Game Changer?

Evening. Marisa's inn.

Marisa stood behind the counter on the first floor — brown hair tied up, apron around her waist. The everyday figure of an innkeeper.

"You're back?"

Marisa smiled. A forty-three-year-old's smile.

"Dinner?"

"Not yet."

"Come upstairs. I'll make you something."

Marisa's room on the second floor. Irene set the table, then headed back down.

Fucking perfect.

Marisa brought out soup and bread. Pumpkin soup, its sweetness rising warm off the bowl.

"Eat."

We sat across from each other while I sipped the soup, and Marisa rested her elbows on the table, chin in her hands, watching me.

...Her chin pressed into her chest, and the weight of her breasts deepened the line of her cleavage. My dick gave a twitch all on its own. Hide it — get it behind the soup bowl and press down, hard. Getting hard at a forty-three-year-old innkeeper's dinner table. Fuck. I'm a loser.

"You look busy these days."

"There's a lot of work at the palace."

"Royal Psychologist. Impressive, my Do-hyun."

My Do-hyun. Marisa had taken to calling me that before I ever left for the front. Possessive. Marisa's Do-hyun. This woman is certain that I'm her man.

She has no idea I'm the one who made her certain. Fuck — and that's the funny part.

"Take care of yourself."

Marisa's eyes had gone serious.

"The palace is a dangerous place. Politics eats people alive. The better you are, the bigger a target you become."

"I know."

"Knowing it and living it are two different things. Be careful."

Marisa took my hand. A warm hand. The warmth of forty-three years.

Then she pressed her lips to the back of it.

Mwah.

Gently.

"Do-hyun. Sometimes you push yourself too hard."

"Do I?"

"Mm. It's all right to rest sometimes."

Marisa's advice. Warm. But I can't rest — not with prey called the queen waiting right in front of me.

Sorry, Marisa. I'm a man who can't rest. While her warm hand worries over me, beyond that hand I'm already sizing up my next prey. What a piece of shit I am.

Then—

"...Are you free tonight?"

Marisa's brown eyes had gone glassy.

A month.

While I was away at the front, this woman slept in an empty bed for a month. I'd drained away five years of thirst for her — then left the space I'd emptied dry for another month.

Marisa's cheeks colored faintly.

Not embarrassment. Thirst.

"Tonight, I'm a bit..."

I let the words trail off. Part of my mind was still on putting my plans for the queen in order. But Marisa's hand closed tighter around mine.

"It's been a month, Do-hyun."

Her voice dropped low.

"A month. Every night, you were all I thought about."

Gulp.

My throat worked around a dry swallow.

Marisa rose from her seat, came around the table, and stopped at my side. Her fingers pulled loose the strings of her apron.

The apron slid to the floor.

Her blouse showed beneath it — three buttons undone, a sliver of skin peeking through the fabric above her cleavage.

The fullness of forty-three.

"...Stand up."

Marisa took my hand and drew me to my feet.

Her chest came to rest against mine. Even through the cloth, the softness reached me.

"Just once. Even if it's only once."

Mwah.

Marisa kissed me.

Mwah, mwah.

Mwah, mwah, mwah.

Lips layered over lips. Marisa's tongue slid into my mouth.

A wet sound.

My spine shuddered.

The refusal I'd been holding died in my throat. Plans to sort out, my ass — in the face of this warmth, it was all just an excuse.

Marisa's bed.

She undid her hairband, and brown hair spilled down over her shoulders.

It settled across her chest with a soft rustle — the loosened hair of a forty-three-year-old innkeeper, always tied up neat, now falling loose.

"...It's been so long."

Marisa smiled faintly.

"So long since I let it down."

Her blouse buttons came undone one by one.

Pop.

Pop.

Pop.

By the third button, her full chest showed through the parted fabric. Nothing like a brassiere exists in this other world — just a single layer of cloth corset.

"Do-hyun. Untie it for me."

Marisa turned her back to me. The corset's laces crossed in an X between her shoulder blades. My hands were shaking. A month. Her body — whose five-year thirst I had quenched once, then left empty for another month — stood before me again.

I pulled the knot free.

