Determination
“Really? Is it really you, Jun-oppa?”
“Yeah, that's what I said. So get off me a little, Heni.”
He'd expected her to leap back in shock. Instead, Heni's eyes sparkled even brighter as she clung to him all the tighter. The heat of her enthusiasm was so intense that Jun himself recoiled, stumbling backward in alarm.
Just how much has my face changed for her to react like this?
In truth, Jun had already figured out why the boys had been blushing the moment they looked at him. Only the densest protagonists from certain island-nation novels would have failed to notice something so obvious.
Still, the children's reactions were far too extreme. Jun pulled a mirror from his subspace and held it up to his face.
A calm, fine-featured child of androgynous beauty stared back at him from the glass.
This... is definitely something people could mistake.
Even Jun himself would have been fooled if he hadn't known it was his own reflection. The face in the mirror was that pretty. A masculine edge still lingered, but his youth and long hair tipped the balance firmly toward the feminine. Combined with those serene, delicate features, he looked for all the world like a precocious little girl.
He wasn't quite a peerless beauty on Fortuna's level, but in a small village like this he could easily rank among the prettiest faces around. The Blessing of the Social Butterfly must have fully activated with this latest growth spurt.
But I never wanted to look like this. How did it end up this way?
The appearance Jun had hoped for was something cool and charismatic—more like Leon. He had never once wished for the face he wore now.
Jun whipped his head around and fixed Fortuna with a suspicious glare. She was the one who had reshaped his features during the physical remodeling with Realize.
“For.”
“H-haha. What is it, my cute, adorable little Juni?”
“This face. You did this.”
“Hmm? For doesn't know. Never happened.”
Fortuna shook her head left and right with an expression of pure innocence, playing dumb.
Oh, so that's how you're going to play it.
“Then you won't mind if I look in the mirror and change the shape of my face myself?”
“What?! Absolutely not! Do you have any idea how much effort I put into guiding your features with the absolute minimum of cosmetic work so you'd end up looking exactly like this?!”
“Don't care. You should've just done it the way I wanted from the start.”
Jun glared daggers at his reflection, looking ready to tear his own face apart and rebuild it on the spot. Fortuna frantically plastered herself against his cheeks and began pleading in earnest.
“Jun, let's just leave it like this, okay? Now that the Blessing of the Social Butterfly has truly begun to shine, changing your face at this point would only make it look unnatural. If you're unlucky, the blessing itself might even break.”
“...So this is what you were waiting for. Every time I suggested fixing my face early, you freaked out and stopped me just so I wouldn't notice!”
Whenever he watched Leon being fawned over by the girls his age, the church nuns, and the village maidens, Jun would shout “Damn looks-based society!” and try to reshape his face with Realize. Each time, Fortuna would insist, “If you want the blessing to shine as brightly as possible, it's best not to force anything on your face,” then soothe him with a thorough breast-squish until the impulse passed.
Jun had been genuinely grateful for that. Only now did he realize her kindness had been a trap set for her own desires.
She deceived me with words and breasts! For, I trusted you!
A deep sense of betrayal made Jun's body tremble. Sensing his feelings, Fortuna comforted him by rubbing her soft mounds against the bridge of his nose.
He hated to admit it, but he was starting to feel better. A wave of self-loathing and patheticness surged up—only to melt away just as quickly under the power of the breast-squish.
“Mama just loves our Juni's face so, so much. Can't we leave it just like this? Hmm?”
Catching the shift in his mood, Fortuna pressed her body against his face even more aggressively.
It feels good, sure, but isn't this going a little too far? We're not exactly alone right now.
“Haaah♡ Haaah♡ Jun, Juuun♡”
Had she actually forgotten the children were nearby? Fortuna exhaled a sultry breath and began grinding her crotch against the bridge of his nose. A thick, feminine scent flooded his nostrils.
Startled, Jun checked the kids standing blankly behind them and hurriedly peeled her off his face.
“A-ahh, nooo♡ Just a little mooore♡”
Half-melted with pleasure, Fortuna stretched her arms and legs toward his face. Jun looked down at her coldly.
“Hey, you perverted fairy. Snap out of it already. Want me to call the Boss over so you can come to your senses then?”
“Hup! N-no, sir.”
“What you just did is no different from what the Boss was talking about. And you still claimed you were being treated unfairly? Do you have a conscience or not?”
“I-I'm ashamed of myself.”
“As you should be. Try reading the room a little. Got it?”
“Yeees∼.”
The moment she answered, Fortuna dove straight into the top of his head and buried her face there. Through the soul-thread, her embarrassment, self-loathing, and raw lust poured into him.
