Luna

Good news? The rumors about orc cock were entirely true.

Bad news? It’s attached to Kazuma.

Yes, right, if I’m being fair, the kid is… not that bad? He actually tries, which I can’t say about many of the other members of the guild. And he’s managed to wrangle that party of his into something that, if you squint hard enough, can somehow pass for functional.

That’s without going into his list of achievements.

So, yes, at least he’s not Dust. Kazuma, for all his bragging, for all that prone to deflating pride, for all his tendency to hole up in that mansion of his when he hasn’t an impending crisis to prod him into action, is…

Not a bad kid.

Reckless, not half as clever as he thinks he is, disgustingly perverted, a sexual harasser, a braggart, unmanly, unable to hold his alcohol, currently as muscled as a statue, with a cock that feels far too good given how painful something of that size should really feel, brave, an attentive lover, playful—I mean!

Not a bad kid.

Unlike Aqua.

“Sooo… do we get a bonus for how quickly we solved the dungeon?” the girl wearing what no maid would ever wear outside a brothel asks with a smile that goes from one ear to another.

“No,” I say. Or, rather, I repeat.

“Really? But Kazuma worked so hard at it, you know? You should have seen him, all those green muscles glistening with sweat, his chest rising and falling…” she reiterates, licking her lips in a way that makes it perfectly clear what she would rather have between them.

“Standard. Fee,” I, likely futilely, insist.

“What if we sold you the treasure?” she says, batting her eyelashes and finally bringing up something worth discussing.

“That would depend on what treasure it—”

I shut up.

Mostly, because Aqua just took something out of somewhere I would rather not inquire about. A rectangular, thin, shiny—

“What the Hell?” I say as I point with a tremulous finger at a collage of Yunyun being… orced.

“Yup,” Aqua says in the most obnoxious way she could without popping pink bubblegum. “The Dungeon of Interspecies Harmony had some ideas about what ‘harmony’ means.”

I glare at her.

She smiles back.

“You don’t seriously expect me to fork over guild money for lewd drawings of—”

“This is a movie—oh, right, you don’t have those… Okay, how to explain it…”

“I know what a movie is, Aqua…” I tell her with the start of the familiar exhaustion the self-proclaimed goddess usually brings me.

“Oh, really? Huh. Maybe all those magical holograms we keep finding have some—”

“Are you telling me that this is a movie of Yunyun being… you know?”

Aqua’s smile widens.

Then she points at one corner of the glossy box, where Yunyun is wrapped in what looks to be a bouquet of Kazuma’s cocks.

I glare at her.

Because there’s absolutely no way that I will pay her guild money for this.

… This is going to hurt my savings.

***

Aqua

I am the smartest maid in this mansion. The bestest maid. The most loyal servant master has!

Or, at least, that’s what he’ll say as soon as he wakes up from his post-Yunyun coma.

You know, other than ‘Darkness, stop crushing me with your fat butt that loses in all possible ways to Aqua’s.’

Yes. That sounds precisely like something Kazuma would say.

Mostly because Darkness would enjoy it.

…

Okay! Focus! No need to dwell on things when I have a project to finish—oh, would you look at that? I already did.

Damn, I’m good.

I nod with detached, professional approval at my own perfectly objective self-assessment and stand up from my sewing desk to take a proper look at my latest creation. It’s been quite expensive to get materials that work like they needed to, but the results speak for themselves.

Or, well, they would if I was the kind of creepy deity who keeps breathing life into perfectly regular objects who would’ve been much happier if nobody ever messed with their tendency to stay still.

Looking at you, stupid lettuces.

Wait, are lettuces objects? Do vegetables count? I mean, they don’t move—or, at least, they aren’t supposed to.

But really, what kind of maniac put this world in motion? Kazuma likes to blame me for every little thing that goes on around here, but I swear it was already at least this broken when I got handled this assignment. Not even Eris blames me for this one, the flat-chested man-stealer—anyway.

Look, the thing is that all of my creations are instilled with the very beauty of crystal clear, flowing waters. There’s no way the ugly things rampaging around would have anything to do with my divine self because what I am perfectly suited to do is not monsters, demon kings, or whatever, but art.

Such as the masterpiece I just finished:

Kazuma’s old jersey.

Fitted for an orc’s size.

My cheeks start hurting at the intensity and longevity of my proud smile, but, really, that’s the price of success, and I’m willing to pay it.

Because on my sewing table, the fine weave of green and black silk with white cotton stripes and trim gleams under the setting Sun coming in through my window, each steel tooth of the zipper manually recreated by the local blacksmith (the greedy skinflint) and sewn into place by yours truly over painstaking hours until this became both a perfect replica of the original and a luxury item, seeing as natural silk is the closest thing this world has to polyester.

