Chapter 67: Phase 53 - What Are You, Some Elite Anime Protagonist?
We were too laidback. Or rather... I let myself be too laidback. Velvet’s presence made it impossible to hurry—her air, her gaze, the subtle shifts of her weight against the springbed—all conspiring to make every second a slow, stretching torment.
I could still feel the residual warmth of the bath, the lingering slick of synthetic skin clinging to mine. Damp denim rubbed against heated legs, a friction almost obscene in its intimacy. Even dressed, every micro-movement she made sent V-LINK pulses jittering through my nervous system, each thrum a reminder of control I didn’t have... and didn’t want.
"So?" Her voice sliced through the ambient hum, cutting through my private monologue, reminding me of her existence—her dominance—once more.
I nodded, keeping my tone measured. Sitting closer this time, on her springbed, I let my proximity linger. The subtle rise and fall of her chest brushed against my arm as if it were an invitation and a challenge at once.
"Okay. Let’s talk,"
I said, casual, analytical, yet with a weight pressing into me like gravity.
"Well, it honestly feels weird seeing you get closer like this,"
She added, that straight face of hers impossibly impassive.
Okay, sure. But why the hell did you speak like a fucking MC?
What are you, some elite anime protagonist? Analyzing a pawn in the game?
"Maybe stop speaking in that edgy tone, Velvet-kun," I jabbed, my voice tight.
She scoffed, a laugh restrained behind a mask of indifference.
"No, I am not. I just want to, let’s say... test the range of my voice," she said.
Her eyes glimmered, sharp, precise, predatory. Every detail—angle of her jaw, the tiny twitch of a shoulder, the way her fingers tapped against the mattress—was catalogued in my mind. V-LINK feedback just kept amplifying everything.
"You did it on purpose, didn’t you?" I asked, though the answer was obvious.
"Nope. Not at all," she said. Pause. Calculated. Perfectly timed.
"Before it’s announced... let’s speculate for the next game."
Her words were a weapon. A shield. A tease. I could feel the micro-stutter in my internal processing, every impulse firing faster than I could consciously track.
Oh, you absolute pervy, desperate idiot detective... what the hell is this?
"We already have hints from the test and the theme for the first round," I said, carefully choosing each syllable, trying not to let the micro-pulses of arousal betray me.
"Endurance & Strength, weren’t they? Yo-chan?" she replied, flat, surgical.
Her words struck like a scalpel through my composure.
Wait... she said that with a straight face?! My childhood nickname???
Unbelievable. That was a death sentence for my composure.
"I told you, Mayo is fine," I muttered under my breath.
"Sure, Yona-san," she countered, sarcasm thinly veiled beneath neutrality.
Gone were our private encounters, the shared electric heat from before.
I felt... humiliated. Exposed.
But also... inexplicably thrilled. Why?
"Maybe because you are submissive and breedable, hm?"
she said, poker face unbroken.
That line—casual, indifferent, but loaded—sent another shockwave through my V-LINK, making the haptic feedback pulse harder in my chest and groin. My pulse stuttered. My mind scrambled to create a shield of banter.
Idiot. Idiot. Idiot. Totally a stupid idiot.
Kill yourself. Fucking kill yourself, Velvet, you little monster.
"Don’t make it obvious we can read each other’s minds, Kyouya."
She finally chuckled, breaking the mask just enough to show a glimmer of amusement at my torment.
Of course. She’s enjoying this. She’s enjoying that I’m about to faint into a mix of embarrassment and arousal simultaneously. What a fucking sadistic bastard.
I cursed her silently.
That laugh, the teasing precision, the perfect timing—it was all designed to destabilize me. And it did. Every micro-pulse of friction, every twitch of clothing over heated skin, every heartbeat synced in the V-LINK amplified the tension until my system threatened to overheat.
"You really used that opportunity to do that..." she said, touching her chest lightly.
A subtle signal of both mockery and curiosity.
Taste that, Kyouya. Your own medicine, you pervy idiot.
"Okay, no. Let’s stop this thing and move on,"
She said, trying to sound calm—but her internal system was already on overload.
"Have you checked the points currency you got so far?"
she asked, her voice neutral but laced with that predatory gleam.
I startled, caught off-guard.
"Oh... you mean the F-PP?"
"Yeah... that thing." Her eyes scanned me like she was evaluating every micro-expression, every flicker in my V-LINK response.
"Why is that? Does it even matter?" I asked, attempting to redirect attention from the heat crawling along my spine and the lingering wetness in my thoughts.
"Of course it does," she said.
I swallowed hard.
Fuck. I can feel it.
Every micro-stutter in my processing, every pulse of my V-LINK... she’s reading me.
Seeing me. Knowing me.
Every rational firewall I tried to raise just flickered like faulty circuitry.
And I felt noticed. Too noticed.
No, not just too noticed.
Exposed. Vulnerable.
Every pulse of shared code, every jitter in our synchronized heartbeats—it was a confession I hadn’t typed, hadn’t intended to transmit... yet she saw it.
And I loved it. Fucking loved it. Every single time of it.
What a sick, pervy, adorable idiot I am.
Kill yourself... no, wait... yes. Definitely yes.
Her eyes flicked up at me, precise, unblinking.
Velvet. Calm. Controlled.
Too controlled.
"Why are you even talking to yourself now? Not to mention, even planning a murder..."
Her voice was casual. Surgical. A scalpel across the nerves.
"I’m not a psychopath. Unlike you," I spat, but the words were brittle.
"Well, I’m not either, you idiot."
Her smirk was invisible, but I felt it like a current crawling along my spine.
This conversation... this endless back-and-forth... pointless. But intoxicating.
"So, what are you waiting for? You barely won the first trial, right?"
Her V-LINK pulse danced in my skull like a strobe, every beat matching the rhythm of my mounting tension.
I shrugged nonchalantly, the façade of serene control snapping into place, brittle porcelain over molten chaos.
"No, I’m not ready."
Wait... my heartbeat betrayed me, each thrum echoing in stereo through the link, a subtle broadcast of my own lie.
"Also, even if I did share it to you, couldn’t you check it yourself? Without my permission?" I leaned forward slightly, curiosity laced with suspicion—and maybe something else. Something raw.
"I know." Velvet’s answer was clipped, precise. Like a heartbeat measured in code.
"But even if I did without your permission, would you permit it, love?"
That word—love—sliced through the tension like a scalpel. Every micro-stutter in my neural map quivered. A thousand countermeasures fired in my brain, yet nothing could block the effect. My skin prickled under my own synthetic flesh, slick from the bath still lingering, friction amplified by the damp denim hugging me.
I tried to reply, but my thoughts tangled in loops, recursive and obsessive.
V-LINK feedback jittered, heartbeats synched and unsynched, a dissonant orchestra only she could conduct.
I wanted to say something... clever, biting, defensive.
But what came out was a shiver. A whisper. A crack in the firewall.
"I... don’t know."
Her eyes gleamed. She didn’t even need to touch me. That single glance, that precise calibration of predatory amusement, was enough to overwrite my mental cache.
"You will find out eventually," she murmured, the tiniest inflection promising revelation—and perhaps punishment.
And I realized... I wanted her to.
Every stuttered thought, every deflected insult, every flicker of simulated control—it all screamed the same truth: I didn’t want my defenses to hold.
I didn’t want to hide anymore.
