I Won't Let You Lay a Finger on the Young Master!
"Your stance has collapsed, Young Master!"
Ian and Aria's training continued until the sun sank low in the sky.
A little more… faster still.
Ian's goal right now was singular.
To take Aria's swordsmanship and, with his own power, defeat her even once.
"Again."
Driven by that single obsession, Ian repeated Retry, absorbing every breath Aria took and every minute habit into his mind until he owned them completely.
Attempt 60
"That was sharp enough in its own way, but your upper line was open."
Thud—!
Ian rolled across the ground once more.
Damn it. Retry.
Attempt 82
"Your combination is late! The reaction was good, but your right axis wavered, so the attack carried no weight."
Wham—!
Aria's wooden sword drove into the opening again and crushed down on Ian's shoulder.
…
…………
……………………
Attempt 103
Before he knew it, the same spar, the same stances.
For Ian it was hellish training that made every muscle in his body scream.
A little lower… drop the angle.
Yet inside that desperate time that accumulated only inside Ian's head, the tip of his sword grew sharper by the moment.
Once he passed a hundred attempts, he could read exactly where the next thrust would fly just from the angle at which Aria raised her blade—as clearly as looking at his own palm.
I can see it.
Aria, who knew nothing of this, began to feel a cold sweat trickle down her back as time wore on.
The more their swords met, the more unnaturally fast his reactions became.
This is impossible… It's as if he's reading every one of my attacks…!
As though he already knew where she would strike and was cutting off the path in advance, he slipped past her attacks with uncanny precision.
Swish—
At last, when Aria drove her wooden sword in a sharp thrust, Ian knocked the tip aside with the absolute minimum of motion, as if he had been waiting for it all along.
A single perfect counter, completed only after more than a hundred failures.
Whoosh—!
The tip of Ian's wooden sword tore through the air and stopped dead a hair's breadth from Aria's pale, slender throat.
"Haa… haa…"
Aria's blue eyes trembled violently.
Even though the wooden blade never touched her, the wind of the sword brushed her nape and sent a shiver racing down her spine.
Ian steadied his ragged breathing and let his signature sly smile curve his lips.
"Master. Looks like I won this time."
"…This time?"
Ah… I let it slip without thinking because I was so sure I'd won.
Aria's brow furrowed at the sudden, strange sense of dissonance.
"This is only the second time I've ever crossed swords with you in a spar, Young Master… What do you mean by 'this time'?"
"Hm? Did I say something like that?"
Ian gave a short laugh.
But this was no moment to quibble over words.
Yesterday he allowed a counterattack, and today he beat me in half a day…?
The essential point was this:
A young master who had only been learning the sword for half a day had perfectly defeated her. That shocking fact itself.
Ian lowered his wooden sword with a secretive smile that said not to ask further.
Aria still could not believe it.
She looked back and forth between her own trembling hands and Ian's face.
"How… how is this possible…"
It was not simply a matter of copying movements.
He even completed a counter I never taught him, all on his own…
This bone-chilling genius was not something that could be wrapped up in a word like "talent."
"Young Master…"
Aria's red lips trembled lightly.
"You truly… were born with a terrifying gift. There must have been a serious error at the Awakening Ceremony."
"Perhaps you should undergo a formal Awakening Ceremony once more…"
"Drop that talk already. Whether I'm a dud or whatever, I don't particularly care."
Ian cut off Aria's earnest report and, with the tip of his finger, lightly brushed the sweat-dampened curve of her cheek.
The skin he touched startled as if recalling the night before and trembled finely.
Ian leaned in and whispered low against her ear.
"More importantly, you haven't forgotten, have you? Then I'll see you later, Master."
Leaving that lingering promise behind, he tossed the wooden sword aside and headed for the mansion.
Watching his retreating back, Aria swallowed hard.
The door to the master's bedroom that would open for the second time tonight was already pressing down on her chest with a heavy, unsettling heat.
That night, in Ian's bedroom.
Aria once again clutched her chest, which felt ready to burst from trembling, and carefully opened the door to step inside.
Ian, seated on the bed, greeted her warmly.
"Oh, Aria, you're here. Come here. I'll put some ointment on you again today."
"It's the least I can do for my hardworking master who suffers every day."
Aria hesitated with embarrassment, yet walked over of her own accord and sat demurely at the edge of the bed.
"…Young Master Ian. Please take care of me again today."
Until yesterday this touch had been frightening and shameful.
Strangely enough, now Ian's warm, solid hand no longer felt so unwelcome.
…Why am I like this?
Ian naturally lifted the hem of Aria's skirt with a gentle hand.
The soft, elastic inner thigh, white and firm.
Skin mottled red and blue with bruises from the sparring came into view.
"Wait, come a little closer this way. The light doesn't reach, so I can't see well."
At Ian's low instruction, Aria drew her legs farther onto the bed, face flushed.
Without hesitation Ian scooped a generous amount of ointment onto his fingertips and rubbed it over the sensitive skin of Aria's inner thigh.
"Ah…!"
When Ian's thick fingers pressed firmly into the bruised flesh and drew slow circles, a hot moan slipped unbidden from between Aria's lips.
"Haa…!"
She could not even tell whether it was because the young master was touching her, or because of the pain of the wounds.
Strange… this is strange.
Every time Ian's hand climbed a little higher along her inner thigh toward more secret places, Aria's thighs quivered and she clutched the bed tightly.
"Mm, luckily the front barely shows any bruises now."