But! I owe it to my art to be faithful to the original’s essence!

Recreating a cheap NEET uniform out of subpar materials just because the right ones don’t exist? That makes absolutely no sense! Not when I just know how much Kazuma will tear up when he finally sets his eyes on this replacement and fucks me bowlegged out of sheer gratitude.

Huh. Would you look at that. There’s drool dripping down my chin. How curious.

Nothing that can’t be taken care of with my sleeve—oh, wait, I cut those off.

Bare shoulders are chic.

Sooo… well, I could use Kazuma’s new jersey to wipe my mouth, seeing as it will soon enough be drenched with all manner of my (purified, divine, perfectly hygienic) fluids, but maybe I shouldn’t do that before he has seen it clean for the first time.

So… I guess that leaves my skirt?

Okay, this will take some maneuvering.

I put my bare right foot on my chair and bend forward until my chin touches the hem of my miniskirt, then I grab the backrest as the whole thing starts to wobble, and I manage to wipe my face sideways on the black, glossy fabric before I purify my drool to turn it into perfectly innocuous water that won’t leave any kind of stain on the black satin.

Right. That works.

Skirts are nice.

In fact, looking at the piece of shimmering black draped over my thigh, highlighting each and every curve with lines of tremulous light that fade toward the lacy hem as if pointing at the bare flesh beneath, I would say that skirts, or, at least, my skirt, are really, really nice.

And not wearing underwear beneath it? Being just a bit of a sashay away from flashing Kazuma my perfect, divine butt and the hint of wet lips under it? Being always ready for him to pick me right up and impale me on his cock, already freely dangling from—

Wait.

Pants.

I have reinforced his jersey’s pants so he won’t break them with an erection—which took a bit of actual work and expensive materials to do—and that seems like something he will definitely appreciate, but…

But skirts are nice.

Skirts without underwear are nicer.

Skirts without underwear being slowly lifted by Kazuma’s throbbing cock as he looks at my bare butt are the absolute best.

So I narrow my eyes at the jersey lying on my sewing table.

Do a bit of mental calculus that has me cutely poke the tip of my tongue past my lips in a way that I’m sure would end up with me giving him a sloppy blowjob if he saw me right now.

And take out my scissors.

Nothing but the very best for my dearest master.

***

Vanir-chan

I, somehow, resist the urge to slap my hand over my masked forehead in a suitably dramatic fashion that would have me arch my back as if to look at the very Heavens with all the disappointment they keep raining down on me.

Truly, what is the point of meticulously plotting the downfall of somebody so prone to defeating herself?

“Vanir…?” Wiz hesitatingly asks.

I look straight at her and morph my mask to properly display the majesty of my elegantly poised eyebrow.

“Vanir-chan,” she corrects with an exhausted sigh that fills me with all the satisfaction of a job well done. A satisfaction that scheming against the accursed goddess rarely brings me.

Truly, it’s only your closest friends who can be so predictably drained of the joy of living.

Dying.

Undying.

Darn it. Now I am the one with mental exhaustion. Curse you, Wiz! Curse you and your confounding vital circumstances!

“Vanir-chan… can I come back—” she starts to say, wiggling on her seat in a way that has her curves do all sorts of things that become only even more alluring at the absolute certainty that she’s doing so unintentionally.

Truly, Wiz, you are a foe to be reckoned with! One who would so cruelly and ruthlessly exploit the one advantage you hold over me in the field of seduction! One who could weaponize being an airhead unaware of her own appeal to such a masterful degree! I am awed! Astonished! Humbled!

Spiteful!

“No,” I tell her, being true to my own desires like the splendid demon that I am.

“But… it’s my store…” she asks of me, her head tilted forward in a way that has her chin point straight at the hint of cleavage showing under the narrow opening straining at the middle of her purple robes, looking up at me through her bangs in a way that belies our height difference as I stand above her with my arms crossed precisely so it looks like I am looking at her over my own bust.

And her unplanned, natural pose is still better than my masterfully applied one!

How can this be! How can this devastating power be learned! Ah, Wiz, your cruel unfairness befits a Demon Lord’s General! You truly are a foe not to be underestimated!

“And I am saving it from your own incompetence. Wiz! This is a chance! A magnificent boon I’ve granted you so that you can pursue at once both your passions!”

“Both?”

“Running a functional store and Kazuma’s cock!”

“Wha—no! I—I—I am not a lustful undead who keeps longing to drain the life out of a breeding stud through his penis! I am noooot!”

She isn’t.

But it is still fun to tease her about it.

“Oh? Did I not detect a spark of joy when you were so readily accepted into his homestead—”

“That was just because he’s very kind! They all are!”

“Even Aqua?”

“I—I mean… Lady Aqua is a graceful goddess, and…”

Wiz trails off.

Her thoughts trail off.

