Chapter 274: Final Arrangements (3)

I opened my mouth as I watched Sophia, head bowed low, fidgeting with nothing but her fingers.

"If we punish her in public, how does that actually play out?"

"Under the Ability User Criminal Punishment Act," Yeongeun said. "She spends the rest of her life as a special ability-user criminal, a special Certifier fixed to her body, paying reparations and compensation the whole way down—or, if the crime runs deep enough, splash, into Alcatraz. Looking at what that girl did, the reparations side is the likely one. But if our Seoha pushes hard enough, Alcatraz is still on the table."

Hmm. I can't send her to Alcatraz. That leaves exactly one option.

"Sophia. Go empty yourself in the bathroom. Wash every inch of you clean, and come back out."

At my words her face went red, then pale, then red again, and she walked off toward the bathroom of the unused master bedroom.

The moment she vanished beyond the door, my three lovers began to stare at me. No words. No expression. Just eyes.

"......Why the faces. You think I'm about to jump Sophia?"

"Aren't you?"

Yeongeun wore a faintly sullen look, the look of someone asking how I could turn my eyes anywhere else while they were standing right here. Franc and Hwayeon said nothing, but they seemed to be of the same mind. These girls, honestly......

"Try trusting your boyfriend a little, will you? This is Sophia, who already betrayed me once. I can't just let her walk, so I'm going to brainwash her—what the hell are you thinking!"

"......"

I barked it, but whether it was the word boyfriend or the blue bead of TP gathering at my fingertip and the Mana Vision, the three ladies flushed and quietly looked away.

"For crying out loud......"

"Th-then why tell her to go empty herself? What are you planning to do?"

"To brainwash someone, you have to break the mind first. She's an ability user, so her will's probably iron. Stomp her until her mind snaps and she might not be able to hold her piss or her shit, so I told her to empty out beforehand."

Only then did understanding touch their faces. They looked at one another, and Hwayeon was the one who spoke.

"But you already have experience using violence on Hiarid, do you not. You may well be better at it than I am."

"Come to think of it, how did Hiarid submit to our Seoha?"

......Too late.

The instant Hiarid opened her mouth I shot up and clamped a hand over it, but I was a beat too slow. My three lovers' faces went cold as an arctic wind.

Yeongeun and Hwayeon drifted in like ghosts, each seizing one of my arms, and clapped a hand over my mouth as well. Just like that, Franc put her question to Hiarid.

"Hiarid? Do finish what you were saying."

No! Don't say it!

I shot her a desperate look, begging her not to speak, but the stupid winged bitch didn't catch on. She tilted her head a little and opened her mouth.

No—!

Right on cue, Sophia—freshly washed, just stepped into the living room—heard Hiarid's account, shrank in on herself, and looked at me with a frightened face.

It wasn't a made-up expression. She was genuinely afraid. She closed her eyes, swallowed hard, and poured oil on lovers who were already beginning to burn.

"I-If Master wishes it, I will endure fisting as well."

The calm before the storm. So this is what they mean by the quiet just before a bomb goes off.

A crack sounded from the arms caught in Hwayeon and Yeongeun's hands. A real cold sweat broke on me, and I was seriously weighing whether to run for it by Space Leaping, when my lovers—thin ice glazed over their faces—forced smiles and spoke.

"Right. Sexual violence is still violence."

"When one considers the formidable physique of a High-Tier Variant, disarming the mind through sex would indeed be swifter than a physical beating."

"Direct intercourse would be the most effective means of shattering reason, and yet, seeing that Seoha deliberately chose fi—fis...ting, it must have been out of consideration for us, must it not?"

That wasn't them trying to understand me. It was each of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠them talking to herself, trying to talk herself into it.

My heart hammered. The three of them looked at one another, turned their eyes on me, and opened their mouths at the same time.

"Seoha."

"Uh—uh?"

Under the force of those gazes, and the spirit behind them, a chill spread through one side of my chest. What would come next? A rebuke of my perversion? Or the news that I'd disappointed them?

What left their mouths transcended my expectations by a wide margin.

"If you ever get tired of our bodies, tell us. Anytime."

"Whatever we have to do, whatever we have to take, we'll satisfy you."

"When that time comes, you will be sure to tell us, won't you?"

I thought my heart was going to drop out of me.

"What are you saying? Tired of you? Don't be ridiculous! That will never happen. Trust me. I only have you!"

I made my excuses desperately, then turned a savage glare on Hiarid and Sophia, the two who had made this mess. Both flinched and took a step back.

