Shoot the Horse First
To capture this female knight, I first needed to strike a deal. “What sort of transaction are you seeking? A request for a new doll? Or perhaps some dangerous drug or aphrodisiac?”
I interlaced my fingers atop the table and regarded her with a relaxed gaze.
“First, let’s settle the truth behind the incident I commissioned earlier. The suicide bombing by that idiotic knight-aspirant who put my father in bed. Have you uncovered the true culprit or the mastermind pulling the strings?”
At my question the masked woman let out a light sigh and shook her head.
“We are pursuing the investigation with utmost diligence, yet we have still not caught any heavyweight figure who could serve as the ‘justification for forging a new doll’ you desire, honored customer. That is my interim report.”
“Tsk.” I clicked my tongue in annoyance. Truthfully, I hadn’t expected much. The original story’s version of events had been nothing more than a mundane revenge drama. Still, on the off chance, I rested my chin on my hand and added instructions in a chilling voice.
“Then continue the investigation. The moment even a single person connected to the incident emerges as a mastermind… break him so that he obeys my every word without question, yet leave his ego perfectly intact. Deliver him in a state of absolute submission, fully aware of the hideous terror and dread he feels toward me. I will listen to his ugly true nature while he grovels at my feet.”
At my sadistic, twisted demand the woman contorted her body in an eerie fashion and lifted the corners of her lips.
“Fufufu… What a delightfully depraved and captivating taste you have. I do hope that unfortunate mastermind turns out to be a beautiful woman.”
As she accepted with a bewitching air, I drew an old red leather notebook from my coat and set it on the table. It was the journal of corruption Karin had penned every night after her transformation into a doll, each page soaked in shame and pleasure.
“Next is the second request. Using this notebook as the foundation, I intend to train my prospective bride to perfection. I wish to know whether the President possesses any useful hallucinogenic incense or drugs among his arsenal.”
The woman’s golden eyes sparkled with curiosity the instant they fell on the red notebook. She extended a hand, red nails glinting.
“My, what a thick, intoxicating aura this carries. Might I read the journal for a moment?”
Tap. I struck the back of her hand away and refused flatly.
“No. This is an intimate secret shared only by me and the woman who will become my wife.”
At my unyielding possessiveness that refused to let another’s touch stain it, the woman withdrew her hand with visible regret. I tucked the notebook back into my coat and continued.
“I require a catalyst to shatter my prospective bride’s paltry reason through gaslighting. The President sees through every resource and circumstance in the Empire, so I need not explain further. I will pay the entire remaining balance of the compensation I received from the Camilla incident in exchange for the expertise, the means to perfectly execute this hypnotic training and bind Karin completely to me.”
At my proposal the masked woman closed her eyes without a word. She sank into deep meditation to commune via telepathy with her exalted “President.” When her eyes opened again, an intrigued gleam danced within them.
“That is his message. The advice is offered as a courtesy to a valued customer who will soon become an excellent patron.”
The woman produced a perfume bottle emitting a faint pink glow from her bosom and slid it across the table.
“As for the incense… this will suffice. Fufufu, consider it a special service from me.”
What she offered was the very perfume from the original work—one that would raise the body’s instincts to their absolute limit until the victim ultimately surrendered to her own shame and pleasure.
I accepted the bottle with a satisfied smile.
“Splendid. I’ll purchase something for you later without haggling. That concludes our transaction.”
The woman rose and offered me another elegant bow.
“Ah, one final matter. My lord has asked me to convey that he eagerly anticipates the ‘first regular inspection’ in a few days. Please continue to treasure the dolls we have provided.”
She left behind only an enchanting smile like a night breeze and the thick fragrance of roses, vanishing from the office like a mirage in the same manner she had appeared.
Having secured everything I wanted, I hummed a cheerful tune as I prepared to leave the office, only to pause beside the Baron. He lay unconscious in the corner, head pillowed on the doll’s lap, panting like a beast trapped in the nightmare the Saintess must have inflicted. I leaned down and whispered low and cold into the ear of that pathetic little rat clinging to the doll’s embrace.
“If you don’t want your neck severed, love the doll in your own room according to your station. Stop drooling over what belongs to others.”
With that icy warning I stepped out into the corridor of the knight order that had become entirely my domain, walking with leisurely confidence.
The corridor still buzzed with the lingering heat of the morning uproar. Knights who spotted me flinched, then quickly yielded the way, regarding me as the “division commander’s son-in-law” and “Senior Karin’s prospective groom.” Their greetings carried a strange mixture of respect and envy.
