Aphrodisiac, Blood, and the First Time
"Nngh... ngh...."
This heat cycle was so severe that she had needed to set aside separate time to rest.
Maybe it was because she couldn't vent her frustration by hunting humans, but something kept building up inside her.
Just then, the handkerchief neatly folded on the table caught her eye.
It had never been washed separately, so Prince Leoport's blood still stained it.
As if reaching into forbidden territory, her hand moved toward the handkerchief.
Before anyone could see, she snatched it up and pulled it under the blanket.
-Sniff sniff
She pressed her nose to the red part of the handkerchief and inhaled.
A unique scent that couldn't be compared to or likened to any fragrance she had ever smelled.
A scent that was instinctively addictive.
She fell into the scent so deeply that it was a shame the handkerchief was old and the fragrance was fading.
The idle thoughts that had filled her head vanished one by one, and only the scent lingering at her nose remained.
-Knock knock
Startled by the sound of knocking at the door, she quickly pulled her face out from under the blanket.
Even though she knew no one could enter because the door was locked, she hid the handkerchief.
"His Highness the Prince has invited you to the dining room."
From beyond the door, another maid relayed the prince's message.
'I was right in the middle of the good part.... Of all times to call me, he calls me now. Useless prince.'
She went to the dining room with her displeasure in tow.
She had still been irritated up until she arrived at the dining room, but as they talked about the black market, the bad feelings quickly faded.
While she was receiving advice from the prince, who was suspiciously knowledgeable about the black market, the head chef brought the food, and the prince suggested they eat it together.
To anyone who knew the prince's movements, it was a situation that would look suspicious no matter who saw it.
Did he really think that she, his personal maid, wouldn't know that the prince and the head chef were close?
In an instant, her mood soured again.
Had he really struck up a conversation with her just for this?
She firmly refused the ploy whose ulterior motive was plainly visible.
"I prefer to eat separately."
She had expected him to shout at her to eat and force the issue like before, but the prince gave up cleanly.
Just as she was thinking it was strange that he had given up so easily, the prince lifted the cloche.
The aroma of the soup that had been trapped beneath the cloche spread through the dining room.
A scent that was sweet, yet drew her in against her will, an indescribable fragrance.
It was the same one that had come from the handkerchief.
No, it was so fresh that comparing it to the old, dried-out handkerchief that had lost its original scent felt like an insult.
The fragrance spread quickly, riding the steam rising from the warm soup.
Before she knew it, she was sitting in a chair.
The prince made a dumbfounded expression.
"You said you weren't eating."
Out of pride that she would never sit down in surrender to soup, and out of lingering suspicion, she acted petulant.
"Yes, I won't eat it. I'll just look."
She said that, but she couldn't take her eyes off the soup.
What would it taste like if she put that in her mouth?
Imagining the taste, she swallowed her saliva instead of eating.
The prince ate the soup.
It wasn't a pretense of eating.
His throat moved as he swallowed.
For it to have been a trick, he ate far too readily.
Maybe he really had just meant to share a meal.
Hadn't the prince changed from before?
Though that wouldn't change her own purpose in approaching the prince....
'Eating soup together is fine, isn't it?'
She was embarrassed to be changing her own words, but for the sake of that soup giving off such a delicious aroma, she could endure it.
"...Is the offer to eat together still open?"
Of course, she had no intention of eating the soup placed in front of her.
Because he might have tampered only with the soup meant for her.
"I want to eat the one Your Highness was eating."
As if her guess had been right, the prince was visibly flustered and reluctant to trade soups.
He even did something childish, stirring the soup with the spoon that had been in his mouth.
But that wasn't enough to stop her.
In the end, the prince's soup was placed in front of her.
-Gulp
She couldn't eat the handkerchief.
No matter how fragrant it was, no matter how delicious it smelled, she couldn't eat it.
But soup was different.
She could swallow it, and she could savor it.
Honestly, she didn't know why she was so fixated on the soup either.
It might have been a side effect of her heat cycle, or it might have been because the fading scent of the handkerchief was wafting from the soup.
