Chapter 45
Seeing Cha Eun-joo begin to get excited, dark mana leaking from her, my first thought was that I needed to calm her down first.
If I failed to explain things properly here, not only would the relationship between Cha Eun-joo and Kim Isabel become awkward, but things could even escalate to the worst possible outcome.
And if that happened, both training them as my slaves and making them perform a friendly, cooperative blowjob together would be delayed as well. Considering that, having our relationship fall apart right now was obviously not a good thing.
I had no choice but to somehow explain things so that Cha Eun-joo wouldn’t misunderstand my relationship with Kim Isabel—though, rather than a misunderstanding, the relationship Cha Eun-joo seemed to think we had was probably the correct one.
“Eun-joo, calm down. It’s not like Isabel and I were doing anything strange.”
“Then what was it…?”
“I was only helping Isabel because she isn’t used to men. It’s not as though we were doing anything weird.”
“…If you were helping her, then why are you taking your clothes off, Seonho?”
“Because I thought getting used to a man’s body by touching it directly was also important for getting used to men.”
“…That’s a lie. If Isabel isn’t used to men, there’s no way she could shamelessly touch your body like that. Isabel, you’ve been lying to me this whole time, haven’t you? Pretending to be afraid in front of me while shamelessly touching Seonho behind my back….”
“Eun-joo, that’s enough.”
“……”
Still, she listens well. I was glad to see all the training I’d put her through paying off.
“Don’t get worked up. Listen, Eun-joo. I can explain this in a way you’ll understand.”
“…How?”
“Isabel can touch my body, even though I’m a man, because of the ‘buff’ I gave her. Just as I give you a buff when you’re fighting monsters, I’ve been giving Isabel a buff that keeps her from being afraid of men.”
“A buff…?”
“You know that my ability is a mental-type buff, Eun-joo. And you probably know better than anyone just how effective my buffs are.”
“Ah….”
When I brought up the buff, Cha Eun-joo slowly reined in the dark mana leaking from her and made an expression that suggested she understood the situation.
The claim that I had given her a mental-type buff seemed quite convincing. As the person who had received my buff more than anyone else, she probably knew better than anyone how effective it was.
“Isn’t that right, Isabel?”
“…Yes. Just as Mr. Lee Seonho said, I was training to get used to men while under the buff. I thought that if I gradually became accustomed to men while receiving the buff, I might eventually stop being afraid of them even without it….”
Kim Isabel had waited until I finished explaining things to Cha Eun-joo before adding her own words in agreement, which made the explanation even more convincing.
Thanks to her calm response, the conversation didn’t get tangled up or turn into a confusing situation. Cha Eun-joo’s expression relaxed as though she understood everything, and the dark mana leaking from her was completely reined in.
“I-I see…. I-I didn’t know that was what was happening….”
“I can see how it might look strange from the outside. Honestly, if I were you, Eun-joo, I would have misunderstood too.”
“……”
“But strictly speaking, it isn’t much different from the training you and I have been doing. Just as I gave you ‘Courage’ and hunted with you because you were afraid of monsters, Isabel’s object of fear just happens to be men instead of monsters.”
“I-I see….”
“I only thought it would be better for me to help her than someone else, since I’m probably the man Isabel is closest to.”
That was probably a sufficient explanation. Since it was Cha Eun-joo, I knew she would understand and accept what I’d said.
After all, she had been the first person to overcome her weakness through my buff, before Kim Isabel.
“I-I’m sorry, Seonho…. I-I misunderstood things…. And I’m sorry too, Isabel….”
“It’s all right. It’s understandable that you misunderstood. It’s fine as long as we cleared things up.”
“…I also think this was a situation where I could easily have been misunderstood. So please don’t feel too guilty, Ms. Cha Eun-joo.”
“…Yeah. I-I’m sorry, both of you….”
Cha Eun-joo’s sudden misunderstanding ultimately ended with her apologizing to Isabel and me.
…Though, strictly speaking, it wasn’t even a misunderstanding. Cha Eun-joo had merely expressed completely justified anger.
* * *
Because Cha Eun-joo’s arrival had made the atmosphere awkward, Kim Isabel’s ‘training to overcome her fear of men’ ended after she rubbed my back a little.
Although I had explained that this was training performed while she was under the buff, there was no way Kim Isabel could openly rub my body in front of Cha Eun-joo.
More importantly, if Cha Eun-joo saw Isabel rubbing my body, it would create misunderstandings where there had been none. If she saw Isabel training while letting out slightly labored breaths and soft moans, even Cha Eun-joo would obviously realize that Isabel and I were doing something strange.
『Suggestion Dispelled』
“Hngh, hyaaah…?!”
-Crash!
“Th-then I’ll be going back now…! Th-thank you for indulging me in the training…!”
-Rattle, clack!
“…See?”
“Yeah…. So there really is a buff that keeps her from being afraid of men….”
Thanks to Isabel becoming flustered after the buff wore off and making such a commotion, the excuse that she was training to get used to men while under the buff seemed to have worked.
After ending the morning training on a somewhat awkward note, I couldn’t do anything special in the afternoon either, since Cha Eun-joo said she would wait until I was discharged, so we ended with nothing but ‘treatment.’
In the end, thanks to Cha Eun-joo, I lost one precious opportunity to train Kim Isabel. Even if the reason was her loyalty in showing up to satisfy my sexual desire until my discharge.