Only days ago those same eyes had looked upon me as the family’s worthless trash. Now, with a single bombastic declaration from Knight Commander Camilla, their attitudes had flipped like a hand turning over. I answered the shallow, ridiculous stares pouring toward me with a willingly arrogant smile and kept walking.
Soon that rat of a baron will tamper with the documents himself and prepare a perfect “special instruction room” somewhere in this order—soundproofed, secure, and mine alone.
Imagining the sticky trysts that would unfold in that secret space, I rounded the corner with a satisfied smile—only to stop short.
“Mom! What on earth was that strange remark you made outside earlier? Thanks to you the rumors have only become more firmly established as fact!”
At the far end of the corridor stood Karin, face flushed as she protested, while Camilla soothed her.
“Oh dear, strange remark? You’re going to marry into the count’s family anyway, so acknowledging it early and becoming one true family would be far more comfortable for you, wouldn’t it?”
Camilla wore her characteristic firm yet benevolent motherly expression as she comforted her daughter. To think this was the very culprit behind the pandemonium at the knight order’s main gate moments ago—now feigning innocence and engaging in ordinary mother-daughter conversation. How utterly hypocritical.
Watching the bizarre scene, I tapped my fingers against the small vial in my coat. The object the President’s agent had given me was no cheap cheat like the “sensitivity ×3000” or “absolute obedience potion” that appeared in trashy erotic novels.
From the beginning, I’ve had no interest in such low-grade hypnosis.
Those materials were fine for one-off gratification but lacked the profound allure worth revisiting once inspiration ran dry. In that sense, this drug served purely as an auxiliary tool that maximized physical instinct without creating dependency, guiding the target to abandon her own reason and fall into corruption of her own accord.
Though, setting-wise, it is a thoroughly depraved and obscene compound made by blending the dense love-juice of a succubus with the pure holy water drawn from the Saintess’s body in grotesque proportions.
Especially knowing the woman who had just handed it to me was the original work’s Saintess, the source of its ingredients required no imagination. With such byproducts from this sticky, sacred fantasy world, my gaslighting training—built upon the journal of corruption Karin herself had written—could proceed far more elegantly and obscenely.
Aah, how I long to embrace that proud, noble mother and daughter at once and ravage them like a beast.
I licked my lips at the thought of claiming both the female knight who stood so defiantly against me and her mother, the Sword Master, in one delicious mother-daughter bowl.
Honestly, combining my dominance with this bizarre drug of Saintess and succubus fluids would allow me to forcibly enact that depraved desire right this instant if I wished.
But I did not hurry. I calmly analyzed Camilla’s gaze. When it turned toward me it brimmed with the blind lust of a female surrendered to pleasure, yet when it rested on her daughter Karin the instinct of a mother who still wished for her child’s happiness and safety remained.
That subtle gap. Camilla wanted Karin to become the legal wife and be loved, but she had not yet fully accepted the notion of herself falling alongside her daughter as the owner’s shared plaything.
If I surrendered to this boiling desire and took both women at once? Camilla’s noble maternal love would likely act as a defense mechanism, causing her suppressed reason to snap back, or Karin’s mentality might shatter completely and drive her to an extreme choice.
Straight to a bad end and death flag.
As the villain who controlled the variables of the original story, I had no intention of committing such third-rate errors. I inwardly chuckled and recalled an old proverb.
To catch a general, first shoot the horse he rides.
To perfectly subjugate and destroy the haughty general named Karin, I first had to elevate the submission of the horse she relied upon and trusted most—her mother Camilla—until she became my flawless accomplice. The true aesthetics of gaslighting and domination lay in making the mother herself break her daughter’s purity and feed it to me on a silver platter.
Having finished my thoughts, I approached the pair with deliberate footsteps. At my appearance Karin froze mid-sentence, flinched, and bared open hostility, while Camilla’s cheeks flushed faintly and her thighs pressed together.
I ignored Karin entirely and offered Camilla a courteous yet lewd smile.
“Then I’ll be counting on you for this afternoon’s ‘special reform class for the good-for-nothing,’ mother-in-law.”
The moment the words left my mouth, every trace of flustered motherhood and the sensual afterglow of last night’s doll-like behavior vanished from Camilla’s face. In their place stood the harsh training instructor, the knight commander whose overwhelming might had driven countless knights into hell.
She smiled like a feral beast and cast me an arrogant look.
“Of course. You’d best steel yourself. Even if your muscles burst and your bones shatter, try to endure it, son-in-law.”
The Sword Master’s chilling smile dripped with killing intent. Yet knowing what manner of sticky, depraved reward would follow that “hellish training” once we reached the bed, I felt a pleasant thrill run through me.