I was Thrown into an Unfamiliar Manga

“Me?”

Caught off guard by the sudden nomination, I looked at Sasha.
She shrugged her shoulders and brazenly asked, “Is there a problem?”
“This isn’t, like, a class president election… being pushed into something just because someone else recommended it feels kinda…”

Just then, the class rep beside me pushed her glasses up and said,
“For reference, I also became class rep because of a nomination.”
“……”

…Okay, that kind of shuts me down.
Left speechless, I looked at the two of them while Rika chimed in with interest.
“I actually think it wouldn’t be so bad if Ryu-chan participated. Right, Karen?”

“Hmm. Well. It’d be entertaining.”
Now it felt like they were all working together to shove me onto the stage.
It was probably because of earlier—trying to ditch them to help Satoru with those girls.

As I hesitated, unsure of what to do, the MC cut in at the perfect moment.
“Well then! How about this? We’ll play a simple game. If I win, you participate. If you win, you don’t have to.”
“What kind of game?”

“A manly game of rock-paper-scissors!”
Well… I guess that’s fair.
I was quietly impressed by how smoothly the MC handled it when—

“Are you still accepting additional participants?”
Yaguchi, who’d been quiet until now, raised her hand.
“Yes! Of course!”
“What?!”

Ryuji’s voice cracked in panic—he clearly had a bad feeling.
“I’d like to nominate someone too.”
As expected, the person Yaguchi pointed to was Ryuji, who’d been sitting right next to her.

“Wait a sec! I never said I’d participate!”
“No veto rights.”
“…Yes, ma’am.”

Overwhelmed by her energy, Ryuji quietly accepted his fate.
Still, nothing was set in stone yet—we hadn’t technically joined the contest.
“Then the gentleman here will also play rock-paper-scissors with me.”
Watching everything unfold, the MC smoothly took control and raised his right hand above his head.

“To make sure everyone can see the result, please raise your hand over your head!”
I followed his lead and raised my arm.
“Alright, here we go!”

The mood around the stage naturally began to heat up.
“Rock…”
Everyone echoed after the MC.

“Paper…”
Even though it was just a game, I nervously swallowed.
“Scissors!!”

And the result—
“Yes! We’re back from that brief delay accepting last-minute contestants! Let’s continue the Onjuku Beach Swimsuit Contest!!”
“…You’ve got to be kidding me.”

I lost. Completely.
***
Since I’d lost in front of everyone, there was no backing out now.

And so, thanks to the “crime” of almost ditching the girls to meet up with college women, I was half-forced into participating in the swimsuit contest.
“…Let’s do our best.”
“…Yeah.”

Ryuji, too, ended up getting dragged in by force.
Maybe it wasn’t just bad luck—but the law of romcoms itself that had thrown us onto the stage.
Because we joined midway, Ryuji and I were assigned the final performance slots.

“Wooooaaahhh!!”
Watching from backstage, I realized just how long three minutes of “charm appeal time” really was.
It might sound short at a glance, but if you think of it like a presentation or group project speech, it’s painfully long.

Especially when you have to act flirty in front of dozens of strangers.
I already knew it wasn’t my thing—but now I really knew.
I stood there, watching the swimsuit contestants desperately doing everything they could on stage.

“Contestant number 17! Where are you from?”
“Ah, I run a small fitness center in Tokyo. My name’s Yoshida Kenichi.”
The tanned muscle guy said that and smoothly struck a pose.

Side chest.
A pose that emphasizes the pecs, biceps, and calf muscles.
Even at a glance, his body was competition-tier.

He definitely seemed like someone who’d been in tournaments before.
“What made you decide to enter the contest?”
“I heard the Onjuku Beach Swimsuit Contest was pretty famous in this area. A friend of mine won once, so I got curious and decided to try.”

He flashed a gleaming white smile as he said it.
The girls in the audience screamed in response.
He was exactly the type of trainer popular at gyms.

