Ian, whose limbs were bound by girls while experiencing ultra-close ASMR, looked at them with worried eyes.
He wasn’t that stupid—he was just pretending to believe the absurd excuses the girls were making in this bizarre situation.
‘Maybe… I guess that’s what I thought.’
A drrug that made you speak your true feelings honestly.
It quickly became clear why the two of them had hidden it.
In Syrah’s case, it was to keep them in check.
In Stella’s, it was to avoid shame.
If those two had made such a decision, it was best to act like he didn’t know what they were thinking.
That was his duty as an adult.
“Hehe, Ian—why are you so cute, huh? I want to just bite you.”
“I like it, I like it, I like it—eh, huh.”
At some point, the two had forgotten the act they were trying to maintain and had started hugging Ian or nibbling on his ear.
Ian noticed, but didn’t bother pointing it out.
Even if they realized they’d broken character, they probably wouldn’t have the courage to admit it out loud.
Once the top two satisfied their own desires, the girls clinging to him at the bottom completely dropped the act as well and began fulfilling their own urges.
“Ian—yeah. Can I get closer? Can I sleep in your arms?”
“…Out of all of us, who do you like best? Huh? Tell me.”
As the soft touch of female b0dies and their sweet scent surrounded him, Ian—who was singing the national anthem in his head—suddenly felt a certain part of his body reacting.
It was a terribly embarrassing biological response to have in front of girls who were ten years younger than him. Ian abruptly stood up and, while slowly backing away, opened his mouth.
“…It just occurred to me.”
“Yeah? What is it?”
“We… why are we doing this?”
It wasn’t like they had taken a drrug that would kill them unless they clung to a man. It wasn’t a potion that would turn them into husks if they didn’t confess to their crushes.
It was just something that prevented them from hiding their true feelings.
So what did any of that have to do with clinging to him?
When Ian pointed that out, Stella, who had been blushing, screamed in frustration.
“Bah, you idiot! Dummy! Idiot!”
That was her true intention. Even without the drrug, her real feelings were obvious.
***
After some time, Ian calmed himself and looked around.
The girls who had clung to him just moments ago were now sitting far apart, only stealing glances at each other.
The atmosphere was stiff, and Ian felt the need to break the tension.
“Stella.”
“…Why?”
“Am I really that good?”
“S-sh! Okay! I like you, alright!? So what!? Just stop asking, it’s annoying!”
Stella, now painfully aware of how dangerous it was to be unable to hide her true feelings, hugged her knees and clamped her hands over her mouth.
Unlike Noah and Dinua, who blurted out their thoughts involuntarily, the drug Stella had taken didn’t force her to speak. Still, when she was flustered with embarrassment, Syrah—jealous that the attention was only on Stella—approached them.
“Ian, Ian. Why don’t you ask me?”
“Okay, Syrah. Do you like me?”
“Yes! I do, I really do! I love you to death!”
As if she had no intention of hiding it anymore, Syrah confessed.
With one person’s confession paving the way, Noah Dinua, encouraged by the others, also stepped forward.
“Hey, Ian. Of course, I like you, but it’s not that kind of love or anything! I just wanted to hear you say you liked me too…”
“…What do you usually keep in your head?”
“Uh, huh!? No! It’s not like I talk a lot, but now… because of the medicine, I just can’t stop—Eupeup!”
“Cute. Yeah. I like you because you’re cute.”
“Heh, heh heh…”
Noah started firing off words like a machine gun, and after hearing she was cute, she began to drift off to sleep.
“…Ian, let’s get married.”
“…Dinua, did you also take the same drug as the others?”
“Yeah, another drug. But this one… it just makes me say things I normally couldn’t. When I think about you, it all just comes out—I feel like my heart might burst… but my mouth just moves on its own…”
Dinua was probably using the medicine exactly the way the emperor intended—reversed or not.
After receiving confessions from all four, Ian let out a deep sigh.
How had it come to this? Really, how had it come to this?
‘I used to curse at harem stories…’
He had always believed that love should be one-on-one, that pure love was the best. But what about his reality now?
The truth was… complicated. Four women liked him. Anyone else might be dying of envy, but for him, this situation was just… deeply inconvenient.
‘Still, I need to respond.’
Ian knew that a confession wasn’t something you could pretend not to hear. Especially not when he was the one who had confessed before.
Even if medicine had helped them, he didn’t believe they wanted their feelings to be received this way. Still, a confession was a confession.
“Me too—”
He tried to meet the eyes of the girls. It was nearly impossible to look at all four of them at once, so he decided to take turns.
To Stella, who had confessed first—
“I like you too.”
“…You do?”
“Yeah. All of you are great motivators and friends.”
