A few minutes after showering and drying off, Rhys finally heard the doorbell ring, his mood now souring a little. "They could of take their time if they wanted." He muttered, tired and not ready to play nice.
"Fight on, Rhys. If you don't get a head start now the female lead tomorrow might." Kane cheered, waving his hand a little to exaggerate his point.
Opening the door, he smiled using his skill, charming the man in front of him. Although Rhys was tall now, this man was even taller. He seemed to be around six foot, with messy white hair and bright blue eyes, his body a little tanned.
Making eye contact, Rhys received the information of the second target, Seth Hyls. He was a law major student who played basketball all throughout middle school and high school. He was a calm and kind person, but didn't talk much. His best friend in high school, Xavier convinced him to live together.
"He really does scream male lead. His appearance looks so unnatural." Rhys said in his head to Kane, who only nodded. The man looked like the ideal type if you were looking for a husband.
Getting back on track, he took Seth's hand and happily greeted the man. "Hello! I'm Rhys, your roommate, it's a pleasure to meet you, I hope we can grow really close!"
As soon as he said that, Seth blushed a little probably from the close contact, while Kane almost gagged. Just who was this man who was so opposed to hand contact with a man?
"I'm doing this for the affection." Rhys chanted in his head, causing Kane to snicker, oh the poor boy was in for a rude awakening.
Returning the gesture, Seth smiled to Rhys and greeted him. "My name is Seth, it's nice to meet you, I hope we get along too. Xavier should be here later." As if his beautiful appearance wasn't enough, his voice was low and soft, a comforting feeling.
After the quick exchange, Rhys saw the affection raised, but only by one point? Now he's at a total of one?!
"I told you, host. The tutorial was easy. Physical contact like brushing hands won't do much anymore, it'd be better if you just kissed." Kane teased, making Rhys irked.
"Come on in! I'll help you with one of your bags." Rhys said, trying to hide his anger. Picking up the smallest bag, he brought Seth upstairs to the third bedroom.
"This will be your room, it's right next to the steps. Down the hall next to your room is Xavier's, to the left is our third roommate's, and at the end is mine." Rhys explained, it sounded almost like he actually lived in the house before this morning.
"Thank you, the room looks really beautiful." Seth said in astonishment as he entered. A small sigh of relief escaped Rhys' lips, he spent all morning cleaning so he was ecstatic that it looked good and clean.
"I'll leave you to get settled in up here first and I'll explain to you the rest downstairs, I'll be in the living room." Rhys smiled before leaving, once he closed the door he let out a huff.
"Damn it why is it so hard to raise affection. I carried his bag and everything!" Rhys cried out in his head as he made his way downstairs.
Kane rolled his eyes. "Well what did you expect to happen? You carried the lightest bag and only brought him to his room. I think any roommate would give a house tour."
"Two more to go, then we can get groceries." Rhys muttered, checking his phone. 3:27 it read, hopefully they won't come too late he didn't want to take a taxi this late, nor spend too much money.
"You know you don't need take a taxi, right host? You have a car. And don't forget the money I told you to exchange!" Kane reminded, he swore that Rhys was smart yet stupid at the same time.
"Wait you're right! I have rich parents and money." Rhys cried in relief to himself, heading over to his room to grab his wallet before returning downstairs.
"It's not that much. Only a few hundred." He tsk'd, a family of four would be a lot for groceries, not to mention money for gas, and rent, and bills. He never had to worry about this when he was successful!
"Don't worry to much about that, Rhys. One point is valuable, and turns into $1,000. You should have a few at least totalling $100,000 or more, I don't know where all the money goes, actually. It's my first time." Kane explained, causing Rhys to widen his eyes slightly.
"You're a genius for once! No wonder I have rich parents, it's because of all the points I transferred, right?" Rhys questioned, understanding the system a bit better when he saw Kane nod.
What he learned so far is that things done in system space affects the future worlds he comes to, whether it's from money or the cosmetics, which really made him glow, these points really were like a cheat!
Ten more minutes passed until Seth finished unpacking and came downstairs to have conversation with Rhys, and another twenty passed before the last two arrived, thank goodness. He wasn't sure how much longer he could keep the conversation flowing while gaining no affection points!
Going to the door, Rhys opened it to see the two standing next to each other, one looking very happy and cheerful while the other as if he was looking at dirt.
The first one he linked eyes with was the cheerful boy with bubblegum pink hair and hazel eyes. He was small, probably five foot, pale, and petite, even smaller than Rhys' original host body.
Getting the information, his names was Xavier Meiyer, an 18 year old engineering student who really liked pretty things. He's a bubbly and energetic person, that likes noise.
