A Vessel Permitted
The thick, sweet scent of the incense candle melted into the steam, tickling my nose. The water in the bath was clear, yet the dense clouds of vapor turned the entire view into a hazy white haze. As I leaned my upper body slightly forward in the tub, Silvia seemed to read my intent and glided toward me without a sound, parting the water. With a soft splash, she naturally slipped into the space behind my back.
Silvia spread her legs and settled in as if wrapping around my waist. Thanks to that, her firm thighs became the perfect armrests, comfortably supporting both of my arms. The breath that touched my back was soft and warm. The towel that had covered her body was already neatly folded at the edge of the bath.
Silvia’s slender fingers slowly slid down from the nape of my neck, tracing my spine all the way to my lower back. As if she herself contained an even hotter heat, her touch was filled with a pleasant warmth.
“Report on the progress of the maids currently in training and the combat slaves.”
Silvia answered while persistently digging into the knotted muscles around my shoulder blades.
“The maids have completed their basic education flawlessly and have now entered the advanced course. The combat slaves have such a solid foundation that they may begin intermediate training immediately. Among the slaves we recently purchased, there were none with notable rebelliousness or hostility worth reporting.”
Even as she spoke, her hands moved with artistic precision. The pressure from her fingertips as they traveled down each vertebra accurately targeted only the areas where fatigue had accumulated, pressing into them with deep, soothing force.
I rested my arms on Silvia’s thighs, simultaneously savoring her flawless report and the supreme pleasure of her massage. Surprisingly, the fact that Silvia possessed such skill was thanks to Victor’s training. In my memories, the original Victor had learned from the best instructors across many fields when it came to anything related to slave training. When I recalled that he had personally handled even the maids’ early training, it was enough to inspire a sense of awe.
“And Lua?”
The moment the question touched on Lua, the tips of Silvia’s fingers trembled slightly. She paused as if choosing her words, then answered in a voice slightly flushed, one that didn’t quite match her usual cool composure.
“Lua is now… at the stage of being weaned. Recently, she has begun to accept finely minced meat as well.”
Silvia’s breath scattered against the back of my neck. She pressed her upper body even closer without pausing her hands. Her breasts, buoyed by the water, pressed warmly against my back, and her slender arms crossed over my chest to precisely knead my shoulders and pectoral muscles.
Every time she focused on the massage, her thighs moving beneath the water subtly tightened around my sides. She swept her palms up across my chest, then straightened her fingers and persistently rubbed along my collarbone. Her increasingly rapid heartbeat transmitted itself fully down my spine.
“I intend to consult the empire’s finest pet trainer and arrange specialized education.”
“Have the trainer sign a contract promising not to spread rumors even if they learn Lua’s true identity.”
Very few people knew of Fenrir’s appearance. I had no intention of leaving anyone who discovered the identity of such a precious treasure without taking measures.
I leaned back. The back of my head sank deeply into the area near Silvia’s collarbone, and her breasts settled warmly beneath my shoulder blades. The moment I clearly felt the softness and elasticity of her skin, a change came over her breathing.
“Do you have something to say?”
Silvia always maintained the perfect image of a chief steward. Yet occasionally, there were clear signs that she was swallowing words before they could leave her throat.
Her hands pressed heavily into my trapezius and the sides of my shoulders. As she meticulously traced the grain of the muscle downward, she opened her mouth in a low voice, as if exhaling a long-suppressed breath.
“Lately… it seems I keep wanting to rely on you more deeply, Master.”
Instead of answering, I closed my eyes and let her confession flow past. A brief silence fell, but Silvia seemed to interpret my silence as permission rather than rejection and continued.
“Even before you won Elina at auction, Master, you were strict enough to inspire respect on your own. But now… there is a subtle consideration in every word you speak. I wondered if it was just my imagination, but even among the slaves in the mansion, there are rumors that your demeanor has changed.”
Silvia’s quiet confession scattered into the steam. I used her firm thighs as an armrest and slowly stroked the smooth skin near her knee with my thumb. It was a secretive movement that didn’t even create a ripple, yet to Silvia, who had already yielded her psychological boundaries, even that small friction became a powerful stimulus.
“It seems I’ve given my chief steward too much free time if she’s spending it collecting and gossiping about the slaves’ idle chatter.”
At the playful rebuke, Silvia’s hands paused for a moment. Then a faint, gentle smile spread across her lips.
“Even in what you just said, your authority remains sufficiently stern, Master. But… strangely, what I feel more strongly is the warmth hidden beneath it.”
