Chapter 1: Because I Am the Strongest

Chapter 1: Because I Am the Strongest

Star Origin Calendar, Year 95. The New Federation.

On a nameless island—

At dawn, halfway up a rugged mountain, a fourteen-year-old girl named Caroline was struggling to climb, her face flushed with urgency. She cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted toward the summit, where a white-haired boy was still quietly watching the sunrise.

“Tendou! The organization’s final assessment is about to start—you need to come down, now!”

But the boy at the peak, Masamune Tendou, did not rush to answer.

Instead, he kept his gaze fixed on the sun just as it began to rise from the distant horizon. His eyes, shimmering with a strange brilliance like starlight itself, reflected a glow that seemed to hold unspoken expectations.

A moment later, when the first sharp edge of dawn broke free of the sea, Tendou smiled.

No one knew why he smiled—just as no one knew the truth of his identity as a transmigrant.

Two years had passed since Tendou crossed into this world.

On the very first day of his arrival, the “Popularity System” had awakened within him, along with the knowledge of the world he had landed in.

This was a world built upon the power of Star Origin.

Star Origin—a mysterious energy source. The root of all extraordinary matter. The fountainhead of all supernatural power.

Originally, this world had been no more advanced than Earth’s early 20th century.

But ninety-five years ago, a meteor shower forever changed its fate.

Countless shards of Star Origin rained down across the planet.

And with them came miracles—and horrors.

Many humans who touched these fragments awakened abilities beyond imagination, earning the title of Starbearers.

Countless beasts and plants twisted into strange and powerful forms, later known as Starbeasts and Starflora.

Scholars of the new phenomenon declared that day to be the dawn of a new era: Year One of the Star Origin Era.

As for Tendou, he had arrived in Year 93, only two years before the events of Stellaris: Embers—a story he had once known only as an anime from his previous life.

That’s right. He hadn’t just transmigrated into another world.

He had been dropped straight into the stage of an alternate-dimension anime.

And if he wanted to survive this so-called show, there was only one path: to gain enough popularity.

. . .

[Life is but a play. By stepping into Stellaris, you have become part of its grand stage. Yet under the starlight’s spotlight, the true protagonists have long since been chosen. If you, a mere supporting role, wish to remain on stage for long… you must gather enough Popularity.]

[Seasonal Popularity Rankings – End-of-Season Results]

• Rank below Top 10 → Forced plot death. The character “Masamune Tendou” is written off.
  
  

• Rank 4–10 → Confirmed for next season’s cast.
  
  

• Rank 3 → Guaranteed 10% minimum screen time next season.
  
  

• Rank 2 → Guaranteed 20% screen time + 100,000 bonus popularity points for character promotion.
  
  

• Rank 1 → Guaranteed 35% screen time + 1,000,000 bonus popularity points for character promotion + one chance to rewrite personal backstory.

. . .

The Popularity System.

To Tendou, it was both a blessing and a curse.

A blessing, because by spending popularity points, he could constantly grow stronger—or even purchase extraordinary boons, such as “advance knowledge of the season’s plot.” Like a prophet armed with spoilers.

A curse, because if he failed to rank within the Top 10 by the season’s end…

The system would schedule his forced exit.

In other words—he would be killed off by the plot itself.

For that reason, Tendou hadn’t just been scheming for two years straight—he had also borrowed the full amount of popularity credit from the system.

Sure, that meant he was already saddled with a crushing debt before the story had even begun—But to him, it was a price worth paying.

After all, the role he envisioned for himself was that of a natural-born powerhouse—like Gojo Satoru from Jujutsu Kaisen.

And if he wanted to achieve that, he had to put an overwhelming gap between himself and every other character.

That was why blowing through his full one-million-point loan wasn’t reckless. To him, it was necessary.

Risk and reward had always gone hand in hand.

And going all-in? Sometimes, that was the greatest wisdom of all.

. . .

[Character Status Window]

• Name: Masamune Tendou (Reserve Member of Ember Organization)
  
  

• Age: 12
  
  

• Star Origin: None
  
  

• Star Core: Star-Eclipse Eye (Compatibility 100%)
  
  

• Attributes: Strength S / Agility S / Spirit S / Constitution S
  
  

• Skills: Star Energy Manipulation (Master), Flash Step (Master), Starbeast Encyclopedia (Expert)—
  
  

• Current Popularity Points: 0
  
  

• Loaned Popularity Points: 1,000,000 (Maxed Out)

. . .

All S-rank base stats. Multiple master-level skills.

This was the glorious character sheet Tendou had forged after two years of planning and spending every last borrowed point of his one-million popularity loan.

It was worth noting that those S-rank stats weren’t absolute numbers, but relative ones.

In other words, his strength, agility, spirit, and constitution had all been pushed to the current limits of his body.

Which meant… if his growth rate couldn’t keep up with his body’s potential, those stats would eventually slip back down—first to A-rank, maybe even B-rank.

But Tendou was utterly confident he could maintain all four at S-rank.

Top rank of the season? He would claim it, without fail.

“The stage has already been set. Now… it’s time for the actors to make their entrances.”

