A Dream Best Forgotten
I stepped into the room, shut the door at once, and locked it so no one could enter.
“Ugh….”
Everything I had been carefully ignoring crashed over me all at once.
A woman’s body. A woman’s desire. A woman’s feelings….
The problem I had spent so long turning away from suddenly seized me by the throat. Or rather, it wasn’t sudden at all. It had been waiting ever since my period started about a month ago. I had simply been too busy with everything else to notice.
I had to become a man again….
I wasn’t supposed to feel things like this.
My chest felt tight. Whenever I closed my eyes to forget what had just happened, the memory only grew sharper.
“Aaaah!!”
I thrashed across the bed. Damn it! Damn it!! Get out of my head already!
Why does it keep coming back!
After all that flailing I was a little short of breath.
“Haa….”
Still, curiosity was harder to kill. Masturbation as a woman… would it feel good?
I was human. I had lived an entire year in a woman’s body and never once tried it. Wasn’t that actually strange?
Man or woman, if your gender suddenly flipped, wouldn’t you try it at least once?
“Ah—no! What am I even thinking right now?”
The thought was indecent. Masturbation? This body was supposed to go back to being male. What good would knowing a woman’s pleasure do me?
“R-right. That’s insane.”
In my previous life I’d heard people claim a woman’s climax was ten times stronger than a man’s.
Thinking about that made it a door I absolutely must not open. I had to hold out.
Still thrashing in the grip of that temptation, I sat up on the bed and forced myself to meditate. Bit by bit I managed to quiet my heart and mind.
“Yeah. This isn’t the time for thoughts like that.”
I’d completely lost the plot and neglected what I was supposed to be doing.
I pulled the alchemy notebook from the desk. Time to organize the Mandrake Elixir recipe.
I focused hard and wrote everything down carefully—the exact ratios of mandrake, medicinal herbs, and detoxifying herbs, the amount of water, the combination times, every last detail.
Once the recipe was finished I recorded the effects.
It enhanced mana. For anyone at the Knight Class the results were dramatic; someone who had already reached a certain level might even undergo Marrow Cleansing—full physical rebirth.
“That should do it….”
I closed the notebook and rubbed the bridge of my nose.
“Ha… all of a sudden the exhaustion’s hitting me….”
Whether it was mental fatigue or something else, drowsiness rolled in even though the hour was still early.
But if I fell asleep too soon I’d only wake up at dawn, so I had to hold on a little longer. I stared blankly at the capped fountain pen.
“It’s long….”
The pen looked about ten centimeters. An improper thought slipped in. Carefully I brought the fountain pen toward my navel. Even through the fabric the contact felt strange. My hand kept moving, slow and deliberate. The pen slid past my navel and settled against my lower belly. When I stood it upright it reached all the way down to my crotch.
I swallowed hard.
An erect male organ would be bigger than this pen.
Yet it reaches this far? Young Master Maximilian’s was even larger. So… was it really impossible after all? The pen crept lower, lower still.
I couldn’t rein in the curiosity. I was an ordinary human being; of course I had ordinary sexual desire.
That was true whether I was a man or a woman. And I had been holding it back for more than a year.
Just once wouldn’t hurt, would it? The thought began to take root. Whether I agreed or not, my hand kept drifting downward. Closer and closer… toward that place.
Knock knock.
I jumped so hard I flung the fountain pen away.
“Ah—no!”
That thing was expensive! I lunged after it in a panic, but—
“I-it’s dead….”
The barrel had snapped clean through.
A tragic loss, yet I had no time to mourn a pen.
I got to my feet and approached the door, then carefully unlocked and opened it a crack.
“Julian? Are you all right?”
The knocker was Sister Mary.
“W-what is it?”
After what had just happened, the whole situation felt awkward.
“You retired early, and then I heard a rather loud noise. After some hesitation I decided to check on you.”
Ah—because of the screaming earlier?!
“I-I was just a little confused, that’s all.”
“I’m glad to hear it. But that fountain pen….”
Oh no. She’d spotted the broken pen.
“I-I threw it when I got startled….”
“We’ll need to purchase a new one.”
Ugh, those pens cost a fortune… it hurt just thinking about it.
“I-I can buy a new one tomorrow.”
“Yes, of course.”
Sister Mary withdrew. I closed the door and locked it again.
“Haa….”
What in the world had I been about to do…….
“Get a grip….”
I abandoned the whole mess and threw myself onto the bed.
I must have been out of my mind to even consider something like that. There was no other word for it.
And why did my thoughts keep drifting that way in the first place….
“Just sleep.”
It was still a little early, but staying awake only invited more useless thoughts. Sleep seemed the wiser choice.
“Just go to sleep….”
The moment I lay down and closed my eyes, the improper images returned. To drive them out I forced myself to recall magic and Holy Magic—complicated magic circles, intricate Holy Magic formulas. The difficult, technical details crowded out everything else.