Ryuji, standing next to me, said,
“Not quite on your level, but that guy’s got some serious muscle.”
And the ghost of the foreigner floating behind Ryuji gave his harsh review:

“Hmph. That’s just show-off muscle. Totally impractical.”
He wasn’t even talking to me, but it still hurt.
I wondered what he’d say if he found out my body was also built at a gym.

But since I had to keep the fact I could see ghosts a secret, I kept my mouth shut.
Anyway, thanks to the MC’s smooth direction, Yoshida Kenichi’s three minutes flew by, and he exited the stage.
Wearing swimming trunks, he glanced at me as he stepped down the stairs.

It felt like he was sizing me up—but I quickly looked away.
Didn’t want things to get awkward if he tried to strike up a conversation.
Luckily, his gaze soon disappeared, and just as he slipped out of sight, the MC’s voice rang out from the stage:

“Oh no oh no oh no!”
The bikini-clad girl standing in front of the stairs was flustered, repeating “oh no” over and over before awkwardly robot-walking out onto the stage.
Needless to say, her three minutes of appeal were a complete failure.

Ryuji and I, watching her real-time cringe-fest unfold, °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° made a silent vow:
Whatever happens, we’re not doing anything embarrassing out there.
***

It felt like my turn would never come—but finally, it did.
Ryuji, who went just before me, pulled off a series of acrobatic tumbling moves for his charm appeal, grabbing everyone’s attention.
He’d apparently done over ten years of judo at Yaguchi’s dojo, and it showed—his body control was on point.

Unlike my stiff, heavy build, he had flexibility. Really did feel like a shounen protagonist.
“Alright then! Let’s bring out contestant number 28, our final challenger!”
“You got this, Yu-seong!”

“…Yeah.”
Ryuji’s not-so-comforting cheer at my back, I stepped onto the stage.
The contest had been going for nearly an hour and a half, so the crowd was clearly getting tired.

Same went for the judges—they looked bored stiff.
Well, it made sense. These contests are usually just excuses to stare at hot women. I couldn’t blame them.
As I walked to center stage, the MC came over and shoved the mic at me.

“Now, our final contestant is a walk-on entry from earlier! Tell us your name, age, and where you’re from!”
The mic was so close to my face it was almost touching, but I answered calmly.
“Uh… I’m Kim Yu-seong, 17 years old, a high school student from Setagaya, Tokyo.”

The crowd immediately began to stir.
“His voice… what the heck…”
“Seventeen? With that face?”

“You’re joking, right?”
Apparently, people found it hard to believe.
But I had no way to prove I was actually a high schooler, so I just kept my mouth shut.

Sensing the awkward tension, the MC let out an exaggerated laugh to smooth things over.
“Hahahaha! This contest’s really gone global, huh? Even foreigners are joining now!”
He must’ve mistaken me for a tourist—but I didn’t bother correcting him.

“And now! It’s time for his three minutes of charm appeal! What kind of appeal will Kim Yu-seong, all the way from Korea, show us?!”
The MC set the stage perfectly.
“……”

Now, the only thing that mattered was how I worked the crowd.
“Hooo…”
To shake off my nerves, I took a deep breath.

Then I peeled off the T-shirt I’d been wearing.
Fwip!
Revealing an overly muscular body—borderline too much.

I felt an odd sense of freedom as the sea breeze hit my bare skin.
Then, turning my back to the audience, I struck a pose.
Just like Yoshida Kenichi had done earlier.

But—unlike what I expected—the audience reaction was strangely ice-cold.
A tense silence filled the air… until someone in the judge section suddenly stood up.
“It’s a god…!”

It was the shopkeeper from the beach house.
He clapped on his own, murmuring with a face full of emotion.
“The god of muscle has descended to earth…!”

It was absurd. But no one called him out on it.
Maybe because his daughter, the only one who could stop him, wasn’t around.
Then, like they’d been infected by his enthusiasm, others slowly started clapping too.

“Wooooaaaahhhh!!”
The applause soon swelled like a tidal wave, filling the small venue.
What the hell? What is even happening right now?

All I’d done was strike a pose—yet the reaction was like I’d just won a gold medal at the Olympics.
I stood frozen in place, utterly at a loss.