I turned reality into a romantic comedy.

Gu Lingguo rushed up to Chen Junqian in one breath, and casually picked up the glass jar containing origami cranes and little stars from the bookshelf, waving it in front of him:

"Reality and the world of anime are different. I realized this a long time ago, but just like my desire to cosplay characters, I can understand my brother's feelings."

After Lin Mu finished speaking, Gu Lingguo seemed to have entered into some kind of Khan's grand military review, and continued to analyze each person for Chen Junqian:

"Then there's the younger sister. Ah, this is even more of a disaster. The last person in real life who pursued this kind of relationship broke their parents' legs and sent them to the orthopedic hospital. But considering that Xiaoxi is still young and doesn't understand what her brother is pursuing since she's not a fan of anime, this superficial game should be able to continue for a few more years."

"Xiao Xi is the same age as you, isn't she?"

"That's different. I'm very mature mentally. Don't you believe me, brother?"

"...I believe you, okay?"

"That works, and then next up is Sister Zhu Wenyun. Brother just came back from a trip to Changsha with her. Although she seems like the kind of senior student in the literature department, because Brother himself is so mature that he doesn't seem like someone his age, he actually seems a little cautious in front of you. Surprisingly, he seems very thoughtful and sensitive, which is quite anime-like. However, as the female lead in a romantic comedy... it still feels a bit strange."

What's strange about it?

"If I had to say, probably no one would consider 'School Days' a romantic comedy. Although that's just my personal opinion at the moment, I think Sister Wenyun has the potential to be one. Being too sensitive and meticulous is never a good thing. A girl like me, who eats and drinks as usual and never takes things to heart, is much better."

After talking about Zhu Wenyun, Gu Linguo brought up Shen Nianqiu, who shared some similarities with her:

"Then there's my brother's older sister. The fact that she's actually a super pretty girl online is quite a romantic comedy development. However, Sister Shen's personality is even worse. I've read Sister Wenyun's new book and heard about her own experiences from Xiaoxi. Girls who grow up in this kind of family can sometimes be a bit extreme. But the most important thing is that she's not even in Guoning right now. What kind of female lead is a romantic comedy who can't even appear in public?"

It was as if she were truly empathizing with Chen Junqian himself. At this point, Gu Lingguo helplessly shrugged, finally shifting the topic to her current girlfriend:

"So, in my opinion, the one most likely to fulfill my brother's wish is actually Sister Xu Youwei. I always feel that she is actually easier to fool than Sister Lin Mu in some ways. Otherwise, the two of them wouldn't have such a good relationship. Many times, she seems like the typical arrogant young lady, but now she's basically just spoiled. I guess that's thanks to my brother."

Chen Junqian sensed a hint of probing in Gu Linguo's words, and he remained noncommittal, responding with a term from the world of anime and manga:

"After all, people in this era are more willing to like this kind of delicate rather than arrogant personality. The kind of arrogant or violent female tsundere characters that were popular before might be disliked now. I think Yoyo is very cute now. From this point of view, she is indeed the most suitable girl to be the female lead in a romantic comedy."

After hearing Chen Junqian's words, Gu Lingguo clicked her tongue almost imperceptibly, her eyes lowered for a moment before quickly looking up again, her face still showing the same joy she had when the Khan was reviewing his troops, and her tone was equally lighthearted:

"So, does brother want to do those things with Sister Youwei?"

"If Lin Guo refers to classic scenes in romantic comedies, then at least things like riding bicycles together or sharing an umbrella on a rainy day must have been done, of course, not like what she did in Nozaki-kun."

As he spoke, Chen Junqian pointed to the anime screen on the computer, his tone leisurely.

"Putting aside romantic comedies, it feels like something couples would do."

"But I'm just a chuunibyou (middle school syndrome) person who wants to be the male lead in a romantic comedy."

After this back-and-forth exchange for a while, Gu Lingguo, realizing she couldn't get a definite answer from Chen Junqian, had no choice but to puff out her cheeks and temporarily give up.

