Chapter 54
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 54
Acrid smoke filled his lungs, then seeped out. Oscar glanced down at himself and let out a hollow laugh.
His desire, swollen to a disgusting size, was beginning to ache.
Reason insisted that what he was doing was madness.
She was a suspicious woman, one he was only grateful to for bringing him the key. She’d claimed her goal was money, but he couldn’t possibly take that at face value. He had ordered a background check on her and assigned Abel to watch her, receiving reports on her every move.
So far, nothing of note had turned up.
Abel’s reports had been trivial. She wandered around daily, but never farther than the market, and today’s incident had been Abel’s fault. The report from the Wolves dispatched to her hometown had not yet arrived, but Oscar was prepared to ignore it all as long as it posed no threat to him. The only thing that mattered was opening the Pelfe vault.
As he smoked, Oscar’s eyes sank into deep thought.
It would have been less suspicious if she had invoked their contract, swearing not to go elsewhere. He would have laughed it off if she had demanded more money.
“I want to be by your side.”
For a heartfelt confession, she couldn’t even meet his eyes. For a seduction, it was pathetic.
Either way, it had nothing to do with him. And either way, it was so absurd it was staggering.
But what was this?
His chest tightened with a discomfort like thousands of insects crawling through his insides.
Oscar sank into a state as cold and deep as an ancient lake in a subterranean cavern.
“…Crazy bastard.”
A curse escaped him. As the smoke pooled in his mouth seeped out like a cold vapor, he roughly scrubbed a hand over his face.
Should he have simply relieved his sexual urges whenever they arose, just like hunger or the need for sleep? If he had, would this desire that threatened to devour his reason have grown so monstrous? But the mere thought of the cloying perfume and powder that clung to amorous bodies was nauseating.
Time folded in on itself without warning.
The woman, frozen, and himself, pressed against her.
Her dry lips, chapped to the touch… they had been warm.
“……”
That was all.
Nothing more.
Oscar slowly exhaled a pent-up breath.
Right. That’s all it was.
Lust was like a wave, rising, falling, and rising again, over and over. Behind a surge that felt as if it would never end, a deep trough was sure to follow.
It would be a hundred times better to call a prostitute. Ordering her to wash off any offensive scents and then sating this damnable lust would be a clean solution with no messy consequences.
Having reached his conclusion, Oscar rose from the windowsill where he’d been leaning. He was about to crush the barely-smoked cigarette into an ashtray.
Just then, the sound of a door opening reached his sensitive ears.
And then, footsteps.
Softly, softly.
It wasn’t the sound of hard soles against the floor, but of soft flesh touching down and lifting away.
“……”
The tip of the cigarette, moments from being extinguished, let out a shimmering wisp of smoke.
Softly, softly… softly…
The hesitant, faltering steps were drawing closer.
The darkness before him, the smoke rising from his fingertips, the conclusion he had reached after circling like an idiot—it all receded into the background in an instant.
“…Excuse me…”
The woman stopped walking. Oscar, who had been about to crush out his cigarette, brought it back to his lips.
The sizzle of burning tobacco and the low sound of his exhale filled the vast room.
An excruciating silence, so profound he felt he could hear time itself passing, pressed down heavily on the shoulders of the man who had laid waste to a mercenary company overnight.
And what shattered that oppressive silence was a sound so trivial it was almost nothing.
Softly…
A voice so faint it was laughable.
“…Your Excellency.”
Oscar’s gaze moved slowly.
The woman seemed to be cloaked in the very fabric of darkness.
Her deep navy gown blended with the shadows, its outline faint. Perhaps because of this, the skin not swallowed by the darkness looked exceptionally white.
Her feet, visible below the ankle-length gown; her slender nape; the hand clutching the gown’s lapel; her face, tilted downward.
He could almost see the slow breath she exhaled through parted lips. The memory of the lips he had mindlessly devoured, the tender flesh beyond them, the scent of fresh greenery that had pierced his senses—he felt it all come crashing down, demolishing the tower of suspicion he had built. He could see the tower of cold reason shaking from its foundations, crumbling to ruin.
…Crazy bastard.
Oscar mocked himself scathingly. More than mocked—he wanted to slap himself across the face.
Just lust.
A trivial urge that would be gone once sated, gone once expelled like any other waste. It had come to him in a form just as trivial. He couldn’t tell if the heat flaring up inside him was irritation at himself or this squalid lust, nor was there any point in trying to distinguish between them.
