Chapter 40: Evelyn, the Bloody Bride

"Do you really have to tell me this while I’m cooking?"

"Yes, because I know you’ll try to escape otherwise."

"I’m not escaping."

"Says the person who left home at the crack of dawn using exercise as an excuse."

"I had to train."

"Right. It had nothing to do with wanting to impress your angel."

I placed the knife on the cutting board a little harder than necessary and looked at her. Eris wore an innocent expression, but the small smile at the corner of her lips made it obvious that she was deliberately trying to irritate me.

"Just continue explaining the contest."

"The NovaCon Grand Cosplay Contest will take place in twelve days. We need to submit photos of your costume for the preliminary round two days before the event, so we don’t have as much time as you think."

"I haven’t even decided what I’m wearing yet."

"That’s why you need to decide today or tomorrow. We can buy a ready-made costume, but if you’re aiming for the top three, we’ll have to modify it. The judges score more than just appearance. They also judge craftsmanship and character portrayal."

After cutting the chicken into small pieces, I seasoned it and set it aside. While washing the rice, I could see Eris opening the contest’s official website on my laptop.

"How many people are entering?"

"There are currently more than four hundred applicants. Only sixty will be invited to the venue after the photo preliminaries, and that number will be reduced to twenty for the stage round."

My hands stopped beneath the water.

"Four hundred?"

"And applications haven’t closed yet."

"Why are you only telling me this now?"

"You didn’t ask."

I lowered my head slightly and silently reconsidered how grateful I was to her. Yesterday, I had accepted her offer to help while overwhelmed by the excitement of the five-star card, but I hadn’t thought hard enough about the hundreds of contestants I would have to surpass before earning it.

Eris continued speaking as she scrolled down the contest page.

"On top of that, several strong competitors are entering this year. Last year’s champion, ScarletDoll, is on the list again."

"Who is that?"

"A professional cosplayer who makes all her costumes from scratch. She’s especially famous for her armor and mechanical wings. Last year, she made a pair of dragon wings that opened onstage and stretched two meters wide."

I frowned as I placed the pan on the stove.

I hadn’t even decided which character to cosplay, while my opponents were apparently preparing armor that could fly.

"Who else?"

"There’s KuroNeko. Her craftsmanship isn’t as good as ScarletDoll’s, but she’s one of the best at portraying characters onstage. Last year, she switched between two different costumes in thirty seconds during the finals. She also has more than two million followers online."

"Her follower count shouldn’t affect the judges’ scores."

"Not directly, but having thousands of people come specifically to watch her gives her a huge advantage."

Once the oil in the pan heated up, I added the chicken. The sharp sizzle as the meat touched the surface briefly drowned out the unease growing inside me.

"The third important name is Argent," Eris said.

"What’s special about that one?"

When Eris went silent, I glanced at her over my shoulder. She looked far too amused.

"Argent is a man."

"What’s so surprising about that? The contest can’t be limited to women."

"True, but he usually cosplays female characters, and his transformations are extremely convincing. Once he puts on makeup, he’s almost impossible to recognize."

The wooden spoon in my hand stopped.

"Why are you telling me that specifically?"

"Because he might be your greatest rival."

"I never said I was cosplaying a female character."

"You haven’t said anything yet."

Eris stood with the laptop in her hands and approached the kitchen. After sitting on the chair across the counter, she turned the screen toward me.

The person in the first photograph looked like a beautiful woman with long silver hair and delicate features. The photograph beneath it showed a reasonably handsome young man with short black hair.

It was almost impossible to believe they were the same person.

"See?" Eris said. "Argent placed fourth last year. He says he’s preparing much more seriously this time because he intends to reach the top three."

"That has nothing to do with me."

"Even though you’re both men, you both have faces that are exceptionally suited to female characters."

I pressed my lips into a thin line.

"I’m not accepting that as a compliment."

"I wasn’t trying to compliment you. I’m evaluating your chances of winning."

As I turned the chicken, I leaned my face a little closer to the steam rising from the pan. If my face turned red from the heat, I could claim it had nothing to do with this conversation.

Eris turned the laptop back toward herself.

"Mira Solis will be hosting the contest. You know her, right?"

"The blonde woman who hosts television programs?"

"She’s also a former cosplayer. She won NovaCon’s first contest years ago, so people take her involvement in the event very seriously."

"This is a much bigger event than I expected."

"It’ll also be streamed live online."

My hand stopped again.

"Live?"

"Yes. More than six million people watched last year’s final."

An indescribable pressure formed in the center of my chest.

Walking onto a stage in a cosplay costume was already humiliating enough. Knowing that millions of people could watch it live threatened to immortalize my disgrace forever.

When Eris saw my expression, she tried to hide her smile.

"Don’t worry. Maybe no one will recognize you."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

"We could choose a character whose face is completely covered."

"If the judges score appearance, hiding my face would be stupid."

I became annoyed with myself the moment those words left my mouth. I was still pretending to be reluctant about entering the contest, yet my mind had already started calculating how to win.

With a five-star card at stake, protecting my pride was a luxury I couldn’t afford.

Eris must have noticed because she nodded with satisfaction.

"Now you’re thinking properly. We need to go to the mall tomorrow. We can check the costume shops and buy a wig and makeup supplies. Depending on the character, we may also need colored contacts."

"How much makeup are we talking about?"

"We’ll need foundation, concealer, contour, eyeshadow, eyeliner, false lashes, and setting spray."

