Chapter 354
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 354
Chapter Title: Interlude–Three-Way Confrontation
“So…”
The living room, now wider thanks to renovations.
Ha-eun, sitting on the sofa, narrowed her eyes as she looked between Oh-jin and Vega, who was standing next to him.
Call it a woman's intuition, but she could easily tell the atmosphere between Oh-jin and Vega had changed.
*Sigh*.
A deep sigh escaped Ha-eun's lips.
“After Isabella, now it's Vega?”
“…Well.”
Oh-jin trailed off, avoiding Ha-eun's gaze.
Ha-eun shot a sharp glare at the evasive Oh-jin, the corners of her mouth twisting into a fierce sneer.
“You waltzed off to the Sanctuary alone and came back as a pair?”
“…”
“Fucking hell, you go in as two, are you gonna come out as three next?”
“Ahem.”
Just like with Isabella, even if he had ten mouths, he had nothing to say.
As he waited for the verdict, bowing his head reverently like a criminal before a judge.
[It is not my, my child's fault!]
Lawyer Vega raised her hand high and began her defense.
“Hmm. Not Oh-jinnie's fault, you say?”
[I was the one who confessed my feelings first.]
“Oh?”
[It is my fault for being unable to hold back, even knowing you two were lovers.]
Vega swallowed dryly, her expression shrinking.
Ha-eun slumped onto the sofa and touched her forehead as if she had a headache.
“Sigh, yeah. I kind of thought this would happen. I knew it.”
When Oh-jin headed to the Sanctuary saying he was going to apologize to Vega, she'd had a vague premonition.
That he might end up with one more lover.
But there was a huge difference between knowing it in her head and accepting it in her heart.
“Still… it's pretty damn annoying.”
“I will gladly accept any punishment.”
Unable to overcome his guilt, Oh-jin meekly bowed his head like a criminal who had turned himself in.
[N-No! If there is a punishment, I shall take it in his stead!]
“Our masochist goddess can stay out of it.”
[…What is a masochist?]
As Vega tilted her head in confusion, Oh-jin quietly approached and whispered the meaning in her ear.
Vega leaped up like a scalded rabbit.
[I-I am not such a shameless woman!]
“Oh, really now?”
Ha-eun twisted her lips into a smirk and crept up behind Vega.
[W-What are you trying to do?]
“Shhh. Just stay still.”
She grabbed the dress of Vega, who was manifested in her original form instead of her small vessel, and, like an elementary schoolboy playing a prank on a girl he likes, flipped her skirt up.
The dress flipped over, revealing the goddess's pristine and luscious bottom to the whole world.
[Kyaaaaaaaaaa!]
A scream unlike any she had ever made before erupted from Vega's lips.
[W-W-W-What are you doing!]
Vega's face flushed with shame, her lips sputtering incoherently.
Ha-eun looked at Vega's reddened, swollen bottom and smirked as if to say, "I knew it."
“Looks like you two had a very fun time before coming here, huh?”
[I-It's not like that!]
“What do you mean 'not like that'? There's a 'very good job' handprint right here on your butt.”
[H-How impudent!]
“What's impudent is the goddess who was sulking and locking herself away, only to offer up her ass as soon as you two made up.”
[…]
A factual assault of an unimaginable level.
Vega's verbal lashing was so scathing that it would have been better to be beaten with a weapon; she collapsed with a thump, her eyes vacant as if her soul had left her.
[I-I... it's not... like that...]
“Vega.”
[Sob. What did I do so wrong...]
“Vega!”
No response.
She seemed to be just a corpse.
“…Ha-eun.”
“Ah, s-sorry. I guess that was a bit too much.”
When he stared at her reproachfully, Ha-eun laughed awkwardly and scratched her head.
Vega's reaction had been so perfect that she'd crossed the line without realizing it.
Ha-eun approached Vega, who was sitting on the floor, hugging her knees and sniffling.
“Anyway, please take good care of Oh-jinnie from now on.”
[Does that mean... y-you'll acknowledge me?]
A golden starlight twinkled in her once-vacant eyes.
Ha-eun let out a deep sigh and nodded.
“It's not about acknowledging you or not. I'm the one who said I'd fully support Oh-jinnie's choice.”
Still, was it a relief that he didn't bring home some random bitch she'd never seen before, but Vega, who had been with them all along?
No, she was still too pissed off to let it go so peacefully.
“I should just chop it off.”
“…Chop what off?”
Ha-eun muttered the bloodthirsty words while pinching Oh-jin's side hard.
The pain was so sharp it felt like his flesh was being torn off, making his eyes fly open, but given his transgression, he quietly endured Ha-eun's venting.
*Click.*
Just then.
The front door opened and a woman entered the house.
A woman so beautiful it felt as if the surroundings had momentarily brightened.
Isabella neatly arranged her removed shoes and came inside.
“I'm home~”
Her voice was as warm as a spring breeze.
“Hm?”
Noticing Vega, Isabella tilted her head.
“Oh my, have you two made up?”
“Made up? They're practically dying of love for each other.”
“…What do you mean by that, sister?”
Isabella's eyes turned cold as she looked back and forth between Oh-jin and Vega.
Ha-eun clicked her tongue, tsk, and held up three fingers.
“It means there are three of us now.”
“…Ah.”
A low gasp escaped Isabella's lips.
[I... am s-sorry.]
“Oh my, what do you have to be sorry to me for?”
