146. Knowing Is Enough.
146. Knowing Is Enough.
[Pure Love Tattoo]
-Originally a tattoo meant for corruption, but through Hera's power, it was transformed into a tattoo for pure love.
-Sensitivity increase of 100% during intercourse with 'Chrono'
-During intercourse with 'Chrono'────stress resistance──and mental ─buff occurrence rate increase per hour
-[Pure Love Barrier] activated
".....Geuh"
Agape popped out.
She transformed into a hammer and refreshingly struck the text.
And what came after this. Even if I were to disappear, all the parts that would negatively affect Yuno vanished.
[Main God─Hera : My child... did you truly not trust me that much....]
"....Eou"
I had nothing to say.
When I eventually bowed my head and apologized, Hera quietly began to soothe me.
[Main God─Hera: Do not bow your head. I too know what kind of things you have suffered, and just as the wound of betrayal once endured does not heal easily, I know that your hurt will not simply fade.]
"............"
Even though it was clearly an oracle I could only read through text, her voice somehow seemed to resonate in my ears.
Yuno's, Hera's voice seemed to gently embrace and reassure me.
[Main God─Hera : My child. I shall not demand that you believe in me, that you have faith in me.]
[Main God─Hera : However, if you blindly deny and reject what you have seen with your own eyes, what you have felt....]
[Main God─Hera :...I might feel, a little disappointed.]
"I'm sooorryyyyy!!!"
Guilt.
A pretty severe amount of guilt.
Honestly, I definitely thought they were cheating me.
Even back during the Cronus incident, I still thought the Main Gods on the heroines' side were normal, you know?
But if Athena pulled that kind of stunt, and Hermes just took it and ran, how could my perception of gods possibly be good?
Of course, I knew there was a reason the saying about the fallacy of hasty generalization existed, but....
...Anyway, I kept bowing my head and apologizing to Hera.
[Main God─Hera : Stop apologizing now.]
[Main God─Hera : More than that, don't you have other things to do?]
"Huh? What do you mean by tha──Ah, shoot!"
Minerva.
What happened to Minerva?
I hurriedly turned on the TV and put on the broadcast I had seen earlier.
[An accidental act that occurred while still not freed from Siren's brainwashing──]
[The Queen Siren subjugation battle. A hidden person?]
['This was all the power of the Athena Guild, and absolutely no outsider intervened', the truth of the subjugation battle?]
".....Sssip"
How far had things progressed while I had looked away for just a moment?
As I hurriedly flipped through the news, I soon learned of Minerva's whereabouts.
[I am... I am not sick!]
[You are all being deceived! Please, look at the truth, the truth, not the media!]
"She's fucked."
Minerva being transported to a mental hospital.
The fleeting moment shown through the live camera broadcast began to resurface as news articles again.
Who Chrono was
That Minerva had a new lover
Eyewitness accounts via CCTV and so on and so forth
"She's completely fucked."
I'd never seen an event like this before.
An event I had never once encountered in-game.
A situation twisting in real time.
I stared blankly at the TV and pondered where to even begin untying this knot... was this even something that could be solved by thinking about it?
"I can't even touch this."
When the urge to just give up washed over me
[At the very least... please free Chrono....!]
"....If I can't touch it, I should at least kick it."
Even as she was being hauled off to a mental hospital right now, she was crying out for me alone.
So how could I possibly abandon Minerva?
I lightly slapped both cheeks to snap myself back to my senses.
"I'm used to absurdity, to things getting fucked up beyond belief."
A phrase I hadn't used in a long time.
Somehow, I felt my motivation returning.
"...But seriously, what do I do now?"
Motivation coming back was all well and good, but I couldn't get a handle on what exactly I should do.
Should I just stop time like this and extract Minerva? No, the situation had already become too twisted for that.
Then should I just leave it as is? The moment I did, Minerva's NTR event might unfold.
'Since she was dragged off to a mental hospital....'
Probably a doctor or her father side.
...Should I just, stop time and kill them?
"Haaaa...."