It’s always mystifying that she’d be so reluctant to badmouth somebody, even in the privacy of her own thoughts, but I’ve come to appreciate the challenge it poses since we started living together.

You could say that I have grown fond of such a challenge.

… Is this female solidarity? I really shouldn’t have spent so much time crafting the perfect endocrine system for this vessel. It may be messing with my magnificent intellect.

“You are thinking something rude,” she says with a devastating pout the likes of which would immediately prompt a rather enthusiastic orcish irrumatio.

… All right, mental note taken. Let’s see you fight against this, Kazuma.

“Me? Belittle someone in the privacy of my own thoughts when I could be grandiosely recounting in glorious detail all the myriad, humiliating words composing a veritable epic of disparagement out loud? It’s like you don’t even know me, Wiz,” I declare with the spread fingers of my right hand lightly resting atop my magnificent bust.

… Its’ quite a nice bust. Kazuma thinks so.

Also, Wiz is sighing for reasons that are not mysterious at all, given I can read her mind.

Rude.

“That really sounds like you…”

All right, I will forgive you.

“Wiz, my dearest, oldest, truest comrade, can’t you see the opportunity you have been so graciously handed by my magnanimous self? You are now living with Kazuma, near him at all times, a true companion, a sister in arms! Truly, you’re in a unique position to get anything your master’s lineage ever yearned for without making any of their sacrifices! You can get mind broken by an orc who will then cuddle with you until the shattered pieces of your pleasure-addled brain will once again fit together! You can get railed by thick, orc cock every single day of the rest of your life—existence, and you’ll still be a functional adventurer at the end of it. Or, at least, as functional as adventurers ever are! Truly, Wiz, I envy you—”

“You just want him to pound you silly,” Wiz spitefully says with a pout that fools no one!

“Lies! If I wanted to, the lustful beast would now be on his knees, crying with happiness at the chance of pleasuring me with his unworthy tongue!”

“Vanir-chan, I know that you haven’t had hormones for long, but—”

“His knees would get scraped raw on this wooden floor as he strived to drag even a single muffled grunt of approval out of my lips! His cock would quiver at the mere sight of me glaring in disdain at the beast who dared ever refuse me! The scent of his orchood would fill your entire store as dollop after dollop of glistening precum poured out of him like a fountain with all the anticipation of my even deigning to run the tip of my toe up his shaft! He would beg me not for release but for enduring torture! If I ever decided to truly seduce Kazuma Satou, there would be nothing he could do other than surrender and devote his entire existence to trying to please me!”

I am pointing down at Wiz with a quivering finger, panting in the precisely adequate fashion to show the utter conviction in my words rather than a lack of air at having ranted for longer than planned on a subject I hadn’t intended to elaborate upon.

Yes.

Conviction.

That’s the only thing nestling in my breast at my impassioned speech.

Unlike Wiz, who’s staring at me with a flat look that’s only enhanced by her unwillingness to breathe right at this moment for reasons that, I’m sure, she’s planning in her devious—

Damn it.

I let my hand fall down by my side, as lifeless as my interlocutor, and drag another chair from behind the counter to sit beside Wiz as I rest my elbows on my thighs and my chin on my cupped hands before she gently pats my back in a condescending manner befitting the cruelty of an active Demon General.

… Wiz, could you stop having wholesome thoughts of empathy, friendship, and support for a single second? It’s making it very hard to project a spiteful, resentful mischaracterization onto your guileless façade that is no façade at all, but your utmost, genuine feelings.

Blargh.

“I am sure Kazuma appreciates you, Vanir-chan,” she gently says.

“As a friend,” I mutter. Not sulkily at all. I only sulk when it serves my plans.

Really.

“Friends are precious,” she says, surrounding my shoulders with her arm and dragging me into the trap of her embrace with all the unescapable might of an undead monster luring a victim to their, far too soft, enveloping doom.

“Everybody says that. Everybody says that but do you know how many people mean it? Because I do. I constantly know precisely how many people in this accursed city value the bonds of friendship over a lover’s embrace, no matter how trifling or passing the connection beyond the carnal. That succubus’ café is rich for a reason, Wiz.”

“You don’t believe that,” she says, not only with utter conviction but ruffling the back of my short hair with cool fingers that send pleasant tingles down my spine.

I don’t nuzzle against the side of her generous breast in a feline fashion. I merely pretend to do so to lure her into a false sense of security.

“Maybe I don’t…” I mutter, almost inaudibly, to better portray a believable, vulnerable performance that makes her lower her guard and consider me as a friend in need of support and cheering up.

Yes, Wiz, fall into my elaborate trap. Keep thinking about me as if I was a young girl distraught over far too new feelings and passions she doesn’t understand except in the most abstract manner after centuries of seeing them from the outside in. Truly, you’re as easily led as a lamb to the slaughter. You are falling magnificently for my elaborate plan. My stunning performance.

