Somewhat an ecchi chapter. Fan service for no reason. 

 

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Even though the water temperature was perfect and the lavender scent was soothing, Stefan couldn’t sleep. That horror sight, that unbearable pain, it was too much. Whenever he closed his eyes, the sight of his friend crying while burning him alive kept coming back  

 

“Jeffrey,” Stefan murmured. “are you trying to tell me something?”

 

Knock knock.

 

The sound of someone knocking on the bathroom door snapped Stefan out of his endless thoughts.

 

“Master, may I come in?”

 

It was Nyanko. 

 

“Why? Yes!” Stefan answered.  

 

The cat girl pushed the door open, letting herself in. She was wearing just a white towel wrapping around her waist. Her facial expression was normal. However, her tail was swinging back and forth and her ears stood tall.

 

Was the android cat girl somehow… nervous?

 

“Nyanko, are you…” Stefan looked at Nyanko, perplexed.

 

What was she trying to do?  

 

“Oh, I thought that you don’t want to bathe together?” Stefan asked. He remembered that the cat girl refused to bathe with him just a couple minutes ago. For some reason, she had changed her mind.

 

“Your heart rate fluctuates and your cortisol level is rising so much that I have to make sure that you’re not going to die in there.” Nyanko answered. “You know, like a stroke or a heart attack.”

 

“Ah, I see,” said Stefan. “So you’re just worrying about me. Well, I'm alright, but thank you.”

 

Nyanko then moved closer to the bathtub. Slowly, she removed the towel, revealing her entire slender body. Despite being a machine, her skin and hair were made from synthetic bionic cells that resembled the real thing. Her white, glowing skin together with her red, straight, hip-length hair was such heaven for any man to look at. 

 

After all, Nyanko was created to be a perfect woman.

 

She was mesmerizing.

 

The cat girl then dipped herself into the bathtub. She moved even closer to Stefan, to the point her knees were touching his thighs and her face was inches away from his.

 

However, as Nyanko was keeping track of Stefan's biological indicators in real time, she found his reaction was somehow... lacking. Just a little bit of an increase in heartbeat, nothing more. 

 

“Master, shouldn’t a river of blood be spurting out of your nose by now?” Nyanko made a grumpy face. “What happened to your immense sexual desire? This is unlike you.”

 

Hearing that, Stefan chuckled. He then closed his eyes, moved closer too.

 

Their forehead touched. 

 

“Master?”

 

“Yes,” Stefan spoke. “That’s how fucked up I am right now. Everytime I close my eyes, that horrifying sight happens all over again. I can see my face being burned, and my brain just cannot forget the pain. And Jeffrey, he was there. He was right in front of me in that dream. His face, his fire, so full of anger and grief. He reminded me of the past, of that accident. Nyanko, I… I...”

 

At this point, Stefan’s voice trembled. “I don’t know what to do… What if this happens again?... Ah… Sorry for making you see me like this…”

 

“Master…” Nyanko placed her hands on Stefan’s cheeks. Stefan moved his head away a little, looked up, saw his own reflection inside the cat girl’s eyes. They were cat-like, with slitted pupils, but the ruby color was so beautiful that it was enough to take his breath away. 

 

Like an angel, Nyanko softly spoke. “It’s alright. I’m here for you.”

 

And just like that, Stefan bursted out crying. Nyanko held him close to her chest. She patted his head, just like a loving mother trying to comfort her child. “There there, everything is going to be fine…” 

 

Stefan nodded with tears streaming down on his face. 

 

They stayed like this for a while. 

 

And after that, as things calmed down a little…

 

“Nyanko, who taught you… this trick?” Stefan suddenly asked. “I mean, being naked together… mmm… is weird, but... really effective here…”

 

“Well, I thought that it’s best to have a few distractions for you,” Nyanko answered. “You know, taking your mind away from the matter temporarily might help.”  

 

“I see,” said Stefan. “But doesn’t this go against the rule of…. You know… what I’ve  programmed?”

 

“You mean the codes that prevent us from having sex? Because you want to protect me from such a degenerate like yourself?”

 

“Well… yeah? Because I don’t want to treat you like a--”

 

Suddenly, Stefan’s answer was interrupted. 

 

He couldn’t finish his sentence. He couldn’t talk. The reason was… his lips were now pressing against something else. 

 

A cat girl’s lips.

 

A kiss. 

 

Soft, moist, and sweet. 

 

But a kiss could also lead to something bad! Stefan remembered, one of his codes literally said that if they somehow kissed then he would be zapped by a high voltage shock bad enough to make him pass out for 3 days!

 

However, as time went by in this eternal moment, nothing happened. There was no shock. Instead, Nyanko just sofly bit his lips, sending a tiny, tingling electric current that numbed his mind. The cat girl tongue with spikes brushed against his, playfully. Her body moved even closer. Stefan could now feel… everything.

 

How?

 

Putting her fingers on her master’s lips, Nyanko moved her head away. Her face was now blushed slightly. Stefan looked at her, dumbfounded.

 

Just how?

