Marked as Mine
"Nn… mmm……."
Calsira, who had collapsed as if her consciousness had simply switched off, stirred back to awareness with a soft moan.
"Where… is this……."
She pushed herself upright, frowning at surroundings that were nothing like her usual quarters.
"Ah……!"
The moment the night's events came rushing back in a flood of memory, her already bright red face flushed an even deeper crimson.
"You're awake?"
Jincheon, sensing from beyond the bedroom that she had come to, poked only his face through the doorway.
"You piece of sh—!"
"I was just getting lunch ready anyway. Perfect timing. Eat before you go."
Calsira had been about to unleash a torrent of curses, but he said his piece first and vanished. The sensation of winding up for a jab only to have the other fighter land one and slip away left a dull ache at the base of her skull. She rose with a sharp, irritated motion.
"Hah—!"
The sudden movement sent a residual wave of pleasure rolling up from deep in her lower belly.
"Haa… haa……."
Right on its heels came the full recognition that she had been pinned beneath him, screaming, until morning. Even the tips of her ears went scarlet.
Was that… pleasure……?
It had been the first time in her life she had felt anything so intense that her mind went completely white. At first she had been too bewildered to understand what was happening, but as the hours wore on she had felt her own body answering with pure rapture every time it took him in. She had been too ignorant to adapt at the start—yet if she were to feel that pleasure again now……
What the hell am I thinking? I'm insane. Completely insane! I was raped!
Jincheon's Sex Cultivation had forced her to taste the joy of pleasure from her very first experience. Calsira steeled herself. A weaker woman would have broken down in tears. A prouder one would have flown into a rage at the humiliation. But she was both strong-willed and pragmatic enough to have discarded her pride for the sake of survival; even with her body defiled, her mind was already turning over how to claw her way out of the situation.
Pregnancy was a concern, yet common knowledge held that cross-species conception was difficult. For now, she had no choice but to trust that.
First I need to find my weapon.
The holster on her suit still held the automatic pistol she used. Recover that, then talk—that was the plan. And then—
Sizzle—
"Gulp……."
The sound of meat cooking outside, and the rich aroma that came with it, made her swallow hard.
Why does that smell so good?
The scent alone punched a hole of raw hunger straight through her. After confirming that her holster was gone and checking her suit and underthings, Calsira dressed and stepped out.
A fresh vegetable salad sat in the center of the table; place settings waited in front of the chairs for the main course.
He wants to talk, then?
She realized he had not bound her, had simply left her free. If she bolted now she would still have been raped, would gain nothing, and would only earn his open mockery. She had already thrown away her pride to survive—but she had no intention of enduring the naked contempt of an obvious inferior. She chose practicality.
Desperate women really are the easiest to manage.
Jincheon watched Calsira take a seat, choosing conversation, and smiled. Ordinary women would have been weeping and screaming by now.
Done.
Spices, sides, sauces, the finest cuts of meat—he had poured luxurious ingredients in without stinting and finished the dish at the exact moment their flavors peaked. He halved the meat, carried the pan to the table, plated the portions, and casually tossed the pan back toward the kitchen. Calsira flinched at the throw—yet the pan settled onto the range with perfect, gentle precision, striking nothing else.
"Dig in."
Jincheon sliced into the medium-well steak with his knife and put a bite in his mouth. Spices and meat unlike anything from Earth wrapped his tongue in rich, sweet heat.
Calsira carefully followed his lead, cutting a mouthful-sized piece and placing it on her tongue.
"Mmph!?"
After a few chews, she began to doubt her own senses.
What… what is this!? It's delicious!
It was several times better than anything she had eaten in the imperial palace. True, she had never been treated particularly well there—but palace meals still far outstripped what ordinary citizens ate.
Was he the head chef of some famous restaurant?
It was good enough to make her wonder. The vegetable salad, dressed with a lightly spicy vinaigrette, cut cleanly through the richness coating her mouth. She was shoveling food in with abandon when—
"Before we talk, I should apologize first."
"Whuh?"
The sudden remark left her looking like an idiot, the sound muffled by a mouth still full of food. The second she realized what she was doing, her face went red and she swallowed in a frantic gulp.
"Ahem. Ahem. If you're going to apologize for something like that……."
"It had been so long since I'd had sex that I only cared about my own pleasure. Next time I'll make sure you learn what a woman's enjoyment actually feels like."
"Hoooo……."
She had expected an apology for the rape. What she got was an entirely different kind of self-reflection. Extreme rage, she discovered, could produce a strange calm. Calsira exhaled in a trembling breath.