“Even in terms of shamelessness, my brother has already mastered the essence.”

"Being shameless is better than being a blockhead whose favorability rating refreshes with each character's episode, right? Or does Lin Guo think I'm better suited to be the male lead in a romantic comedy?"

"No... you are not allowed to refresh the favorability rating with each individual unit."

Gu Linguo simply looked away and muttered quietly to herself:

"That would be going too far."

"So it's definitely better to be a little thick-skinned."

Standing up and stretching, Chen Junqian steered the conversation back to the message his partner had sent him through his sister when he was still in Changsha:

"Is Lin Guo planning to do cosplay again recently?"

"Yeah."

"Hey—"

"Ugh...chuunibyou is so disgusting."

Amused by Chen Junqian's deliberately drawn-out onomatopoeia, Gu Lingguo, who had been inexplicably downcast by his remarks, once again broke into a genuine smile and sat there looking at him, saying:

"Sister Wenyun said that my brother can put on makeup now."

"Yeah, I've been self-studying for a long time, so if Lin Guo does cosplay again, she won't have to wear the cosplay outfit and not be able to do makeup like last time. Actually, cosplay is a very demanding art form. It's one thing for Lin Guo to be cute, but it's another thing to make the cosplay accurate or beautiful."

As he spoke, Chen Junqian reached out his right index finger and gently poked her cheek.

"So I forgot to ask, what role will Lin Guo play this time?"

"Of course, it's a character from the romantic comedy that my brother has watched the most times. It's Kirisaki Chitoge from Nisekoi."

Well... now I can't really say that I watched that thing simply because it had so many ridiculously exaggerated romantic comedy plots, despite its nickname "Old Grudge Romance".

P.S.: Thank you for reading and subscribing.

Chapter 159: Lock, Key, and Agreement (Two-in-One)

As a well-known romantic comedy that has been dubbed "old tropes" by audiences, Chen Junqian could easily find a lot of romantic comedy achievements in it. After removing those achievements that had been achieved by chance or through his persistent persuasion over the past few years, such as "The Promise," "Let's Have a Study Session Together," and "Isn't This Position Too Terrible?", what's left for him and Gu Linguo is still a vast blue ocean, full of fresh achievements waiting to be triggered.

For example, the two of them are now preparing to replicate the opening scene of the animation.

[The transfer student girl with a piece of bread in her mouth]

On a morning when you're about to be late for school, you'll encounter a transfer student girl suddenly rushing out from around the corner, a piece of bread in her mouth—the moment of impact sends the bread flying, her uniform tie drooping, and as she touches you in a subtle way that defies any law of physics, the threads of fate intertwine. This is the classic opening of countless romantic comedies, and an unavoidable, destined encounter in countless reincarnations.

[Condition for achieving this: Achieve the above scenario with any heroine who is suited for romantic comedy]

Since it was originally a rehearsal beforehand, and Gu Lingguo herself never intended to cosplay in front of others, otherwise, no one could guarantee that the atmosphere at her home, which had finally improved, wouldn't be ruined again. After all, for a menopausal woman like Lin Su, seeing such outlandish costumes, wigs, and colored contact lenses would probably make her lose her temper and start going crazy without caring about anything else.

So the two of them were dressed casually, and after meeting up, they began to look for a suitable place in the streets and alleys of Guoning.

Thanks to Chen Junqian's familiarity with Guoning, finding such a small alley with corners and few people was a piece of cake. All other props were bread. Considering that the achievement itself did not impose many restrictions on the appearance of this thing, maybe eating a jianbing guozi, Taiwanese rice ball, water-baked flatbread, or egg pancake would also work to get by.

However, unlike Chen Junqian, who has developed a localized mindset over the years and tries to use localization techniques to pass off any classic Japanese romantic comedy elements as something else, Gu Linguo has a rather traditional approach to replication. Not only did she buy bread slices that looked exactly the same, but she also seriously prepared to spread jam on them. Later, Chen Junqian himself said that it would be difficult to wash off clothes, so she stopped with some regret.