The second one he linked eyes with was a man with deep blue hair and purple eyes, and thin black rimmed glasses. He was about the same size as Rhys with an average build.
Receiving his information, he was Erin Keller, a 19 year old medical student who has mysophobia. He's quick tempered and quick to pick fights.
"Hi hi hi! I'm Xavier and this is Rin, we're the new roommates!" He exclaimed jumping up and down a bit before grabbing Rhys' hand.
Matching the energy, he used his smile on Xavier and greeted him, explaining how happy he was to have the two of them as roommates before Erin interrupted.
"I never gave you permission to call me Rin, my name is Erin. We just met after you slammed into me." He hissed out, obviously annoyed at how loud Xavier was.
To break up the tension, Rhys invited them in and showed them to their rooms. After giving the whole explanation and waiting for them to come back, Rhys found that his affection with Erin had raised by one.
"I'm so glad I cleaned this house beforehand." Rhys smiled as Kane shuddered. There was a whole lot of yelling and forced labour on his part.
"Now that we're all here I wanted to bring something up. We have a really nice kitchen in the house, but the problem is I didn't stock up on food, since I didn't know what you all would like. I was wondering if we could all bond and grocery shop together?" Rhys said, trying to be as playful as possible.
On the other end was silence that felt like forever, even though it was a few seconds. Xavier sprang up and jumped onto Rhys and happily said of course he would love to, he couldn't wait to bond with his friends.
With that, his affection was raised by two points. "That's the highest so far!" Rhys felt relief. In the end it still was an easy world, he thought until.
"You're beyond irresponsible. I was going to review my schedule and do things before school tomorrow, but you're telling me I have to shop now?" Erin hissed, the one affection point he had now dropping.
"No!" Rhys cried internally as he nodded, using crocodile tears on Erin, causing the man to huff out annoyed.
"It's nearly five pm now so let's hurry up." Erin rolled his eyes, causing Xavier to now jump and hug him instead.
"You should learn to be more like that, host." Kane said looking at how easy Xavier hugged and touched people.
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Where's the car, I don't see a garage." Rhys said, thinking back to when he was cleaning the house.
"The car keys should be in your room, in your bag. The car should also be parked outside at the front gate, since this is pretty much private property no one would steal it." He explained.
Damn these rich people, couldn't they have just given him a garage instead of making him walk out? He cursed as he fetched the keys.
As the four finally arrived at the car, Xavier yelled out "Shotgun! I get to sit with Rhys." making Seth chuckle and Erin roll his eyes.
Looking at it, it was actually a pretty nice car, a shiny black one, not that he knew anything about cars, just that he drove one.
"Let's get going, then." Rhys smiled, still trying his best to act like a kind and friendly person. As they started driving, Xavier made himself comfy and got the aux cord.
Playing his music on low, he started conversations, which ended up all over the place because he asked so many at once.
Groaning, Erin looked out the window while Seth and Rhys entertained him. It was a quick twenty minute drive to the store, and once they entered Rhys finally felt the impact of the targets.
As they made their way around, everyone seemed to be staring at them, the four cute boys. Why wouldn't they? Everyone in this place had natural hair and eyes, maybe a little hair dye but that's it, nothing exotic like them.
Rhys had silk cherry red hair and blue eyes, with a slightly toned body and a chiseled face now, making him fit in a bit more with the male targets, but he still wasn't exactly on their level. They just had a glow to them, which would probably rank him fourth amongst the group in terms of attractiveness.
"I swear I'm going to be the most good looking host." He grumbled in his head, waking around with the indifferent group of males. They must either be used to it or just can't tell how radiant they were. On the bright side, whenever someone looked in his direction he can use his smile skill.
"Finally, let's go to the deli." Rhys said, finally glad it was almost over. The trip was nothing notable, Xavier acted like a child picking out candy for the first time while Erin looked on in annoyance, barely joining conversations, while Seth and Rhys acted like the parents.
As they were about to leave the deli, they were interrupted by a few girls who were giggling and whispering amongst each other, which only cause Rhys to internally groan. Remind him to never go shopping with pretty people again.
As one of the girls began to ask if any of them were single, Rhys and Erin simultaneous cut her off. "We're not interested."
Rhys, sort of shocked looked to Erin who seemed to now be glaring down these poor women. Sure he thought it was annoying to talk to people who weren't his targets, but did he have to glare at them like that?
"Uh well, what about you two then? My number is-" the woman turned her the attention to Xavier and Seth. Although she was annoying, he had to admire how she tried to shoot her shot.
