Carnivore (4)

In the bathroom I took all of it out on Franc's body—every last scrap of the fury from the climax I hadn't been able to finish earlier.

By the time I was done, her belly had swollen up like a mountain and she was half-unconscious. I ran the hot water, laid her down, and washed myself off.

My head was fogged, as if my brains had drained out along with the ejaculation, but I couldn't leave the Madam lying out there like that. I rummaged through the washroom, pulled on a bathrobe, soaked a fresh towel in hot water, and stepped out into the living room.

"......"

Slowly wiping down the unconscious Madam's body, I let out another sigh under the weight of a thoroughly complicated heart.

Hwayeon's childhood was pitiful enough, but somehow I had the feeling the Madam's past wasn't much better. I felt that hunch especially hard in the part about her having meant to live without ever marrying.

...This damned hunch! Wasn't it gone?!

Anyway, she'd tried to devour me like a carnivore and gotten herself subdued instead, and looking at that slender face of hers, I didn't know how else to put it. She just seemed pitiful. Wretched, even.

I knew perfectly well that feeling compassion wasn't the normal response. But the way she'd kept staring into my eyes while we talked, and the way she'd suddenly flipped partway through—I'd have said there was some problem there other than the Madam herself. For example, what if I'd used some ability I didn't even know I had?

Franc and Hwanyeon, after taking my Healing Wave, had both shown a somewhat indecent side of themselves. So it was hard to write the idea off as pure nonsense.

"What am I even supposed to tell Hwayeon..."

Honestly, this was what worried me most.

I did have something to say to her. Even if I'd resisted, the result would have been the same anyway. The Madam was a C-Class physical-reinforcement ability user, and she wasn't someone I could overcome just by fighting back. Push Mana Mode to its absolute limit and I became something like a quasi C-Class, but it lasted a mere few dozen seconds. I could have resisted by firing Mana Bullets and Mana Lasers, but that would have been no different from trying to kill her.

I couldn't kill Hwayeon's mother. And yet having sex with Hwayeon's mother was...

"Nnngh."

Wiping down the Madam's naked body—a dead ringer for Hwayeon's, like they'd been cast from the same mold—I scratched hard at my head.

Coming to her house with her had been the mistake from the very start. I should have made any excuse at all and settled for a meal at some restaurant nearby!

...Regret, whenever you get around to it, is always too late.

As I carefully wiped her down, a glance showed that the redness at her groin had almost entirely faded. Hwayeon had regenerated in an instant—was this the difference between C-Class and B-Class? The fluids that had pooled inside her were seeping out and running down along her anus, so I wiped her again and gathered her up. Then I carried her to the large bedroom attached to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the bathroom where I'd washed, laid her on the bed, and pulled the covers over her.

Asleep with her eyes closed and her lips slightly parted, the Madam was truly no different from Hwayeon, and my heart misfired all over again.

"Damn it. Haaah."

The semen in the belly of Franc, still lying in the tub, hadn't all come out even then.

It seemed the more TP the semen contained, the longer it lingered inside her spirit body. But maybe because my cock wasn't there to plug her like a stopper, it was trickling out of her womb along her vagina in a thin little stream and running across the bathroom floor.

I felt bad for Franc, who was still dazed, but I had to force the semen out even so and get out of the mansion. I couldn't begin to guess what reaction the Madam would show when she woke. In the worst case, already snapped as she was, she might fixate on me like Misery and end up kidnapping me, locking me away, and breaking me in.

"S-Seoha..."

Franc, come back to herself, lifted a hand with effort ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and reached for me. I caught that hand tight and spoke.

"You hurting a lot?"

"N-nooo. Hic."

...What? Why was she hiccuping?

"First... I'm getting the semen out of your belly, Franc."

I focused Mana Sieve into my hand and pressed firmly on her swollen lower belly, and the stream of semen flowing between her legs grew steadily thicker. The problem was Franc's reaction.

"Hnnnngh. Don't wannaaa. The semen's all miiine."