"Then how about turning over and lying on your stomach? The back is harder to reach for ointment since you can't see it. Lie face down, Aria."
"…!"
At the thought of fully exposing her back to Young Master Ian, Aria's face flushed as if it might explode.
Fierce shame surged up, yet at the same time the loyal obedience that said she must follow Ian's command sent a sweet thrill through her lower belly.
"…Yes, Young Master."
As if entranced, Aria lay face down on the bed.
Ian undid the back buttons of her maid uniform so that her smooth back was fully revealed and eased the clothes down a little.
With the rustle of fabric, the cool night air touched Aria's bare skin.
Ah… to show Young Master a sight like this…
Sliiiide—
Firm fingers traced the slender line of her waist and climbed slowly up her spine.
"Master, you worked me so mercilessly during the day… yet at night you're so obedient?"
"Nngh… Y-Young Master…"
When Ian's sly, low whisper tickled her ear, Aria felt her face burn and buried her head deeper.
By day she was the strict master who swung a wooden sword with terrifying force in the rear courtyard and made him roll across the ground.
Yet once night fell she trembled all over at a single touch of his hand and could do nothing but accept it—this contradictory sight.
To Ian it was a thoroughly pleasing view.
"Nngh…!"
Every time his fingertips touch me… my whole body tenses…
Ian deliberately put strength into his fingers and kneaded the large bruise on her back with slow, firm pressure.
The ointment melted with her body heat, and the slick sensation spread along Aria's spine like a shiver.
"Y-Young Master, nngh… p-please, a little gentler…"
"I don't want to. Considering how harshly Master worked me during the day, you should be able to take at least this much at night."
"Aahng…!"
Unable even to refuse, Aria bit her lip and let out a moan as the tingling sensation flooded in.
Every time Ian's hand stroked over her back and waist, over the smooth skin above her hips, a strange heat kept welling up from the depths of her lower belly.
Ah… strange… why is my whole body getting so hot…?
Young Master Ian is treating me.
He is simply applying ointment out of pure concern.
The more she tried to persuade herself of that, the more her nerves stood on end at every single touch of Ian's hand, and strength drained from her body.
Dangerous fantasies of wishing he would just force himself on her body as it was swirled through her mind.
"Haa… haa…"
"Aria, your breathing is too rough. It's not because it hurts, is it?"
Ian leaned close to the ear of the prone Aria and asked quietly.
When his hot breath touched the shell of her ear, Aria's body flinched.
"N-no… Young Master… nngh."
Already, uncontrollable wetness had gushed from Aria's depths and soaked her underwear and the insides of her thighs.
She felt so lewd she wanted to die of shame.
"Good. Then that should be enough for today."
Contrary to Aria's expectations, once the wound treatment was finished Ian closed the ointment lid without lingering regret.
Then he kindly pulled her clothes back up and began fastening the back buttons again.
"…Ah."
When her own lewd anticipation was dashed so emptily, Aria was swept by embarrassment and an unnameable sense of loss and hurriedly straightened her clothes.
The sensation of her underwear clinging wetly to her skin made it impossible to lift her head.
What… what was I thinking all by myself…!
Just as she was about to offer a word of thanks while drowning in the shame of having entertained lewd fantasies alone—
Crash—!
With a sharp shattering sound, the large bedroom window exploded into fragments!
The air in the bedroom that had been warm only moments before was instantly replaced by the stench of blood.
"…!"
Black-masked assassins, silhouetted against the moonlight and radiating cold killing intent, leapt into the bedroom.
Assassins…!
Aria's eyes turned ice-cold in an instant.
The maid who had been melting under Ian's hands only moments before, soaked in hazy heat, was nowhere to be found.
Forgetting even the shame of her soaked underwear and her disheveled clothes, Aria instinctively leapt down from the bed and planted herself in front of Ian.
In the same breath she snatched the sword hanging on the bedroom ornament stand and gripped it tight.
The instinct of a maid of the count's household crushed the secret heat that had been rising deep in her body in a single stroke.
I won't let a single one of them lay a hand on Young Master.
Shiiing—
The cold blade slid smoothly free of its scabbard and gleamed under the soft moonlight.
Faced with Aria's sharp killing intent that stood in such contrast to her disheveled appearance, the assassins who had entered the bedroom faltered for a moment.
"Young Master, fall back behind me! No matter what happens, I will protect you!"
Aria growled low and clenched the sword hilt hard.
Yet the masked assassins merely clicked their tongues at Aria's aura.
They showed not the slightest sign of panic.
The assassin at the front drew a sword black as pitch and spoke in a frigid voice.
"A maid, is it. Quite a keen blade. But do you think you can handle the three of us?"
"Shut up. You won't lay so much as a fingertip on Young Master's body!"
Aria's blue eyes shone cold with killing intent.
Inside, however, cold sweat was running.
Of all times…!
These were not amateurs who had killed once or twice.
They looked like seasoned assassins of at least B-rank.
On top of that, her stamina was already drained from sparring with Young Master Ian all day,
and the sensitive skin beneath her rumpled maid uniform had been stimulated until her condition was far from normal.
If I fall… Young Master dies.
Aria gritted her teeth, fiercely drawing up her mana, and faced the assassins in a chill standoff.
Behind her, standing by the bed, Ian watched the blood-reeking confrontation in complete silence without uttering a single word.
A strange silence free of fear or fluster.
Ian's combat sense, honed through more than a hundred Retries of endless sparring with Aria, was calmly reading every movement of the assassins and the angle of every blade tip.