Like some dog in heat.
What the hell was she, anyway?
Oscar stared at Seo-ah, his gaze a glare as he took a deep drag from his cigarette. Fixing his eyes on her like a predator before its prey, he walked to the sofa. He lit a single gas lamp beside it and sat down. The woman, who had been standing there clutching her clothes, looked at him with a start. Then, she finally took a step toward him, her face betraying her desperate urge to flee.
Her small, white feet appeared and disappeared beneath the gown. With each hesitant step, the darkness enveloping her receded.
The contour of her legs, visible for a moment through the smooth fabric; her hair, cascading to her waist; her hand, clenched so tightly the bones of her knuckles stood out; her arms, crossed in front of her. And then, when his eyes finally landed on her white nape and bowed head…
Oscar realized the deep darkness had been her last bastion.
So this is how scared she is.
“So you really want to play with me, do you?”
The woman flinched at his mocking taunt.
The sight of it made him laugh. A dry, chilling sound escaped him, and at the noise, her pitiful face became even more of a spectacle.
“If you want to play, you shouldn’t just stand there like that.”
Her red lips parted. He could clearly see her downcast eyes blinking with anxiety. Then, when he saw the hand desperately clutching her lapels begin to tremble, his insincere amusement evaporated into thin air.
His mood, which he thought couldn't sink any lower, plummeted.
A violent impulse to ravage her insides surged through him like a flame catching the wind. It felt as if molten iron from a furnace was flowing backward to melt his organs.
Oscar reached out with his free hand and took the woman’s trembling one.
Her captured hand came away with laughable ease. The collar she’d been holding fell open and, her face turning ashen, she grabbed at it with her other hand and spoke in a rush.
“I-I-I’ll do whatever you say.”
“……”
“I’ll do it myself.”
A cruel twist formed on Oscar’s lips.
Anyone watching would think I was forcing you.
“Is that so?”
A tear that had welled in her round eyes finally fell.
“Yes.”
What have I even done to make you cry? It just makes me want to do something truly appalling.
“Sit.”
Her tear-filled gaze wandered before landing on the empty space beside him.
Oscar sneered at her.
“Are you going to sit there and have tea with me?”
“Then… where…”
If I say it, will you sit there?
Without warning, Oscar yanked the hand he was holding.
Her wide eyes flew open as her small body was pulled helplessly forward.
No, she spilled.
Her wet hair came first, then her body. Unable to let go of her lapels in a pointless show of modesty, she ended up completely draped over him.
He felt her body go rigid against his. The moment they touched, she squirmed, trying to get up, fumbling as she refused to release her grip on her gown.
If there was one thing he found agreeable, it was that she didn't make a sound.
Oscar smiled languidly and took one last drag of his cigarette. Then he stretched out his arm, crushed the butt into the ashtray, and grabbed the woman’s waist with both hands.
Her body was as light as her waist was slender. Lifting her until her knees, which had been pressed together between his legs, were in the air, he parted them with his own. The captive woman’s eyes shook violently.
“Spread them.”
He wanted to see her spread her own legs, but his lust, which had reached its limit, came first. Oscar used his right leg to push her left leg open, and his left leg to push her right one apart as he moved between them.
“Ah…!”
Like the key that had appeared so easily one night, everything about the woman was easy. He could feel the effort in her thighs as she tried to close her parted legs. But all it did was push open her useless gown, and her feet, unable to touch the floor, only made her lose her balance. She swayed, then managed to steady herself by placing one hand on his chest. Her weight seemed to be entirely on that hand; he could feel it pressing into him.
Oscar held his breath without even realizing he’d stopped breathing.
Reason made one last, desperate cry.
What the hell is this?
What is this thing that’s making you act like such a goddamn fool?
But the world of the raw beast was victorious. Her miserable brown eyes and swollen lips pushed aside all morality, ethics, and principles.
Oscar gave up all resistance.
He acknowledged the entirety of his flooding lust.
I want to plunge into her. I want to pull out the desire that’s about to burst through my trousers and shove it between this woman’s parted legs.
Unlike the woman’s hands, which were effectively bound, Oscar’s were free. He brought a hand between her wide-open legs. Not understanding what he was about to do, the woman only sucked in a sharp breath when his fingertips brushed against her most private part. She tried to get up at once, lifting her hips.
“Y-Your Excellency…!”