The corset slid down.

Marisa's bare back. The line of her shoulders, the curve of her spine, the narrow dip of her waist.

I embraced her from behind, both hands coming up under her breasts.

Gulp.

The ample flesh rippled in my palms.

The weight of forty-three years.

A chest no one had touched for five years had taken my hands a month ago, lain empty for another month, and now came to rest in my palms again.

"Haah..."

Marisa let out a soft moan.

My fingers found her nipple. Already stiff.

"Do-hyun... mmh..."

I rolled it gently between my fingertips. Her shoulders shook.

"Nnh..."

Marisa's head tipped back, brown hair brushing my shoulder. A scent rose off her — soap mingled with the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠warmth of skin.

"Haah... Do-hyun... Do-hyun..."

Her hand covered the back of mine, pressing it harder into the slow work over her own breast.

"A month... every night I thought about this..."

Her voice came out soaked.

"...This hand of yours settling here. Gripping me heavy, like you mean to set your child to nurse at them."

Gulp.

Her breasts rippled in my palms again. A forty-three-year-old body. A body that had waited five empty years and now, after one month, ached to be filled again. This woman knows in her bones what these breasts are for. Flesh that nurses children and holds men — and she is offering that original purpose to me, all of it.

Gulp.

I swallowed again.

Even after we moved to the bed, Marisa didn't hurry.

"Do-hyun. Tonight, I'll set the pace."

For all her month of waiting, she began by settling the terms — how fast, and how to say stop. I nodded. I used nothing on her mind. What was needed now was not desire hauled out of her by force, but a choice Marisa made with a clear head.

She closed her eyes briefly, then looked at me again.

"Slowly. If I start to hate it, I'll say so at once."

"All right."

She reached her hand out first. A month of distance didn't dissolve in an instant, but warmth beginning at our fingertips filled the gap little by little. Marisa steadied her breathing again and again, then took my hand once more — her way of saying it was all right.

"...Darling."

I froze at the word I'd never heard from her, and Marisa smiled a little.

"Right now, I wanted to call you that. Not because anyone told me to."

That one line was enough.

We went over contraception briefly, and what the future might hold. I made no claims about reading her body's condition with my power, and we didn't settle it on Marisa's own reckoning of her cycle, either. Whatever couldn't be decided here would wait for a physician — and we agreed to keep tonight's intimacy separate from the choices of tomorrow.

What came after was slow and careful, the way it is between people who have waited a long time. Marisa drew close when she wanted to and slowed when her breath ran short; each time, I watched her face and waited for her answer. At some point her arms circled my back, and the stiffness she'd been holding in her shoulders finally melted.

In time our movements gentled to stillness. Marisa rested her forehead against my chest and breathed for a while.

"...I waited a month for this moment."

She pressed a brief kiss to my skin.

A little later, Marisa lay beside me, her breathing evening out.

"Do-hyun."

Back to the usual name, in place of what she'd called ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠me before.

"...You're seeing the queen, aren't you?"

My heart skipped. The Royal Psychologist's regular sessions were part of the public schedule — but I hadn't expected Marisa to read what they meant.

"Yes."

"The queen is a lonely woman too. I know what three years of that feels like."

The words of a woman who had endured five years alone.

"It's all right to give her your heart. But don't forget where you come back to. Every single time."

Marisa took my hand. Her eyes didn't waver. It was closer to a bond she'd chosen herself than any command I'd implanted with [Mind Interference].

"This is home, Do-hyun."

Through her palm, a steady heartbeat passed into mine.

"...Yes."

Dressing, I paused at the door and looked back. Marisa was watching me with an innkeeper's quiet smile.

Night. Back in my room.

A single room tucked away in the inn's annex. A notebook and quill sat on the desk.

I sat down and laid out the plan for the queen.

In my world's clinical psychology there is a concept called the therapeutic alliance — the sense that counselor and patient are working together toward the same goal. The stronger that alliance, the better the outcome.

The standard clinical model treats the alliance as an instrument: a tool serving the patient's recovery.

I use it in reverse.

Build a therapeutic alliance with Elena — then convert that alliance into emotional dependence.