"But the only thing we can replicate right now is probably bumping into something around a corner... Senior, don't expect me to actually be able to jump over this side of the wall like in the anime. I can't do that. In fact, if I could do that level, it would be quite appropriate for Raku to call Chitoge a female gorilla. Anyway, it would definitely be at a non-human level."

Gu Linguo, who already had a piece of bread in her mouth, spoke in a cute, slightly indistinct way. After muttering to herself for a while with her hands on her hips, she didn't care whether Chen Junqian heard her or not, and then jumped and hid around the corner. It seemed that she was going to try it out for the first time to see what it was all about.

"Three—two—one!"

Upon hearing the countdown, Chen Junqian pretended to run around the corner, though his actual speed was slower than walking. However, considering that in animations, male and female protagonists in similar situations are always shown in slow-motion close-ups, it was perfectly fine...

Just as he was thinking this, the girl rushed out from around the corner and bumped into his arms. However, even with her full strength, she couldn't knock down Chen Junqian, who had such good physical abilities. In fact, if he wanted to, he wouldn't even need to stumble.

Considering that the two of them were just acting, Chen Junqian cooperated by falling backward with the force from the other party, landing hard on his buttocks. While protecting vital parts like the back of his head, he slowly lay back until his upper body was completely in contact with the ground.

Frankly, if someone else had passed by at that moment, they would probably have subconsciously thought he was trying to scam them. After all, his actions were so smooth and fluid; he was hit and then immediately collapsed to the ground, almost wailing, "My elbow! My elbow! My herniated disc!"

However, Chen Junqian couldn't perform the "keeping the watch on time" act like Hao Jian and the old lady, because he was already carrying another person on top of him.

As it turns out, saying something and actually doing it are two different things. Or rather, in this scenario of a collision, the female lead's position was inherently more difficult than the male lead's. It's just that in romantic comedies, the male protagonist often has to lie there and wait for the "perks" to come to him, while the female lead has to consider many things, such as figuring out how to simultaneously push Newton back into his coffin while adjusting her own position to the most ambiguous and alluring spot in just a few seconds.

That's why, when Gu Lingguo tried for the first time, she first tried to tame the bread slice that was about to slip out of her mouth due to the force of the impact. Then, after Chen Junqian lay down, she deliberately moved her body up a little, trying to straddle his chest and abdomen. At the same time, she was thinking about whether she should bring her face closer or if it would be better to lift her buttocks up a little.

However, these actions obviously couldn't be completed in a few seconds. So, by the time Chen Junqian had finished posing, Gu Lingguo, sitting on him, was still shifting her legs, bending over, and supporting herself with her hands. It took her a while to finally achieve a strange posture that resembled both yoga and a push-up. After holding it for a few seconds, she gave up and lay directly on Chen Junqian, munching on her bread and complaining:

"I really don't know what position you have to fall in real life to achieve that position in anime where you just bury your senior's face under your skirt. That kind of action is just too inhuman. And do girls really wear skirts without safety shorts?"

As she spoke, Gu Lingguo, who was sitting up on Chen Junqian's lap, casually lifted her skirt slightly, revealing the edge of her safety shorts:

"Look, like this."

"...Let's put the skirt down first."

"No, no, according to the plot of a romantic comedy, you should subconsciously say the specific color you see now, and then I'll blindfold you and scream 'H!'"

"You said yesterday that my chuunibyou fantasy was to become the male protagonist of a romantic comedy. I think your chuunibyou fantasy is pretty much the same, Lin Guo."

"No, no, the male lead in a romantic comedy should have a female lead by his side, otherwise it would be too boring and pitiful for him to act out a one-man show, sweetie."

When the girl suddenly leaned over and touched his head, saying those exaggerated "yoshi yoshi" sounds like something out of a model opera, Chen Junqian couldn't deny that his mood lightened a bit. After all, he often felt a bit awkward when he did strange things on his own to get away with things and achieve the romantic comedy, just like she said. Now, having a girl willing to seriously accompany him to recreate these scenes one-to-one... was indeed a very good thing.