Get a grip, Chrono.
Even if it somehow wrapped up nicely right now, that would be a problem in itself.
If the fact that I can stop time spread later, what would happen?
Probably, this incident would be re-examined and I'd end up a criminal.
'What do I really do'
A situation where no answer came from my completely blocked-up head.
The one saving grace was that since the incident had just erupted, there was some leeway in time in various ways.
Proof of that was, hadn't an emergency mission come in saying the NTR rank could rise and to stop it quickly?
"Think... thiiiink....."
I sat down, exhaled, and tried to formulate a plan──and just at that moment
─Tiriririk♬
"! Chrono! Mars called!"
"....Give me the phone."
The cellphone rang with perfect timing.
I took the phone and connected the call.
"Yel...lo...?"
"Hello."
"Chrono....!"
Like that, it was Mars's voice I heard for the first time in a while.
My heart that had been pounding seemed to gradually calm down at the sound of Mars's voice.
"....Where are you now."
"Me? Right now...."
When she asked where I was
'...a love hotel?'
I absolutely could not say that.
"That's... so, that is, uhh.... hmm...."
While I was dragging my words out, thinking of what to say, Mars asked me.
"Your body, is it alright? Are you hurt anywhere?"
"Ah, yeah. My body's fine. How about you. Having a decent vacation?"
"...Chrono. Be honest. You... you aren't sick somewhere, are you?"
"? Why did your voice suddenly get so serious?"
The serious one right now was me.
Mars sighed deeply and appealed to me as if frustrated.
"You... fuck, if it's because of me, you'll die twice over by my hand, so tell me your situation straight."
".........."
She must have noticed.
I didn't know how she grasped the situation without a single piece of context.
If it were Minerva or Yuno coming at me like this, I might have thought it was a leading interrogation, but Mars was different.
Mars wasn't smart enough to pull off a leading interrogation.
So this was less the domain of 'reason' and more the domain of 'emotion.'
In other words...
"Sorry, Mars."
".....Fuck..."
She'd guessed, through her gut feeling, through a sixth sense, that I was in a love hotel with Yuno.
Look at the proof.
The deep emotions packed into that single curse.
I readied myself to run to Mars and bow my head to the floor as I spoke.
"I'm in a love hotel with Yuno right now."
"Yeah. With Yuno at a love hotel─
─What the fuck?"
"Huh?"
What.
Didn't she already know and was saying that?
"You... where did you say you are right now?"
"A love hotel?"
"With who."
"With Yuno?"
"And for what."
"Well, Yuno got cursed by the Succubus Queen, you see. The Carnal Crest, you know that? Because of that, she fell under a curse that was turning her into a succubus in real-time──"
The long-winded excuses that followed.
Even as I spoke, I spouted words I myself couldn't figure out what nonsense they were, dragging out the time
"Shut up."
"Yep."
It was Mars telling me to shut up.
The moment I shut my mouth, Mars asked.
"So.... you, fuck, basically spent the whole night fucking Yuno at a love hotel, right?"
"....Sorry."
"Fuck... you fucking bastard...."
"I'm really sorry. That's, the situation got a bit twisted so that's─
─Wait, but fuck, is this really something I should be apologizing for?"
Thinking about it, it kind of pissed me off. Had I done it just because of lust?
Wasn't it something I had no choice but to do to save a person's life! Of course, admittedly, I did feel a little that way later on──but anyway, shouldn't a person who needs to live, live!
"You unbelievably shameless bastard... really... disgustingly shameless...."
"...What. Why. Fack shi!"
In truth, I knew it was nonsense.
But if I lost here, I felt like I'd get managed and reformed later.
"Kuh-eup! Heu-hah-eup! Kuut, haaa.... Fine. Fuck, there's no way a bastard like you would go down that easily."
"...You're laughing?"
When I pushed through with sheer nerve, soon Mars chuckled as if she'd lost it.
It caught me quite off guard
Soon Mars let out a giggling laugh and asked me.
"Hey, was it good fucking Yuno?"
