Never Hide Anything From Me
Jincheon saw the cold, rigid set of her face, yet her eyes told him everything—her emotions stood on the brink of a volcano ready to erupt at any second. He opened his mouth to speak.
Smaaaack!
Eirin's slap landed first. The sound alone was thunderous enough to make anyone flinch.
"So it really was true."
She had put every ounce of her strength into the blow; her own palm throbbed. Yet Jincheon's head did not turn even a fraction. The force would have torn a normal man's jaw clean off.
That was when the first crack appeared in Eirin's expression—only it twisted into a sneer.
"How truly impressive. A body tempered enough to endure high-mobility combat that makes even veteran pilots vomit blood is already something to marvel at. But on top of that, the power to control Crypters, and the ability to survive atmospheric reentry bare-skinned…"
Jincheon had explained high-mobility combat and the Crypters to her, yet he had never revealed just how monstrous his physical capabilities truly were.
"With power like that, of course you can toy with the Dowager Empress of a nation like the Giranlek Empire whenever you please. So what shall I do for you now? Shall I gasp in awe at how magnificent you are? Or perhaps—"
"Eirin."
"Shut up! Don't you dare call my name in that voice!"
The moment he spoke her name, her fury only burned hotter.
"Do you have any idea how terrified I was!? When the report came that you'd been pulled into the gravity well, I swallowed the scream that nearly tore out of my throat! I almost gave the order to charge in and rescue you on the spot! I was ready to throw away the war itself—the safety of every crew member—!"
A smile curved her lips then. Clear mockery. Self-mockery aimed squarely at herself.
"But those two women who follow you around heard the same news and didn't even tense up, let alone worry. When I asked out of sheer disbelief, they looked startled instead."
Heliane and Calsira, after all, knew full well that Jincheon could casually wreck mechas with his bare hands and walk away from entire swarms of Crypters without a scratch. The heat of atmospheric reentry was never going to kill him; of course they had remained unfazed.
"I'm sorry."
"I don't want your apology! I… I gave you everything… and you…!"
"I'm sorry. I was shortsighted."
Jincheon quietly explained why he had never told her the full extent of his power.
"First excuse: even if I described my abilities, there was never a chance to demonstrate them. Second: it was for your sake."
"For my sake? Don't make me laugh! For me!? You think that pathetic excuse will get you out of this!?"
Eirin kept pouring her rage onto him, but Jincheon knew that matching her emotion for emotion would shatter what they had. So he continued in the same calm, steady voice.
"Just a moment."
He glanced around, then fixed his gaze on a bathroom stall partition. It was thin metal, yet forged from space-age alloy far stronger than anything from twenty-first-century Earth.
"I'm going to split that open, then put it back together."
"??"
The sudden claim left Eirin baffled. Cutting it was one thing—how did he intend to restore it?
"Hm."
With a soft kiai he drew his index finger through the empty air toward the partition.
Eirin was about to demand what childish game he was playing when—
Srrrrk—
Crack! Kakakak—
The partition sheared into dozens of pieces and crashed to the floor.
"H-how…?"
She snatched up the fragments, confirming they were no illusion. Cutting metal without even touching it was shocking enough—yet the true astonishment came next.
Jincheon opened his palm. The shattered pieces rose, floating gently, then drifted back into their original places.
Zzt!
A welding hiss and a puff of smoke later, the partition stood whole again.
"Ah…?"
Eirin shoved and tugged at the restored metal with all her strength. It did not budge.
"W-what in the world…?"
"You saw it."
While she still reeled, Jincheon spoke in that same unhurried tone.
"This wasn't any tool or technology. It was pure ability—mine alone."
"…"
"Of course it's hard to believe. That's exactly why I never told you."
"Why… would that be?"
Fortunately the persuasion was beginning to take hold; she had slipped back into polite speech.
"These days, with so many races discovered, people call it foolish and barbaric to hate someone simply for looking different. And yet humans still loathe what is not like them. The only thing missing is the excuse of appearance."
Seeing that she was listening, Jincheon continued more easily.
"I don't know how it is now, but on Terra there was an age when hierarchy was decided by nothing more than the color of one's skin. There were also times when people tortured and murdered anyone who seemed to possess unnatural power—simply because their neighbor's crops grew while their own fields failed."
"That's far too…"
"Exactly. Centuries ago. But the Giranlek Empire has the same history, doesn't it? Condemning, slandering, even turning to violence against anyone who was simply different."
"…"
Eirin could not refute him. She had learned the lessons of her own empire—how advancing seafaring technology had let them crush weaker nations and seize their resources, how religion had justified the same cruelties.
"People never change, no matter the era. They fear what they cannot understand, turn hostile, and try either to erase it or to dissect it."
Even in a science-fiction age ruled by technology, the places humans lived remained the same. Ancient times, medieval times, modern times, the present—technology altered the surface of life, yet the essence of humanity had never once shifted.
"That's why I never revealed power of this scale. I wanted to show it little by little so you could adapt."
