I Was Possessed By An Unknown Manga

Chapter 123: The Excellence Of Muscles Is The Excellence Of Humans

“Me?”

Startled by the sudden nomination, I looked at Sasha.

Then Sasha shrugged her shoulders and brazenly asked, “Is there a problem?”

“This isn’t like a Class President election… being pushed into it by recommendation is a bit…”

Then, the Class President next to me pushed up her glasses and said,

“For your information, I also became Class President through recommendation.”

“……”

Then what could I say to that?

As I stood there speechless, Rika showed her interest.

“Hmm, well. It could be fun.”

Now it seemed like everyone was conspiring to get me on stage.

The reason they were suddenly like this must be because of what happened earlier.

As I hesitated, not knowing what to do, the MC intervened at the right moment.

“Well then, how about this? Let’s play a simple game. If I win, you participate, and if you win, you don’t have to.”

“What game?”

“Like a man, let’s settle it with rock-paper-scissors.”

Certainly, that wouldn’t be too bad.

I was inwardly admiring the MC’s skillful handling of the situation.

“Do you accept additional applications?”

Suddenly, Yaguchi, who had been quiet, also raised her hand.

“Yes! Of course!”

“What!”

Seeing this, Ryuji seemed to have a bad feeling and was startled.

“I want to nominate this person, too.”

And sure enough, the person Yaguchi nominated was Ryuji, sitting right next to her.

“Wait a minute! I didn’t say anything about participating!”

“You don’t have any right to refuse.”

“…Yes.”

Ryuji, overwhelmed by her momentum, meekly accepted his fate.

But since the participation in the contest wasn’t completely decided yet, there was still a glimmer of hope.

“Then this gentleman here will also play rock-paper-scissors with me.”

The MC, observing our conversation, skillfully wrapped up the situation and then raised his right hand above his head.

“So that others can see the result, please raise your hand above your head.”

I followed his instructions and raised my right arm above my head.

“Alright, shall we start?”

Due to this, the atmosphere in the arena naturally heated up.

“Rock.”

Everyone followed the MC’s lead.

“Paper.”

Unconsciously tensed, I swallowed nervously.

“Scissors!!”

And then, the result was…

“Yes! There was a slight delay due to accepting on-site participants, but we will now resume the Onjoku Beach Swimsuit Contest!!”

“This is crazy.”

It was a complete defeat for me.

Since I lost rock-paper-scissors in front of everyone, I couldn’t back out now.

In the end, I was semi-forced to participate in the swimsuit contest due to the sin of trying to meet with female college students.

“…Let’s do our best.”

“…Right.”

Ryuji was also forced to participate, just like me.

Maybe it wasn’t just bad luck, but the law of love comedies that led us onto the stage.

Ryuji and I, being mid-entry participants, were assigned to the very last order.

“Wowww!”

Watching from behind the stage, I realized that the three-minute charm appeal time given to each person was much longer than I thought.

It might seem short at first, but when you think about presentations or group reports, it is actually quite long.

Especially since it involved showing off in front of dozens of strangers.

Thinking about it again, I felt this kind of thing wasn’t for me as I watched people in swimsuits doing all sorts of things on stage.

“Participant number 17! Where are you from?”

“Ah, I’m Kenichi Yoshida, running a small fitness center in Tokyo.”

The muscular man with bronze skin said this while naturally posing.

Side chest.

A pose emphasizing his pectoral, biceps, and calf muscles.

At a glance, he had a body like a professional athlete.

It seemed like he might have experience participating in competitions.

“What prompted you to participate in this contest?!”

“I heard that the Onjoku Beach Swimsuit Contest is quite famous around here. Someone I know previously participated and won, so I became curious and decided to join.”

The man said this while flashing a handsome smile, showing off his white teeth.

This elicited screams from the women in the audience.

He was exactly the image of a popular trainer in a gym among women.

Ryuji, watching with me, commented,

“He’s not quite like you, but that guy also has impressive muscles.”

Then, the foreign ghost floating behind Ryuji criticized,

“Hmph, those are just show muscles. They lack practicality.”