"But I still feel like something's missing."

After clowning around like that, Gu Lingguo stroked her chin with a serious expression and said this.

"What's missing?"

“Since I am the female protagonist, Kirisaki Chitoge, my brother should be Ichijo Raku. In other words, he needs to have that lock and key that represents the promise.”

As an important prop that runs through the entire work "Nisekoi", the lock that the male protagonist has carried with him since childhood is a prop for him to engrave shared memories, shared wishes and made a promise with a certain girl when he was a child. This suspenseful writing style of "whose key can open this lock" is also one of the secrets to the high popularity of this work.

As Gu Linguo said, the scene at the beginning of the animation where the protagonists bump into each other is not just for the sake of a model opera to bring the male and female protagonists together. It is essentially to introduce the promise. So it can indeed be said that, like the bread slice, it is a prop that must exist in order to replicate the scene.

"Should I ask one of those shops online that specialize in making these kinds of small souvenirs to customize one?"

"No, no, no, that's really inhumane, isn't it? Didn't my brother complain about it himself? It's such a big lock with a pointed tip. How did the male lead manage to keep it close to his body like a pendant? Just looking at it makes you wonder what if it poked someone."

After venting at length about the original work, Gu Lingguo finally revealed her true intentions, as if she had just laid bare her true colors:

"We don't necessarily have to completely imitate; we can have our own locks and keys."

"Stop, stop, stop. If I remember correctly, someone seems to have a spare key to my house right now. You already have something like that, do you want to ask me for another key? You've practically turned my house into a sieve, and you can't even find a lock with a key."

"I already said it, I took it from Xiaoxi. But if you really care about this, we can switch places. You can provide the key, and I can provide the lock. Hmm, good idea. How about my spare key?"

"It feels completely useless. Not to mention that you're the one who comes to my house more often, I can just knock on your door if I want to go to your house, or I can always climb over the balcony."

"Then let's switch to my room key? It's completely my personal space now, and Mom and Dad won't go in anymore. If my brother has the key, he can just open the door and go in whenever I'm not home and do whatever he wants..."

"It feels like the topic has completely gone off track. To be honest, the keys and locks in the anime are mainly props related to promises, and they are completely different from spare keys for the house and room doors."

After being relentlessly lectured by Chen Junqian, Gu Lingguo pouted, revealing a hint of dissatisfaction. She had clearly planned to use this as an excuse to legitimately hand over her room key, but this was the response she received. After a long pause, she nodded again and said:

"Let's put this matter aside for now. Once I've thought about what I want to promise you, we'll write it down on a little note and put it in a locked container, just like in the anime, okay?"

"Okay, that's settled then."

As he spoke, Chen Junqian glanced at the time on his phone again:

"I'm going to Mu Mu's house this afternoon."

"Oh."

Gu Lingguo remained silent, simply tearing off the bread she was holding and stuffing it into Chen Junqian's mouth before continuing to play the female lead in a romantic comedy, adopting an exaggerated tone of belated realization:

"Oh my god—I actually indirectly kissed my senior! How embarrassing!"

I'm going to Mumu's house this afternoon.

...It would have been great if he and Chen Junqian had met at the beginning of the first episode.

----------------------------------

"Qianqian, wait for me a moment, I'm looking for the keys—um, here they are."

Unlike in previous years, Chen Junqian is now being called to Lin Mu's house for one more reason: to help his childhood sweetheart, who feels she can't even write a proper diary, polish or revise the contents of her diary.

However, this is not a common task. After all, Mu Mu does not face the dilemma of not being able to write what she wants to write every day. Her daily life is usually very simple and easy. Moreover, every time she writes with Chen Junqian, she tries to cover up the truth by starting a new page. So, after half a year, Chen Junqian still has not been able to see the diary entries that Mu Mu wrote before. He can only be considered as having participated in part of Lin Mu's diary creation over the past six months.