Chapter 86 Equality
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
People change. Even when one believes their current convictions are absolute, the events that unfold are never immutable. Reflecting on himself, the moment Yuuri unlocked the Familial Workshop, everything shifted: the scope of what he could do, the influence he wielded, and his entire mindset regarding it. The same held true for Suzuri.
She strove for purity and honor, wanting to live without shame before others, but her counterparts might not offer the same courtesy. Self-abnegation, the act of extinguishing one’s ego, was only beautiful when those who followed upheld that ideal. Unfortunately, no one had inherited Suzuri’s will. And so, she had been abandoned for eighty years. It was a predictable result, then, that she had been reduced to naked self-interest just to keep her consciousness tethered to the silent darkness, where a momentary lapse of will would mean her end.
Fugu, ugh, uuuuugghhh!
Suzuri’s suppressed sobs echoed in the disgusting, fleshy coffer. Stripped bare, her lithe body was ensnared by hideous, meat-like vines, yet she cried out without the luxury of shame for her exposed state. The muffling sound came from Yuuri’s finger pressed into her mouth, a necessary measure to prevent her from biting off her tongue. For a principled person who had once held purity and selflessness as a creed, the fact that she was now instinctively seeking self-preservation, even unconsciously avoiding the principles she once treasured as a virtue, must be unbearable. As proof, the force she applied to the finger wedged between her teeth was immense, straining to sever it with every frustrated breath she took.
Yuuri was truly and profoundly relieved that he hadn’t lifted the compulsion on Suzuri.
This meant, in part, that despite the massive increase in his own protection, her bite wouldn’t completely sever his finger. More importantly, he had feared she might shatter her own teeth in her inability to moderate her strength. The compulsion didn’t grant absolute, impenetrable hardness to a servant under its influence; rather, it subtracted excessive energy from the force the target applied, preventing them from incurring damage. This was how he could prevent her from harming herself and merely restrict her futile thrashing.
While preventing self-harm, he meticulously tightened the tentacles around her body. It was true that he felt a dark, illicit desire in adorning her despairing, naked body with the repulsive tentacles, but more than that, he couldn’t simply soothe her and set her free. Even if her broken limbs healed thanks to her servant status, Suzuri’s heart was still wounded and untouched. If she didn’t face that reality, they couldn’t move forward as true companions.
”Listen, Suzuri. I can’t promise you that I’ll disregard all danger to rescue you, even if something happens to you on a future dungeon run.”
Hff, ugh…
Therefore, he couldn’t just feed her comforting lies. To Suzuri, who had just begun to calm down, he mercilessly thrust his finger into her old, still-bleeding psychological wound. Naturally, her expression immediately fell into despair. Additionally, he felt a slight movement, a testing of the tentacles wrapped around her body, to see if she could pull free.
He rebuked her attempt by caressing her entire body, save for her most sensitive areas. Detecting that her rebellion was exposed, Suzuri resignedly let her tension drop.
”However, that condition applies to the other two as well. It might not be convincing coming from me, the one who’ll have to run away to keep our Workshop safe.”
Fugu, ugh.
Since everyone’s life was tethered to the Workshop’s existence, he must make ruthless decisions when a dire situation arose. Suzuri understood this fact. Yet, the suspicion, Will I be the first one cut?, was bound to linger in her mind. But whether she accepted it as a pretense or not, Suzuri gave a small shake of her head.
”If I die, everyone dies. Marina, the one I trust most, told me she would be the rearguard in a retreat. She entrusted you to me. I don’t shy away from saying Ashley is the most important to me, but I still couldn’t bring myself to put both of you in danger for her sake.”
”…”
For example, if a monster were to ambush them from behind, the scenario would demand that he use Ashley, who would likely be closest, as a shield to escape toward Suzuri. Could he truly execute that? Even as he spoke those brave, seemingly rational words, a shudder ran through him at the explicit scene his own words conjured.