… Scratch a little bit to the left. Ah, yes, keep doing my bidding, my minion.

“So, can I come back—”

“No.”

“Whyyyyyyy?!” she yells, tearfully and pleasantly distraught.

And without stopping her gentle scratches as I keep nuzzling her outrageously comforting bosom.

A snack and a massage. Yes. Truly, my plotting is as magnificently effective as ever.

Now, if only I could come up with a plot involving my eight lipsticks…

***

Megumin

I am Megumin! The most talented of the Crimson Magic Clan’s newest generation! The Princess of Explosions, the Empress of Carnage, The Crimson Black Sovereign of Darkness Beyond Black! The Enslaver of Dragons!

… All right, I need to find a dragon and beat it up before I can shout that last one. It just seems embarrassing otherwise.

It’s just a matter of finding one strong enough to survive a point-blank Explosion but weak enough to stop fighting afterward. Truly, a genius plan befitting my Int stat. Nothing can go wrong with that.

Like with all my other plans. Our plans. Yes. All of them work perfectly and like we expect them to.

I bite my lip with no vague sense of unease at all and look up from the notebook with all my introductory speeches lying on my (currently plumper than usual) thighs at the girl sleeping inside my bed.

In the room we’re currently sharing.

Yup. Just as planned. That’s what I always expected Yunyun and I to one day be like. Sapphic lovers cohabitating and occasionally sharing magic-enhanced cocks between the two of us. All perfectly within my projections.

…

Aaaaaaaaaahhhhh!

I am not gay! I am not! I just—I may keep stealing looks at the others in the bath, but that’s just out of sheer envy and a crippling sense of inadequacy! Really! Yunyun and I are just friends—rivals! Bitter rivals who have been fighting since our early childhood! I have never felt for her anything other than chest-warming contempt!

“Mister Kazuma…” she mutters with that infuriatingly soft smile as she turns around beneath my (perfectly sensible, thank you very much) scarlet sheets with cool-looking runes and explosions, rubbing her thighs together as she, yet again, pronounces the accursed name of my terrible foe with a sweet tone that makes it perfectly clear that whatever she’s dreaming about has plenty of rose petals in it.

Possibly also a bathtub. And scented candles.

And a naked Kazuma.

…

Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!

I am not in love with him! I am not! I despise the absolute lech! I only tolerate him fucking me because of how good it feels and not at all because it’s a chance to feel closer to him than ever, as not even clothes stand between us when he surrounds me with his thick arms and looks down at me with those intense eyes of his, murmuring my name with that deep, rumbling voice that makes my insides quiver as I drench my inner thighs and my labia all but flutters in the sheer need to be filled by him until he explodes—aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!

Nope! I don’t care what he says; I most definitely did not tell him I love him right after cumming around his thick, throbbing shaft while he held me aloft over the cliff that he had carried me away from after every single day of practice, my chest flattening against his broad back as he just took my defenseless, limp body away and made me feel as safe as—aaaaaaaaahhhh!

My heart did not flutter when he told me he loved me! And I am not furious at him for taking it back just because I did not remember my earlier, lust-addled, totally did not count, confession! I am just furious at him because he’s Kazuma, and that’s precisely the only reason any girl ever needs to be furious at the lecherous, creepy, panty-stealing jerk! Yes! Female righteousness claims for his blood! Blood for the blood—

“Hm?” Yunyun mutters as her eyelids flutter, and I rush to her side so fast that my chair teeters behind me, and my speech notebook drops to the carpeted floor.

Just… just because I fear my rival taking advantage of my moment of distraction to launch a surprise attack.

Really.

That is totally something Yunyun would do.

… I wonder if it’s too late to learn a self-memory-modifying spell. Just a tiny one. It wouldn’t even cost that many points.

“Me… Megumin?” she asks with a hoarse voice that doesn’t immediately bring to mind that stupid collage of images with her swallowing two thick orc tentacles at once.

“Here,” I say in a low tone so as not to alert any hidden foes as I pass her the cool glass of water that has been sitting on my bedside table for this—for some reason.

“Thanks,” she tells me with a soft, grateful smile as she grabs the glass, the tips of her fingers brushing over mine in a moment that coincides with my cheeks heating up for… some reason.

A fever, most likely.

No. Not a Yunyun fever.

Also, most definitely not because she’s sitting up, my sheets sliding down perky, pale, bare breasts with rosy nipples that move up and down as she tilts her head back to swallow all of the water before the tip of her tongue peeks past her lips to lick the remaining droplets clinging to her no longer dry lips, the pink flesh glistening with her saliva and the flickering candlelight coming from behind me on my desk.

I… may be staring.

