Chapter 1: CH 1

TL: DannY

ED: DannY

“You want to buy a lottery ticket with me?”

I guess she didn’t have the money to buy even a single lottery ticket.

My spoiled childhood friend, Mita Ryoka, suddenly asked me in a flirtatious way.

“I’m not buying it.”

“Let’s go dream about it. If I win, Yuki and I will split it in half. We’ll take 300 million and split it in half, 150 million each. You can have fun for the rest of your life.”

“Hah. I’ll take you up on your bullshit once in a while.”

The word “half”.

Somehow, I went along with it and handed over 150 yen, half of the 300 yen per lot.

Upon receiving the money, my childhood friend Ryoka quickly ran to the lottery booth.

Lottery tickets. Actually, it’s something that even high school students can buy.

I heard that some stores refuse to sell lottery tickets to high school students.

I hope they’re not rejecting us. We waited for about a minute.

“I got it!

“Oh, good for you.

Ryoka and I happened to be on our way home together.

We didn’t know that buying a lottery ticket on the same day would change our lives forever.

*

{ED: Twelve seconds later}

Time flies. Before I knew it, the New Year had arrived.

At the moment, I’m thinking about the lottery ticket I bought without even thinking about it.

I just came back from my mother’s house, but I wanted to know the result, so I went to Ryoka’s house to greet her for the New Year.

“Happy New Year.”

“Happy New Year!”

I was polite, but she said “Happy New Year” in a light-hearted way.

Well, we’re childhood friends. This is normal.

I’m not sure what to make of this.

“At least give me a proper New Year’s greeting.”

“You’re the top student in your class and you got an A on your mock exams, that sounds like sarcasm, you know?”

“Yes!　I’m just being sarcastic to Yuki, who is dying to try and get into the most prestigious university!”

“Oh, man, so… Where’s that lottery ticket you bought at the end of the year? I know I said I wouldn’t win it anyway, but I’m still curious. Let me see it.”

After giving me an encouraging grin that made me feel like a kid, Ryoka fetched the bag of lottery tickets and said, as if she remembered.

“By the way, it’s January 5th and I haven’t gone to Hatsumōde yet”.

{ED: Hatsumode is the first shrine visit in a new year ( a Japanese tradition)}

I’m a student preparing for an examination. It’s only natural that I should at least ask God for help.

That’s why I decided to take Ryoka to Hatsumōde, even though it was late.

I got Ryoka to change out of her nightgown and we started walking to a nearby shrine.

As we walked, Ryoka started checking the winning numbers on her phone.

“….”

“Hmm, What’s up?”

“Yuki… I think I hit it.”

“Oh, yeah. Are you trying to fool me by deliberately exaggerating? Here, give it to me quickly.”

I took Ryoka’s phone and the lottery ticket and checked to see if I had won.

{ED: Why are you so Tsun-Tsun with the lottery ticket? Pout~}

Let’s see, the winning numbers are 56 pairs, 123456734…

“……”

“See?”

“Hey, isn’t this bad?

“Yeah. It’s really bad.”

Yes, we bought a lottery ticket together.

Who would have ever guessed that we would win the top prize?

“First, a strategy meeting.”

We decided not to go to Hatsumōde.

On January 5th, we walked into a family restaurant that was completely open for business for the new year and started talking about the future.

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.

.

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“What are we going to do with this?”

“Well, since we both bought it, why don’t we split it 1.5 million each?

“I mean, who owns it, you or me?”

{ED: Kids, golden advice is to talk to the adults}

“What? We both bought it, so it’s for the both of us. Don’t ask me something silly.”

I was unable to think things through calmly.

We ordered a drink from the drink bar, but for some reason, we didn’t go to get our drinks, and the waitress brought us water to quench our thirst.

“Ryoka. I bought that lottery ticket! Don’t tell me that I don’t have the right to own it?”

Even though they were childhood friends, we were also strangers. If it’s a lot of money, there’s always the possibility of betrayal.

{ED: Strangers… How in the Wo-… (muffled noises)}

If you find yourself in a situation like this, you will fall into a state of suspicion.

“Of course that’s not true!  Yuki’s the one who is thinking like that.”

“What?”

The mood started to turn ugly.

Then, I remembered something.

“Gift Tax…”

“Oh, yeah. That’s right. One of us has to accept the gift on behalf of the other, and if you give it to the other, you might have to pay gift tax.

Gift tax. It’s a tax you have to pay when you give someone your money, based on the amount they receive.

It is tax-free up to 1 million yen per year. I overheard that you are exempt from tax up to 1 million yen per year, but if you exceed that amount, a high tax rate is imposed.

“When you consider the gift tax, if we split it between us, we’d lose a lot of money.”

“What should we do?”

Ryoka and I are trying our best to get into the most challenging universities.

Unfortunately, we were still children. We still don’t know a lot about taxes and money.

We thought about talking to our parents about it, but decided not to.

Because, you know, it’s the year 2023.

The age of adulthood has been lowered to 18, and as high school seniors, Ryoka and I have already celebrated our birthdays and were 18 years old.

Our parents have practically no right to manage our property.

Even if you talk to your parents, it is obvious that money would be confiscated or regulated in some way for the future.

“What should we do about the gift tax?”

“I know. We have to do something about it.”

We didn’t rely on the fact that we have a civilized device called a smartphone, and we think things through with just our minds.

And we came to a ridiculous conclusion.

“Marriage.”

