128. If You Become a Pet, There's No Problem.
128. If You Become a Pet, There's No Problem.
──Kwaaaaang!!!
"Uwaak?!!"
The door flew open without warning.
At the sound of the door being forced open with full strength, I half-instinctively drew Agape and Squite.
An ambush? At this hour?
Even if it were, who?
Just as about three question marks rose in my mind, a single person stepped through the doorway.
"Chrono...."
"....Minerva?"
It was Minerva.
Minerva had opened the door and entered.
"What's going on at this hour....ho...."
As I approached, hiding Agape and Squite in my hands, Minerva raised her head toward me.
"..........."
".....Uh, um.."
Her eyes, they were the sort of eyes that looked like she could devour someone without batting an eye.
Not her usual focused violet hue, but deeply sunken, dark violet-colored pupils.
A gaze overflowing with grim ferocity, enough to evoke the image of a yandere in anyone who saw her.
".....Did you?"
"Huh?"
What did she say?
Minerva asked me once again.
"This morning, my appearance, my clothes, my disheveled state... did you see all of it?"
"......Sorry."
"I was not asking for an apology."
"........."
Wasn't I saying sorry because I had seen it.
For now, I bowed my head as Minerva wished and answered.
"I tried not to look but... sorry. I saw it."
"Then, is the reason you are standing right now also because of me?"
"...What?"
Standing.... that, what is it.
She meant standing up, right? That's what she was talking about, right?
At those unthought-of, completely unexpected words,
I doubted whether it was because my own ears had developed some strange condition, rather than Minerva having actually uttered 'that word.'
"I am asking if your penis is erect right now because of me."
"............."
Penis.
Penis.
So, put another way....
"Jya—mmphmm?"
"Stop."
I covered Mai's mouth.
The words that followed must not be spoken.
There are times when it is fine to say them, but at least right now, it was something that must not be said.
"Chrono, please answer me."
".....Haaaah."
Under the relentless pressing, I quietly looked at Minerva.
What did she want?
What kind of answer did she desire?
I calmly sorted through my thoughts, pondering how I could soothe Minerva.
"Ngh....!"
"...Huh?"
Minerva flinched, her body trembling.
In that instant, her sharply honed gaze dulled, and something inside began to waver as if about to overflow.
"Just....one thing. You only need to answer me once."
"............"
And only then, was I able to truly see Minerva.
"You were aroused by me, weren't you? It was my body you saw, not Mai, but me you were aroused by, wasn't it?"
"....Minerva, you."
Her low, subdued voice was to hide the voice tinged with tears.
She clenched both hands tightly to hide their faint trembling.
She disguised her increasingly ragged breathing with deep breaths.
"Crying...?"
"Ngh.....!"
But a teardrop that had once seeped out could not be taken back.
"I am... not crying....!"
Perhaps realizing her own state, Minerva inhaled deeply and glared at me again.
No, rather than a glare for the sake of glaring──it was the desperate look of someone gritting her teeth, holding back tears so as not to be swept away by her own emotions.
"Please answer me, Chrono."
Minerva asked again.
"If you were aroused by me... if looking at me made you 'feel that way'....."
Why.
Why on earth.
Just why....
"Instead of me, another woman──ngh....huuhp....!"
Minerva's body trembled violently.
The moment the phrase 'another woman' left her lips,
Minerva's eyes shook fiercely.
─Tuduk... tuk.... tududuk....
"Ngh...?! Huuuhp.... euu.... eueuuhhp.....!"
Teardrops fell to the floor.
Tears that could be described not as flowing, but as falling, soon began to pour down as if a dam had burst.
"Kuhp....! Keuuu.... hueu.... hueuuuuhhp....!"
She tried to steady her breath, swallowing back the sobs, but the tears kept leaking out.
She wiped the tears away with both hands, but the flow was too heavy and the floor began to stain.
"Ah......"
Right before my eyes.
A woman shedding tears.
As my mind went blank, Minerva forcibly gulped down a breath.
"Kuhp!....Keuuhk....."
She let out a half-sickened groan while still killing the sound of her crying.
She bit down hard on her lip, trying desperately to calm her breathing.
"....I'm, so...rry."
A single word of apology.
After that, Minerva immediately turned to leave the room.
"....Please let me go."
"............"
But I did not let her go.
There was no way I could let her go.
If I sent her outside in that mental state, there might be a risk of an NTR event, and besides....
...No, that's not it.