If you want to love, you can do anything. After all, everyone in this place was a beautiful girl whose eyes could make yours sparkle.
Ian wasn’t the type to claim that true love was all about personality—because, to him, the most important thing in love was appearance, and then personality.
People might say that the pretty girls around him looked like they came straight out of a fantasy, but he had no intention of rejecting that.
However, the problem was… they could only exist in that fantasy.
“If I asked any of you to marry me… no one would choose me.”
“… Why?”
“Because I can’t afford to love you.”
He could fall for the shell named Stella Eritz—but not truly love Stella Eritz. As long as she remained beautiful, he could hold her in his arms. But the moment that beauty faded, he was confident he would throw her away.
If you asked why, the answer was very simple.
“Because I am Ian Clark.”
Because he was a player.
He could love for a while, but he couldn’t stay forever. That was the difference between them and himself.
“… What does that have to do with you being Ian Clark?”
Stella, unable to understand, asked.
Ian pondered for a moment before replying in a way she could grasp.
“Just like you were born as the daughter of Duke Eritz, I, as Ian Clark, was born to kill the Demon King and protect this world.”
“… What nonsense is that—?”
[This is not nonsense.]
At that moment, Anna, who had been quietly sleeping on the back of Ian’s hand, appeared. The legendary paladin, known as a holy being favored by the gods, opened her mouth.
“In the past, God told me this— you will save the world.”
“But those words didn’t come true. I couldn’t protect my world.”
Anna’s kingdom had fallen—trampled by demons. After losing her life, she ascended to the heavens and was bound to the system, becoming a summoned hero.
“At the time, I thought it was wrong… but now I understand. God was referring to the current situation.”
It was too narrow-minded to think that protecting the kingdom alone meant protecting the world.
Now, her master—Ian—was trying to protect the world by killing the Demon King.
In the end, if Ian succeeded, Anna would save the world.
“My Master is literally born to protect the world. It makes sense when you consider the special qualities he has shown until now as part of that fate.”
Upon hearing Anna’s words, the girls fell silent. She was a legendary hero connected to a divine being—there was no denying her words.
Hearing this, Noah began to weep.
“Uh, huh? Miss Noah?”
Startled, Anna rushed to her side and asked why she was crying so much.
Noah, sobbing, clung to the hem of her skirt and said, “Just because you were born that way… it’s so sad that you can’t love anyone…”
“… Noah.”
The girls agreed with her. They wished Ian had given a different reason for rejecting them.
Rejecting them because of destiny? That was something they couldn’t accept.
A life locked on rails since birth—wasn’t that just oppression?
“Nonsense!”
Stella Eritz didn’t yield to oppression. She wouldn’t submit to fate.
“You have to kill the Demon King and protect the world, so you can’t be with us?”
That world could fall apart for all she cared. Stella held back the words she truly wanted to say—perhaps because they weren’t her true intentions, or maybe because the drug wasn’t working.
What she truly wanted to say was—
“It’s okay if we become more important than the world.”
Change Ian’s heart. Somehow, carve their names over “Saving the World,” the words etched in his heart as his top priority.
“I can do it.”
It wouldn’t be that hard—to carve her name into the heart of the boy who wanted to save the world.
No one but Stella Eritz could do it.
“Ian, I’ll make you say that I matter more to you than protecting the world.”
“Ugh… You always say things I like.”
“What? Why now, all of a sudden?”
“I’m serious. You know I wont say something like that lightly.”
As he said this, Syrah agreed with Stella. Saving the world was important—but that didn’t mean a boy had to throw his life away for it.
If the world required a person’s life to be saved, Syrah thought that such a world was bound to perish anyway.
“Ugh, Ian—me, me too. I’ll make sure Ian can change his mind!”
“… It feels a bit like I’m relying on the girls, but… me too.”
Noah and Dinua also decided to do their best to win over Ian’s heart.
‘A love that would never come true…’ Ian smiled bitterly at their determination to challenge it anyway.
It wasn’t like he was holding out hope—but still…
“Okay then, as you wish.”
Kuu Woo Woong─!!
Suddenly, intense magical energy swept over them.
Ian, who had felt this kind of energy once before, grabbed his trembling hand and looked toward the direction the energy was spreading.
‘That same sensation I felt from the White Tiger… But what about the other 5-star summons? No—this is even stronger…’
A power even greater than that of a 5-star summon.
On this continent, there was only one being stronger than a 5-star summoned beast.
A demon.
He was enraged.
***
“Did you know that even death has a name?”
“The Demon King has sent this body.”
“Humans, be afraid!”
“L-a-s-t-i…”
“L-A-S-T- is coming!”