Tendou stood and lazily stretched his small frame.

The golden morning sunlight cut across the glittering waves below, falling upon him like a natural spotlight, illuminating his silhouette as if he were already the star of the show.

Then, with an easy smile, he pulled out a pair of sleek sunglasses from his pocket, slid them onto his face, shoved his hands in his pockets, and leapt off the peak.

His light body seemed almost featherlike as he danced down the cliff, stepping effortlessly from one rocky outcrop to the next.

In just a few seconds, the boy who had been calmly watching the sunrise at the summit was now standing at Caroline’s side on the mountainside.

“Yo, Caroline. Morning.”

Even now, at this critical hour, he wore that same infuriatingly relaxed, carefree expression.

Caroline’s lips pressed into a thin line. 

“Hey, Tendou, do you even know what day it is today?”

Her voice rose sharply.

“Of all times, you’re standing here watching the sunrise?! Aren’t you afraid of failing the assessment?!”

Her tone was heavy, her volume loud—like a nagging mother scolding her ungrateful, reckless son.

Tendou winced and quickly covered his ears, his face twisting into a pained expression that practically said: Too loud! My ears are gonna bleed!

But his exaggerated act only made Caroline angrier.

Her frustration, already bubbling, threatened to spill over completely.

Caroline bit back her anger, forcing herself to take a deep breath. Out of genuine concern for him, she pressed her voice into something stern but steady.

“Tendou, I’m not joking with you right now. You need to take today seriously. Do you understand?”

“Because if we fail this assessment…”

Her voice trembled despite her efforts. The fear of failure, of what might happen to them, made her chest tighten.

Tendou glanced at her—at the catlike ears that twitched atop her head, the result of her Star Core surgery. 

He couldn’t help reaching out to ruffle them gently.

“Relax, Caroline. As long as I’m here, we won’t fail.”

“Why… why are you so sure?” she asked, almost pleading.

Tendou thought for a moment, then gave an answer perfectly in line with the “born strongest” persona he had chosen for himself.

“Well, if I had to explain… it’s because I’m the strongest.”

Caroline froze. For a long second, she couldn’t even form a response.

If anyone else had said those words, she would’ve dismissed it as arrogant bragging.

But coming from him… it felt like the most natural thing in the world.

Even so, she still thought it was far too arrogant for him to throw around the words the strongest so casually.

Which was why she resolved then and there to knock some humility into him—to make him treat this final assessment with the seriousness it deserved.

But just as she opened her mouth, Tendou’s expression suddenly shifted. His face went pale, eyes wide.

Caroline’s heart lurched. “Tendou? What is it? Did something happen?!”

“It’s bad, Caroline. This is really, really bad!”

Her cat ears shot straight up, green eyes wide. “Stop being vague! What happened? Tell me!”

And then he said, with a straight face:

“Caroline, the cafeteria is serving my favorite strawberry cake today. But I got so caught up watching the sunrise—I forgot to ask Aunt Lenna to save me a piece.”

He leaned closer, eyes serious. “Caroline, do you think if I run there now, I can still make it in time?”

“…”

Caroline was speechless. Utterly speechless.

She had actually believed him for a second. Believed something serious had happened.

And here he was—still hung up on strawberry cake.

If she were stronger than him, she’d have flattened him with her fists right then and there.

Instead, she could only glare, her fists trembling. Not the assessment, not the organization’s final exam—no, this idiot only cares about his cake!

Her face darkened, fury bubbling once more. She was just about to lecture him into the ground when—

Tendou, sharp-eyed as ever, seemed to read her thoughts.

Before she could say a word, he bolted.

One instant he was there; the next, he was a blur of motion, a shadow racing down the mountainside toward the cafeteria.

It all happened so suddenly Caroline couldn’t even react until his figure had completely vanished.

“…Seriously?”

Only when the echo of his footsteps had faded did she find her voice again.

She stared at the path he’d taken and muttered to herself:

“Star Core compatibility, first place. Perfect scores in the midterm assessment.”

“Tendou, why is it… that even though you’re so reckless and immature, when you say you’re the strongest, it feels like the truth?”

“Compared to you, it’s like we’re not even from the same world.”

Her bitter words hung in the air. But then—

grrrumble.

Caroline flinched as her stomach suddenly protested, a sharp pang twisting her abdomen.

Right. In her rush to drag Tendou off that mountaintop, she hadn’t eaten breakfast either.

Her cheeks flushed red. She cupped her hands to her mouth and yelled down the mountain:

“Tendou! When you get to the cafeteria, save me some breakfast too, you hear me?! Tendou!”

. . . 

Meanwhile, already near the foot of the mountain, Tendou tilted his head, rubbing his ear.

“…Weird. Did I just hear Caroline shouting something?”

He shook his head. “No way. With her personality, she’d never yell like that. Definitely just my imagination. Forget it—priority one is food.”

After all—if you don’t eat seriously, there must be something wrong with your brain.

At this moment, there wasn’t even the faintest trace of worry in Tendou’s eyes about the final assessment.

All that lingered there was hunger.

Because as far as he was concerned, this so-called “final assessment”... was nothing more than child’s play.