Chapter 27
Chapter 27
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 27
Chapter Title: Backfired Realism
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"Huu, huu."
Today, too, I woke up early at dawn, went out for a workout, and returned.
It wasn't anything intense.
Just running the streets around the shop, heading out beyond the city walls to circle the mountain while breathing in the refreshing phytoncides.
After finishing my cardio and returning to the shop, I'd spend about thirty minutes on strength training with the various tools there, and that wrapped up the day's exercise.
"Haa, done."
Having finished today's workout as well, I wiped the streaming sweat with the towel draped around my neck and headed into the shower room.
Why bother managing my body as a mage, you ask?
Honestly, if I were a firepower monster from the Blaster School or a research-obsessed Meister School mage, I wouldn't need to go this far.
The same went for any other school.
One snap of a spell, and it was done for real.
But illusion magic was different.
No matter how much magic you learned, nothing changed in reality.
Even if you mastered the pinnacle of illusion magic, it had no impact on the real world.
To deal damage to someone under illusion magic, you need other methods.
The simplest among techniques and weapons capable of physical damage was a well-trained body.
Of course, no matter how much I trained, I couldn't leave serious wounds on a knight's body.
I knew that better than anyone.
I'm not planning to fight in the first place.
So the reason I trained like this wasn't to kill or harm those under my illusions.
It was to provide even more realistic satisfaction.
That was the conclusion I'd reached after pondering how to make our illusion-bound customers even happier.
To make their illusions feel more real, I had to stay busy.
Sometimes, as the user's status changed within the illusion, I'd need to adjust the posture of the entranced user.
Like recently with Helen, when her limbs were bound by spirit magic—I'd use leather handcuffs to bind her arms and legs, then hang her from the chains dangling from the ceiling to force her upright.
Or, like when Yuris had been captured before, I'd sit a standing user down and tie her in place.
To give users lost in their illusions a more immersive experience despite being unable to move, there were many times when I had to touch and reposition their bodies myself.
To do that, I need a sturdy body and stamina.
That was why I did stamina training that didn't suit a mage.
In short, a firm body let me satisfy my customers' desires far better.
"Huu, refreshing."
I wiped the water from my body and stepped out of the shower, then dressed with reverence.
-Hall of Illusions.
The light purple outfit, the personal color of the Illusion Magic School, bore our shop's name.
The baggy round shirt and shorts were like something you'd wear at a sauna—prioritizing wearability over looks.
They'd barely been used properly, except for that one time Yuris and Helen had no choice but to wear them while their clothes dried.
Still, better to soak these with urine and love juices than ruin those precious outfits.
Noble ladies might see it differently.
I got it.
It was a shame the tracksuit I'd made with my own money went unused, but what could I do?
With my body freshly clean, I stood in the center of the magic circle for the first time in ages.
"Long time no see."
Lately, with magic research for my two customers and part-time gigs to pay the rent, I hardly used it at all.
What was the original reason I'd even made this illusion magic circle?
To perfect my ideal jerk-off material, unavailable in this fantasy world.
Nanako.
My all-time favorite actress, who'd once dominated the AV rankings.
The star of that innocent, secretive one-night stand with her childhood friend.
Today, I stood in the center to indulge in my favorite fantasy.
"I've got plenty of mana stones prepared, and I've patched the flaws using the illusion magics I showed my previous customers."
Thanks to Yuris and Helen, I could now produce a slightly more refined video.
On top of that—embarrassing as it was—I'd filled in some missing data through my customers.
So now I could screen something even more realistic than before.
No crashing mid-breast-sucking from data shortages this time.
Standing in the center of the magic circle, I activated it.
And in that instant...
Wuuung.
Light bloomed, and the scenery shifted.
The scent of a young woman freshly shedding her innocence tickled my nose once more.
Right before my eyes were Nanako's bare, ample breasts.
"Max, I want you to do it. Only you, Max."
It was that scene from the last time I'd been booted out.
Nanako, baring her voluptuous breasts, waiting eagerly to be sucked.
I'd leaned in to take her breast in my mouth, only to get kicked out from lack of data and mana.
"Max... I'm embarrassed."
As I stood there staring piercingly at her breasts, she squirmed shyly and spoke.
Was it just my imagination, or did that voice sound like Yuris?
Yeah, when I made this video, there'd been a serious data shortage.