...She was actually drunk, wasn't she?! She flailed her hands, trying to gather up the semen glowing a faint blue, and I blocked her with my own.

"I'll let you drink your fill later. Not now."

"For reeeal?"

"...I'll feed you until your belly swells up like a mountain."

"Mmm..."

Only then did she quiet down, and looking at her, I felt a flicker of worry. There wasn't such a thing as a semen addiction, right?

A glance at the flowing semen showed me the TP contained in it evaporating fast. I wondered if I couldn't just absorb that back... but a visceral revulsion rose in me, and I gave up.

Every time I pressed her belly, Franc let out a slightly pained moan, and once a certain amount had been expelled, her womb only gurgled and shifted. There was no sign the semen still left inside would come out.

This was a problem... Oh. Right.

"Franc? For now, want to try going into the Soul Stone?"

"Why?"

Franc dropping the formal speech felt oddly refreshing.

"Like this, I don't think we can go home. Want to go inside the Soul Stone?"

"Okaaay..."

She answered in a small voice, and soon light poured from her whole body—gold, with a faint mix of watery blue—and she vanished into the Soul Stone.

Watery blue? Last time she'd only given off gold.

I tilted my head, but there was no way to find out, so I gave up thinking about it. I turned on the shower, washed the evidence of my desire that had fallen in the tub down the drain, then turned Spatial Perception back on and found my clothes.

Get dressed, and get out.

The bodyguards moved to block me as I tried to leave for home, but the guard-sister I'd only gotten to know by face, back when I first met the Madam, held the others off. She gave me a silent bow and opened the way. I bowed my head in return, called a taxi, and headed for the Time River Building.

Riding in the taxi and watching the world go by outside the window, the Madam's words and actions kept circling through my head.

For a long time she had never once caused a scandal, and had shown the world nothing but a perfect face. So why had she shown me a reaction like that?

Even if my prospects were bright, even if she was an ability-first absolutist and my power had fascinated her, showing me a side like that honestly... didn't make sense.

It was easier to believe the opposite—that the Madam was in fact profoundly debauched, that she enjoyed this sort of thing fairly often, and that razor-sharp control of the press had simply kept the rumors from ever spreading.

But that didn't hold water either. If she were truly that obscene, there was no way Hwayeon wouldn't have noticed, and my sister, a ghost for picking up on things, would have disliked her.

Which meant the Madam... truly liked me...

Aaah, seriously!!

I suddenly scratched hard at my head, and the driver stared at me through the rearview mirror like I was a lunatic.

Without Franc beside me, my imagination felt like it was spreading with nothing to hold it back. Think any further and the man might refuse me the ride, so I just emptied my head.

Stop thinking until Hwayeon showed up. I couldn't reach a conclusion on my own.

By the time I'd taken my school uniform back from Kim Ji-soo at the front desk of the Time River Building, caught another taxi, and come home, it was nearly four in the afternoon.

"Sis isn't here today either."

My parents weren't in either. Running late today?

Come to think of it, my sister had been out of the house a lot more lately.

Ever since she became a college student, she was always there when I got home, and I'd asked her once whether she even studied at school. She'd said she'd piled most of her course ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠registration into the mornings, and even when she had afternoon classes she only sat in for about an hour after lunch. Well, aside from that there had to be school events, club activities, group projects—what about those, I'd asked, and she'd answered that assignments were a piece of cake, and that she'd done so many events and clubs in high school she was sick of them.

Getting my ass kicked for asking whether she studied was just a bonus, of course.

That same sister had been coming home late several days running, which nagged at me a little, but I let it go, figuring she'd found something else she wanted to do.

I'd washed at the Madam's, but I'd done it in a rush for fear she'd wake, so I washed again. When I came back to my room, Franc revealed herself from the Soul Stone necklace.

Thin threads of watery blue wavered through the bright gold. It was deeply uncanny. What I'd seen earlier hadn't been a trick of the eye.