Jincheon ignored her reaction and moved on to the real subject.
"Shall we discuss our plans going forward?"
"What are you talking about? Plans?"
"You said this relic expedition is a trap meant to kill you. We've got one day left. We need a plan to either get you out or stop the conspiracy cold, don't we?"
The light yet utterly serious tone left Calsira briefly blank-faced.
"You… you were serious about that?"
His offer to spare her if she became his woman. Honestly, Calsira had taken it for a convenient excuse to take her body. She had never expected sincerity.
"I don't lie about things like this."
Jincheon chewed another piece of meat and spoke again.
"The marking's done. From now on, you're my woman. And I hate having my women taken from me more than I hate dying."
It was neither metaphor nor joke. If anyone ever took one of his women, Jincheon would pursue revenge until his own life ended. No matter how vast the enemy, how powerful, how many political friends they had—those were nothing but minor obstacles. He might take another man's woman, but he would never, under any circumstances, allow one of his own to be taken.
"……."
Calsira felt the same inexplicable trust she had felt the night before when she agreed to become his woman. Why, how—she could not put a clear reason to it—but she believed him.
"First, let's check the survey team's numbers and armament, shall we?"
Kunlo melted into the resistance as if he had always belonged there.
Part of it was his eager, helpful nature—but more than that, he solved problem after problem for them with tireless energy.
"You can eat this plant. It's bright and refreshing—great as a dessert when you want something clean."
He started by identifying edible plants even the locals did not know,
"Crush this and pack it on a wound. The antimicrobial action keeps it from festering."
then offered substitutes for their scarce medical supplies,
"Want me to move this over there?"
and used the strength his martial arts had given him to haul heavy loads wherever they were needed.
It was no exaggeration to say that one Kunlo was doing the work of dozens of resistance fighters. In a remarkably short time, many of them had come to look on him with genuine goodwill.
Yet the world being what it is, there are always people who will dislike someone even when there is nothing to hate. The kind whose chemistry simply does not match. Once they decide they dislike you, every good deed looks bad—not a matter of reason or logic, but of pure feeling.
"Tch. I don't like him."
The furry man who had distrusted and disliked Kunlo from the start—Jurog—shot irritable glances at him as he bustled about.
"Boss, you have to admit the place feels more alive thanks to him."
"He's from another planet, and we don't even have a composition analyzer, yet he's telling us which plants are edible."
The subordinates who usually trailed after Jurog could not bring themselves to see Kunlo as purely bad, and offered what defense they could. He had eased the shortages of food and medical supplies (primitive antimicrobials were the best they could manage) considerably. And in any army, in any age, food mattered most—so Kunlo's knowledge had smoothed the resistance's situation more than a little. Watching him work so hard made it hard to think ill of him.
"Grrrr—"
Jurog only glared more savagely, clearly displeased by his men's words.
"Does any of that look normal to you?"
No enhancement marks, yet physical ability stronger and faster than anyone else's. And from what he had heard, the boy was solid in actual combat too. A strong, battle-ready fighter—exactly the kind of person the resistance needed—had appeared at the perfect moment.
Under that stare, his subordinates hunched their necks and shut their mouths.
But with this, I can finally drive the little bastard out.
Still openly wary of Kunlo, Jurog turned and headed for the officers' meeting. He exchanged brief nods with the other officers arriving at roughly the same time and entered the cave. Once everyone had taken their seats and a little more time had passed, the remaining officers filed in and filled the places.
"We're all here."
Gronel spoke first, opening the meeting.
"I called you because the intelligence we obtained earlier has been confirmed as fact by one of Jurog's men."
"What?"
"That was real?"
At Gronel's words everyone startled and turned toward Jurog.
"I found it hard to believe myself at first—half-dismissed it as a joke. But it was true."
He laid out everything he knew.
Ruins that only appeared in the White Shriek Forest on days when the fog rolled in. A relic survey team that had hired local hunters to explore them, scheduled to depart tomorrow. The team was a small elite force—and, astonishingly, the Horned Empress herself was among them.
Bang!
"The Horned Empress? Is that true?"
Heliane reacted first. The murderer of her father had come; she could not stay silent.
"One of my men confirmed a demonstration run of the Horned Empress at a military facility outside the city. Those horns are impossible to forget."
Jurog continued.
"The strange part is that the survey team has only the one mecha—the Horned Empress."
"The First Princess alone?"
"Fighting the White Shriek in the fog, one-on-one might actually be cleaner."
