༺ Do It Yourself! ༻
Did we decide on a dress code for our outing or what?
When I saw Doah walking through the door, I saw her wearing the exact same outfit as mine.
“…Oh?”
As our eyes met, it was clear that we realized what was going on, and we let out an exclamation instead of a greeting.
“He… Hello?”
It wasn’t in the right order, but I greeted her first.
“Hello.”
At that moment, Doah also seemed to come to her senses as she ducked her head.
…How embarrassing.
We were clearly closer than back when we went out for our assignment, but why did I feel so embarrassed?
Maybe it was more awkward because meeting like this was unplanned.
“You know…”
Feeling that it was weird to just stand in front of the house, I opened my mouth.
“Yes?”
“Is the arcade far from here?”
“Ah! No. It’s only a fifteen minute walk from here.”
“Really? Is it this way?”
As I turned toward the direction of the bus stop, Doah followed behind me.
It was a quiet weekend afternoon.
Now, what would people think when they saw a similarly dressed man and woman walking side by side?
The answer was obvious.
Especially when there was a college nearby.
“Erm… Oppa…”
This time, Doah spoke first, maybe she was embarrassed to walk in silence.
“Yeah?”
“Have you played any kind of rhythm game before?”
“I think I did a little bit on my phone as a kid.”
“Which game?”
“There were notes falling from top and then we hit it like hitting piano keys.”
Looking back, it had been more than ten years since I played that.
“Is it Sonic Beat?”
“Ah, yeah. Did you play it too?”
Doah immediately answered as soon as she heard my description.
“Ah, I played it for quite a while. I even spent money to unlock the songs.”
“Really? I didn’t because I didn’t want to spend my allowance.”
“Well, most of the songs that were popular among the pros were paid songs.”
She walked proudly with her arms crossed.
Seeing Luka-tan in real life, puffing out her chest when she talked about the game she was so good at, was even cuter.
Being so short, she might feel like she was walking fast, but her stride was no different than my normal gait.
“The new game we’re playing today has a different feel than Sonic Beat.”
“Is it harder?”
“It depends. The basics are a bit different…”
Doah eagerly walked me through the basics of the game.
Most of it was stuff I’d already heard from the video I watched yesterday.
I tuned in to Doah’s explanation, pretending I was hearing it for the first time.
Eventually, we arrived at the arcade and went inside.
“It’s really been a fucking long time since I’ve been in an arcade.”
Standing in front of the fighting game I used to play with my friend, I was lost in nostalgia for a moment.
“Oppa, do you like that one?”
Doah asked as I fumbled around with the joystick and gave it a couple of flicks.
“Yeah. I used to bet on drinks with my friends.”
“…Were you good at it?”
“Not really… It’s embarrassing to talk about it. I always lost, so I literally became their drink shuttle.”1T/N: Drink version of the bullied bread shuttle.
Sigh… I tried so hard back then, thinking that maybe I’d won once if I were to try hard enough.
I smiled bitterly at the bittersweet memory.
In hindsight, that was such a stupid thing to do.
The asshole I was playing against was a fucking master.
“Then let’s play that later. I’m not good at it either.”
“You wanna bet?”
At the word ‘bet,’ Doah raised an eyebrow.
“Oppa. Even though I’m not an expert on fighting games, I’ve played a few from time to time.”
So, she really thought that I sucked at it after hearing my story, hm?
The thing was, my friend was a pro, I wasn’t actually bad at it.
“Hey. If you put it that way, I’m used to paying for the drinks.”
“Then thank you in advance~”
…Luka-tan.
You might not know about it, but I’ve already bought you boxes of drinks with the multiple donations I’ve given you.
I didn’t feel like giving you money in the real world too.
“Let’s exchange for the coins first.”
Doah stood in front of the money change machine and slipped a bill inside, making coins spill out of it.
“Here.”
Then, she put exactly half of the amount into my hand.
“…This much?”
She gave me ten of the 500 won coins.
“Oh. You’ll spend that much faster than you think. And if you play something other than rhythm games, it’ll run out even faster than that.”
I nodded bitterly, since I had never spent more than 3,000 won.
“The rhythm game machines are downstairs.”
As I followed Doah downstairs, I could hear all kinds of music.
There, I saw people who looked like pros.
Holy… How the hell did they do that?