How long has it even been since we last had sex, and she's already this horny? She's not even a succubus.
Jun was beginning to seriously doubt Fortuna's species.
“Jun, why is Fortuna suddenly acting like that? She was being all cute and clingy a second ago.”
Kind-hearted Linda asked worriedly as she watched Fortuna. In her pure eyes, that vulgar self-pleasure had apparently looked like adorable affection. Then again, at eleven years old she probably didn't even know the word “masturbation,” so failing to recognize it was only natural.
“She's in the middle of some self-reflection, so just leave her be, Noona.”
“Self-reflection? I don't really get it, but she's okay, right?”
“Yeah.”
Her body is, anyway. Her heart's probably hurting a lot.
Jun deliberately left the rest unsaid so he wouldn't worry kind-hearted Linda. Fortunately, she let out a sigh of relief just as he'd hoped.
“That's a relief. But Jun, why did your face change like that? Your voice too, and... sniff sniff... even your smell.”
“Now that you mention it, Jun-oppa smells really, really good.”
Heni casually inserted herself into the conversation, sniffing as she closed in on him. Too tired to push her away again, Jun flicked her on the nose.
Thwack!
“Aaack! You bastard—”
Heni clutched her nose and glared daggers at him, twin flames burning in her eyes. Yet curiosity about his answer kept her from charging at him like an angry cat the way she usually would.
How am I supposed to explain this?
Telling the two girls—who knew nothing of his circumstances—about the blessing and the Third Core would be an enormous hassle. So Jun vaguely brushed it off with, “I did a good deed, so the god gave me a blessing.”
Since blessings really did descend from time to time when people performed good deeds, the two girls simply envied him and never doubted the story. It wasn't a complete lie, either. He had done a good deed, and Bright God had granted him a blessing.
“Hic! Jun!”
At the mention of a good deed, Harry must have remembered what had happened. Tears streamed from both eyes as he threw himself into Jun's arms. Jun offered a warm smile and gently stroked the boy's back.
Harry was small even among kids his age, so the two of them looked exactly like a precocious older sister comforting her crybaby little brother.
“Hmph. Pathetic.”
Donald snorted, a faint quiver of tears still in his voice. That stubborn refusal to be honest was pure catnip for Jun's mischievous side.
“What? Jealous?”
“W-what? Jealous of what? Of getting hugged by you? Jun, nearly dying once must've driven you crazy. Who the hell would be jealous of getting hugged by the likes of you?!”
“You sure seemed jealous earlier. What was it you said again? ‘W-who are you, Noona?’ all shy and flustered. It was pretty cute.”
“Sh-shut up!”
As Jun grinned wickedly and recounted the moment, Donald's face turned beet-red and he charged. Exactly the reaction Jun had been hoping for. He laughed in satisfaction and casually sidestepped the tackle with his newly lengthened legs.
In the middle of it, his eyes landed on Leon, who was laughing along with the girls as if he had never done anything of the sort. Leon must have read the mischief in Jun's gaze, because he shook his head in a clear “don't you dare.”
Of course Jun had no intention of granting that request.
“Leon, do you really have the right to laugh at Donald from over there?”
“J-Jun. Don't. I'll get mad.”
“‘E-excuse me...’”
“Ugh! I said don't!”
The moment Jun mimicked the way Leon had acted behind the privacy screen, Leon's face also flushed scarlet and he charged.
“Kh! Damn it!”
“This is...”
“Looking for me? That's just my afterimage.”
The two boys even activated their abilities in a genuine attempt to catch him, but no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't lay a hand on him. It was the natural limitation of people who still had to walk everywhere on their own two feet. That was exactly why you always needed at least one movement skill in your arsenal.
“Oppas! How long are you going to keep messing around?! I still have something to say to Jun-oppa!”
After a while, Heni—apparently sick of watching the boys' antics—yowled like an irritated cat. Still fully in mischievous mode, Jun quietly space-shifted behind her and whispered right into her ear.
“To me? What did you want to say?”
“Eek!”
“Hey! Jun! Enough with the pranks.”
Heni let out a cute little scream like a startled small animal and dove into Linda's arms. Linda held her protectively and fixed Jun with a stern look. The contrasting yet equally adorable reactions left Jun thoroughly satisfied; he exhaled a light sigh as if expelling the last of his playfulness and asked again.
“Heni, what did you want to tell me?”
“That!”
Eyes sparkling, Heni pointed straight at him. Seeing her future self reflected in Jun, she declared:
“Magic! Teach me magic!”