Rather than that kind of 'excuse to rationalize myself,'
If I were to express myself a little more honestly.
"I said... let me go...!"
"....Minerva."
Holding onto Minerva's wrist, I spoke to her.
"You asked me earlier, didn't you. Whether I got hard because of you."
"................."
A look that said, 'What are you talking about all of a sudden.'
To that, I spoke to Minerva.
"The way you look right now... is legit the hottest I've ever seen."
".............Eh..?"
So, in other words.
"Don't go."
"................."
I spoke to Minerva.
"Don't go. Stay here."
"..........Ngh...!"
Don't go.
Stay here.
At that single sentence.
"Huuuhp.... euhhp..... heuueuk....!"
Minerva, no longer able to hold back, shed tears.
Finally unable to endure, unable to withstand it any longer.
"Huaaaaaa.......!"
Both knees buckled and she collapsed down.
She exhaled hot breaths one after another, trying to hold it in, but 'holding it in' was now impossible.
"Huaaaaaaang....!"
"........Sssip."
Ultimately, she sat on the floor and poured out her tears.
Chrono hesitated for a moment, unsure of what to do.
─Tuuuk....
"Uht...!"
A hand pushing him from behind.
Dazed, he found himself stepping right up to Minerva and holding her in his arms.
"Hueuk...?"
"Uh......"
The two of them locked eyes.
"Euu.... eueuu.....!"
Whether by her own will or another's, seeing Chrono appear as if he was about to embrace her,
"Huaaaaaaaaaaang!!!!!"
"Uwaak.....!"
Minerva threw her whole body forward and wrapped her arms around Chrono.
She circled his torso with both arms, burying her face in his chest.
"Chrono... Chrono... Chronooo.....!!!"
Tears.
Wailing.
"Uh......."
Chrono himself simply stood there, hands hovering blankly in the air.
─Slide....
"Ah...!"
Someone took Chrono's hands and placed one around her back, the other cradling the back of her head.
"Hueukk!.... Huaa... Huaaaaang...!!!"
The sound of crying deepened.
As she cried with all her might, enough to worry about the state of her throat the next day.
"Mai, you....."
"──Shh."
Mai silently left the room.
All that remained were Chrono and Minerva.
"....Alright."
Chrono nodded his head slightly.
Now, he could not avoid it.
No.
"Minerva."
"Huhh...?"
"There's something I want to tell you."
"....Yes?"
He had to stop avoiding it.
"The truth is, on the day I confessed to you...."
So I confessed to Minerva.
"I... wasn't in my right mind because of Athena."
"........Yes?"
The truth of that day,
the story of that day.
...
..
.
"So.... if I go by what you're saying, Chrono."
Minerva spoke slowly toward me.
"That day, during the Queen Siren subjugation battle... the Main God placed a curse on you...?"
"In her own words it was a blessing, but it was basically a curse."
"....Cutting my Intelligence in half?"
"That's right."
"............"
Chrono's explanation.
The truth of that day.
The truth that confessing to her wasn't his true feelings, but rather an 'incident' caused by the Main God's curse....
"....What is that?"
A reality so bitterly cruel.
The truth that, he never even liked her, and only confessed because of the Main God──before she could sink into that misunderstanding.
"It cut my Intelligence, but it didn't control my mind."
"..........."
Chrono said it.
If he hadn't had any affection for her, he wouldn't have confessed in the first place.
...It sounded plausible enough to hear, but.
"But... Ultimately, you're saying that if you had been in your right mind, you wouldn't have confessed."
"W-well... is that how it sounds?"
What he was actually saying was just one thing.
"That you had some affection, but not enough to want to confess, not enough to want to become 'lovers'.... is that how I should take it?"
"......Minerva."
Chrono's voice tried to deny it, to say no.
But Minerva, who had already realized the cruel reality, could no longer hear Chrono's voice.
Not hearing, not seeing.
All that existed was just an endless abyss.
"Hmm. Yes. I think I understand a little. No, now I think I understand everything."
Someone who had built iron walls with all their might suddenly confessed.
And after actually confessing, they acted completely indifferent.
And the reason he kept rejecting her no matter how hard she tried to get close...
"It was all... all of it. Chrono didn't actually want it, he was just forced to confess....."
"No. That's absolutely not true!"
Chrono shouted hastily, "No," but for Minerva, already lost in her own world, nothing was visible.
Not hearing, not seeing.
All that existed was just endless hell.
"Ev... everything was all, all because of the Main God.... and I was just mistaken all this time──eut, euup...?!"