Therapeutic alliance. Emotional dependence. Cognitive restructuring. Motivational realignment.

Four stages. Back in academia, material used to circulate unofficially under the name "dependency formation." It could never have run as a formal paper — no ethics committee would ever approve it. But it drifted through the underground conferences.

I memorized it. Back when I was in Korea.

Not to become a good clinician. I memorized it because I meant to use it someday. I was already a piece of shit back then; this other world just took the leash off.

The method.

One. In our sessions, work through Elena's problems together with her. Offer political counsel as well. Plant the recognition that this man is on my side. Alliance established.

Two. With [Common Sense Alteration], gradually reinforce the idea that in front of this man, she doesn't have to be the queen. Role dissolution.

Three. Make Elena come to me of her own accord. I want to see him even when it isn't a session. Dependence, self-acknowledged.

Four. Close the physical distance. Handshake to shoulder, shoulder to embrace. Dependence made flesh.

It takes time.

Marisa had crossed the line in five sessions because five years of thirst had built up behind her. I'd tossed a spark onto dry kindling — that's all I did. And today I walked out after planting seed in that dry field too, knowing full well what a dangerous day it was.

And Elena's thirst? Three years. Shorter than Marisa's. But Elena is the queen. Her armor of pride is ten times thicker.

Besides, Elena's thirst isn't of the body. It's for recognition. Not a woman abandoned by her husband the king — a woman politically ignored by him. The conservative lords treat Elena as an ornament called a queen. What she thirsts for most is one person who treats her as an equal.

That makes her harder than Marisa.

It will take patience.

Three months. Maybe six.

But think of the reward.

The highest woman in this other world. The hand that actually moves the kingdom. Thirty-eight years old, golden curls, violet eyes, an hourglass figure.

A body neglected by her husband for three years.

A womb demoted to "ornament" for failing to give the royal line an heir. For three years the king has let that body lie fallow. A king who leaves his own field unplowed. And if the man who sows seed in that field were me—

The moment that body begins to want me.

It's fucking intoxicating.

Hold it in. The game starts now.

The moment Marisa's lips pressed to my chest floated up in memory. Case one: five years of thirst resolved in five sessions. A woman who opened the gates of her own womb and took my seed. That was the first field test of the method my hands have learned.

Elena will be the second.

I'm using the word "field test" about a human being. About a woman who called me darling in her own bed. Who took my seed in and swallowed it mere hours ago. I don't even have the strength left for self-mockery. That's simply what I am.

The next morning. The Royal Palace.

I went to present my report to the queen: the foundational blueprint for the knightly order's mental fortification program, drafted from what I'd seen at the front.

A seven-page report.

I began with the terminology. In my world it was called post-traumatic stress disorder. No such phrase existed here — so I made one.

"Post-Frontline Syndrome."

That single term changes the entire report. No name, no diagnosis. No diagnosis, no budget.

Page one, the phenomenon: estimated rates of Post-Frontline Syndrome across the frontline order — cumulative counts of self-harm, desertion, drink.

Page two, causes: combat exposure, witnessing the deaths of comrades, the weight of command.

Page three, the limits of the current response: the stigma of a "weak mind" that obstructs treatment.

Page four, proposal: preventive training.

Page five, proposal: training counseling personnel.

Page six, proposal: peer support groups.

Page seven, estimated budget.

Elena read the report. Fast. This woman is sharp — all seven pages in three minutes, and straight to the core.

"Preventive training for Post-Frontline Syndrome, counseling personnel, peer support groups. All reasonable."

"Thank you, Your Highness."

"But the budget is the problem."

Elena pressed a fingertip to the last page.

"A budget like this, the conservative lords will block."

"...Which lords, specifically?"

Elena studied me for a moment, violet eyes narrowing.

"Duke Granberg. Margrave Fernando. Count Astorga. Those three are the core."

Three names. My first time hearing them. But I carved them into memory — the conservative faction's core line.

"Granberg is a military man. He hates outsiders sticking their hands into the army's affairs. Fernando holds the purse strings. He's allergic to new budget items on principle. And Astorga is the trickiest of all — a religious conservative, the sort who sees afflictions of the mind as a lack of faith."

