Get a Load of This Guy
A cluster of girls from our department was walking toward the athletic field, and Sohee was right in the middle of them. Surrounded by the other women, she still stood out like no one else — that face, that body, a presence that simply didn't belong in the same frame.
The first-years who'd enrolled this spring were murmuring about her, loud enough that their voices carried all the way to my ears.
"Huh? The girl seniors are coming."
"Oh. Dude. Sohee's with them?"
"Where?"
"Right there in the middle of the girls. You know, the one with the... massive presence."
"Oh... that's her?"
"Whoa. First time I'm seeing her."
At the orientation after-party, Sohee hadn't switched tables either — she'd sat in the same seat as me the whole time. Of course the freshmen wouldn't have seen her. Even so, she already seemed to be famous among the first-years. That provocative combination of a glamorous figure set against a cute, almost baby-faced look would do it.
From the other side of the court, I could hear the male seniors who'd been in the middle of a basketball game.
"Whoa. Sohee actually came all the way out to the field."
"With her mixed in among those intense girls over there, the whole vibe's different. Feels like our department's girls finally have a little of that 'her' energy flowing through them."
The male seniors seemed pretty surprised that Sohee had shown up on the field at all. Even as they passed around sports drinks and wet their throats, their eyes kept sliding toward her.
"What, did she have some kind of change of heart all of a sudden...? Wait. Don't tell me she's actually interested in a guy in the department?"
"You always go there, don't you. She's probably just trying to be more active in department stuff this semester."
"So then... maybe even I might finally have a shot?"
"Cut the crap. Sohee didn't so much as blink when Byeon Yosep was after her from freshman year. You think she's gonna fall for a guy like you?"
"I heard she never even grabbed a meal alone with Yosep, and that guy was popular as hell. It's kind of legendary."
"Exactly. You think Sohee — the same Sohee who turned Yosep down — is gonna fold for that gorilla mug of yours?"
"...That's a little harsh, don't you think."
I could hear the fourth-year guys running their little comedy routine. The conversation was about that Byeon Yosep guy who'd talked to me earlier. Apparently he'd been wagging his tail at Sohee since they enrolled, leaning on the fact that they were the same year, the same incoming class. Fortunately, her ironclad defenses had held off every last one of his advances.
Byeon Yosep, huh. She doesn't seem interested on her end, but he's someone I'll need to watch.
Sohee was the first female I'd already marked to take after reincarnating into this world. There was no way I was going to let another man's fingertips so much as graze her.
"Sohee—!"
Just as I was steeling that resolve, that bastard Byeon Yosep went running toward her, waving his hand.
That son of a bitch?
My brow furrowed. The possessiveness buried in me as the Demon King of Lust stirred and coiled.
"Hey! You're dripping sweat and you're about to throw yourself at Sohee?"
"Yeah. Go wipe yourself off first. Tsk!"
Fortunately, the disaster I'd been bracing for never happened. The girls around Sohee stepped in and blocked Yosep's path.
"Aww, come on, you're being so uptight. I just wanted to say hi — it's been a while."
"You should've said hi at the orientation after-party."
"Back then... there were a lot of other seniors I had to greet."
"Oh, for crying out loud. Byeon Yosep, you can't go around telling people you like Sohee anymore, can you? So she's less important than the guy seniors, is that it?"
"What are you talking about? Sohee, don't listen to any of that!"
"Hahaha..."
Yosep and his female classmates bickering over Sohee. It was the unmistakable picture of college kids who'd been hanging around together for years. Byeon Yosep seemed to have a pretty decent image among the girls in his year. The way they looked at him said it all — the kind of guy-classmate who was a pain in the ass but not someone you actually disliked. Sohee, though, was wearing a distinctly awkward smile through all of it.
"Hey. Byeon Yosep! Sohee finally joined us for once and you're making her uncomfortable. Tone it down when the seniors are around, seriously."
"Yes, yes~ I hear you."
When one of the girls shot him a genuinely pointed look, Yosep backed off a little. Sohee's expression eased considerably after that.
"Hey, guys! We bought some drinks! Have some of these too!"
The girl senior leading the department's female group called out loudly. After that, everyone sat on the benches with drinks and clustered into little groups to talk.
"Hey. Let's go sit with that group."
"Huh? Over there?"
I said it to Mincheol, who was resting beside me, pointing toward the cluster Sohee was in.
"You want to insert ourselves over there? You close with the third-year seniors?"
"Not all of them. Just Sohee."
"Then why go over there."
"It's a chance to get closer to Sohee. You're gonna pass that up?"
"...Hmm. Let's go."
Talking Mincheol into something was never hard.
The two of us walked over to the third-year seniors, who were chatting away in high spirits, and spoke up.
"Hello, seniors. Thanks for the drinks. They were great."
"Th-thank you, they were delicious!"
I approached naturally, dipping my head toward the seniors with a word of thanks, and Mincheol beside me bowed along with me. The most easygoing-looking of the third-year girls spoke up.
"Kang Minsu, right? I think I saw you briefly at the orientation after-party."
"Yes, that's right."
I couldn't quite remember whether we'd actually greeted each other then. Was her name Gayeon? One thing I was sure of: she wasn't a virgin. The fact that my memory of her was hazy told me that much.
"Here! I'll pour you a cup — take it."
"Aigoo. Thanks a lot."
The senior who was probably Gayeon poured sports drink into Mincheol's paper cup and mine like she was pouring soju. I knocked mine back in one go and casually spoke to Sohee beside me.
"Sohee. You actually came."