The horrifying, unwanted imagination momentarily emptied his head. Pathetic, he thought simply. He should have spoken with more resolution, declaring that he would do what must be done, but he simply couldn’t imagine abandoning Ashley. Thus, he was rendered speechless at the very moment he needed to logically persuade Suzuri.
”I’m sorry. I can’t ask you to trust me with that, can I?”
Silence descended. He couldn’t criticize Suzuri’s insistence on a path of self-sacrifice if he couldn’t even commit to his own harsh logic. He was at a loss for how to gain Suzuri’s trust, and the instant he looked down at the heartbroken girl pinned to the fleshy floor, he realized his lapse.
The sheer horror of imagining abandoning Ashley.
The involuntary shiver that ran through him nearly dislodged his finger from Suzuri’s mouth.
”Ah, crap.”
”…”
That brief moment, long enough for her to bite off her tongue. He had failed to offer trustworthy words, and yet his mistake had loosened the very restraint that prevented her from killing herself. It was enough to be utterly disillusioned as a Master, and given Suzuri’s tenacity, she could have done it without hesitation. He imagined the worst possible future a few seconds away, and his blood ran cold.
”*Hamu, lero… churu…”
”—H-hey…!”
His fingertip was once again enclosed in the warm, wet warmth of Suzuri’s mouth. Not only that, but she was no longer pressing her teeth against it, diligently licking the spaces between his fingers and the narrow gap around his nail. When he looked down to see what was happening, her ebony eyes met his without wavering. The earlier, awkward glances, searching for an escape route, were gone.
It was a clear, strong gaze, filled with will. What change of heart had his pathetic display as a Master provoked? As he stood there, confused and silent, Suzuri stopped the movement of her only free part, her tongue. She opened her mouth slightly. Her gaze, still fixed upward, clearly demanded that he free her mouth.
I must believe she won’t try anything desperate.
He told himself that and tentatively withdrew his finger. As her throat worked to swallow the saliva pooled in her mouth, the girl, still wrapped in tentacles, raised her neck and shouted with full force.
”Don’t underestimate me, please!”
A sharp, powerful battle cry. It was the figure of a warrior stripped of the quiet, polite demeanor he had grown used to since they met. Despite being confined to the pulsating floor, her white skin adorned with meaty vines in a shameful state, her sheer intensity made him falter and choke on his words.
”Do you truly think I, a newcomer, am so conceited as to believe I should be as important as Ashley-dono?!”
”No, but… I have to treat you all equally, don’t I?”
While Ashley was dear to him, showing blatant favoritism would inevitably breed resentment. Disunity among the servants could lead to the collapse of the group, so he should treat everyone equally, shouldn’t he?
”That is where your misunderstanding lies, I implore you! Favoritism is something granted because the Master’s heart is moved. That is why it holds value among women! Something given equally possesses an unchanging value, it is the same as saying that the hearts we hold for you, Yuuri, cannot possibly grow any larger!
”U-ugh, I get the logic, but…”
Whether as a woman or a warrior, the notion that one has no worth unless they can serve their Master is a given in this world, and it is a concept deeply ingrained in Suzuri’s shinobi background. The modern idea of a “minimum guarantee” holds no significant meaning here. Suzuri’s shame was akin to realizing that the ‘product value’ she was offering was misrepresenting its quality. Her opinion was, in a sense, utterly rational: Don’t stifle my will to improve quality by declaring you’ll purchase it at a fixed price no matter what.
”I look up to Ashley-dono. She is so devoted and so affectionate with you, Yuuri…! To have the spirit to strive to be like her, to be told, stay as you are, when I want to become that way, if that is not an insult to me, then what is?!… Please, cherish my Ashley-nee-sama. It is precisely because Yuuri is the one who loves that wonderful woman that I can stake my life for you!”
”Ugh, your point is completely valid. I… I said something spineless.”