“What is it?” she asks, shyly lowering her head, looking at me through long eyelashes as a dusting of pink magnificently highlights her cheekbones.

I may be licking my lips.

“Are you… all right?” I ask. Because it would be completely unbefitting of me to face my rival at anything but her very best.

Yes.

Because of that.

“I… I really feel better than I should. I thought I would be really sore after Mister Kazuma… you know,” she says, the shy smile briefly brightening as she looks up at me with… complicity.

Comradery.

Something.

“Megumin?” she asks, long fingers reaching for my cheek, brushing a long strand of black hair away from the corner of my left eye.

I am licking my lips.

I am… My throat is parched, my breathing short, and I’m just staring at Yunyun, naked, on my bed, smiling at me, touching me, assuming that there’s a connection between us, not even bothering to try and mask her feelings because she takes it as a given that they’re reciprocal.

She’s…

She’s beautiful.

She’s always been. Irritatingly so. Infuriatingly so. She’s always made me aware of how her breasts are a forward tilt away from spilling out in all their bouncing glory. She’s always had thighs with just the right tantalizing curve to draw my eyes up her short skirt. She’s always had eyes both soft and deep, eyes that draw me in, that don’t let me go, that look for mine no matter how close or far away we may be.

Eyes that are… quite near.

“Me… Megumin?” she asks, almost breathless, her words caressing my lips with warm air that will never be as warm as the looks Yunyun offers me when she’s not bawling her eyes out at her latest defeat, fidgeting with crippling anxiety, or looking away with overflowing hope that she doesn’t want to see betrayed.

“Yunyun…” I finally answer.

Stupidly. Almost breathless. Caught in her eyes.

And I kiss her.

There’s a little sound coming out of her that vibrates across our lightly meeting lips, but then I lean forward, my hand resting on my bed’s headboard, so close to her that her loose locks tickle the inside of my wrist as warm darkness replaces deep crimson when I close my eyes.

When only her touch, her sounds, her scent, her taste remain. When my whole world is Yunyun and our wonderfully soft, brief kiss.

The long fingers on my cheek advance, leaving behind trails of fire before they slide through my hair, over my nape. Not holding me. Not pulling me closer.

Just…

Just there. Reminding me of how close we’ve always been.

How close we could have been.

And so, I pull away.

She looks at me, deep crimson eyes lazily blinking open as if from a pleasant dream, once more dragging me in.

But I’m not gay.

I… I like boys. I like a boy.

And… And he likes me. Loves me. He’s said so, with me still clinging to his naked body, with his seed dripping down my legs, with his very heartbeat massaging my insides with the cock lodged inside me.

And I…

“Yunyun, I… I don’t know what—”

And she kisses me.

She moves forward, her lips not just pressing mine, but nibbling on them, sucking on them, making my toes curl and my eyes roll back as my nipples harden against the sturdy hem of my strained dress.

She rises above me with a rustle of cotton sheets, making me tilt my head back until my hat slides off and softly falls to the carpeted floor below.

Her fingers massage my nape, finding nodules of tension I wasn’t even aware of and melting them away as she pours her warmth, tenderness, and care over them.

Her tongue peeks out, asking for entry, and I weakly grant it, opening my lips so she can slide into my mouth to reach my own tongue, to slide over and below it, making something that looks pretty damn close to an explosion spark behind my eyelids as her taste fills me in a way it didn’t through closed lips and mingled breaths.

I am not gay.

I am not.

I just…

My hands are on her cheeks, pushing her back as I just get caught in deep crimson once more, as I get a passing glimpse of the Megumin looking back at me, caught in them, mesmerized by Yunyun being here, with me, wanting me.

My heart is thundering, my breathing too shallow, my hands trembling except where they touch her soft skin, where her warmth reassures me.

I am not gay.

I just…

I…

“Stay. With me,” I say, not even knowing why, as something burns at the entrance of my throat and my eyes tingle.

She blinks at me, tears quickly filling her eyes before slowly falling down as a wide smile blooms, as…

“Yes,” she says. “Always.”

I don’t know who kisses who.

I just know I am straddling her, cupping her cheeks between my hands, our tongues meeting and going past our lips from one mouth to another as her fingers slide down my exposed spine to undo the back of my dress, and I slither up and down, my covered nipples rubbing against her bare ones through fabric that is too thick, too constraining.

Until she undresses me.

My dress slides down, pooling over my thighs, and my breasts mold against hers, the two hard points of flesh tipping hers digging into me like inquiring fingers, making me moan across her lips, making me drench my panties as my hands slide up, through her hair, for once loose from her usual braid, the black locks glinting with the quiver of candlelight over her pale shoulders.

I can’t breathe. Can’t think. Can only—

“Megumin,” she whispers right in my ear, making me close my eyes once more as I whine, as she forces something out of me that I didn’t even know was there.