As Rhys turned to look at Seth, his eyes met one of her friend's for a brief second. Information suddenly overcame him.
Serenity Clark, the female lead of this world. Originally, she was a sad and inexperienced woman in a clique of pretty popular girls who were trying to set her up repeatedly, trying to help her experience teenage romance. At the moment, she has no interested in people she deems ugly and plays it off as being humble. She is a narcissistic pig.
Damn, just what did the system have against these women? Rhys thought as he hurriedly moved over to Seth, the only thing on his mind was to get away from the situation.
Taking in a quick breath, he started to cling onto the quiet man's arm and told the woman off. "I mean it, we're not interested, we're only here to shop!"
He sounded a bit more childish than he intended, but it was alright, since Xavier was the same way. He nodded along to what Rhys had said and clung to Seth's other arm, knowing the man was too shy and nice for his own good.
"We're not interested in anything other than our shopping! You're interrupting our bonding time!" Xavier added, making it seem as though this group of four who just became roommates were already friends for years.
Sighing, the woman back off and her friends went with her, Serenity's eyes lingering for a moment before turning away too. Although Xavier seemed jovial and happy, even according to the information, he almost seemed like a tough guy for a second.
"Why do I always find fights in groceries stores, wait no why did I already meet the female lead? You said it started tomorrow! This is supposed to be easy." He whined to Kane, pulling away from Seth before apologising.
"Maybe because you keep leaving the house for extended periods of time? Originally, the three of them never went shopping the night before." Kane commented, floating around in circles for a bit while Seth thanked Rhys and Xavier.
Both Seth's and Xavier's affection rose by one, putting Seth at two, Xavier at three, and Erin at zero. Still, it's better than nothing Rhys thought.
As the four went to check out, Kane continued to answer the last part of Rhys' comment. "Although this world is easy, it generally means how easy it would be to get rid of the female lead and sway the capture targets. In an A ranked world you'd probably have to try extremely hard to kill her off or make get her away from them."
"Thanks." He acknowledged the little tidbit Kane had told him as the four of them as Rhys took out his credit card to pay, causing Xaviers eyes to light up.
"Wow, I've been thinking about it for awhile now but you really are rich, Rhys. You didn't even hesitate to pay, and how much is it for so many people? Even your house was nice." Xavier commented, not intending to sound rude at all, but he was just impressed at how casual Rhys was about it.
"Ah, I guess? I mean, all I asked you guys to do was pay a part of the rent, nothing like buying groceries or whatever." Rhys replied nervously, trying his best to not sound entitled in fear of losing points.
"Anyways, let's head back so I can cook us up some dinner. Any suggestions?" Rhys asked, quickly changing the subject. Thankfully, it worked as Xavier gave him a hundred of them.
Seth said he was fine with anything, and Erin just asked for him to wash his hands thoroughly before touching the food.
It was another twenty five minutes before they got back due to traffic, and the clock read about 6:47 pm, plenty of time to make dinner.
Due to one of Xavier's suggestions, he baked up some tilapia fish and garnished it, with a few squeezes of lemon. On the side, some quick steamed vegetables. Meanwhile Erin and Seth set the table, and Xavier questioned literally everything Rhys did in the kitchen.
When it was finished, Xavier poured a glass of orange juice for Seth, two glasses of water for Rhys and Erin, and finally a Pepsi for himself, and brought it over to the table while Rhys served the food.
"Reese's you're amazing, you can even cook!" Xavier exclaimed as he happily dug into the fish.
"Reece's?" He questioned, slightly annoyed but it didn't show in his voice. With his mouth full of food, Xavier perked up.
"Your name sounds like Reece's peanut butter cup without the the ce's so I just decided to call you it cause you're sweet as candy!" He cheered, going back to his food.
Meanwhile, Seth commented on how good it taste to which Erin nodded, finally giving Rhys some confirmation that Erin didn't hate him, in fact, he saw one affection point raise.
"I'm so glad I learned how to cook no matter how busy I was." He thought to himself as he thanked them for the compliments and dug in himself, joining whatever the conversation at hand was when he could, but Xavier kept switching it by babbling, confusing him half the time.
"Thank goodness it's over now. Just a bit more before I can sleep." Rhys thought to himself as he went to wash the dishes with Erin.
It had only been a few hours since all the targets arrived, but it had been too long for Rhys' liking. Not only did he run into the female lead, but it looks like she's already interest in them.
"Well, at least now that I know easy worlds mean that the female leads are easier to be gotten rid of, and I'm on the lowest difficult, I won't have to worry that much." Rhys said to Kane, drying his hands off as he brushed away his worries of tomorrow.