She came out of the Soul Stone naked, dressed herself properly, and was perfectly sober, as if she'd never acted drunk at all. But her cheeks were faintly red. The memory of what she'd done was still there.

She looked a little scattered, so I waited for her to settle, then asked about the watery blue.

"Watery blue... is it?"

"Yeah. The only thing you can think of is TP again, right?"

"Nnh, yes."

At the word TP she flushed and flustered, whatever it was she'd associated with it, but my head was so tangled up with the Madam that it was overloading, and I couldn't spare Franc the attention.

I'd gone to such pains to build a three-way between Franc, Hwayeon, and me, and now the Madam had crashed in and it felt like that golden triangle was about to shatter. My chest was tight. How was I supposed to settle this mess without leaving aftereffects?

...No matter how I thought about it, there was no answer.

I flopped back on the bed and heaved a great sigh, and Franc sidled over and poked my forehead. Tap, tap.

"Is the Madam weighing on you?"

The moment I focused Mana Sieve into my head, she offered me her lap as a pillow and set about tidying the hair that had only half-dried after my shower.

"Yeah. I feel sorry toward you, Franc, and I can't face Hwayeon either..."

"That was something that could not be helped. Once she had caught you, physical resistance would have been useless. Considering her experience and her years, escaping her would have been too much to ask. I am worried about how Hwayeon will react once she learns of this, but..."

"...Hwayeon wouldn't try to kill the Madam just because she's angry, right?"

"S-surely not."

Saying so, Franc stole a glance at my face, then carefully opened her mouth.

"I-if, perhaps, she is to your liking—"

"Stop. That isn't happening. For me there's only you and Hwayeon. From today on, I'll refuse any situation where I'm alone with the Madam, no matter what it takes."

Something strange had seemed about to come out of her, so I cut her off.

"Yes."

At my words she wore an expression that looked somehow a little glad, and sad, and at a loss. The Madam was clearly weighing on her.

Just how deep did Franc's understanding go? If I'd been in her place, I wouldn't have let the Madam off—or myself, either.

...Surely she wasn't about to tell me to reach for the Madam too?

"Rather, that person as well—"

"I knew you'd say that!!"

"Whaaat?!"

Ugh... this was no good! Because of Franc, my head was turning into a ball of yarn some cat had been batting around!

From the simple question of how Hwayeon would react, to that somehow obsessive look the Madam had kept showing me, the fact that she'd jumped me, the lonely figure she'd shown at the mansion, the line about possibly cutting ties with Hwayeon, and at the very end that loaded remark about living with her eyes on me alone!

And thrown in on top of it, the incomprehensible battle between the Soul Reaper and the Association's ability users, and Franc's terrifying capacity for understanding even while her own man was half-raped right in front of her—think about all of that, and my head felt ready to burst!

Just lying there rolling around in a daze only tangled my head further, so I changed back into my gym clothes and took off running up Iljasan.

Without turning Mana Mode on, I ran like a madman up the hard-packed mountain trail until my breath climbed all the way into my throat, and the people out walking nearby stared after me with the eyes of startled rabbits as I sprinted full tilt up the slope!

"Graaaaah!!"

Feeling a strange freshness in the two legs and the body that moved exactly as I willed them, I covered more than five kilometers at a dead sprint. Then my heart was pounding like it would burst, my vision yellowed, and cold sweat streamed over my whole body.

"Huk, huk. Huff. Haak. Haaah."

I dropped onto the dirt, swallowing down the urge to retch and gasping for breath, and Franc watched me with her face full of worry—maybe because the run had been such a wreck.

"I don't... get it. Why! All of a sudden, someone I... huff. couldn't even bear to look at, is coming at me saying she loves me?"

I hadn't spun up Mana Mode, but as if it had sensed the wrongness in my body, the Phase Power packed without a gap inside me began to move on its own, gently wrapping the heart that was pounding like mad and the leg muscles that ached as if they'd snap. The chills, the body pouring cold sweat, the two legs seizing—their condition improved as if time itself were rewinding.

