Vol.2 Minako in "Game Center Crown"

Minako Aino has stepped into the role of a Guardian of Justice, yet she treats the whole thing with total indifference and keeps ducking her obligations. Her feline mentor, Artemis, cannot work out how to discipline such an unwilling student. His breakthrough comes once he sees how sharp she is at video games, which leads him to bring in a special new title for her to master. Most of the chapter plays out inside an arcade rather than in any showdown with a villain.

Artemis presents himself as the protector of Venus's reincarnation, though his charge acts like nothing more than an idle schoolgirl. After the two squabble, Minako heads for Game Center Crown, greets the older attendant Motoki Furuhata, and throws herself into the machines. When Artemis remarks that her manner seems boyish, she snaps back by branding him a cross-dressing cat and reels off trivia about the goddess of the hunt, knowledge she credits to a game rather than any studying.

She fixates on a title called Lovely Fight, straining to top a rival's unbeatable score. A grumbling stranger watches her, mourning how the venue has drifted from a haven for luckless men into a couples' hangout. Her uncanny knack surfaces again when she plucks a plush cat from a claw machine on her very first attempt. Sensing an opening, Artemis hatches a plan, endorsed by Boss, to sharpen her into a Champion of Justice without derailing her lessons.

A mysterious new game draws a crowd around Minako, who politely hands off her turn. Back at Lovely Fight, she suddenly breezes through it and seizes the top rank, dethroning the elusive Taku. The sore loser reveals himself as Takurou Otaku and, certain she is a disguised man, chases her to expose her supposed secret. Boss then explains that her compact can reshape her into anyone at all. Minako becomes an armored fighter, gets tackled and sniffed by Takuro, and finally shifts into Sailor V. After soaking up the crowd's awe, she delivers a punishing kick when he peeks beneath her skirt, only to recall too late that he was never a foe, before hauling Artemis out of the building.

This entry marks the first appearances of arcade worker Motoki Furuhata, the sore gamer Takurou Otaku, the Game Center Crown setting, the Sailor V Kick, and the transformation phrase tied to Minako's compact. The story never pits her against the Dark Agency, making it one of the rare chapters detached from the larger plot. The plush cat she wins resembles the later anime designs of Artemis and Luna, and her borrowed armor echoes the female warrior seen in the Lovely Fight game.