“You… You are so unfair…” I say.

I don’t know how. I… don’t even know how I haven’t fainted.

And then she giggles, and she makes everything so much worse.

“I am not the one who keeps cheating,” she murmurs with an embarrassed, happy, shy smile.

“It’s… It’s not cheating. It’s winning,” I say. Because it’s obviously true, and I’m right, and I’m definitely thinking straight about all this rather than losing myself in her eyes yet again.

“Megumin,” she whispers as if savoring my name and making a renewed warm heat wash down my thighs, “I… I really feel like I’m winning. Like I do every time you kiss me.”

I try to swallow despite my dry throat and only manage a half-strangled whine.

And then, her right hand on my shoulder blade slides up with lingering, small circles along my spine, up my nape, and through my hair.

Her left hand moves forward, slowly teasing the curves of my ribs before going under my breast and cupping it, gently lifting it up even as she brands me with her touch.

She pulls me closer to her.

I don’t resist her.

I think I never will.

“Nights in White Satin—” she starts to cast, the familiar runes of the first sexual spell she cast on me flowing along her lips before splitting in two currents of shifting pastel tones that go down her arms, toward me, to make me yet again—

Push both hands on top of her mouth.

Her eyes widen, first in surprise, then in the familiar hurt of rejection as I interrupt her spell.

And I can’t shake my head fast enough.

“No! No, I want this! I want you!” I tell her before I can talk myself out of it.

And then the full impact of what I just said hits me, and my hands drop lifelessly by her sides, on top of bunched, red and black sheets exploding with my full shame.

“You… You do?” she asks.

And I…

I can walk it back.

I can deny it. Like I did with Kazuma. I can tell her that it was the heat of the moment, or that she misheard, or any number of stupid excuses that I know Yunyun will believe wholeheartedly after a lifetime of trusting every stupid lie I ever told her.

But… But I don’t want her to believe me. Not if I say I don’t want her.

So I nod.

My cheeks burn furiously enough that I could cry. Out of shame, embarrassment, and—

And Yunyun frantically kissing me.

Her lips pepper burning touches all over my face, down my neck, across my shoulders, on the top of my breasts—

And she spins me around, our tangled sheets flying around us, slowly drifting down as Yunyun straddles me, her hands buried in my hair, no longer gentle, pulling at me, holding me in place as she kisses up my throat before finally finding my lips and taking them.

Her tongue thrusts inside of me, and I try to answer her, but she’s too frantic, and I can only lie beneath her, letting her assault me with love, affection, and devotion as I moan into her mouth and squirm between her soft thighs pressing on the sides of my body.

“Love you,” she mutters, delirious, her eyes unfocused when she pulls back to nibble on my right earlobe until I gasp. “Love you,” she repeats before kissing between my breasts, holding each with hands that suddenly push them up until my nipples brush against one another right before Yunyun swallows them, and her tongue makes me close my eyes and pray. “Love you. Always. Always,” she continues as she kisses down my bare belly, tracing circles of warm wetness around my navel with her tongue as she pulls down my skirt until I kick it off and leave my drenched panties as the last barrier between the two of us.

“Light of Saber!” she yells before she obliterates my underwear.

I… Blink at her. Partially due to the bright colored spots left behind by her point-blank spell.

Past the valley between my spread, wet breasts, I look at Yunyun nervously wetting her lips and looking as contrite as she did after the one time she complained about her birthday presents to me.

“I will buy you a new set?” she offers.

I arch my eyebrow.

“Two! Ten! I will buy you as many panties as you want, in any style you want!” she says, her hands still tightly grasping my hips.

I arch my eyebrow higher.

Then I lift my pelvis.

She blinks at me in utter confusion before a slight light of realization dawns on her.

And, suddenly, I’m staring at my ceiling in wide-eyed wonder as Yunyun’s tongue licks every single drop of the moisture still sticking to me after her best combat spell almost gave me a very intimate sunburn.

Magic Defense is a great stat.

Though… I wonder what last time would have been like if mine was just a bit lower.

My cheeks burn yet again, and I shake my head over my askew pillow as if denying the very memory of Yunyun decidedly dragging me to my bedroom before showing me precisely everything that she could do with her spell repertoire.

The way she increased my skin’s sensitivity until the air around me felt like gentle tongues probing all over my body.

The way she lengthened her own tongue to reach precisely where she knew my most sensitive spot would be.

The way arrows of light rushed over my body to point at where I would be most appreciative of a kiss or a caress at any given time, my cheeks burning in mortified embarrassment when the biggest, brightest arrow kept stubbornly pointing at my clitoris.

The way her saliva became a potion for me to drink, for sleep to half take me so she could make love to me in my room and in my dreams.