She'd been zoning out. She looked at me, a little startled, then answered.
"Ah. Yeah! I said I'd come watch."
"Honestly, I didn't think you would."
"Huh? Why?"
"Everyone said you don't like this kind of gathering."
I said it with a slight smile. Sohee fidgeted for a long moment, looking uncomfortable, then pulled her phone from her pocket.
"Th-that reminds me, I don't have your number. If we're going to keep studying together, we should be able to get in touch. You don't have mine yet either, right?"
"That's right."
"Could you... give me your number?"
I took the phone she held out and entered my number like it was the most natural thing in the world.
"Thanks. I'll text you."
"Yes. Appreciate it."
I said that and was about to drink another cup of sports drink when Sohee's classmates, who'd seen the number exchange, started making a fuss.
"Ooooh? Sohee. You know how to ask for a number?"
"Whoa. First time I've ever seen Sohee ask anyone for their number."
"Where'd the Sohee go who never even had the seniors' numbers and was always a pain about it?"
While I drank, the girls crowded around Sohee and started talking like they'd just witnessed a miracle.
"Come on. We just... got close, and we meet up to study sometimes."
"Study? Study what?"
"We just meet up now and then and do a little English."
The girls reacted like she'd dropped a bomb. Yosep included.
"Holy shit."
"What? Didn't you two meet for the first time at orientation? You're already that close?"
"Sohee... our Sohee...! Ngh...!"
Sohee's female classmates ran the full range. Some were amazed, some were curious. One of them was putting on a crying act like she was Sohee's actual parent, laying it on thick.
Meanwhile, Yosep — whose expression had stiffened slightly at Sohee's words — tossed out a line.
"Well. Sohee's just that nice. A junior asked her to teach him and she couldn't say no, right?"
He said it looking at me, with a look that said it bothered him at least a little. Another girl fired right back.
"Yeah. That same Sohee who can't say no turned down every single time Byeon Yosep asked her out, though?"
The girls snickered. Yosep looked flustered, but he answered with a smile that wouldn't kill the mood.
"Hurgh... you just punched me right in the solar plexus."
"Haha... if I hang out with Yosep, we just end up playing around the whole time."
It was the kind of remark that should have made Sohee pretty uncomfortable, but she deflected it smoothly, like she was used to this. Her face, though, didn't look all that at ease.
Looking at this, I can see why she doesn't want to do department activities.
Sohee's original personality probably didn't love crowds to begin with, but that wasn't the whole story. A guy like that trailing after her asking her out, and her own classmates treating it like cheap gossip. I'd stick to just attending class too, if I were her.
I was thinking that when the voice of the most senior male upperclassman rang out from a distance.
"Alright!! Everybody gather back up! Let's go another thirty minutes and call it!"
The booming voice rolled across the field. Hearing it, Mincheol and I turned back toward the court.
"Ah, shit. We barely even said hello."
"You should've tried to hang around more."
"You're at least close with Sohee. I don't know a single person over there."
"Tsk. That's a shame."
Even when I set the table for him, this Mincheol bastard still couldn't get close to the females. Then again — if there were males like me, there had to be males like him too.
I was walking toward the court with that thought when Yosep's voice came from behind me.
"Minsu, was it? You seem pretty close with Sohee."
The question came the instant we'd put some distance between ourselves and the third-year girls. Anyone could see he was wary of how close I looked with Sohee.
So he's not completely clueless.
I'd taken him for just an annoying bastard, but he had a male's territorial instinct after all.
"Just. We got close over drinks at the orientation party."
"Hmm~ Is that so? Our Sohee isn't the type to get close that easily over drinks."
Get a load of this bastard.
Our Sohee?
For a second, my instinct as an incubus surged. I barely managed to crush the impulse to rip his mouth wide open.
"Other people do seem to find Sohee a little hard to approach, but I was fine? She was really good to me at the drinking party."
"Oh... is that right?"
A faint twitch ran across Yosep's face.
"Well. Still, the orientation after-party is probably the last time you'll get to drink with Sohee. Even I've only seen her drink a handful of times, and I've been around her since we enrolled."
He said it with a face steeped in quiet superiority, like he knew Sohee far better than I ever could.
"I heard a rumor you like Sohee. Is that true?"
I tossed the question straight at him, just to see how he'd react.
"Yeah. As you can see, she's lukewarm on her end, though."
"That's too bad."
"Still, you know what they say — there's no tree that won't fall if you chop it ten times. If I keep showing her how I really feel, she'll come around, right?"
Heh. What a pitiful male. Thinking he could claim a female of Sohee's caliber just by laying his so-called sincerity out in the open.
He had no idea. The one-on-one meals and drinking sessions with Sohee that he hadn't managed in years — I'd done them in two days. And in those same sittings, I'd stolen her lips and fed her my saliva besides.
"Anyway. I'm telling you this just in caaase you happen to be interested in Sohee. I'm already in too deep with her to do anything about it, but there's no reason the other guys should suffer too, right?"
Yosep said that and walked past me.
What a joke of a guy.
Acting like this was for my sake. Talking like he was warning me not to waste my heart on a girl who wasn't even interested in men. When what he really meant was: Sohee is my target, so don't even think about making a move.
I'm actually looking forward to this.
The virginity of the tongue inside those lips he'd wanted so desperately. And the untouched virginity between her thighs that no one had even come close to. Once I had taken both — once he found out — I could already feel myself looking forward to the face he would make.
The instinct of a Demon of Lust, carved into my very soul, was beginning to stir in earnest.