I let out a hollow laugh as I saw them moving their fingers so quickly that I could only see their afterimages.
Well, it seemed the world really was a vast place, so no wonder there were all these OG pros.
“Oppa, this way.”
As I watched in awe, Doah, having stood in front of the device first, waved me over.
“First, press this to get started.”
A tutorial window popped up, and I did as I was told, pressing the buttons one by one.
“How is it? Did you get the hang of it?”
“I just need to press when I see the notes coming, right?”
“Try going at it with the mindset of matching the beat rather than seeing the notes coming.”
“Okay.”
As I inserted the 500 won coin and proceeded to the song selection window, I had a hard time managing my facial expressions.
“Why aren’t you choosing?”
“Ah… I don’t know which one seems more fun…”
Yeah, I lied.
There were too many songs I knew.
I expected there to be some anime-related songs since the machine was made by a Japanese company, but I didn’t expect it to be this many.
If anything, as an otaku, I was more shocked that I recognized all the songs on the page.
“I’ll try this one.”
I pressed on a song, thinking it was better to choose a song I knew than one I didn’t.
The music started, and notes began to flow on the screen.
“Oh… You’re doing better than when you were at the experience center that day.”
I wanted to reply, but I felt it was impossible to multitask when playing a rhythm game.
The buttons in front of me were drawing all my attention.
Ooo… This was the end of it.
The beat gradually got faster.
“Boku no koe ga~”
Unable to hold back, I hummed the song in a small voice.
The opening video was played in my mind.
This part was the scene where the heroine made her entrance, looking totally stunning, followed by other characters at once.
When the one-minute game was over, I looked at Doah with pride.
Even though it was a level 3 song, my score was an A.
I knew there was an S, an SS, and an SSS, but for a beginner, an A was enough.
It was a rare letter, I barely even saw it on my grade transcript.
“Good job.”
Doah smiled wryly at my reaction.
“Come on, what’s with that reaction? This is good enough.”
“What? I literally praised you just now!”
“Your face said otherwise.”
Doah turned her head slightly, seemingly getting her conscience pricked.
“By the way, Oppa. Do you know this song?”
“Why?”
“I think I heard you humming along.”
Oh, fuck. Han Taemin you idiot.
You shoulda held back, you absolute moron.
What the fuck were you even trying to do when you sang that?
I had been zealously cosplaying as a normie, so I really needed to get away from this situation somehow.
“Ah, my desk mate used to play the song everyday.”
“…This song?”
“He was someone who liked this kind of thing.”
“Aha.”
Doah nodded in understanding.
“Well, the song is famous, you know. It’s an opening song of a very famous anime.”
Yeah, I know.
I know it very well, in fact.
Like, I even had that anime’s merch in my house.
“I’m trying a harder one next.”
The song I chose for this time was level 5.
Certainly, it was faster than level 3, and I missed a lot of the notes.
“It’s hard.”
Due to me hitting the button unskillfully, my fingers were screaming in pain.
“There was this pattern on the song you tried previously.”
Standing in front of the machine, Doah spread her hand, which was so much smaller than mine.
“You can press on it easily if you do it like this.”
Doah explained as if she were an experienced instructor, but as I watched, I had a question.
“By the way, don’t you just need to press this with your pinky and index finger like this?”
“No. It’s impossible.”
“Why?”
“Because you can’t reach it, obviously.”
Doah spoke as if that was the truth of the world.
“No, no, YOU can’t reach it, not me.”
I smirked, doing the pattern Doah showed me with just three fingers.
“See? It works.”
When I did and succeeded, her eyes shook.
“…Why does it work?”
“Because your fingers are short.”
Similar to how having long fingers gave you an advantage in playing some musical instruments like piano and guitar, it was also the case with rhythm games, it seemed like.
“Wow… I followed you because you said you are a pro, but it seems like I can’t trust you with this…”
I felt like teasing her.
Out of obligation as a mischievous Pink Army, it was only natural to want to make fun of Luka’s dumbfounded appearance, right?
I tapped Doah on the shoulder as she stood there with a devastated look on her face. At that moment, she dropped her head.
“…yourself.”
“What?”
Her voice was so small, I couldn’t hear it properly.
“Ah, do it yourself, then!”
Her slightly flushed face was proof that I managed to get under her skin.
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