More than half those words sounded like ingredients used in some kind of Nexus spell.

"You’re putting all of that on my face?"

"Yes."

"No."

"Noctis, stage lighting will make your face look washed out. No matter how beautiful you are, you could look terrible in photographs without makeup."

"I’m already pale."

"That doesn’t make the situation any better."

Eris left her chair and approached me. As though inspecting my face, she took my chin between her fingers. When I tried to pull away, she caught my cheek with her other hand and held my head still.

"Your blue hair and eyes mean you could cosplay certain characters without much makeup, but if we want to win, we can’t rely entirely on your natural appearance."

"Let go of my face."

"Your skin is in good condition too. We won’t need much foundation."

"Eris."

"If we adjust the shape of your eyebrows and make your eyes look sharper—"

"The food is going to burn!"

I grabbed her wrist, moved her hand away from my face, and turned back toward the stove. Fortunately, the chicken hadn’t burned yet. As I added the sauce to the pan, Eris remained beside me and continued showing me pictures on the laptop.

"If you want to choose a male character, we have a few options. You could cosplay the White Knight from one of the games released recently. Your face might be a little too delicate for him, but we could balance that with the armor."

"How are we supposed to make armor in twelve days?"

"We could buy a ready-made set and modify it, but it would be expensive."

"What else?"

"There’s an assassin character whose costume would be easier to prepare, but at least ten people have already applied with the same character this year."

"We wouldn’t get any points for originality."

"Right. There’s also the demon prince from the anime that came out last month, but the entire upper half of his costume is exposed."

"Absolutely not."

"It might look good once you’ve built more muscle."

"I can’t turn into a muscular demon prince in twelve days."

Eris examined my arms and tilted her head thoughtfully.

"If we work hard, perhaps—"

"No."

I began frying the rice and vegetables in a separate pan. Eris finally placed the laptop on the table and helped me take out the plates, but she clearly had no intention of dropping the conversation.

"I think we should consider female characters too."

"I think we shouldn’t."

"You’re throwing away your greatest advantage."

"My greatest advantage is looking like a girl?"

"You don’t look like a girl," Eris said in a perfectly casual voice. "You’re prettier than most girls."

My eye twitched.

"That was worse."

"We can’t change the truth. Your facial features, height, and body type suit most female characters. With the right costume and makeup, you could look even better than Argent."

"Being mistaken for a woman wasn’t enough, so now you want me to prove it in front of four hundred people."

"There will be far more than four hundred people there."

"Thank you. I feel much better now."

I let out a long breath as I divided the food between two plates. After pouring the dark sauce over the chicken, I added the vegetable rice beside it and placed one plate in front of Eris.

As usual, she eagerly picked up her fork to taste the food. I placed my own plate on the table and sat across from her, but I didn’t start eating.

I didn’t like what Eris was saying, but I couldn’t claim she was wrong.

I would feel more comfortable choosing a male character. I could walk onto the stage wearing armor, a jacket, or a long cloak and preserve what little dignity I had left. However, I needed to place among the top three against hundreds of experienced contestants, which meant I had to use every advantage available to me.

The value of a five-star card was impossible to calculate.

Even Umbrella, the item I currently possessed, could defy the laws of physics and transform into any object I wanted. There was no telling what kind of power might come from a five-star card.

Perhaps it could grant me an ability capable of competing with a real Nexus.

Perhaps it could finally allow me to stop being the useless Noctis who had been cast out by his family and looked upon with either pity or contempt.

In exchange for a reward like that, could I really refuse to wear women’s clothing for a few hours?

As I moved my fork along the edge of my plate, I began thinking about the anime I had watched and the games I had played in my previous life. Hundreds of characters unknown to this world passed through my mind.

I had seen that the contest allowed original designs, so choosing a character no one in this world recognized wouldn’t be against the rules.

In fact, it might be my greatest advantage over the other contestants.

A character no one had ever seen before, with no other cosplay for the judges to compare mine against...

I didn’t want to become a cute idol or a mage dressed in bright, colorful clothing. Even imagining myself wearing a skirt and smiling onstage made my stomach turn.

If I had to cosplay a female character, she should at least be frightening, dark, and powerful.

As I searched through the old games in my memories one by one, I remembered a dark role-playing game I had played years ago. I could still recall the first time I encountered a certain character in one of its secret endings.

Her pure white hair reached below her waist.

Her eyes were as dark red as fresh blood, and the black crown on her head looked as though it had been woven from intertwined thorns. Bloodstains covered the hem of her white wedding dress, and its elegant fabric dragged across the ground with every step, leaving red trails behind her.

A pitch-black raven perched on her shoulder, while she held a single flower between her pale fingers, its petals mottled with stains of red and black.

Despite her beauty, no one who looked at her could feel at ease.

Rather than a bride, she resembled a queen who had been murdered on her wedding day and risen from the grave to take revenge on an entire kingdom.

We could easily find a white wig and red contact lenses. Umbrella could form the black crown perfectly, while the raven could be made from lightweight materials. Altering a wedding dress would be easier than creating most other costumes, and we wouldn’t need to be professional tailors to add the bloodstains.

More importantly, the character’s unsettling presence meant I wouldn’t need to make cute gestures onstage.

As every piece of the costume slowly came together in my mind, my fork slipped from my fingers and landed on the table.

A small smile appeared on my lips without me noticing.

"I found it," I whispered.