I Accidentally Built a Harem of Girls Who All Hate Each Other

Leaving the Student Council office that evening felt different. I wasn't just a weary prisoner being released for the night. I was a field agent, loaded down with enemy intelligence (or in this case, enemy textbooks) and a mission that bordered on suicidal. The two German tomes in my bag felt like they weighed a hundred pounds each, their physical heaviness a perfect metaphor for the impossible task they represented.

Reina dismissed me with a wave of her hand and a final, smug reminder. "Tomorrow morning. Before homeroom. Do not disappoint me, Tanaka-kun." The unspoken threat was that disappointing her would be far worse than the impossible task itself.

The walk home was a blur. I didn't notice the whispers. I didn't see the stares. My mind was already churning, trying to process the sheer scale of the challenge ahead. Two first chapters. Two thousand words of analysis. One night. My brain, already running on fumes, felt like it was about to seize up completely.

I bypassed my own front door and went straight to the hedge, the pre-arranged rendezvous point for Operation Fluffball. Yui was already there, a small bag in her hand, her expression a mixture of grim determination and genuine concern.

"Noodle, report," she said, her voice a low, urgent whisper.

"The Warden is a sadist," I groaned, letting my bag drop to the ground with a heavy thud. "This is cruel and unusual punishment. It violates the Geneva Convention."

"Let me see them," she commanded.

I pulled out one of the heavy books and handed it to her. She opened it, her brow furrowing as she scanned the dense, unfamiliar text. "Wow," she breathed. "She really hates you."

"Tell me something I don't know," I sighed, rubbing my tired eyes.

"I did some recon," she said, her 'Handler' persona kicking back in. She handed me the small bag she was holding. Inside was a high-caffeine energy drink, a protein bar, and a flash drive. "I found a few online translation programs that are better than the basic ones. And I downloaded a couple of lectures on introductory set theory from a university website. It's not much, but it might help you fake it."

I looked at the flash drive, then back at her. "You did all that during my detention?"

"A good handler supports their agent in the field," she said with a shrug, though a faint blush colored her cheeks. "Now, go. You have a long night ahead of you. I'll take care of the 'assets'." She gestured towards her back porch.

"Right," I said, my spirit bolstered slightly by her support. "Thanks, Angel."

"Just get the mission done, Noodle," she said, giving me a firm, encouraging nod. "And don't fall asleep. I'll send you check-in texts every hour."

I trudged into my house, waved a weary hello to my dad, and immediately barricaded myself in my room. This was it. My fortress of solitude. I booted up my old, clunky desktop computer, plugged in the flash drive, and stared at the task ahead.

The hours that followed were a special kind of hell. The translation software was clumsy, spitting out grammatically nonsensical sentences that I had to painstakingly decode and reassemble. The university lectures were dry and complex, filled with terms that made my brain ache. I typed until my fingers were numb, the energy drink making my heart pound while my mind slowly turned to mush.

At 10 p.m., my phone buzzed. Angel: Status?

Noodle: I now know how to say 'the axiom of empty set' in three different, equally confusing ways in German. Progress is slow. Morale is low.

Angel: Keep going. The Warden expects you to fail. Proving her wrong is a victory in itself.

At midnight. Angel: Check-in. Don't fall asleep.

Noodle: I think the letters are starting to melt off the page. I am seeing sounds and hearing colors. Is this what madness feels like?

Angel: That's just the caffeine. Drink some water. Two more hours, then you can write the report based on what you have.

Her messages were a lifeline, a tiny tether to sanity in my sea of academic despair. She wasn't just my handler; she was my drill sergeant, pushing me through the pain.

It was around 1 a.m., as I was staring at a particularly dense paragraph about transfinite numbers, that I heard a soft tapping sound. It wasn't my phone. It was coming from my window.

My head snapped up. Had I finally gone crazy?

The tapping came again, a little more insistent this time. I stumbled over to the window and pulled back the curtain.

And my heart nearly stopped.

It wasn't Yui.

Crouched on the narrow roof outside my window, looking deeply uncomfortable and clutching a small, steaming thermos, was Asuka Miyamoto.

I slid the window open, my jaw hanging open in disbelief. "Asuka-san? What... how... why are you on my roof?"

"Your light was on," she whispered, her usual booming voice reduced to a conspiratorial hush. "I figured you were still up. I was out for a late-night run and, well..." She looked away, a rare blush on her tanned cheeks. "After what happened at the pool... and with Kujou being such a tyrant... I figured you might be in trouble."

She held out the thermos. "It's miso soup. My mom makes it when I'm up late studying for exams. It helps."

I stared at her, then at the thermos, my exhausted brain struggling to process this new, insane development. The school's sports ace, the human fireball, had climbed onto my roof in the middle of the night to bring me soup because she thought I was being bullied by the Student Council President.

"How did you even get up here?" I asked, my voice a stunned whisper.

"There's a drainpipe on the side of your house," she said with a shrug, as if climbing a two-story building was as easy as walking up stairs. "It was no big deal."

"I... thank you," I stammered, taking the thermos. It was warm in my hands. "But you really didn't have to."

"Yeah, well," she said, scratching the back of her neck, a gesture so uncharacteristically shy it was jarring. "I just thought... what you did today at the pool was really brave. Even if the Prez is a total monster for it. So... yeah."

She gave me a quick, awkward grin. "Anyway, I should go before someone sees me. Good luck with... whatever she's making you do."

And with the same silent, athletic grace she arrived with, she navigated her way back across the roof and disappeared into the darkness, leaving me standing at my open window, holding a thermos of miso soup, my mind completely blown.

I was supposed to be a socially inert rock. I was supposed to be isolated. But my impossible punishment, my fortress of solitude, was somehow acting like a magnet.

I closed the window and took a sip of the soup. It was hot, salty, and incredibly delicious. It tasted like an unexpected act of kindness.

My phone buzzed. It was Yui.

Angel: What was that? I saw a silhouette on your roof.

My blood ran cold. Of course she saw. Her surveillance was 24/7.

Noodle: You're not going to believe this.

I quickly explained what had just happened. Her reply was instant and radiated pure, unfiltered fury through the screen.

Angel: She CLIMBED your HOUSE?! Unacceptable! That is a gross breach of mission protocol! And a flagrant violation of the five-foot exclusion zone!

Noodle: I didn't invite her! She just... appeared! Like a soup ninja!

Angel: This is a complication. Miyamoto-san has now escalated from a 'person of interest' to an 'active rogue agent'. We need to monitor her. But for now, finish your mission. And DO NOT enjoy that soup! That is an order!

I looked at the half-empty thermos in my hand, then back at my screen. I dutifully typed my reply.

Noodle: Roger that, Angel. Soup is not being enjoyed. Over.

I took another long, delicious sip.

Some orders, I decided, were meant to be broken. The night was still long and full of German mathematicians, but for the first time, I felt like I wasn't just surviving. I was being supported.

And that support was coming from the most unexpected, and complicated, of places.