"That's why, because I liked it I did─"
"─I'm asking if it was good or bad, you gonna spout weird nonsense?"
"It was fucking great."
"You fucking bastard."
A voice filled with disbelief.
However, rather than anger, it felt more like amusement.
"My body's way more insane for fucking, you know? Give me the address right now, you horny dog bastard."
"Yeah~ don't know where I am, do ya? Can't find me~? Can't do anythiiing~?"
"I can just ask Yuno to tell me."
"............"
Ah, that's a bit.
In an instant, I became the pathetic summer dog whose throat gets grabbed.
"Yuno, you won't, right?"
".....Sorry, Chrono. Still, you'll forgive me, won't you?"
"Yuno, you too...!"
Tiriririr♬
The notification sound of a sent message.
At the same time, a notification sounded from the other side of the phone
"Just you wait, you bastard."
".....!!!"
In some sense, a phrase akin to a death sentence.
Slowly, Yuno approached my side and patted my back.
As a side note
"Found you, you son of a biiitch!!!"
"Hik, hiiiiik!!!"
Mars arrived not even 3 minutes after the address was sent.
Looking at the aura flickering around her body, it seemed she had even used 'Advent' to rush over.
"Chrono.... Been a while."
"....Gulp!"
The sight of power gathering in the giant greatsword she held in one hand carried a destructive force that felt like I might just be erased from the world the moment it hit.
'Am I seriously going to die?'
No, I probably wouldn't die.
If it really got dangerous, I could just stop time and bail out.
Instead, whether I liked it or not, the mood felt like it would be a life-or-death game of tag with Mars...
"....Fuck."
"........?"
A single curse.
"Wow.... fuck, seriously."
A single sigh.
Gradually, the red aura on the greatsword in her hand began to fade away.
"Am I a fucking retard?"
Soon the greatsword returned to a normal blade, and she tossed it against the wall, then slowly walked toward me.
"Just until a moment ago I was super pissed."
"I really came here to smash your solar plexus fucking hard."
Contrary to her gruff words, she wore an expression that looked like she was happy enough to go crazy
"....Disgustingly handsome bastard."
"Oobup...??"
And then Mars pulled me into her embrace.
"Sniff sniff.... sniff──Kyaa! You're absolutely reeking of female scent, fuck!"
Just how much could she figure out from scent alone?
"Three people including Yuno, right?"
Yuno, Minerva, Mai.
All together, three people.
"...Nope."
"Ah, I kind of smell Ur too. Since it's very faint, guess it's been a while since you met?"
"──!!!"
Including the day I met Ur because of the instruments.
'....She figures things out way too well.'
A sense of smell bordering on psychometric levels.
At this, Mars smiled and asked.
"So, setting Yuno aside, did you also have no choice but to fuck the other girls?"
"......That's..."
"You know if you make excuses here, it'll be disgustingly ugly, right?"
".........."
Fuck.
What was I supposed to do.
When I ultimately shut my mouth and buried my face in Mars's chest, Mars held me tight and whispered.
"Me, didn't I say earlier that I wasn't angry?"
".....Eo... eo...?"
A body that gradually began to float up.
Lifted gradually upward by Mars's two arms, up into the air, my feet no longer touching the floor
Uh...
Uh, uhh...
"Actually, that was a lie."
"Uwaaaaaak?!!!"
In an instant, my body flipped backward, my vision turned around─
"Three is crossing the line, you fuuuucking bitch!!!"
"Keohup....!"
─Kuwoong, an impact rising up from the base of my spine, planted into the floor.
A suplex. A clean hit.
As I collapsed to the floor, slumping like that, Mars said.
"Know that you won't get out of my hands until every last trace of that horny female scent is gone."
"Th... that is...."
Won't you get horny and go wild instead....
I had nearly fainted, but Yuno healed me, and informed her that there was still the matter of Minerva remaining, so the incident was barely able to be wrapped up.
"You made me worry for nothing, you son of a bitch."
"Sorry for making you worry."
"....As long as you know."