An Impossible Game

I arrived at school, entered the classroom, sat in my seat, and thought.

(Yesterday’s earnings from the bakery were 100G… Considering the prices of items I can order from the home improvement store, I’m nowhere near living comfortably. I need to make money somewhere…)

While I was thinking about how to raise funds, it became time for class to start. When I looked around, Josette seemed to be here. Our eyes met for a moment, and Josette looked away.

Yesterday, too much had changed too quickly for me to pay attention in class, but maybe because I had a bit more breathing room today, I was able to listen.

(This is math… right??? The content is elementary-school level, isn’t it???)

What we were doing in class was two-digit addition. The teacher posed problems and randomly called on students to answer.

“Now then, this is a difficult one. What is 69 + 94? …Kent, answer it.”

I got called on.

“It’s 163.”

I answered instantly.

“What! Correct!”

“Wooo!”

A murmur spread through the classroom. How was that not a calculation you could answer right away?

Something was off… I felt uneasy.

Then the next class was language arts.

(There are hardly any kanji used in the text. And when kanji do appear, there are reading guides written above them.)

This, too, was elementary-school level.

Maybe out of consideration for commoners who worked in the mornings, the school day started quite late. Because of that, after two periods, it became lunch break.

(Ugh… I don’t have lunch…)

The school did have a cafeteria, but it cost money. With 0G on hand, I couldn’t use it. The bread I’d gotten yesterday was already gone—I’d eaten it during the night. I decided I’d save some of today’s portion for tomorrow.

It was painful to watch other people eating, so I went behind the school building where no one was around. Then I heard voices arguing back there. Curious, I went to check, and I saw Josette hurling insults at someone. When I looked at the other person, it was a thin, average-looking girl with light-brown hair and no distinctive features. Without a doubt, she was Rachel, the game’s female protagonist.

(If I remember right, early on she gets seen talking to the Prince, gets called behind the school building, and Josette says something like, “Someone like you talking to the Prince is shamelessly above your station.”)

“For someone like you to speak with the Prince is outrageously above your station.”

“Huh? He picked up a handkerchief I dropped, and I only talked to him a little…?”

Rachel shot back.

“You dare talk back? If I see you again, you won’t get away with it.”

With that, Josette left… but she was walking straight toward where I was.

(If I run now, it’ll be way too suspicious… What do I do…?)

While I was thinking, she was already right in front of me.

“Uh… hi.”

“You were watching that, weren’t you?”

“Yeah… well.”

Josette scanned the area and confirmed no one else was there.

“Could you not tell anyone about this?”

“Why?”

“If you do, my reputation will spread and my plan will be ruined…”

“What plan?”

“No more talk. This is hush money.”

Cutting me off, Josette took my face in both hands and pressed her lips against mine.

“Huh? Huh?”

“I’ve paid you properly, so keep your promise.”

With that, Josette ran off.

(How did it end up like this?)

Not understanding anything, I stood there, frozen. While I was like that, lunch break ended and afternoon classes began.

In the end, I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and none of the afternoon lessons went in.

Classes ended, and it was after school. Josette was already gone from the classroom.

I switched gears and decided to put my energy into my part-time job. When the shift ended, I received 200G and bread and went home.

Apparently it was 100G for the morning and 100G for the evening. Yesterday I’d only worked the evening, so I’d only had 100G.

(They could’ve counted it as morning work too…)

I ate the bread, pulled the aluminum thermal blanket over myself, and went to sleep.

The next morning, school was off, so I’d be working at the bakery all day.

“Good morning. I look forward to working with you today.”

“Morning. Same to you.”

“Morning, Onii-chan. Same to you.”

After the late-morning rush ended, while Marie was preparing extra dough, I asked something I’d been wondering about.

“When you make the dough, don’t you use yeast?”

“Yeast…?”

Marie didn’t seem to know.

“May I have a little dough?”

“Go ahead.”

She cut off a small piece of the dough she had been kneading and handed it to me.

“Please wait a moment.”

I went into the back and brought out the ordering device.

“Let’s see… found it. Instant dry yeast. One small packet is 40G.”

For now, I bought one packet—probably enough for a single batch—and came back.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. I’ll add this… knead, knead. That should do it. Could you bake this together with the others?”

“What did you put in?”

“Well, that’s a surprise.”

I answered with an intentionally teasing tone.

When the bread finished baking, Marie and Catherine stared in shock.

“It got… bigger.”

“It really did… It puffed up… maybe?”

The other bread came out the same shape it had going into the oven, but the dough I’d prepared had risen and swelled dramatically.

“Alright, try it.”

I had Marie and Catherine taste the puffed-up bread.

“What is this? It’s soft, and it’s delicious.”

“It’s true. I’ve never eaten bread this soft.”

I was pleased—the reaction was exactly what I expected. I tried the bread myself too.

“This turned out pretty good.”

“How did you make it?”

Marie questioned me, clearly eager to know the secret as a bread artisan.

“Simply put, I added an ingredient that makes the dough rise like this when you bake it. There seem to be a few options, but I tried the easiest one—you just mix it in.”

“So you can do something like that…”

They left the remaining yeast bread at the shop as free samples. Customers who came in, hearing it was a free taste, took a bite. Then their expressions changed in a way that was almost funny, and they started asking how much it cost. Marie explained it was a prototype and declined to sell it, but the customers’ interest was intense.

Marie asked where I had gotten the instant dry yeast.

I told her the purchase price, and she started calculating costs. After deciding it would work, she handed me money and asked me to secure enough for the day.

I returned home once, operated the device, used the money I’d been entrusted with to buy bulk instant dry yeast, and went back to the shop. Marie immediately used it to bake bread, and from the afternoon onward, yeast bread was lined up for sale.

Word about the prototype had spread from the morning, and in the afternoon more customers than usual crowded into the store. Even though the price was slightly higher than the bread they had sold before, it sold like crazy.

And so, Marie’s bakery took its first step toward growing into one of the most famous bakeries in the Royal Capital.