Though not directed at me, I felt the sting of his words too.

I wondered what he would say if he knew my muscles were also built in a gym.

But since it was a secret that he was visible to me, I couldn’t open my itching mouth.

Anyway, thanks to the MC’s skillful hosting, the three minutes passed quickly, and Kenichi Yoshida finished his turn on stage.

Wearing trunk-style swimwear, he glanced at me as he descended the stairs.

He seemed to be sizing me up, but I pretended not to notice and looked away.

It felt like it would be awkward if he started a conversation.

Fortunately, his gaze soon shifted away, and just as he disappeared from my view, the MC’s voice announcing the next person echoed from the stage.

“What should I do? What should I do?”

The female participant in a bikini, standing at the stairs, was fidgeting and repeating “What should I do?” before she robotically walked onto the stage.

Of course, it was inevitable that she would fail to appeal to her charm in the next three minutes.

Watching this real-time creation of an embarrassing history, Ryuji and I vowed never to do anything that would embarrass us in front of others.

It seemed like it would never come, but finally, it was my turn.

Ryuji, who was right before me, captured the audience’s attention during his three minutes of charm appeal time with acrobatic tumbling moves.

Having trained in judo for over 10 years at Yaguchi’s dojo, he was certainly very skilled at using his body.

Unlike me, who was generally stiff, should I say he had flexibility?

Indeed, he was like the protagonist of a shonen manga.

“Now then! Participant number 28, please come out!”

“Go for it, Yu-seong!”

“…Alright.”

With Ryuji’s not-so-helpful encouragement, I ascended the stage.

Perhaps because the preliminary round had already been going on for nearly an hour and a half, the audience seemed visibly tired.

And the judges appeared just as unenthusiastic.

Well, usually people come to these contests to see pretty girls, so it wasn’t like I didn’t understand.

As I stepped to the center of the stage, the MC approached and extended the microphone to me.

“So, our last participant is a man who joined on the spot earlier! Please tell us your age, name, and where you’re from!”

Although flustered by the microphone thrust so close to my face, I complied with his request.

“Uh… I’m Kim Yu-seong, a 17-year-old high school student from Setagaya-ku, Tokyo.”

This caused a stir among the audience.

“What a voice…!”

“17 years old? With that face?”

“Is this a joke?”

Apparently, my words weren’t quite believable.

Having no way to prove I was a high school student right there, I kept quiet, and the MC, perhaps to defuse the atmosphere, burst into exaggerated laughter and said,

“Hahaha! The swimsuit contest must be so famous now that even foreigners are participating!”

He seemed to mistake me for a tourist, but, feeling no need to correct him at this point, I remained silent.

“Well! Let’s move into the three-minute charm appeal time! Let’s see what kind of charm Kim Yu-seong from Korea will show us!”

The MC set the stage naturally with his words.

“……”

Now, it was entirely up to me to elicit a response from the audience.

“Hoo.”

I took a small, deep breath to relieve the tension.

Then, I casually took off the T-shirt I was wearing.

Thud!

This revealed my overly muscular body.

I felt a strange sense of liberation, with the sea breeze hitting my skin.

Then, I naturally turned my back and struck a pose.

Just like Kenichi Yoshida, whom I saw earlier on stage.

However, contrary to my expectations, the reaction from the audience was unexpectedly cold.

Amid the dead silence, someone from the judges’ seat suddenly stood up, kicking their chair.

“A god…!”

It turned out to be the owner of the seaside house we met earlier.

He clapped alone, muttering with a face filled with awe.

“The god of muscles has descended to earth…!”

It was an absurd statement, but no one objected.

Perhaps it was because his daughter, who would usually object to his behavior, wasn’t there.

As if infected by his actions, the audience gradually began to clap, one by one.

“Wooooooww!!”

Eventually, the applause swelled like thunder, filling the small venue.

‘What’s happening? What’s going on?’

Just from striking a pose, the reaction was as intense as if I had won a gold medal at the Olympics, and I stood there, not knowing what to do.