She leaned her upper body deeper, bringing our eyes level. Droplets of water falling from the ends of her wet hair trickled down my shoulder. Her hot breath surged forward, persistently tickling my bangs and eyebrows.
“That change in you, Master, seems to keep leading me into fantasies that exceed my station.”
Her hot breath surged forward, persistently tickling my bangs and eyebrows. Silvia’s face, seen up close, was devastatingly beautiful. Her forehead revealed between wet strands of hair, her straight nose, and her lips pressed together just enough to hint at white teeth. Within her eyes swirled a strange longing mixed with submission.
“Silvia.”
She drew in a breath and answered.
“Yes, Master.”
“What do you desire?”
The question scattered right in front of her lips. Silvia closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them again, visibly struggling to suppress her heated breathing. Her voice had dropped an octave lower than usual and trembled dreamily.
“I… desire nothing. It’s simply that this emotion that has recently bloomed inside me feels so unfamiliar and confusing that I could not endure it without confessing to you, Master.”
I stroked the smooth skin near her knee more deeply with my thumb, still using her thigh as an armrest. The muscles in her thigh tensed rigidly, then helplessly relaxed.
“Do you remember what I told you about wanting to see this side of you in the future, and that you should continue doing well?”
“……Yes. I have not forgotten it for a single moment.”
Silvia answered without avoiding my gaze. Her cheeks were flushed red—whether from the steam or from my touch, I couldn’t tell.
“Do you think you have been doing well since then?”
Silvia slightly lowered her head and put more strength into the fingertips pressing my shoulders, kneading the muscles with deep pressure. It was a strange expression where pride as a chief steward and tension as a woman intersected.
“I am pouring everything I have into handling the matters you might concern yourself with as smoothly as possible… Because your peaceful daily life is the very reason for my existence.”
At her unwavering voice, I let out a soft laugh. I lifted my head and examined her wet face once more, slowly and carefully.
“On that point, I will praise you.”
The moment the praise fell, Silvia’s eyes trembled greatly. Our gazes intertwined thickly. In truth, I was merely a stranger imitating the character ‘Victor’ from this world. After losing my life in an accident, I had opened my eyes inside the body of Victor, the villain from the novel.
Life in Korea had been relentlessly harsh. Having lost my parents early, I had desperately clung on for the sake of my younger sister left behind, trying to live like everyone else. Without any leisure to create even a single memory that others took for granted, after graduating university I had worked like a madman. Human relationships beyond the workplace had been nothing more than an impossible dream.
But what about now? Although every day was like walking on thin ice as I changed the flow of the original story, this life was so stimulating and enjoyable that I sometimes felt guilty toward the sister I had left behind. Sitting naked across from a beauty like Silvia and receiving her supreme service—this reality was so sweet that it sometimes felt like an impossibly distant daydream.
That said, I didn’t feel any significant sense of debt toward the original owner of this body, Victor. After all, according to the original story, that bastard Victor was destined to have his neck severed by Elina’s sword in a few months—or perhaps a few years—and Silvia would already have been sold off to Gomez.
The situation I was enjoying now was a new reality created by me, not Victor. I decided to enjoy this situation a little more. No, quite a lot more.
I straightened the body that had been leaning on Silvia and slipped my hand through her armpit from behind, lifting her in one swift motion. The sensation that met my fingertips was far more delicate and light than I had expected. Silvia was moved directly onto my thigh.
At the sudden sensation of being lifted and the change in position, Silvia’s eyes widened, unable to find her bearings. When her completely bare body was fully exposed to my sight, she showed a hint of panic but desperately fixed her gaze, refusing to look away from my eyes.
“Hngh!”
A short moan burst from her lips as hot moisture was pressed and released between our touching skin. I stared into her trembling eyes and asked in a low voice.
“That unfamiliar and confusing emotion—what kind of reaction has it caused in you?”
Silvia seemed to sink into thought for a moment, then carefully placed her slender, trembling hands on my collarbone and chest.
“It seems I have developed a craving to know… the extremely personal parts of you that others do not know.”
I looked at her as if urging her to continue.
“What thoughts you have when looking at documents in the office, whether there is any inconvenience in your current life… and what you think about Lua.”
When Silvia finished speaking and closed her mouth, a heavy silence flowed through the bathroom. Very slowly, she began massaging my sternocleidomastoid, trapezius, and shoulders in order. In her eyes, which stared piercingly into mine, there was not mere lust but a fundamental curiosity about how I evaluated her.