Before long I slipped under.
The expensive bed was soft, the blanket wrapping me in gentle warmth; it felt wonderfully snug. Then someone peeled the covers away.
I fretted and grumbled, but a pair of arms gathered me up with unexpected tenderness. The dark veil lifted, and Young Master Maximilian stood before me.
He looked down with a bright smile. For some reason his upper body was bare.
I tried to speak, yet no sound came. He seemed to be speaking as well—his lips moved—but I heard nothing.
What on earth was going on? I couldn’t make sense of any of it.
Then his face drew closer. Why?
I didn’t understand. Closer still, until I must have closed my eyes, because everything went dark. What was happening? A sensation against my lips? My senses were in chaos.
Suddenly he was covering me….
I wanted to resist, yet my body refused to move. Only then did I realize I was naked too.
What was this? Were the two of us rolling naked across the bed?
Hands brushed my chest, my thighs. Strangely, it didn’t feel unpleasant.
My senses were so dull I couldn’t even be sure I was being touched.
No voice would come, yet I seemed to be panting. Sensation itself remained distant.
Then the scene shifted again. I was holding his manhood. This time the sensation was startlingly clear—strangely, vividly clear. I didn’t know why. Oddly enough I found myself fondling it, stroking it, playing with it.
He watched me with eyes full of affection.
Why? How had things come to this? And then the scene changed once more.
He gazed at me with such tender eyes, and somehow I was pulling him into a fierce embrace.
A wave of relief washed through me. I felt safe. Our bodies were joined. Yes—we were in the middle of the act. Me and the young master?
Had I gone mad?
Suddenly the world shuddered. Objects around us blurred; the table vanished; the bed warped and stretched unevenly.
I could no longer read the expression of the man holding me.
Had we truly been joined? What was being done to me?
Confusion accelerated; memory grew hazy.
Then, in a single flash of clarity, I understood.
Ah. This is a dream.
The instant I recognized it, the trembling world shattered.
“U-uh….”
I opened my eyes to the familiar room in the Meyer mansion in the capital.
“Ah…….”
The details were foggy, yet I knew perfectly well what kind of dream it had been.
“A wet dream… a wet dream…!”
And between my legs, around the perineum, there was a faint dampness.
I wasn’t even a man—I was a woman—and I’d had something like a nocturnal emission?
I sat up and checked my panties. They really were wet. Not soaked, but unmistakably damp.
“Fuck….”
I’d had a dirty dream? Why? Because of what I saw yesterday?
The shame and embarrassment were so crushing I couldn’t lift my head.
How was I supposed to look anyone in the eye this morning after this!
Then a thought struck like lightning. This was no time to sit here mortified. I needed to wash. I absolutely did not want anyone discovering me in this state.
So I had to shower right away—and wash the panties too.
I sprang out of bed, gathered a change of underwear and clothes, soap and a towel.
“Ha… what the hell is this first thing in the morning….”
If anyone else had been around I would have watched my language, but I was alone, so I cursed freely.
My nerves were that raw.
I slipped quietly out of the room and headed downstairs. Even in those few moments irritation flared.
Why was my room on the third floor and the bathroom on the first?! The descent took forever.
I prayed I wouldn’t run into a single soul before I reached the bathroom. Fortunately it was still the small hours; everyone else should still be deep in dreamland.
The moment I hit the first floor I spun toward the bathroom and broke into a run.
And slammed straight into someone.
I scrambled not to drop my bundle; at the same time I felt a pair of hands steady me.
“Oh dear—are you all right?”
I looked up. Young Master Maximilian stood there.
“Euk!”
Of all the people I least wanted to meet—
The instant I saw his face the dream came flooding back. The memories had been blurry, yet looking at him made every detail sharpen again.
I shook my head violently, trying to scatter the rising images.
“I-is something the matter?”
He looked flustered by my behavior.
“S-sorry!”
I scrambled to my feet and fled toward the bathroom. Glancing back over my shoulder, I saw him wearing the expression of an abandoned puppy.
“Ugh….”
Why that face!
It made me feel as though I’d done something wrong, and the guilt niggled at me. Still, I ducked into the bathroom without another word.
“Ha….”
Only after the door closed could I catch my breath and start preparing to wash.
Then came a knock.
“Miss Julian?”
“Y-young master?”
I was in the bathroom—why was he calling?
“Y-you dropped something.”
What?! I checked the things I’d set on the table. One item was missing.
Of all things… of all the things I could have dropped—!
I carefully cracked the bathroom door open just wide enough to stick my hand through the gap.
“I-I’m sorry.”
“Y-you have nothing to apologize for, young master. I’m the one who dropped it.”
A soft piece of cloth settled onto my palm. I snatched it inside at once and slammed the door shut.
“Th-thank you.”
The words left me and I sank to the floor.
“P-please take your time washing.”
I couldn’t manage an answer.
Ha… fuck, this is so embarrassing…….