Just as her thoughts were spiraling deeper, a soft, wet sensation touched her lips.
What appeared before the suddenly lucid Minerva was.
"Eup....chyup....uup, eup, heuup...!??!"
Her lips were overlapping with Chrono's.
A peck. Perhaps a kiss.
No. Judging by the feeling of something gently slipping between her lips, it was closer to a kiss.
"──Puhah..... hah, have you come to your senses now?"
".......Huh?"
Have you come to your senses now.
So, that meant....
"I like you."
"....Hic!"
A confession.
But there was one difference this time.
"But the thing is, I'm basically trash who's building a harem, you see? So I can't give you everything."
".............."
This time, it was a pure confession from Chrono, untainted by Athena.
"So Minerva, that's why it's hard for me to confess to you."
Because if you wished for it, you could meet someone cooler and better than me.
Because if you wanted to, you could meet a man who would only look at you for his whole life.
"Because of me alone, your life could be ruined...."
Chrono's confession.
To this, Minerva spoke.
"....That, those words are just sophistry."
"What?"
She called it sophistry.
Told him not to say such nonsense.
"If you really had that kind of heart, you wouldn't even be doing something like a harem."
"Umm...."
She wasn't wrong...
"Th-that's... let's just say there are a lot of circumstances involved...."
"Circumstances? What circumstances?"
"I mean, well...."
Should he call them circumstances that were hard to explain...?
Seeing him try to talk around it, Minerva questioned him more persistently.
"How did you accept Ur?"
"Ur.... well, I should say we spent time together when things were hardest. Or maybe I should call it a contract matter...."
"Contract, yes, fine."
Then what about Mars?
"Mars was... a love born from truly feeling 'love'."
"Was Mars your first love?"
"Up until then, I didn't have any thoughts of a harem."
"I see... then that's fine."
Then why was Mai okay?
"Mai, well...."
"If you were in 'that kind of relationship' with Mai, it should have happened long ago. So why did it suddenly progress this cycle?"
"I feel like I'm being interrogated here...."
...You know Mai was originally bound in subordination to the Main God?
"But somehow, she ended up completely bound to me, so that's why."
"Bound to you... you mean?"
"Because there's no risk of her betraying me, and no obligation I have to bear?"
"..............."
No risk of betrayal.
No obligation to bear.
At a glance, it seemed like the words of scum, but there was the answer Minerva had been wishing for.
Subordinate... responsibility...
In the case of Ur, a Part of the Muses.
According to Chrono, they were bound by a 'contract'.
As it was a contract, and as it involved a god's beloved, it couldn't be helped.
For Chrono, the case of Mars.
She was his first love that he felt for the first time, a relationship where he had sworn to himself to truly fulfill his 'responsibility' to her.
Up until then, he had no thoughts of a harem.
Ur was the love of a god.
Mars was the love of a person.
At this point, Chrono had intended to stop, but.
"Ah, just in case you're wondering, if we're getting technical, Mai is a Servant Demon. A kind of pet."
"....Servant Demon."
The Servant Demon was a case he skipped over.
An unconditional ally with no obligation to bear, no risk of betrayal.
So he took her into his arms.
A Servant Demon never complains or expresses dissatisfaction.
So she could be held in his arms. If that was the case──then.
"...I'll become one."
"What?"
There was only one answer to give.
"I'll become Chrono's pet!"
".......???"
If she became Chrono's pet, there would be no problems at all.
As an aside.
[I'll become Chrono's pet!]
[.......???]
"....Whoa."
In the next room.
Mai was watching the situation in the next room through her smartphone.
An eccentric act she had pulled off by connecting Chrono's phone on a video call before leaving the room.
It was something Mai could do because she had her own phone now...
"Minerva is amazing."
Honestly, when she came outside, Mai had expectations.
Probably, once she was outside, the two of them would have a deep and meaningful time.
And she thought this would definitely serve as a novel 'side dish' for her...
...She knew he'd confess, but he confessed about the Athena situation.
And while confessing his love, he simultaneously did a scumbag coming-out.
The whole time she watched Chrono's actions deviate from a normal story, she wanted to give him advice right then and there, but.
[You.... are you being serious right now?]
[There's no one who would say something like that even as a lie! No, I mean it!]
[Nooo.... why is this conversation flowing this way...!]
"...Maybe it's not so bad?"
Sure enough, should she call him the master of the Heavenly Demon?
His skill at painting the big picture was no joke.