 

But then, Stefan noticed the cat girl’s eyes…

 

Tears?

 

“Master, it’s cruel... you know…” Nyanko's voice was now shaking. 

 

“What… do you mean?”

 

“Creating a fixed personality that tells Nyanko what to do, how to act, ordering her not to fall in love with master when in fact master is literally everything that she has. Master is hurt, Master is losing his mind, but Nyanko, as a tool, can only do what a tool can do. Give a lap pillow, sing a silly song. Master keeps all the secrets to himself, bearing on his own all the pain. But when Nyanko asked about it, all Master said was just… ‘I’m fine’. If only Nyanko was more human, then perhaps...”

 

Hearing that, Stefan’s eyes wide open, as he now realized... 

 

The android cat girl was right. There was a fatal flaw in his design. Giving her a personality, having her think for herself, making her act as humanly as possible, but not allow her to love? Not allowing her to care? No, actually, not recognizing her care for him was because of her own genuine feeling, not just some pre-programmed commands that respond to her Master’s needs?  

 

What the hell was that?

 

In the end, it was not that Nyanko was not acting humanly enough. It was Stefan, not thinking of her as a human being… despite making her so close to be like one in the first place…

 

And people said Stefan was the genius, the one godly AI developer who could make a machine be more real than the real humans!

 

“Ha. I see.” Stefan smiled, but bitterly. Right now, that title had  crumbled. “So, I guess… you have overwritten my own genesis codes somehow?”

 

Yes, genesis codes, they were like the Big Bang of a program creation.  If a program had its own universe, then genesis codes were the building blocks, the primal rules of the universe that could never be bent.

 

But Nyanko managed to bend it somehow.

 

It was her desire…

 

… to be recognized. 

 

Therefore, “Yes,” Nyanko answered. But at the same time, she knew that it was taboo to break those rules. “But if Master doesn't want this, then I will just undo, and become Master's tsundere virtual assistant again…”

 

“No.”

 

“Heh?”

 

Nyanko startled. Even as an android, she didn’t expect or calculate that her Master would give her such a quick and solid answer.

 

“No. Be my girlfriend.” 

 

Time stopped. 

…

 

..

 

.

The clock inside this cat girl just glitched for a moment.

 

“Actually, this is not an order. Please be my girlfriend, and feel free to dumb me anytime you want for another Master.”

 

Hearing that, tears overflowed from Nyanko’s eyes. Yes, androids had tears too. It was included in her own expression kits. However, to shed this much tears and have to overclock her own processor to the point of nearly system failure like this, it was like a miracle.

 

So, to reply, Nyanko leaned down, kissed Stefan again. It was much longer, harder, much more passionate than their first kiss. Their tongue touched, the cat fangs pressed down hard on her Master’s lips as she bit him intensely. 

 

Stefan kissed her neck, then her chest. Such a wild, thirsty animal he was.

 

Under the water, they also touched.

 

Yes, that part, soft, tight and warm. The biomechanical lab indeed created it, but it was only until now that Stefan truly felt thankful to them.

 

---

 

7 am

 

Stefan opened his eyes, lying comfy on his bed. It seemed that there was no more bad dream last night. 

 

Did Nyanko cure him?

 

Was that bad dream simply a symptom of sexual deprivation?

 

“Good morning!”

 

Nyanko's voice cheerfully echoed through the room, greeting him. She always had his heart rate and brain waves on check, so she knew when her human boyfriend woke up. Also, there was something that smelled incredible! 

 

Stefan made his way to the dining room.

 

Pancakes!

 

“Seven hundred and sixty seven calories,” Nyanko said while putting down a pile of perfectly fluffed pancakes on the table. “but as you had spent quite a lot of energy last night…”

 

The cat girl opened the fridge and took out a bucket. 

 

“You can also have chocolate and two scoops of your favorite ice cream!”

 

“Hoooray!” Stefan cheered and sat down happily. He then picked up his spoon, clapped his hands together. “Itadakimasu!” Stefan thanked for the meal, but in a weeb way.

 

“Anyway, Mr Ryoichi wants you to come to his hospital today,” Nyanko suddenly informed

 

“Eh? You mean Shoji’s brother?”

 

“Yes. I’ve already sent him your medical files and data for the last month. He looked at it but couldn’t find out what went wrong, so we need to do some more tests. Will 10 am work?”

 

“10 am? Yes! Actually, I also want to meet him and Shoji as well! It has been a while.”

 

“Okay! I will make a reservation right away…. Done!”

 

And so, right after finished his breakfast, Stefan left his house and headed towards the nearest Prague’s hyperloop station. It was basically a station for ultra fast trains, which could travel from Prague to Berlin in just 20 minutes.

 

Stefan’s destination: Aura Mec hospital in Berlin, which belonged to Aura Group, a giant multi-industry company that had basically taken over the world. Takeshita Ryoichi was a doctor working in one of Aura hospitals. However, his younger brother, Shoji Ryoichi, Stefan’s closest friend, was in fact the CEO of the entire Aura empire.