‘At times like this, I’m not sure whether I should reward her or punish her.’
Looking only at the result, punishment would have been appropriate. But if I punished her for an action done with good intentions, she might become too passive a slave.
I wanted a slave who, when Master came home, would wait in a naked apron, scurry over, and ask whether he wanted a meal, a bath, or her—in other words, a slave who could take that much initiative on her own. So I put punishment on hold.
But rewarding her didn’t make sense either. If I handed out rewards indiscriminately when she hadn’t done anything particularly well, she might start getting uppity despite being a slave. She might not realize it yet, but someday she had to define our relationship herself as “‘Master and slave.’”
‘It can’t be helped. At times like this, I have no choice but to give her both a reward and a punishment.’
Now that I had been discharged, the restrictions of time and space that had interfered with my relationship with Cha Eun-joo were gone. If I wanted to, we could even spend the whole night together.
Once those two restrictions disappeared, what I needed to do next was obvious. I had already decided back in the hospital room what I would do next with Cha Eun-joo, whose heart had already fallen to me.
As I wondered how to naturally take Cha Eun-joo to a hotel or my house, she was the one who first brought it up.
“U-um, Seonho….”
“Yeah?”
“Um, today…. I-if you have time, Seonho….”
“……”
“C-could I get hypnosis training once too, like Isabel…?”
…My plan to punish her was canceled for now.
How could I punish a slave this pretty, so eager to do adorable things?
* * *
Cha Eun-joo walked out of the church alongside Lee Seonho, the person she liked most.
Even though it was the day she had been waiting so long for—his discharge day—Cha Eun-joo wasn’t in a very good mood. Just moments ago, she had witnessed the first friend she’d made at the academy besides Lee Seonho secretly running her hands over his back.
‘…It can’t be helped. Isabel must have wanted to overcome her fear of men too.’
Just as Cha Eun-joo couldn’t use her full strength against monsters because she was afraid, she had to respect the weakness of her friend as well.
After all, only a few days ago, she had been struggling with a similar problem herself. Because she had lost her family to monsters as a child, she had trembled in fear even when faced with fake monsters created by holograms.
The one who had saved her from that state was none other than Lee Seonho, who was walking beside her now. Thanks to his buff and the training she had continued diligently, she could now muster some courage even against holographic monsters without the buff, and while buffed, she could confidently cast magic even in front of a huge Owlbear.
If she hadn’t met him during the written exam, what would have become of her by now? She might have trembled in fear during the practical exam, failed to defeat even a single monster, and ruined her academy entrance exam.
In that sense, Lee Seonho was her benefactor, the person who had enabled her to do her part as a hunter trainee, and someone she wanted to continue relying on in the future.
…And they had also become close enough to see and touch each other’s private parts. He probably couldn’t imagine that she knew about it.
That was why she felt a little unhappy. The man who was practically her boyfriend had taken off his clothes and let another woman touch his body.
Even if that woman was her friend Kim Isabel, it still made her feel bad.
‘If he had at least told me beforehand, I wouldn’t exactly have opposed it….’
If the training had been meant to help her friend overcome her fear of men, and touching Lee Seonho’s body had been necessary for that reason, Cha Eun-joo wouldn’t have interfered.
It was for the sake of Kim Isabel, the first friend she had made at the academy besides Lee Seonho, and because Isabel, too, had suffered a similar problem—one Lee Seonho had once helped her overcome.
…Of course, she would still have felt a little jealous, but she wouldn’t have gotten that angry.
“……”
In fact, she knew. She and Lee Seonho were not lovers yet, so he had no obligation to report his every move to her.
If she confessed her feelings to him honestly, the two of them might officially start dating.
No, they almost certainly would. She had already known exactly how Seonho felt since the day they first met. If she confessed first, he would probably nod enthusiastically, practically jumping for joy.
She knew that intellectually, but she still couldn’t seem to find the courage. At times like this, she really needed the ‘Courage Potion’ buff she received from him.
But a confession made by relying on a buff might not feel sincere. She had to confess using her own strength somehow, but she still lacked the courage.
…In the end, she knew it was irrational to complain like this when she was the one who had failed to become Lee Seonho’s lover because of her lack of courage.
‘Still, I hadn’t even done that yet….’
Even though he had touched her breasts, she had never touched Seonho’s back.
She should have been the first to see his bare chest and back muscles too.
That regret fueled her jealousy and left Cha Eun-joo’s thoughts in considerable turmoil. As a result, a mildly petulant remark naturally slipped out toward Lee Seonho.
“Hypnosis training?”
“Y-you just helped Isabel with her training, didn’t you? S-surely you’re not going to do it only for Isabel and not for me…right?”
She couldn’t bear the anxiety without somehow confirming how he felt about her.
Technically, they were only doing lewd things under the guise of training, but training was training, regardless.
She only needed to confirm that he wasn’t going to help Kim Isabel with her training while putting hers off until later.
And besides, even if Isabel really did have romantic feelings for Lee Seonho—
‘If I become Seonho’s lover first and we become intimate, then even if Isabel seduces him later, Seonho won’t be swayed….’
So this wasn’t merely about satisfying his sexual desire.
It was Cha Eun-joo’s strategic dating plan to keep the person she loved from harboring improper feelings for another woman, and to make sure he could satisfy all of that desire with her alone.