"Seoha, you're so coo—"

"Don't you finish that with 'because you're cool.'"

"......"

I asked it of Franc, her cherry lips pressed shut.

"Pfft... Franc, do you not even have any jealousy? If I were you, haah, I'd have called lightning down on the Madam, and on myself too. You're not even angry?"

"Of course I am angry. Angry enough that I want to scream until my throat tears."

Eyebrows lifted in a sharp inverted V, her face cold as she said it—my heart dropped with a thud.

A face chilly and biting, nothing at all like the times my sister had been angry, soon loosened gently into an expression that said there was no help for it.

"She is the single most influential person in Korea. If she stakes her life on your love and begs for your affection, then I welcome it. The more she clings to you, the safer you will be. I do not know what a shadow power broker is, but if it is to your benefit, then it can only help you. It would never do you harm."

"......"

"I-I'm sorry..."

Every word out of Franc became a dagger and stabbed me in the chest. Of course she was angry. She'd only been letting it pass out of understanding.

At the sight of me wilted, Franc smiled bitterly and wrapped her arms around my back.

"No. I am sorry as well, for showing my anger. You did everything that could be done to avoid that situation. That, I can guarantee. So please do not be sorry. My anger was aimed at myself, for failing to stop it, and at her, for forcing herself upon you."

"Yeah..."

Hear something like that and not feel sorry, and you wouldn't be a person. You'd be some animal's whelp.

"Persuading Hwayeon is what will matter. If only Hwayeon can be persuaded, then at least within Korea there will be no one left who can touch you—directly or indirectly."

"...Wouldn't that be too much to ask?"

And with that, I told her what I'd felt in Hwayeon's behavior after she had her first time, last Tuesday.

"You are right. I too was curious why she suddenly broke the promise to wait until she was nineteen and offered up her virginity... so she was guarding against a situation like this as well."

"......"

I was sitting there with a gloomy face when Franc carefully opened her mouth.

"Seoha? Would you leave the matter of speaking with Hwayeon to me?"

"Huh? Do you have some kind of way?"

Franc gave a dazzling white smile and lifted her index finger just a little.

"One method came to mind. But it is a secret from you."

"Ehh."

On any other day I would have tickled her or pestered her until she confessed, but I was so full of guilt over what had happened with the Madam that I couldn't bring myself to.

"Now then, please leave that matter to me, and let us head back."

"Yeah."

I checked the time. It was past six. By now Mom or Dad would be off work. Would my sister be home too?

I dusted off my backside, stood, and raised Mana Mode. At once my breathing evened out, and strength brimmed through my whole body.

Franc had told me to leave it to her, but I ought to prepare, just in case.

We weren't married yet, but having shared a bed with the mother of the woman who would become my wife was something no ordinary Korean could ever understand—not ethically, and not by the way Koreans think.

My head hurt, and a sigh came out of me on its own.

Haaah.

I ran the five kilometers back at a controlled pace, and with the sweat streaming down me that refreshing lightness came over me again, as if I could take flight.

Was it that running for a long time made my chest feel like it would tear? I'd truly hated the long-distance run and the hundred-meter dash among the fitness tests at school, because I hated that feeling—and I was surprised to find that somewhere along the way I'd come to take running as something enjoyable.

Even so, I was too lazy to run like this every day. Occasionally, when I had the time, would be fine.

I got home quickly, but neither my parents nor my sister were there. Thinking they were late today of all days, I started showering again, and before long my sister arrived and knocked on the bathroom door with an urgent face.

"Aaah! Seoha, are you in the shower right now?!"

...She must have been desperate for the bathroom. I answered that I was, and she dashed off to the big room. Right after that Mom and Dad arrived too, and life started moving through the empty house.

Coming out of the shower, I caught my sister as we traded places and she went in to wash.

"What kept you out this late? When I got home and you weren't here, I thought something had happened."

"I was running around looking into that training ground of yours. By the way, you met the lady today, didn't you?"

I startled at the words my training ground, then frowned at my sister for bringing up the most uncomfortable subject there was. Mom, changed into comfortable clothes, came out of the master bedroom and asked.