All of that and more flashes behind my eyes, the morning of exhausting sex replaying as it has quite often since I first had a way to compare what Kazuma and Yunyun can make me feel.

But…

But now I can compare what her magic and Yunyun can give me.

I… I can give myself to her, letting my body grow limp as she drains my strength with every tender kiss, with every brush of her lips along my lower ones, with the ghost of her touch as the tip of her nose gets so close to my erect clitoris that her warmth is almost tangible.

“Love you,” she murmurs, and I can’t help it when my thighs close over her ears and the heels of my feet push her bare back closer to me.

I manage to find the strength to grasp her hair, and I pull.

And she finally kisses my clit.

Sparks once more go off behind my eyelids, and I don’t even know if that’s an orgasm or something else. Something that leaves me short of breath, my heart thundering, my legs quivering, and…

“Love you,” I mutter low enough that she doesn’t hear me. That she can’t hear me. That please, please, let her not have heard me—

Her tongue swirls around my clit before tapping it twice and retreating as she sucks on me as hard as she can until my fingers lose all strength and let go of her soft, smooth hair that was always so much glossier than mine, that always shone so beautifully even as I dealt with rough, dry kinks and split tips.

And she says I am unfair…

My fingers twitch as if trying to reach her, to hold her, to catch her so that she won’t leave. Because even after all these years, I can’t believe she so desperately wants to be friends with me. That she stuck to our childhood oath of fated rivalry. That she…

That Yunyun loves me.

Her tongue swirls around me right as her fingers enter me, spreading me open, demanding I let her in, and I bury the back of my head in my pillow as I scream her name inside my head because my mouth can’t do anything other than hang uselessly open in a silent plea.

And then she really starts.

I can feel her whole body moving under my calves, the sinuous wave traveling up her smooth back, across every single taut muscle before it crashes through her lips and into me, the lapping of her tongue almost soothing when compared to what her fingers, lips, and suction are doing to me as my hands fall lifeless by my sides, unable to even grasp my sheets like I so desperately want to just to have something to cling to, something that tells me I’m not being washed away by the ocean of sensation she throws at me.

The end of her short bangs tickles the underside of my belly, and I try to laugh before she takes even that away just…

Just by raising her eyes and meeting mine, showing me something so tender, so intense, that it hurts.

‘I love you,’ she silently tells me as she kisses me and fucks me with fingers far thinner than Kazuma’s cock, far shorter than it, but that still seem to reach up to squeeze my heart.

My mouth falls open once again as I try to answer her. To tell her… something.

Anything.

To tell her how pissed off I was at her following me to Axel.

To tell her that she’s ridiculous, being so stunningly beautiful, and claiming that nobody wants to be her friend.

To tell her that there’s a reason Arue sent her that letter and not me.

To tell her that she doesn’t need me. That she can just be herself and find people who will adore her for it.

But those eyes of hers hold me, and I can only return something that I know doesn’t fit. That I know is not enough, can never be enough. Not from a girl who can only cast a spell once before she needs to be literally carried. From a girl who can’t even tell the man she shared her first kiss with that she loves him. From a girl that needs to act up because she’s so small that nobody will notice her otherwise.

And she’s Yunyun, and everybody notices her.

Her lips let me go, and her smile shines with all the arousal she can bring out of me before she crawls up my limp body until she’s staring down at me, her hands by the side of my face, her black hair shining with a halo of warm candlelight as it spills down her shoulders and trails down my breasts.

“I love you,” she says once again, as if unable to believe she’s finally allowed to say it out loud.

Her body lowers, and her left thigh presses down between mine as her sex slides over my own leg.

She gasps, her lips briefly pouting in a way that is devastatingly eye-catching, and then her arms slowly lower her, the pressure between our breasts increasing until, once again, I can feel the waves traveling across her entire body as she rubs my trapped thigh, my lower lips, my belly, and my breasts.

And every wave crests right before crashing inside my head, wiping away all thoughts that don’t belong to her. All thoughts that aren’t held warm and safe by her deep, crimson eyes.

My lips are open, mouthing silent syllables in a fervent litany that I can’t bring myself to tell her.

Yet she smiles.

She smiles until her eyes close, and she gasps, her sex trembling against my leg, giving me just enough strength to press up against her. To rub her with even a fraction of the care and devotion she’s shown me before she opens her surprised eyes as I grab her undone twin tails and drag her down until our lips crash, and I, for once, manage to dominate her tongue as if still trying to win our latest challenge.

Her hands slide under my back, over my sheets, and her warm palms press against my shoulder blades, lifting me up so I can kiss her deeper even as she loses strength, as her hips speed up along my leg as I try to do the same, to time it so that, at least this once, I’ll cum along with her.