Sophia, for her part, looked confused at the sight of Yeongeun doing the same as Franc and Hwayeon, but she didn't open her mouth and do something stupid enough to feed my anger.

Only after I spent a good while hammering it home—that they were all I had, that the only women in my life were the three of them—did my lovers find themselves again, and finally set about what needed doing.

"I thought so last time as well. There is scarcely a place on Sophia one can strike. The belly, the backside, the thighs, perhaps."

"Don't all C-Class recovery ability users learn Auto Regeneration as a common skill? Even if she gets hurt, she'll heal right away, so it shouldn't matter."

"No. That is not what I mean. Her bones will break and the auto skill will trigger before we have even delivered a mental shock. The pain would then fall off sharply, and the beating would lose all its efficiency, would it not?"

Hwayeon had been of the mind that rather than inflict physical pain on Sophia, she ought to be handed over for trial and left to the law. After what had just happened, her thinking seemed to have swung a hundred and seventy-nine degrees.

She was showing a meticulousness that went so far as to drag mathematics into the calculation, more eager than anyone to deliver Sophia a pain that was short and brutal.

"How could that be? Auto Regeneration doesn't block the pain of breaking. It restores the body once the body is damaged. Pain is pain, and healing is healing!"

But when we caught Sophia, her bones broke more than once, and Auto Regeneration never activated, did it?

"Sophia. You don't have the auto skill?"

Sophia, gone pale at the back-and-forth between Hwayeon and Yeongeun, answered my question through a fine shiver.

"I-I have it. Only, Auto Regeneration, a healer's general-purpose technique, can have its effect suppressed by the owner's will. Wh-when Master came for me, I was holding the effect down, so I didn't heal."

"Is that so? Then whether she uses Auto Regeneration or not, we need only keep doubling or tripling the number of bones in her body. Seoha is right beside us, so as long as she does not die, he can restore her at once. Or there are Yeongeun's hundred and eight tortures. I believe violence alone will be enough to exhaust her mind."

Ah. So this was about keeping me from having to lay a hand on her.

I swallowed at Franc's blood-chilling little proposal and looked at Sophia. This time her face had gone pure white.

Hwayeon rose from her seat, cracking her fingers, and spoke to Sophia with a cold eye.

"Talk will only take us so far. We should act first. Sophia. You are ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠prepared, I trust."

"Y-yes. I'm prepared, Boss. Torment me all you like. Kill me if you want. Only please, look after my family."

They'd said they'd cut off every scrap of information and locked her in a room, and she truly seemed to know nothing at all. I signaled Hwayeon to hold, turned on Mana Vision and Mana Voice, and spoke to Sophia.

"......?!"

Sophia sucked in a sharp breath, eyes flying wide, face struck with shock.

At that single stressed word, Sophia finally nodded, resolve in her eyes.

"Yes. There is no nation that will protect me. Nowhere that will take me in, either, I imagine. The verdict will, as a rule, be an order for reparations in a sum that cannot ordinarily be repaid."

"Yes, Master."

"Ah......"

Certainty about her family's safety settled over her face. She closed her eyes, relieved, and let a single tear fall.

"Yes! Thank you for forgiving my family! Even if I must offer up my life, I will serve Master with all my heart! Thank you, truly!"

She flattened herself in a deep bow, and her sky-blue eyes filled with tears.

A kind, gentle look of relief that her family was safe. Hwayeon watched it with eyes that were still cold, then quietly opened her mouth.

"Then we start by having you take the hits."

She fetched fist guards packed with cotton, worked her hands into them, and the air around her turned murderous. At that sight Sophia swallowed, and a fine tremor started through her.

"Cha Soyoung was wounded by your betrayal as well. Bear in mind that you will apologize to her afterward."

"Of... course."

Hwayeon turned to Hiarid.

"Hiarid. Take her by the arms and lift her. A little more—more—until Sophia can barely stand on the very tips of her toes. Yes. That will do."

Sophia, in a thin gray sleeveless shirt and a black long skirt, all of five foot four, was caught in the arms of Hiarid—close to seven foot two—and left dangling like a punching bag.

Hwayeon brought scissors and cut away everything below Sophia's chest, laying bare a dainty navel and a white stomach that was only now putting on a little flesh and turning pleasant to look at.

Sophia looked at her with puzzled eyes—arms hauled up overhead, and now the hem of her clothes cut away to expose her belly.

"You are far too thin. Strike an arm, a leg, the head, and the bone may break and powder, and the pain of that alone might kill you from shock. So I will hit the abdomen, where the instant impact and the quantity of pain are greatest, and where the vital points gather. You may activate Auto Regeneration. No—I recommend that you do."