"The lady? Who are you talking about?"

"Hwayeon's mother. I stopped by the Time River Building today, and there was a commotion."

Not exactly a small one, was it? The Madam had jumped from the roof of the twentieth floor and then dragged me off. She didn't seem to know the details, and started fussing at me to explain already.

"You know how the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Madam helped me at the last council. There was that, too, so I had lunch at her house and came back."

"Lunch? You had a field trip today. What about the field trip?"

That was when Dad, changed and come out, turned on the TV, and a story about the museum was running on the evening news.

The Association spokesperson was in the middle of a background briefing when my name came up, and then...! Why was that nickname jumping out again!! Aaah!!

"...Blue Genius??"

Just kill me.

Listening to Mom and my sister cackling, I flopped out flat in the living room. Dad was changing the channel with a grave face, but the lunatic bastards at the stations had nothing else to talk about—every last one of them was covering the aberrant appearance at the museum and talking only about me!

Just say the name! Why did they have to stick the nickname on and call them together!! Blue Genius Jung Seoha...!

The woman anchor turned in her seat and looked to the side, and the screen cut over. A darkening sky filled the frame, and behind it the camera caught the museum's front exterior glass, more than half of it shattered.

As he spoke, the camera took in the spot where Hwa Joong-kang's finishing blow had detonated, and the Mirror Pond, grotesquely shattered by attribute rounds, while the reporter's voice went on explaining what had happened there.

My sister and Mom, who had been cackling, dropped their laughter clean away at the words mid-high rank aberrant and hardened their faces. Dad, too, focused in silence on the exchange between the anchors and the reporter.

The reporter's account ended, the picture moved back to the newsroom, and the man and woman anchors began trading remarks.

...Not a word about the person who brought the Soul Reaper's casket in.

"Son. What happened."

Dad lowered the volume and asked it with a hardened face.

Mom and my sister were looking at me a little pale, and worried they might faint the way they had last time, I decided to leave out the more provocative details and explain.

"The field class today was at the museum. I picked up a bad feeling and got out of there with the kids from school. Then there was this strange monstrous cry and a vibration, so I reported it straight to the Association, and a little later, when the Association's ability users arrived, I just told their captain what I'd seen. That's all."

"Son, your body's all right? Nothing's wrong?"

"I'm fine. I was more than three hundred meters away. I only passed on the information, and then I evacuated to the Time River Building."

Mom and my sister swept hands down their chests, looking as if they'd aged ten years on the spot. Dad thought it over, then asked me again.

"Was there any part of it that runs afoul of the Minor Ability User Act?"

"Yeah. They said there's an exception clause for cases like this. The Special Task Force team leader confirmed it to me himself—even if I pass along information with a detection ability, nothing disadvantageous comes back on me."

"Then that's settled. And saving close to six hundred people... well done."

Uh... Dad praising me felt like the first time in forever. My sister watched the news that the few who hadn't been able to get out in time were hospitalized at the Association hospital, searched around on her phone, and stroked my head.

"The people who couldn't get out—that couldn't be helped, so don't dwell on it. None of them lost their lives, and they say a stretch of rest will be enough for a full recovery."

"Our boy, you really are remarkable."

Mom hugged me tight and praised me for doing well, and the stress of what had happened during the day felt like it eased a little.

Once Mom and my sister went into the kitchen to make dinner, Dad spoke low.

"Blue Genius is what you used to call yourself, back when you were little..."

"Stooop! Not another word!!"

There were plenty of other perfectly good nicknames, so why did they have to slap on one that dripped with eighth-grade syndrome! And on top of that, it even tied into that horrific nickname from my active days...!

I clutched my head, flopped forward, and wailed, and Dad let out a snort of a laugh.

"Get used to it. A nickname the Association puts on you lasts a lifetime."

"Kugh."

Listening to Mom and my sister giggling in the kitchen, I grabbed hold of a mind that was trying to go blank.