Isabella smiled brightly and shook her head.
“It's a bit awkward for me to say it, but my situation isn't that different from yours, Lady Vega.”
After all, Isabella herself had also wedged her way in between Oh-jin and Ha-eun, knowing they were a couple.
[I-I see. Thank you for saying that...]
“However.”
Her mouth was smiling, but for some reason, her eyes were not smiling at all.
“I still believe there needs to be a clear hierarchy in these matters.”
[…A hierarchy?]
“Simply put, a pecking order.”
“What are you talking about, a pecking order?”
Oh-jin, who had been listening quietly, tried to interject with an incredulous look, but.
“Oh-jin, you stay out of it.”
Rejected in one fell swoop, Oh-jin instantly shriveled.
“First, without a doubt, is Sister Ha-eun. She met Oh-jin first, and she was the first one to become his lover.”
“Hmph, hmph. Well, th-that's right, isn't it?”
Ha-eun needlessly puffed out her chest, raising her nose in the air.
She looked like a scarecrow emperor who had lost all real power to his chancellor.
Isabella lightly hugged Oh-jin's arm and held up two fingers.
“And second is me.”
[Well... if we're going by the order in which we became lovers, I suppose so.]
Vega nodded, as if she didn't particularly care about things like pecking orders.
“So.”
Isabella gave a mischievous smile and pressed her body tightly against Oh-jin's arm, which she was still hugging.
“That means there's no spot left next to Oh-jin.”
Assuming Ha-eun took the other side, there was indeed no space left on either side of him.
[Hmm. Is that what you wanted to say?]
Vega's eyes narrowed as she watched Isabella cling to him like a puppy marking its territory.
*Whoooosh!*
Her body glowed and then changed into her palm-sized vessel.
[Then I shall make my spot here.]
Zipping through the air, Vega landed gently on Oh-jin's shoulder.
It was her own designated seat, from which she could reach out to pull Oh-jin's earlobe or stroke his cheek.
“Hmm. So there was a way.”
Isabella swallowed a groan, looking as if she'd been outmaneuvered.
Feeling vexed at the thought of letting it end like this, Isabella pondered for a moment before snapping her fingers as if a good idea had struck her.
“And from now on, Lady Vega, you'll have to call us 'sister'.”
[…What?]
Vega's expression hardened.
A Constellation, and not just any Constellation, but Polaris, the one at the apex of hundreds of others, having to use the honorific 'sister'?
It was a title more horribly incongruous than the Secretary of Defense calling a fresh-faced private 'bro'.
“Oh, yes, yes. Why don't you try calling us 'sister'?”
[W-Why are you joining in?]
Ha-eun's eyes sparkled with amusement as she poked Vega in the side.
“…”
Watching the two women tease Vega with sparkling eyes felt like watching senior soldiers hazing a new recruit.
[M-My child.]
“Ahem. Well... it's not really my place to interfere.”
Honestly, I want to hear it.
The scene of the honorific 'sister' coming from Vega's lips.
[Ughhhhh.]
Vega furrowed her brow and bit her lip, then cautiously opened her mouth.
[*Inhale, exhale.*]
She took a deep breath.
[Please take care of me from now on... s-s-sisters.]
“Pfft!”
“Puh!”
Ha-eun and Isabella simultaneously clamped their hands over their mouths, squirming as if a bug had gotten inside their clothes.
“Kyahahaha! She said 'sisters'! 'Sisters'! Did you hear that?!”
“Hahahaha! It suits you even less than I imagined!”
Ha-eun and Isabella burst into peals of laughter, teasing Vega.
[Th-That's why I said I didn't want to!]
Vega shouted, her face flushing red.
Isabella wiped away the tears that had formed in the corners of her eyes and patted Vega's shoulder.
“Ah… I'm sorry, Lady Vega. I honestly didn't know it would be this unbecoming.”
“Ah, damn, I got goosebumps.”
They tried to console her belatedly, but her pride as a Constellation had already crumbled and could not be restored.
[You are all so impertinent!]
Vega put on a deliberately stern expression and returned from her small vessel to her original form.
[No matter how casually I may treat you, I am still a Constellation!]
Vega launched into a passionate speech, as if a lot had been building up inside her.
[A Constellation is a divine being born from the primordial giant...!]
Listening to the nagging that began to drone on, Ha-eun and Isabella looked at each other with expressions that said they'd stepped on a landmine.
“O-Oh-jin?”
“Where did that bastard Oh-jinnie go?”
The two of them sent pleading gazes in Oh-jin's direction, but he had already vanished like a phantom.
[Ahem! Where are your eyes wandering! Am I not in the middle of explaining the birth and history of Constellations!]
The deep sighs of the two women, now trapped by Vega, echoed faintly.
*'Still, I'm glad it all worked out.'*
Oh-jin, who had slipped away and used Black Heaven to hide his presence the moment he saw Vega about to explode, watched his three lovers with a faint smile.
-You, who couldn't even protect a single one... not even one... dares to be greedy?
Suddenly.
The memory of the Heavenly Demon's gaze, glaring at him with eyes full of hatred, came to mind.
Oh-jin let out a bitter chuckle.
*'Just like you said, maybe I am being presumptuously greedy.'*
But.
So what if it's greedy, so what if it's selfish.
*'I won't give up.'*
Unlike you.
I will, without fail.
Engraving a firm vow in his heart, he walked toward the three women—no, his three lovers.