Elena's fingers drummed lightly on the report.

Tap. Tap.

"If we can't work out how to get this past those three, the report is worth nothing."

A crease formed between Elena's brows. The political wall.

"Your Highness, I have a proposal."

Elena looked at me.

"The conservative lords' resistance is, at bottom, a doubt about cost against benefit. Then why not begin as a pilot program? Apply it first to a single company of the knightly order, and present the results six months from now in hard numbers."

"Numbers?"

"Return-to-combat rate, desertion rate, incidents of self-harm, frequency of drink-related trouble. Show them a before-and-after comparison in figures, and even the conservatives will find it hard to argue."

Elena's violet eyes lit up.

"...Granberg is military — he'll take the line of 'if it's proven, I'll accept it.' Fernando might pass a pilot budget. But Astorga... how do I handle the faith angle?"

"With Count Astorga, approach under the banner of an auxiliary means of restoring faith. Frame it so the program doesn't replace faith — it lays the ground that lets faith function."

Elena paused for a moment.

"...You know politics too?"

"Psychology and politics overlap a great deal, Your Highness. Both of them come down to moving the hearts of people."

Elena nodded. The corner of her mouth lifted — not quite a smile, but... favor.

...At the word favor, my lower belly pulled tight. Getting half-hard off a single curve of the queen's lips — God, how pathetic can you get. Hold it in. Right now you keep the counselor's face. A loser who stiffens at the sight of his prey smiling.

"Good. Submit it as a pilot program. Revise the report and bring it back to me."

"Understood."

"...And, Do-hyun."

A first. My name, in place of "you." No — hold on. It's a different nuance from the "Do-hyun" in "Pass this to Counselor Kang Do-hyun," the instruction she gives her secretary.

Or am I imagining it?

"Yes, Your Highness?"

"The matter of the conservative lords... let's talk more about it later. Unofficially."

Unofficially.

The queen is asking me for unofficial political counsel. That reaches beyond the bounds of our sessions.

Unofficial counsel is the signal that the alliance-building is complete.

"Whenever you call, I will come."

Elena turned to the window. The palace gardens lay below.

"...It's strange."

"What is?"

"When I speak with you, my head feels clear."

And there it was — a slow, melting warmth.

[Common Sense Alteration] is taking root. In front of this man, I can be at ease. It's melting, little by little, into her cognitive framework.

In standard clinical practice, when a patient reports feeling comfortable in front of her counselor, that is one stage ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of therapeutic progress. The normal line.

What I'm doing is nudging that normal line, one small push at a time, onto the line of dependence. The queen feels her mind growing clearer. In truth she is simply resettling herself onto my palm, one square at a time. And it's going fucking beautifully.

That night, I was revising the report in my room when a messenger bird flew in.

The queen's seal.

My heart pounded.

To Do-hyun. Not "you" — my name. And then, privately.

Regular sessions are twice a week; the next one falls the day after tomorrow. And yet the queen was summoning me outside the session schedule.

The weight of the word privately.

An official meeting and a private one are different things. Official: the Royal Psychologist and the queen. Private... Do-hyun and Elena.

This is the stage where the patient comes of her own accord — dependence entering conscious awareness. She doesn't recognize it as dependence yet. She only feels that she wants to talk to this person.

My method is working exactly as designed.

"I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠am available."

I tied my reply to the messenger and sent it on its way.

Flap.

The messenger bird vanished beyond the window.

I faced the mirror. Fixed my face. Changed my clothes.

Game changer.

My place in this world is about to shift — not the post of Royal Psychologist, but the position of the queen's private person.

I'm ready.

Stepping out into the corridor, I thought: treating fifty knights at the front had been practice. Thawing Erica's frozen emotions, dismantling Karin's traumatic memories — all of it, just hands warming up.

Taking Marisa in five sessions was the first field test. Including walking out of there today with my seed planted in her womb.

The real thing starts now.

Queen Elena.

The finest prey in the other world.

A field left fallow for three years running. A womb the king will not sow.

And the face in the mirror knows better than anyone what a fucking piece of shit I am for calling it that.