For now, she set aside all those questions and, as if bewitched, scooped up a large spoonful of soup and put it in her mouth.
The taste of the soup was beyond anything she had imagined.
It was an overwhelming flavor, enough to make every meal she had eaten in her life feel like sand.
The moment she swallowed one bite, her stomach quivered softly, asking for more.
Her face flushed, her hands trembled, her body grew sensitive... was this happiness?
No.
This wasn't happiness.
It was closer to heat.
The head that had been as warm as the soup's heat went cold.
The cause of the problem in her body was clear.
The suspicious soup, and the prince who had prepared it.
"What did you make me eat?!"
***
[Ingredient Magnifier]
Churu (I): When ingested by beastfolk, potion effects are doubled for a set period.
This was bad.
No—if Churu could do this, why wasn’t I told sooner?!
The Lowest-Grade aphrodisiac, which should have only made her cheeks flush, showed a much stronger reaction than expected once mixed with Churu.
-Crash
I dismissed the Status Window and looked ahead, but Taira was gone.
Looking closer, the chair was toppled on the floor.
I scrambled up and went around to the other side of the table.
Taira was slumped on the floor.
At the unfamiliar sensation she was experiencing for the first time, she wrapped one arm around her chest and clutched her trembling thigh with the other hand.
Her face was flushed red, and her head was hung so low that she looked like a perfectly ripe tomato.
But what I had to keep in mind was that this tomato was a murderous tomato that could kill people.
Taira glared up at me with her molars clenched tight, only her eyes raised.
"What did you make me eat?!"
Right, I'd like to know too.
No matter how I looked at it, this wasn't double.
It was a reaction like she'd taken an aphrodisiac several grades higher.
Two streams of blood ran from Taira's nose.
Since the aphrodisiac reaction was more severe than expected, I worried the bleeding side effect might also be worse.
I worried she might bleed from all seven orifices, but fortunately it stopped at nosebleeds from both nostrils.
Judging by the side effects alone, it seemed the effect had only increased by about double, just as the Status Window said....
"Are you okay?"
Taira shoved away my hand when I tried to help, grabbed the handkerchief from the table, and wiped her nosebleed.
She flung the bloodstained handkerchief to the floor and radiated killing intent.
"Don't touch me! If you touch me... I'll kill you!"
Her legs gave out and she nearly fell.
Was this the tiger Fear I'd only ever heard about?
As I braced myself against the table to steady myself, another Status Window appeared in front of me.
[New Content]
[Combat Content Added!!!]
{We've introduced combat starting with the DLC, which was missed in the main story. Gather companions to fight alongside you and support them with potions!}
[Perk: Potion Storage]
Shit, combat!
How much content are they cramming into this DLC?
The fact that this appeared now meant that combat had begun, and that Taira had, for the first time, resolved to kill me.
That was not good news.
The only thing I could rely on in this situation was....
[Perk: Potion Storage]
The perk I'd just received.
Still, since it was a perk related to combat content, wouldn't it help in this situation?
Just from the name, it seemed far removed from combat, but you never know.
Maybe there was a poison in the storage, or a potion with crowd control.
I hurriedly checked the description.
Potion Storage: You can add the effects of potions the player has consumed to [Churu].
Notes: No effect on the user.
Damn it.
This was literally a human storage!
Why would they give this as a combat content perk?!
I was about to die, and instead of a combat ability or survival skill, it was just "potions come out instead of blood."
And on top of that, it had no effect on me.
The zombie meta of drinking your own spilled blood for infinite power was impossible too.
I hadn't even consumed that many types of potions in the first place....
"If you don't properly explain what you made me eat.... It's going to hurt a lot."
"Wait! Just calm down for a second!"
Now that things had come to this, if I said I'd put an aphrodisiac in it, I was definitely dead.
A lie... a fresh and reasonable lie....
"My saliva!"
Aside from the blood and aphrodisiac I'd had the head chef add, the only thing added to the soup was my saliva on the spoon.
"My saliva got into it."
