Shimotsuki-san Likes the Mob

–She had it all.

Born to a wealthy father and a beautiful mother, she inherited their talents and had a good memory for things. There was nothing she couldn’t achieve if she put her mind to it. Mary Parker was an absolute genius.

For her, she saw “reality” as a series of tasks.

Of course, she was capable of doing anything. She was able to master whatever task she was given, and she never forgot what she had learned. In a video game analogy, she had reached the maximum level at a younge age and is now playing life in easy mode.

But in spite of that, there was only one thing she could enjoy.

That was “storytelling”.

(It’s amazing…!)

Unlike the boring reality she had been living in, she found stories to be fascinating.

The girl who despised the real world became enthralled by the fictitious world.

(More… More!!!)

With a thirst for knowledge, she was very eager to learn about all kinds of stories. Animes, movies, dramas, novels, mangas, and so on. No matter the medium, she continued to fish for stories from one end to the other.

The days then lasted a year.

She was only 7 years old at the time, but she was already familiar with all kinds of stories, and there was almost nothing she didn’t know.

That was around the time that Mary had a favorite “genre.”

(Suck it up!)

She had read a certain book.

It was a revenge-type story, in which the protagonist becomes overjoyed after defeating the antagonist.

After being defeated by the protagonist, the antagonist’s character had fallen into despair and was crestfallen. The ending made her feel inexpressibly happy.

(More, more, more!)

Wanting nothing more than to have fun, she began to read only the sagas. But there weren’t enough works in that genre to keep her entertained forever.

Stories are finite.

They were insufficient for her, who seeked endless pleasure.

(More! Even though I want to enjoy it…!)

She was dissatisfied with the real world because things do not turn out the way she wanted it to.

She wanted to say, “Suck it up!” but she couldn’t find a story that would allow her to.

She could not tolerate that.

She couldn’t stand the fact that there were things she couldn’t have.

And so, she kept looking.

She scoured through every medium possible, desperate to find the genre she had liked.

Then one day.

(…Huh? I wonder if stories are something that can only be found in fictional worlds?)

Suddenly, she realized.

She thought the real world was a dull, depressing place, but… she was too starved… and finally turned her attention to the real world.

(I suppose “stories” do exist here… After all, reality is essentially just an enormous setting with a messed-up plot and complicated character relationships, right?)

With this, she had finally found it.

Mary had been exposed to an infinite number of stories.

(Perhaps I could simplify the setting, alter the narrative, and carefully select the characters so that I could see the… story.)

Her hypothesis had made her heart skip a beat.

Of course, that would be something difficult for an ordinary person to accomplish.

But she was a genius. She was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. She had gotten everything she desired. She could do anything if she wanted to.

That’s why Mary was able to do it.

(…And it’s done!)

Her first story was a love-hate drama about her parents.

It was a common occurrence in wealthy families. The father was involved in an unwanted marriage for political reasons. He had someone he really loved, but could not be with them.

Her mother, on the other hand, was an awful person with a rotten personaltiy who was only interested in money. She was a horrible person with an excellent family background and good looks. She saw her father only as a means to an end, and she abandoned childcare and housework to spend her time with young men.

Mary had made her mother such an antagonist. She searched for her father’s love interest, staged a fateful encounter, reignited their former love, and exposed her mother’s infidelity.

She was, of course, the mastermind. She manipulated her parents and their relations at will behind the scenes, never revealing herself.

As a result, the story was complete.

(Suck it up!!!)

She was thrilled by her birth mother’s demise.

She relished the pleasure of seeing her father happy and in love.

Her first story was… a masterpiece.