was even correct.

"I appreciate the sentiment." Sayori started to show her smile again as she finally stopped gazing at the ground. "I'll try my best to follow your advice."

She then stood up from the bench and walked towards the academy, only to turn around and ask Issei with a big smile "Now, shall we go back to the club room?"

Issei truthfully didn't know if she was putting up her fake personality or if the advice helped her. Just then as he stood up, the system notified him of something new.

A new image has been added to the Gallery

Cherry Blossom

Issei looked at the image for a bit, it made him feel warm, that smile made him want to believe that he actually helped her, and now that he knew about this concerning matter, he wanted to be her confidant.

Though he lamented the fact that she had her eyes on Cordis, he accepted that. If anything, he would have at the very least, this special bond with her.

He then quickly rushed towards Sayori's side to get back to the club, Issei started to feel calmer as he seemed to have done the correct thing.

As they made their way to the club room, they both opened the door, only to see Natsuki and Yuri arguing. Cordis was in the middle silently listening as it seemed like they were fighting over him. Sayori quickly put herself in the middle to try and stop the fight.

Apparently this was the first time this had happened, Issei knew exactly why, the protagonist was a huge factor here, so when multiple love interests were in the same room, it usually ended up like this.

Once again, he couldn't help himself from glaring at the fellow male member of the club.

It seemed as if they had finished sharing poems, which made him wonder what Cordis' poem was about. In the end Issei didn't really care since usually the protagonist was quite bland.

He totally wasn't still jealous.

They all bid farewell as Cordis and Sayori went back together to their houses, although Yuri and Natsuki didn't end up apologizing to each other, they did seem a bit guilty over their argument, while everyone else went alone. Issei felt exhausted as he was not expecting any of today's events.

He noticed that the Writer's System had been silent for the whole time, but then a notification showed up.

Quest #2

Work of Art

Condition: Show a Good grade poem at the Club

Failure: You are unable to show a Good grade poem

Completed!

Rewards: Relationship Menu Option Unlocked

A new option had been unlocked from the menu and this one seemed more related to Dating Simulators. This time Issei was anxious over how it would look, since the system seemed to be incredibly simplistic.

He waited a bit to see what the next quest would be, a few seconds later another panel showed up.

Quest #3

Friendly Bonding

Condition: Increase your Relationship with a Character to 50 at the end of the next day

Failure: You do not increase your Relationship with a Character to 50

Accept

It seems like this time it will be about the Relationship section, perhaps a tutorial of sorts. Issei didn't know if this could lead to a romantic route or if this was simply just friendship. He then switched to the Help section in hopes for an explanation of the new option.

Relationships can be either Friendship or Romantic, the first bar next to the character represents friendship, while the second bar represents romantic feelings.

"This might be the shortest explanation yet." Issei didn't have much to add, since it looked like it was going to work similarly if not identical to most Dating Simulators.

Relationships

Story 1

Cordis: 12/100 - 0/100

Monika: 20/100 - 0/100

Natsuki: 15/100 - 0/100

Sayori: 40/100 - 0/100

Yuri: 23/100 - 0/100

Well, as always the menu was incredibly simplistic, Issei guessed that just comforting Sayori helped a lot in increasing their bond, seeing Cordis have a low score was both expected and not at the same time, they may not have interacted much, but they were still pretty amicable.

The other three seemed more in the middle, he assumed that Yuri had more due to him understanding her message in the poem, and his reputation hurt his bond with Natsuki.

He noticed that it said Stories 1, meaning that this could not be the only time he took part in a story, he wondered what other stories could he enter, and if he could do so while completing another one.

He then realized that Cordis also had a romance bar, which Issei decided to completely ignore as he really did not want to enter in a relationship with another guy, he didn't swing that way after all.

In the end, he spent grinding his Temperance stat by creating more poems, this time he didn't go for another Magnum Opus Grade poem, since he didn't know if he could take the pain again. Instead he'd spend his time creating Great Grade poems.

As night fell Issei decided that it was enough and went to sleep, awaiting the next day and starting the new quest.

Yet, he couldn't help but worry over Sayori, and what she would do in the future.

(A/N)

Uuuh, I can explain, so instead of working on The Grimm Emperor, I just had to take advantage of this rush of want to write, so I continued with this story.

Now this is important for me to say, you know that part about depression and trying to cheer Sayori up? Well, you need to know that I am NOT a professional and would not recommend you taking my advice about it. Was it meant to be correct? ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY NOT, it was more meant to show a much more realistic side of someone trying to help out while not knowing how to.

I've been told that I am good at listening and giving advice but I don't really buy it despite it seemingly helping them a lot.

The poem's meaning is my interpretation of them, don't take them as fact, poems are meant to be interpreted by the readers, so it's normal if it is different for each one.

Lastly, the image that I've used in this chapter, I have no idea of the original author, since I just took it from google.

Just like I promised, I would talk about scrapped concepts and such that would have appeared in the last chapter, that being the first one.

Originally this wasn't meant to be a Gamer fic, instead a Time Loop one, but I realized that the first few stories didn't really mesh well with it, and so it was moved as part of a skill, making the Gamer System what I ended up with.

The Magnum Opus section was supposed to be Issei's first death, but after giving it a bit of thought concluded that it would be unnecessary and would take the bigger death's impact.

The Well Written poem was supposed to be called Poor Screenwriter's Book, another reference to Lobotomy Corporation but thought it was too many important items for a single chapter, and it also had a WAYYY different finality than the Well Written poem.

Cordis was originally gonna be called Kordian or Corazon, but the former was scrapped as it was apparently a polish musician's name iirc and Corazon was just too chained to One Piece.

So that's it for the current scrapped concepts. I'll see y'all when I decide to update again.