{ED: Truly ridiculous but I ain’t complaining coz’ I like it}

“Keke, marriage!? What are you spouting all of a sudden, Yuki?”

“No, I thought that if we exchanged the money together after we got married, we could use it freely as joint assets without being subject to gift tax.”

“Indeed. But marriage, you know. It’s not like we’re lovers, we’re just childhood friends. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not.

“But if we get married, one of us won’t be able to insist that this lottery is mine, and we can avoid betrayal. Well, the worst that could happen is a quick divorce.”

It’s an outrageous idea.

It’s a great idea, but it’s not a great idea for the two of us, who were both very naive.

“Is it okay for Yuki to marry me?

“Are you okay with marrying me?”

Gift tax.

I couldn’t help but think of that word that suddenly came to my mind.

Ryoka seemed to agree with me, and we both looked at each other closely.

Seeing the look of agreement on Ryoka’s face, I declared clearly.

“Good, we’re going to get married.”

“Yes, we’re getting married. We have to persuade our parents.

{ED: The Kids are ‘Fast and Furious’}

“Hey, don’t you Remember? It’s the year 2023. The age of adulthood is 18. You don’t need your parents’ consent.”

“Oh, right.”

After that, we didn’t do much research on what would happen if we won the lottery, but we did a lot of research on how to get married and made preparations.

Then we went to the Municipal  Government Office to get a copy of our family register and other things.

{ED: I hope I’m right since that’s the place where japanese people register their marriages according to google}

I became an adult at the age of 18. There was no need to check with my parents to see if they had given me their consent.

The preparations progressed at a quick pace, but there was a problem with the witness section of the marriage certificate.

The age of adulthood had been lowered to 18, but the signature of someone over 20 was required.

“Who do you wanna get?”

“Wait, wait. We’re still in high school, right? Are there any school rules against getting married in high school?”

I think we’ll be fine. When I read the school rules in the student handbook while I was gathering the family register and such, it didn’t say anything about not being allowed to get married.

“Oh, oh.”

When I was writing the marriage certificate, I encountered a column for witnesses.

For now, I’ll take it home and think about it.

It was when I was thinking that.

“Can I interfere for a moment, please?　You’re in high school, we heard the word “marriage,” and you can’t find an adult witness over the age of twenty. If you are fine with me and my wife, we’ll sign it, okay?”

Two people who had just come to register their marriage approached us.

They must have heard us worrying about the lack of witnesses as high school students.

“Why are you helping us?”

“Sure, you may still be at the age where people say you are a child. Still, you believe in love and want to get married. When you see someone like that, isn’t it natural that you want to help them?

It’s not that being a witness is some kind of big responsibility.

I happened to run into two newlyweds who had just submitted their marriage certificate, and they filled in the witness fields.

So, the preparations were over.

All we had to do was to submit the documents and we would be married.

“I’m starting to get nervous.”

“Oh, me too.”

I nervously submitted my marriage certificate at the counter.

The age of reaching adulthood is 18. You don’t need your parents’ written consent anymore.

“Congratulations.”

{ED: Congratulations~ Celebrations~}

Shindo Yuki and Mita Ryoka got married.

Ryoka entered my registry, and Ryoka became Shindo Ryoka.

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.

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As a result of the rapid progress, there was still time.

January 5th. The day when I can redeem my lottery ticket.

After submitting the marriage certificate, we headed for the redemption with the same vigor.

{ED: Yes, there was this lottery wasn’t there… }

Since I was the winner of the highest prize, I was taken to a small room to receive an explanation.

{ED: SUS}

“Um, are you two sure you’re buying jointly?

“What’s a joint purchase?

“It means two people bought a lottery ticket together. In the case of a joint purchase, you can decide how much each of you will receive, and then you can receive the winnings according to the ratio.

“What about gift tax?”

“Huh?”

I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

I can’t stop the sweat from coming out of my eyes. No, I don’t think I can.

“Of course there’s no tax, right?

{ED: Oh Holy Smokes. Enjoy your married life}

“……”

“……”

“Can I help you?　Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t check the documents thorougly. I’m sure you’ll be happy to know that as the two of you are husband and wife, you need not share the winnings from your joint purchase. However, just in case there is a possibility of a dispute in the future, I recommend that you both divide the money. What would you like to do?”

“Oh, yes. Please divide it neatly in half.”

“Yes, so the winning percentages are 50 percent each. We’ll split it in half and transfer the money to your account.”

“Please, do so”

“…”

“What’s wrong?”

“No, it’s nothing”.

The procedure went on in silence without me being able to say that I got married because I thought there would be a gift tax.”

After all the procedures were completed, I was able to have my winnings transferred to my newly created account. As expected, the money won’t be transferred immediately.

I’m really looking forward to seeing the money transferred to my new account.

After leaving the bank, we decided to take a look at the situation.

“We’re idiots, aren’t we?

“Yeah, we’re idiots. We were too paranoid about winning a lot of money. Why did you do all that crazy research about marriage and not look into how to receive your prize money?”

“You know, what do we do?

“Well, you know. We should just get divorced.

{ED: End of series goodbye. Just Kidding… }

“Well, as expected, both Yuki and I are going to be divorced, right?　Well, for the time being, since we’re married, can we live as a normal couple?”

“A bad marriage huh. It’s not that we’re incompatible or anything. If we are really compatible, we won’t get divorced.”

“Let’s just try living together.”

“Yeah, maybe it’s not a bad idea to become a couple.”

And so began the strange married life of Ryoka and me.

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