To compensate, the magic circle had pulled in various resources to tweak the senses, guzzling an insane amount of mana in the process.
I couldn't keep up with the consumption, and it crashed.
But things were different now.
Embarrassing as it is...
I'd sucked on Helen's and Yuris's breasts, so I knew exactly what that sensation felt like.
It was a brief memory for the sake of realistic illusions, but it was etched vividly in my mind.
"Sorry, let's start."
I sucked on Nanako's voluptuous breasts.
I licked her areola with my tongue and suckled her nipple.
The soft, warm texture of her breast transmitted vividly through my lips.
That alone made my lower half stiffen.
Naked just like her, my hardened cock thrust high into the air, making its presence known.
"Max, you're so hard."
Nanako's voice came from above.
The laughter-laced tone was plenty to stir up old memories.
There I was, the teenage me discovering JAV for the first time.
"Haa, haa."
"Max... feels good."
The breast I was sucking on felt similar to Helen's.
And to Yuris's as well.
They were clearly different breasts—different sizes for the areolas and nipples, different sucking sensations—yet why did they feel identical in my mouth?
My ears heard Nanako's voice, but the breasts I was sucking belonged to Yuris and Helen.
Without someone outside providing real-time data tweaks, leaving it all to the magic circle means the quality suffers.
Unlike when I controlled it from outside, this was an inherent limitation of leaving everything to the circle.
Was it because of the sudden stray thought?
"Max."
The Nanako looking down at me had become Yuris.
Yuris gazing at me with loving eyes.
Her blue irises, so out of place in this Japanese-style house, fixed on me.
"Yuris...?"
"Teacher, now let me suck you. Sit here."
Those loving eyes were unmistakably Nanako's.
But the voice was Helen's.
Helen—no, Yuris—knelt before me, promising to suck my cock, and looked up at me.
Nanako gripped my shaft as Helen's tongue lapped at the tip of my glans. Yuris smiled at me.
An error born from Yuris and Helen mixing with Nanako.
[Multiple pieces of information have been mixed.]
[Insufficient computation speed.]
The error triggered video buffering.
The magic circle's sensory function, which had been fooling the user's senses via pre-loaded data, failed to operate properly.
Nanako was sucking my cock, but I felt nothing.
[Emergency stopping video.]
Acknowledging an irrecoverable error, the magic circle terminated the video.
Once again, I couldn't see it through to the end.
This time, it wasn't a mana shortage.
The real-time correction system, needed to update data on the fly and keep the illusion going, had failed.
"Damn it."
The circle worked fine when I tweaked it in real time from outside.
But hand it off to full automation, and problems cropped up.
"Too realistic this time, huh?"
The base data was so lifelike that stray thoughts bubbled up in my head.
"Others get to enjoy it just fine, and I can't?"
What kind of curse was this?
I'd built the damn thing to enjoy it myself.
Satisfying customers was just to make the pre-loaded data more realistic.
"Lots to improve."
I felt the limits of my own skills.
"Wish Master were here."
It'd be a bit embarrassing to show her my dirty laundry, but I'd seen plenty of my customers' secrets too.
A genius like Meiko could tweak the circle in real time without issue.
"Miss Meiko."
She used to fix stuff like this in no time.
Even that first whiff of Nanako's body scent—it was modeled after her smell.
"Lacking data on women?"
"Yes. So I need to smell Master."
"Disciple, smell me? What are you saying? Are you insane?"
"Tsk, haa. Just a little! It's all for research."
"Hey, hey, don't cling! I said don't cling!"
"Master, they say an elbow feels like a breast if you flex it. I'm a guy, so gather some female data for me?"
"You pervert, trying something weird again, huh?"
"Just let me touch a bit. For real bodily sensations. Can't exactly grope real breasts, right?"
"You..."
"Then mind if I touch your breasts?"
"Are you mad? Absolutely not. Men and women have boundaries—how could I?"
"Then, excuse me for the elbow."
"Kyaa! Stop! I said stop! It tickles!"
Remembering that fond data-gathering session with Master brought a smile to my face.
That skin scent from back then made for excellent reference material.
I'd mimicked breast texture decently with her elbow, but since it wasn't real, it guzzled mana.
That was when it happened.
Knock knock knock.
A knock at the door—I went out.
"Ah, there you are."
Standing there was Helen de Silvesta.
With her attendants.