A dull boom. She had only tapped the spot beneath the navel, light as a knock, and still it sounded like a drum being struck. Sophia's body jolted, and a violent cough burst from her full lips.

"Khek. Hack! Cough, cough!"

"Above all, Seoha is here. You will not die of a ruptured organ. Do not worry."

I watched Sophia—face gone blue from a single blow, coughing hard, trembling—and clicked my tongue. I'd been thinking of a whip...... Then again, a whip means blood spraying and flesh tearing, so maybe gut-shots were better.

Thud. Thump.

"Kya—ngh!"

At Hwayeon's gestures and her fists, ripples spread across the skin of Sophia's belly, and the organs underneath sloshed.

Each blow dragged a moan and a scream out of her, as if her breath were about to stop, and she shook. I watched, then turned away.

The dull impacts, the coughs thick with suffering, Sophia swinging like a punching bag every time she was hit—watching it, I felt like I was going to get aroused. ......Is getting sexually excited at the sight of a woman being abused and suffering also tied to those demon bastards?

Come to think of it, I hadn't even washed since getting back. Take a leisurely bath, and it would be over by the time I came out.

I left Franc and Yeongeun watching the punishment with cold eyes, walked toward the bathroom, and drew my Spatial Perception back in.

Crack! Snap! Crack!

"Hhk...... hah......"

I took my time washing, and when I came out the genre had changed. Gut-shots were gone. In their place was hardcore BDSM.

Sophia, stripped down until little remained but her skirt, hung dangling from Hiarid's hands while a leather whip split into many tails at the end landed across her. Hwayeon's face was blank, and she seemed to be hitting lazily, as if she were playing—but that was the hand-strength of a B-Class Physical Reinforcement ability user. On Sophia's body, hardly different from an ordinary person's, even that was force enough to spray blood and tear flesh.

The proof was her back, crushed to a ruin and split open, blood running down the line of her spine and dyeing skirt and panties red. The skirt had drunk the blood and clung to her legs, showing off the shape of them.

Sophia had her head bowed low. Cloudy eyes spilled tears and drool, and a weak moan leaked out of her. Every time the whip landed her body wriggled and squirmed and twisted, but she seemed half out of her mind.

"Switched events, I see."

"Mm. Madam said a punishment lands better if you raise the intensity of the pain in stages."

At Hwayeon's words I looked Sophia's body over, and the bruises were certainly there, livid marks scattered across her. The lower belly in particular wasn't blue. It was black, a wide bruise spread out from below the navel. The shapes of twisted, contorted organs showed plain through the skin of her stomach, and whether because she had wet herself, the fishy smell of blood came mixed with ammonia.

I frowned at the blood, and Franc quickly opened the veranda door and came back.

"......"

I looked up at the face of Sophia, hanging from Hiarid's hands.

Gut-shot hell, and whip play on top of it. An hour of pain without a pause. Sophia wore the face of someone whose soul had left, spilling tears and drool, shivering.

Not even the presence of mind to use her self-recovery skill? I waved a hand in front of her eyes. No movement in the pupils. She was completely gone.

Well, Sophia hardly exercised or trained even on an ordinary day. On top of that she'd starved for nearly a month until the flesh fell off her, and was only just beginning to put weight back on. Her durability would have dropped to nothing. She'd be markedly weak to impact.

I spoke to Hwayeon, who was touching the blood-soaked whip with that blank face.

"If she's this far from coming to, I think that's enough."

"You're going to feed her TP?"

The question came from Yeongeun. I glanced at Hwayeon. That expressionless face was a mask. Underneath, she was shaken. Cold only on the outside, that one. Always.

"Yeah. I'll steep her in pain and pleasure with TP, then brainwash her with Mana Vision and Mana Voice."

"Thinking about what Hiarid said earlier, it seems less like you brainwashed her and more like you made her submit...... Will this be all right?"

"Hmm. The High-Tier Variant instinct to try to kill an ability user on sight has died off completely, and from the way she follows my orders to the letter, I think we can rest easy. Even if not, her family's lives are hanging on this. She won't be able to pull anything stupid."

At the words I spoke while looking Sophia over, Hwayeon put the whip away and stepped back. Whether relief and a stifled frustration were mixed in her, the expression wasn't a particularly good one.

I told Hiarid to set Sophia down, and she lowered her slowly to the floor.

