And with that, round one drew to a close. And with a new round came a new GM: Mashiron. And with a new GM came a new prompt:
[StroZero]
She set me up, that woman. Before I knew it, I’d already shouted out at the top of my lungs: “Oh, me, me! This is me!” It was almost like a reflexive response. It made me happy to know I had it, but I also cursed its existence. I felt it coming—the trap set up by Mashiron, the completely different prompts she’d given the other two, the total shellacking I was about to receive...
“Indeed, it is,” Tadasu-chan said.
“Mm-hmm. Like two peas in a pod,” Sensei said.
What? I thought, a little alarmed before confidence welled up within me, my love for StroZero gushing forth: “Right?! We’re like lovers!”
“L-Lovers?” Tadasu-chan said. “I’d always suspected, but so it is...”
“...Oh. Uh-huh! Yep, yep! You and her, lovers, yep!” Sensei said.
What happened next had nothing to do with Word Wolf. I went off on a tangent expounding my StroZero love.
“It’s love, pure and simple. Even now, when our bodies intertwine, I feel the same connection as I did the first time.”
“In...intertwine?” Tadasu-chan said before turning into a blubbering mess.
“Keep going! Expose the werewolf with the power of your love!” Sensei said.
The more I ejaculated love, the more it surged back into my heart. It was all made clear to me that day: why I had been born as a woman.
“I promise to love you, to comfort you, honor and keep you, both in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer, as long as I shall live! Take me to be your wife!”
Tadasu-chan squealed. “She proposed! She actually proposed! And how romantically as well! Every girl’s dream!”
“I did not think this would be the way I found out you had such a penchant for shojo tropes...” Sensei said.
I still had so much more left to say, but alas, time was not on my side. Mashiron cut in with a sharp, “And that’s time!”
Just like last round, we had to vote for who we thought the werewolf was, but... “Huh? I felt like we were all on the same page there.” Both Tadasu-chan and Sensei had seemed perfectly amenable to what I’d been saying, so... Who do I vote for?
“My vote’s in,” Tadasu-chan said.
“Same,” Sensei added.
“What?!” Apparently I’m the odd one out here?! Panicking now, I voted for Tadasu-chan because screw her. No, but seriously, because she’d seemed more flustered than Sensei had been.
“The results are in!” Mashiron announced. “One vote for Tadasu-chan. Two for Shuwa-chan!”
“Aeugh?”
“You’ve been lynched, Shuwa-chan. Why don’t you tell everyone what your prompt was?”
Finally, the reality of my situation sank in. “Wait, what?! Why me?! How?!”
“Now, now, just relax and tell everyone your prompt,” Mashiron said.
“Um... It was StroZero.”
Tadasu-chan sighed. “Just as I thought.”
“I enjoyed it for a bit but now I’m just annoyed,” Sensei said.
Tadasu-chan’s reaction to the big reveal was muted, while Sensei’s, on the other hand, was vexed for some reason, but both pointed to the same conclusion:
“Well done, villagers, you have successfully lynched the werewolf,” Mashiron said.
Yep, I’d been the werewolf. And a blatantly obvious one at that.
“But...how?” I said. “Nothing felt off at all...”
“Now, now,” Mashiron interrupted. “It’s too early to throw in the towel. You still have a chance to steal the win.”
“Oh, right! If I can guess their prompt!”
I’d almost forgotten that was a rule, since the last round didn’t end with a villager victory. If I could just guess the villagers’ prompt, I could still snatch victory from the jaws of defeat!
...
If I could just guess the villagers’ prompt!
But I couldn’t! I had no freaking idea! I’d been just blabbing on and on about StroZero and neither of them had had much of a chance to speak! I think! If they’d been talking, I sure as hell hadn’t been listening!
“Um, um... ‘Seiso’? I guess? Since neither of them objected when I said, ‘This was me’?”
Radio silence.
“Oookay.” Fine. I’ll take the L. “Are you going to tell me what the right answer is now?”
“It was me,” Mashiron said.
“Sorry?”
“It was me. The prompt I gave Tadasu-chan and Sensei was ‘Mashiro Irodori.’”
My mind went blank. In other words, this whole time, this entire time I’d been expounding on my love for StroZero, the other two thought I was talking about Mashiron? My mind flashed back to the very start of the round—back to when I’d suspected I’d fallen into a trap of Mashiron’s making—and I realized I’d been right.
“Ma-shi-ron! You set me up!”
“Hm? Whatever could you possibly mean?”
“You mixing business with pleasure now, huh?”
“I dunnooo. Nothing in the rules said I couldn’t~.”
“You... Tease me, will you? Is this payback for the rawr thing?”
“Well, you know. Maybe from the perspective of everyone else in the room, it might’ve sounded like you were confessing your love to me. Calling me your lover...proposing to me.” Her voice trailed off into a bashful giggle.
“H-Hey! Stop getting embarrassed by your own plan! If you can’t even keep it together, how am I supposed to...?” I could feel my cheeks heat. “Are we still doing this bit or not?!”
“Sorry, sorry. Ahem.” But she couldn’t keep it together, and another bashful giggle slipped out.
“M-Mashiron!” I yelled, now completely blushing myself.
“Gross,” Sensei said. “Almost as gross as the recent trend of YoTubers pretending like they’re poor.”
“Shush,” Tadasu-chan said. “Let them have their moment.”
: sasu(ga) mashi(ron)
: hahaha mashiron's rare otaku laugh never ceases to entertain
: submissive shuwa-chan is cute too
: what are they doing in front of their kouhais...
: isn't this just mashiron's way of asserting her territory in front of the newcomers?
: ganbare, gen 5 squad
This round, this...unexpectedly mortifying second round ended with my total defeat. Yeah, maybe it’d been my mistake. Yeah, maybe I hadn’t noticed Sensei’s split second of hesitation because I’d been too focused on StroZero—but I wouldn’t have gotten so embarrassed if it hadn’t been for Mashiron! Why’d she have to do that? Why’d she have to go ahead and tease me like that? I usually have no problem proclaiming my love for her, but when she gets all assertive on me, it’s like...
Ah, forget it! There’s no more time to be embarrassed! On to the next round!
Round three: I was the GM. As GM, I wouldn’t participate in the two-minute discussion period. I’d just mute myself (to the other participants; chat could still hear me) and enjoy the antics as they unfolded. As I mentioned earlier, this was the round I’d been waiting for.
To kick things off, I needed to send everyone their prompts. Before that, however, I quickly muted myself and spoke to my chat. “Heh heh heh. Are you ready, chat? We gon’ make these monkeys dance. We gon’ make these monkeys dance real good.” GMs were allowed to share their prompts with the viewers at the start of the game, and here’s what I showed them:
Villagers: Mashiro Irodori, Churiri. Prompt: A live concert.
Werewolf: Tadasu Miyauchi. Prompt: An orgy.
: Looool