“And… what do you think of me?”
I quietly read that gaze. In Silvia’s eyes, there was not a complete absence of rational curiosity toward me as a person, but the longing to know how her master evaluated her seemed far stronger. No matter how much I searched through Victor’s memories and my own, Silvia had never once been rebuked.
“Silvia. Have you ever received a rebuke from me?”
“……Not in my memory.”
“Why do you think you have never been rebuked?”
“It may be partly due to your generous nature, Master, but I believe it is also the result of my constant efforts not to forget even a single word of what you say.”
I sent my hands slowly from her shoulders to her waist, just as she had done for me. The massage techniques she used had, after all, been learned from Victor. Every time my touch reached her, Silvia accepted the stimulation as if it were a sensation she was experiencing for the first time, savoring it with abandon.
“Your life will continue to be that of a slave, just as it has been until now.”
“...”
“Do you remember the things a slave must not hold toward their master?”
Silvia steadied her quickened breath and answered in a trembling voice.
“First is expectation of the master’s mercy, second is the arrogance of trying to become equal with the master, and third is affection without the master’s permission.”
“Correct. But sometimes strange things happen between master and slave. Cases where a master ends up falling deeply for a slave they intended to use merely as a tool to release their sexual desires, for example.”
Both of my hands gripped her slender waist. The moment Silvia’s breathing was driven to its limit, I suddenly stopped and released her. I stared directly at Silvia, who was clearly embarrassed by her own instinctive reaction, and murmured.
“You are now in the process of developing a vessel called a heart.”
“......”
“I once said that slaves have no need for such a vessel. Because the moment they contain emotions, slaves are bound to break.”
I gripped her waist with both hands once more and pulled her against my body far more threateningly than before. Silvia’s chest pressed against mine so tightly it seemed it might be crushed.
“However, Silvia, I permit you to create that vessel.”
Silvia looked up at my face with an expression where surging excitement and bewilderment at the current, far-too-close situation intersected. I firmly wrapped my arms around the waist of the woman sitting on my thigh, and with my other hand gently grasped the damp nape of her neck.
“Permitting you a vessel does not mean I have handed over the right to decide what fills it.”
When I slowly stroked down her nape with my fingertips, Silvia let out a quick breath and delicately tilted her head. The hot waves inside the bath rippled softly with our movements, gently tickling her lower body.
“What and how it will be filled—I will decide.”
“Yes… Master.”
Silvia’s eyes wandered helplessly between my eyes and my chest. When I tightened the hand gripping her wet nape, she collapsed helplessly into my embrace like a believer seeking salvation.
The reason I had deliberately specified the right to fill that vessel was not simply to oppress her. Silvia was far too capable and loyal. Yet at the end of that loyalty there was always a void that would devour even herself without hesitation, an emptiness difficult to escape alone.
If I allowed her to fill the vessel on her own, it was obvious that Silvia would fill it with guilt, excessive responsibility, or devotion that would never be repaid. But the owner of this body now was not the Victor of the original story—it was ‘me.’
What I had most desperately realized during my harsh life in Korea was that giving your heart to someone was ultimately a dangerous gamble that handed over control as well. Therefore, I did not want to leave any room in her vessel for ‘uncertain emotions’ to creep in.
Only when her heart was filled strictly under my calculated control—the pleasure I permitted, the duties I commanded, and the affection I allowed to a certain degree—would Silvia be able to remain by my side completely, without breaking.
I lifted her wet chin, forcing her gaze to stay fixed on mine. Her languid, unfocused eyes reflected only me.
“Silvia, what will be the first emotion placed in your vessel?”
Silvia exhaled a trembling breath and put strength into the fingers resting on my thigh.
“…”
I brought my lips close to her ear and whispered.
“It is relief.”
“…Relief, Master?”
“Yes. The relief that comes from the fact that no matter what you do or what you think, you are ultimately in the palm of my hand. That cowardly peace of not needing to take responsibility for yourself will be your first filling.”
Silvia’s breath stopped for a moment. It was the expression of someone whose deepest weakness, hidden behind the mask of chief steward, had been pierced head-on. No matter how capable a slave she was, Silvia was only in her early twenties. A child who had been forced to live the life of a slave before her own heart had even fully grown.
Moisture instantly welled up in the corners of Silvia’s eyes. Instead of answering, she buried her forehead against my shoulder and shed a warmth different from that of the bathwater. The ripples in the tub gently swayed in time with her trembling.