"But no matter how skilled she is, isn't going alone dangerous?"
"The other soldiers will provide support."
The Zabalcan Empire had gained its present strength by seizing a Calsorn Empire military base. Sending a famous ace pilot for a relic was not strange in itself—but fielding only the Horned Empress still felt off.
Jurog was not finished.
"And the hunter they hired is a Terran named Jincheon."
"Jincheon? Unusual name."
"What's a Terran doing all the way out here?"
The resistance was small; simply gathering information under the Zabalcan Empire's surveillance net was already difficult. And because Jincheon never advertised himself, the only people who knew he existed were other hunters—the ones who had watched him tear would-be knowledge-thieves apart with his bare hands.
"The problem is that this Jincheon has a disciple and partner. Belion Kunlo. Sound familiar?"
"Kunlo?"
"Don't tell me……."
A hunter hired by the survey team. And that hunter's disciple and partner had just joined the resistance?
"Are you claiming Kunlo is a spy?"
One of the officers asked. Jurog nodded.
"Isn't the situation suspicious enough?"
"Certainly……."
"Hmm……."
As doubt toward Kunlo began to spread, Heliane spoke up in his defense.
"I know it looks suspicious, but I don't believe Kunlo would betray us."
Whatever else, she trusted the look in the eyes of a boy who had lost his parents and burned with hatred for the Zabalcan Empire. She wore the same eyes herself.
"You might want to ease up on the favoritism."
"Favoritism? Then why are you so desperate to drive him out?"
"Because it's suspicious! How is this not a suspicious situation!?"
"I already told you! If Kunlo were a spy, the Zabalcan bastards would have hit us long ago!"
The two of them were about to lock horns again and poison the atmosphere when—
"Something's off."
Gronel, who had been listening quietly, spoke, and the mood shifted.
"Off? What is?"
"I received the same information you did. But I was told the Terran hunter named Jincheon was only hired recently."
Gronel's report matched Jurog's on almost every point—except one.
"I was told that Terran was hired only recently."
"Recently?"
Hired recently, and arriving with the survey team tomorrow. That would mean Jincheon's employment was pure coincidence. If they had already been in collusion, there would have been no need to stage a hiring at all.
The lack of a unified intelligence system laid bare how slapdash their operations really were—but the resistance had no leisure to dwell on that.
"They could have hired him early and faked a recent hire!"
"Arguing that point will only waste endless time."
Gronel granted that Jurog's counter had merit, so rather than burn hours he decided to settle it at a stroke.
"I trust Kunlo. If he betrays us, I'll stake my life on it."
"What!?"
The other officers stared, stunned that Gronel would go so far as to wager his life on Kunlo's reliability. None of them had expected that level of trust.
"I'll stake mine too. My life."
Heliane immediately reinforced Gronel's position.
"Kunlo lost his parents to the Zabalcan bastards. He has the same eyes I do. I trust those eyes."
When two officers with major stakes in the resistance both offered their lives, the atmosphere shifted at once.
"If Gronel and Heliane are willing to go that far……."
"Neither of them is the type to trust something uncertain."
These were two people who had survived by treating every uncertainty as a threat. And both of them had just put their lives on the line as guarantors.
"You've all seen what Kunlo can do by now, haven't you? His strength will be a huge asset against the Zabalcan forces."
In a short time Kunlo had displayed physical ability and skills that broke every ordinary scale.
"Mm… if those two are vouching for him, that changes things."
The influence of two high-standing officers was enough to create a consensus: for now, they would trust him.
Jurog hated the turn of events, but the tide had already gone out; he could only seethe in silence.
"In any case, it is an established fact that the Horned Empress is entering the forest to search for a relic."
Sensing Jurog's mood, Gronel did not drag out the Kunlo matter and moved to the main point.
"If any of you are thinking of plans to merely disrupt the relic search, drop them."
His tone was more heated than usual, his insistence hard.
"By any means necessary, we capture the Horned Empress alive or kill her. If we miss this chance, we will not get a second one!"
"He's right! All our suffering, all our comrades' deaths—if we take just the Horned Empress, all of it will be repaid!"
Heliane, burning with hatred for the Horned Empress, rose in fierce agreement. Given the combat record the Horned Empress had racked up, her words were barely an exaggeration at all.
Capture the Horned Empress.
United by that single shared goal, the officers began pouring every resource they possessed into preparing for a final battle.
Kunlo. That boy is the variable in this plan. I have to deal with him somehow…….
And one among them was already turning over, in private, how to eliminate the variable named Kunlo.