More precisely, he had wanted to keep her from either abandoning all resistance out of terror or elevating him into some kind of god. Honestly, what he had just demonstrated was not even two percent of his true strength.
"But failing to trust my partner and hiding my power until things came to this—that is my responsibility. You have every right to blame me and curse me."
With those final words he closed his eyes, as if leaving the decision entirely to her.
"…Just answer me one thing."
"Ask."
After a moment of thought, Eirin posed the question that would decide everything between them from this day forward.
"What… am I to you?"
"The woman I chose. The companion I will walk with until the day I die."
Two different sentences, one identical meaning—spoken as though nothing could be more natural.
Eirin considered, then walked past him. Jincheon watched her head for the door with something like resignation—
Whump!
—until she spun around in a flash and threw her arms around him from behind.
"Never… hide anything from me again."
"I won't."
Instead of his usual light, teasing air, Jincheon answered with a quiet gravity that carried the weight of years. He caught her wrists, turned, and drew her waist and back into his embrace, sealing the promise with a kiss.
"Unnie."
"Hm?"
"Doesn't Lord Jincheon seem a little late?"
Waiting for him aboard the transport ship, Calsira grumbled toward Heliane. By now he should already have finished inside her three times over.
Heliane thought for a moment, then gave a bitter little smile.
"It can't be helped. That side outranks us completely—in status and in influence."
She had already guessed why he had not returned.
"It's so unfair. We waited forever too…"
Calsira understood at once: he had gone to meet Eirin.
"He only has one body."
"Then what if he didn't have only one body?"
"!!"
Heliane whipped her head around at the sudden sound of Jincheon's voice. Standing there were naked Jincheons—plural.
"W-what on earth…?"
"W-who are you!?"
Calsira leveled her sidearm at the four identical figures.
"Whoa, whoa, Calsira—put that away. These bodies don't have the original's full abilities."
"Jin…cheon…?"
That light, unmistakable tone. Heliane recognized the real Jincheon at once, yet still could not make sense of what she was seeing.
"I had the Crypters grow bodies from my DNA, then split my consciousness into them."
"These are pure one-hundred-percent Jincheon, made only from my DNA."
"But only the flesh is Jincheon—no martial arts."
"Reproducing the martial arts at one hundred percent turned out to be impossible."
The four of them spoke in turn, plunging the two women into deeper confusion. They had believed they knew everything about him; the idea that he possessed an ability like this had never even crossed their minds.
"I-is it really Lord Jincheon?"
"What, you think the Crypters suddenly grew my body and decided to stage a rebellion?"
"Then just tell us something from before you met the Crypters."
"Let's see… Ah, Heliane—remember that time?"
"Back in the ruins where we got Gareld, when we were having sex, Calsira shoved her hand into your—"
"Kyaaaak! Kya-kya-kya-kya-kya~~~~~~!! It really is Lord Jincheon!"
The fourth Jincheon's words sent Calsira into a shrieking panic. Even she had to admit the act had been closer to torture than pleasure. Terrified that Heliane would remember and repay her in kind, she hastily accepted that these were the real thing.
"For the record, I only developed this ability after the number of wives climbed past the hundreds."
"Doing nothing but this from morning till night—even I started thinking it was a bit much."
"So I used Intent to create another body and another me."
"The Crypters made the whole process dozens of times easier, though."
At least it was clear now: Crypter-grown flesh inhabited by Jincheon's own mind.
"But why four instead of two?"
Heliane was glad he had not forgotten them, yet the number still puzzled her.
"Isn't it obvious?"
The Jincheons smiled as they took positions in front of and behind both women.
"You've been lonely as hell, so we have to satisfy every single hole."
"!!"
"Gulp…!"
Understanding dawned. Shock and eager anticipation warred on their faces.
Once the women were stripped bare, the multiple Jincheons began considering all the things only a group of them could do.
"Just so you know, I won't make clones unless it's really necessary."
"They're too convenient."
"Lean on convenience too hard and you get lazy."
"Even convenience needs moderation."
Jincheon was perfectly willing to use his head for the sake of convenience, yet clones made life so effortless that he preferred to handle most things himself. Unlimited convenience was no different from being a kept animal—someone else solving every problem while you never lifted a finger.
Squeeze!
"Hahut!"
"Kyahit!"
The Jincheons at their backs seized their breasts in firm, familiar grips. That alone proved every one of them was the real Jincheon. The strength of the kneading was exactly right; their bodies began to rejoice at the return of their master.
Slurp—
"Ahang!"
"Th-there… kihuut!"
The ones in front dropped to one knee and buried their faces between the women's thighs. Tongues licked open their slits and stirred deep inside; long-denied pleasure flooded their bodies at once.
"Already soaked? You've been waiting for me, haven't you?"
"W-well what else was I supposed to do!? We had to go two whole weeks without you!"
"R-right! Do you have any idea how lonely we were…!"
A few firm squeezes of their breasts and a handful of licks were enough to leave their cunts overflowing. With foreplay already shortened, the Jincheons moved on to the next phase.