I ignored Hiarid, who was looking at Sophia with envy, and reached out to stroke the belly that had swollen in uneven lumps and gone black where the blood had died under the skin. Through that thin skin I could feel organs twisted into a wreck.

Doesn't it hurt that much? I heard twisted bowels are agonizing.

"Nnnngh......"

Ah. So she had been enduring it. The moment my hand touched her, her thighs began to tremble out of rhythm, and drool started to drip.

I looked at the blood-bruises around that small navel, put my fingers into Sophia's mouth, drew out TP, and let it flow in. She writhed like a broken marionette.

"Hh—?! Gulp. Kkhk...... Haaang. Glk. Nngh."

The writhing seemed to drive extreme pain through the belly and the back, where the damage was concentrated, and she shuddered; that shudder seemed to raise the pain again, and she twisted once more. A continuous cycle of pain, convulsion, and pain.

And gradually, as if my TP were taking effect, a plainly different shade began to gather at the center of the blood-soaked panties.

Her vacant mind couldn't keep up with what her body was doing. Instinctively, out of her senses, she began to drink down the TP I was pouring into her mouth. Bright yellow-blonde hair tossed hard. Her eyes stayed unfocused. Her body convulsed.

"Krrk. Gulp, khek. Kk!"

If anything, the twisted intestines in her abdomen seemed to hurt worse than the wounds on her back. She was panting as if she'd die from the heaving of organs reacting to the TP. And the heat TP kindled seemed to be turning that pain into pleasure.

They say the upper limit of pleasure a woman can endure far surpasses ten times a man's—and this was TP that made even such a woman roll her eyes back, unable to bear it. Periodically dripping in only about one to ten TP already did this. Keep injecting tens to hundreds all at once, and her brain cells might all die of pleasure, and she might end up an idiot.

Sophia's Phase Power was currently around 3.3 million. Put in too much and she'd evolve into B-Class, so I fed her little by little, carefully, so that wouldn't happen.

I started spreading TP over the belly crowded with black blood-bruises. Whether TP carried even a localized recovery effect, the bruises faded, very slightly. Pleasure, by contrast, seemed to come on even stronger. Like someone worked up on an overdose of aphrodisiac, body plastered in sweat, face flushed red, she bit my finger and began to suck it with a fervor.

Seeing her start to move on her own, I turned Mana Vision and Mana Voice back on and spoke.

"Htt—?!"

As if my voice, humming as though layered three times over, were stimulating a brain smeared with pain and pleasure, the pupils of her wide-open eyes had narrowed to pinpoints. Sophia, who had looked at me by reflex, saw my blue-glowing eyes, and little by little a dreamy look came over her.

"Nn......"

Hearing my voice, with that strange resonance in it, Sophia nodded, face steeped in pleasure, half out of herself.

"Nnh. Nn...... hnn......"

Sophia, who had been gulping down TP without pause, mumbled through a flushed face. She had my finger in her mouth and she was panting besides, so I couldn't tell what she was saying.

I asked it as I drew my finger from her mouth. A drop of drool clung at the corner of her lips, and Sophia opened her mouth in a languid, wavering voice.

"The price... of my sin... across my whole life... I'll be loyal... devote myself... and with my body... I'll repay it......"

I listened to what she muttered in a daze, set my hand on the blue-black bruise of her lower belly, and injected TP. The TP fed through her mouth and the TP poured into her abdomen set off a chain reaction, and dropped Sophia into an abyss of pleasure.

"Hyaaak! Kyaaaaa! Nngk, ahhaaang! Aaaak!"

Afraid she'd bite her tongue while she screamed, I pushed my fingers back in and poured TP into her mouth again. And I kept whispering at her ear that her master was me, that the one she had to obey was me.

Whether Mana Voice truly had an effect, each time I whispered she convulsed as if the words were striking her brain directly. Watching that, I repeated the brainwashing for as long as it takes to drink a cup of tea.

"Kkgk...... kehhh......"

Sophia made the sound ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of her breath failing and went rigid, and I thought it was about time to wrap the brainwashing up...... She wasn't blacking out in a snap the way Hiarid had. Keep going, though, and it seemed she'd break for good.

To finish it for certain, it seems I'll have to do that after all...... What do I do.

I thought for a moment, decided there was no help for it, and spoke to Yeongeun.

"You know that thing we bought after we went into the Submerged Ruins, and never used? Go get it."

"......What are you talking about?"

Yeongeun, who had understood perfectly and was playing dumb anyway. If you're going to deny it, at least don't let the corner of your eye twitch.

If she was going to pretend not to know, then I would have to say it plainly enough that she couldn't fail to understand.