The word equal could be taken as a minimum guarantee, but depending on how you looked at it, it could also suppress the spirit to try harder. Conversely, it could be accepted as an excuse to neglect one’s efforts to contribute to the group. In such an environment, it was clear that Suzuri, a newcomer seeking to solidify her position, would be hampered. Suzuri was a girl he had only just met. Unlike Ashley, his first love, or Marina, a fellow reincarnate, he needed to work on sharing values with her. By setting the evaluation fixed from the start, he had effectively given Suzuri no ground to sell herself.
What should be equal wasn’t the evaluation, but the opportunity.
He was finally able to recall that long-forgotten piece of knowledge, likely from his past life.
”Thank you, Suzuri. I see, I’m allowed to be more self-serving. Then, for that very reason, I won’t easily permit you to stake your life.”
”You’re still talking about that, Nhii!“
Mechanically dominating a group is easy, in a way, as it eliminates the need to agonize over human emotions or the weight of life. But he had just been taught that he shouldn’t be that way. Considering her utterly valid point, he couldn’t lightly permit Suzuri’s self-sacrifice, either. He accepted her petition, and just as he gave in to her wishes, the newcomer, seeking merit, naturally raised an objection.
The tentacles had been wrapping around Suzuri’s body, ostensibly to restrain a girl who had just recognized her emotional wounds from doing anything desperate. However, if she was going to deny the very obsession for her Master’s favor that she had just argued for, he had to teach the wayward servant her place.
Hyaaa! Ann!
”Suzuri, you are so incredibly stubborn. This is exactly what you wished for. A woman entwined by hideous meat is an incomparable sight of beauty, isn’t she?”
He could no longer shut out the sensation of the soft flesh transmitted through the tentacles and the sight of the hot, white skin laid bare before him like an offering. There was no point in merely restricting her well-toned, lithe body from moving. He coiled slender tentacles around her unrestrained form, tightening and squeezing them, and roughly widened her guarded stance using five finger-like tentacles.
As he kneaded her resolve and spirit simultaneously, her earlier fighting spirit wavered. A piercingly sweet cry escaped her, delighting her Master’s ears.
”Do you understand, Suzuri? It would be utterly out of the question to lose this stubborn body, a body that’s exactly to my liking. Do you really think I’d easily let go of such a tenacious bride who willingly submits her will to the tentacles?”
”But… If it comes down to it, it’s the right course for you to cut me first, Nnnngh! Onnnn!“
Such an impudent girl, who wallows in self-sacrifice even at this stage, requires proper instruction. He inserted a tentacle finger into her guarded stance and rubbed the underside of her resolve. As he pressed his fingertip into that throbbing, engorged spot, Suzuri arched her hips, slicking out wanton fluid as if ignoring the compulsion.
”I’ll make you say it. ‘Please never, ever abandon me, because I need your strength so badly.’”
”Fugyuuuh!* I… I won’t sh-say th-that! To let the Master and His Wives escape is a shinobi’s honor! *Hoh! Nhii!”
Suzuri, who had finally started seeking self-interest, seemed to have forgotten that she herself was now one of those wives. Her composure in knowing her place and striving to better herself was a virtue in this newcomer, but underestimating her own ‘place’ was unacceptable. He looked down at Suzuri, who was letting out cries of pleasure and smiling joyously even as she was being ravaged by the tentacles.
Yes, whispering about her appeal and giving her pleasure was important, but it wasn’t enough. In this current situation where he still hadn’t secured Suzuri’s trust, the only way to overturn her choice of self-sacrifice was to ensure everyone had the power to make it a non-option. The power he had unexpectedly gained by being pulled into Suzuri’s private domain. He was certain that if he fully mastered this, he could give Suzuri everything she desired.
Notes:
• Suzuri – A scout who braved the labyrinth and lured a petrifying monster to protect her friends, she endured long isolation while frozen in stone and relied on inner magic to preserve her sense of self.
• Ashley – Count’s daughter, royal attendant, has a crush on Yuuri.
• Marina – First Princess of Restea—needs labyrinth escort.
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Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
Thanks for reading.
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