"Ha, do you think that makes any sense? That I would get this flushed... excited over mere saliva? I didn't know imperial saliva was so special."
"There's a reason the imperial family has so many descendants. How else could the emperor take so many concubines? It's all because their saliva is special."
I delivered the absurd logic with the most plausible expression I could manage.
Taira's eyes looked uncertain too.
A feeling of should I believe this? Or not?
If what I said was true, she couldn't press the issue.
Because she was the one who had asked for the soup with my saliva in it.
That is, if it was true.
"If it's a lie, you'd better prepare yourself for the consequences."
Taira bared her fangs and walked toward me, step by step.
Her legs were still trembling, perhaps from the lingering aphrodisiac reaction, but it would be more than enough to kill one patient who couldn't even use mana.
Taira stood squarely in front of me.
Then she looked me straight in the eyes.
I hid my fear deep in my heart and met her gaze confidently.
"Ha, if you say saliva was the cause, you must think I can't verify it."
"I told you I'm not lying. Ugh—, I'm telling the truth."
Taira grabbed my chin with one hand.
Then, without giving me time to react, she pulled me toward her.
Our lips met.
-Suck, slurp
Our tongues tangled stickily.
Taira's tongue was rougher than I expected.
Her sandpaper-like tongue chased mine as I retreated into my own mouth.
As if to say, if you're going to take it, take it, I pushed my tongue in instead.
I had no intention of winning this tug-of-war.
"Ngh."
When my tongue entered in return, Taira's eyes went wide.
Her saliva and mine mixed together.
Taira pushed at my shoulders with her hands, trying to pull away.
'You barged in however you pleased, and now you think you can leave however you please?'
Not a chance.
I wrapped my arms around her back as she tried to flee.
Perhaps because of the aphrodisiac's effect, she couldn't muster proper strength and was pulled against me.
Our bodies were pressed so close that she couldn't push me away with her arms.
Through our tightly pressed chests, each other's heartbeats transmitted.
"Hah—."
"!!!"
Holding Taira, who had frozen for an instant, I tilted my head and kissed her deeply.
I could feel her lips and tongue, her ragged breathing, all of it.
Around the time our breathing fell into the same rhythm.
I slowly pulled my lips away.
A thin thread connected the two of us.
Taira's expression looked dumber than usual.
And a little...... lewd.
As our faces fully separated, the thread connecting our lips broke.
As if that had been the signal to come to her senses, Taira's eyes sharpened.
"Was that enough confirmation?"
"Kgh, you didn't need to go so far just to let me confirm it."
"Weren't you the one who tried to confirm it this way first?"
Unable to retort, Taira bit her lip.
"...I was rude."
With nothing more to say, Taira bowed deeply in apology and fled the dining room as if running away.
Left alone in the dining room, I waited until the sound of Taira's footsteps had completely faded.
I let out a long sigh of relief.
"Hoo... If I hadn't bitten my tongue in a hurry, that could've been bad."
When Taira had approached, I had bitten the tip of my tongue to draw blood.
Then, using the perk "Potion Storage," I had applied the aphrodisiac I'd eaten earlier to the Churu (blood).
Thanks to that, I'd been able to prove that there was an aphrodisiac component in my saliva.
To be precise, it was blood, not saliva, but she seemed too swept up in the moment to notice.
"To have my first kiss stolen like this. Anyway, it's still bleeding."
I wasn't talking about my tongue.
I'd only bitten it lightly, so the wound on my tongue had already healed.
I walked over to the mirror on the dining room side.
After pulling up my clothes, I looked into the mirror over my shoulder.
"What are these nail marks......."
As if I'd been mauled by a wild beast, eight clear scratches remained on my back.
They were the wounds Taira had left when she clawed my back during the deep kiss earlier.
Even though I'd been wearing clothes, I'd gotten this hurt.
If this was what happened from just a kiss.......
If we went any further, I'd die, wouldn't I?
Maybe I should take a recovery potion first instead of Viagra.
"Right, potions. I should hurry back and take a potion."
I made sure not to forget the handkerchief Taira had wiped her nosebleed with, and returned to my room.