I let go of her hair to grab her neck and massage her breast, briefly plucking at her nipple before gently circling it and then pinching it right after her eyes relaxed.

And I fuck myself on her leg, marking her with every drip of the pleasure she forces on me.

She pulls away, her open mouth hanging right over me, short and sharp breaths filling me with all the confidence I did not have moments ago. The confidence that I can at least give her something, that she can feel even a fraction of what she makes me feel.

No magic. No tricks.

Just…

Just two girls.

I don’t like girls. Really, I don’t.

But I love Yunyun.

Her eyes flutter closed, and I let go of her nipple to grab her ass. To pull her against me as hard as I can as I press up against her with what strength I can put into my legs and hips.

To fuck her as best I can without fingers or tongue.

And she keeps looking at me. Keeps looking straight into my eyes as she just…

Comes.

I almost miss it. I almost miss the moment when she just closes her eyes and lets out a yearning sigh right before her arms give out, and she falls on me, her head by my side.

Cheek to cheek.

Cheek to burning cheek as I just take in how her hips are spasming along my thigh, and the idea of Yunyun cumming because of me pushes me right past that line I’d been desperately holding onto as the world once again becomes pure black streaked by an explosion of colors.

I yell something. I don’t know what.

Hopefully, it isn’t that ‘Yunyun’s making me explode!’

***

It… It takes me a while to come back.

When I do, Yunyun is still on top of me. Shivering.

And I, awkwardly, cheeks burning, as unwilling as ever to admit whatever is wrong with me out loud…

Pat her back.

“There, there,” I say.

“You said it,” she whispers right in my ear.

“Yes? Do you want me to say it again?”

“Yes! Yes, please!” frantic crimson eyes ask me as she’s suddenly hovering right over me.

So I blink in mild surprise, acknowledge that the mysteries of Yunyun’s psyche are as fathomless as ever, and humor her:

“There, there,” I tell her, patting her back once more.

Yunyun blinks at me.

Then she pouts.

“You’re teasing me,” the naked girl who just made me cum unconscious accuses me.

“Of course,” I tell her. Because who am I to refuse a victory so easily earned?

“Fine…” she grumbles. “Now… can you tell me?” she asks with eyes that hold just a hint of a wet sparkle.

And, in a moment of clarity, I can see two clear courses of action.

The first one involves some back patting and repeating ‘There, there.’

It ends up with Yunyun comically crying and storming out of our room—out of my room.

The second one involves using my prodigious Int stat to deduce that my stupid, lust-addled brain is very likely to say the same kind of things in the same kind of situations, infer what it is that I would’ve told Yunyun from previous experimental samples, even if those accounts may come from such disreputable sources as Kazuma, and…

I can’t do it.

I… I just can’t…

Her eyes shine just a bit more. The candlelight is dimmer.

Some time has passed.

Some time in which we were naked, in bed, together, our sweat mingling along with our breaths.

Some time in which Yunyun has clung to me, overwhelmed by hearing me say the stupid words.

I lick my lips.

Cup her cheek.

And…

“I am not worthy,” I say.

“What?” she answers.

“You… You are the heiress of our clan. You are rich, and smart, and beautiful, and talented. I… I only have my magic. It’s the only thing I have, Yunyun, and I need to prove that it’s enough, that I can…”

“You don’t have to—”

“I do! I do, or everything is worthless! I can’t just—just accept you without giving something back! You are—”

“You are you! You are Megumin! She who will conquer the path of Explosions! The most powerful Archmage from the Crimson Magic Clan! She who will become my wife!”

“Wait, that’s not how that introduction goes—”

“Now it does!”

“But I—”

“My! Wife!”

“That’s not even legal!”

“I will make it legal!”

I look up at her. At crimson eyes swimming with unshed tears, yet burning with determination.

Holding me.

Like she always has.

So I reach up to cup her cheeks, and I pull her down to kiss her forehead.

And then, so softly she can’t hear me, I whisper, caressing her skin with every syllable that goes past my lips:

“I love you.”

Then I hug her to me as tightly as I can, refusing to let go for this one instant even if I should. Even if I—

“I heard that,” her muffled voice says from my breasts.

“No, you didn’t,” I tell her, making a perfectly healthy use of my gaslighting skill.

“You love me!” she protests, her arms flailing by her side.

“There are no witnesses,” I tell her with perfect aplomb and no burning tingle on my cheeks.

“I am a witness!” she says, trying to escape from my enhanced bust and struggling to do so for reasons that make my cheeks tingle harder.

“You are an interested party. No judge will believe you,” I tell her, biting my lower lip when her attempts at freedom end up, somehow, with her sucking my hard nipple right between her plush lips.

“I will make you say it again,” she promises, no longer trying to flee as thin fingers walk down the sides of my quivering belly.

“You can try,” I purr as I caress the back of her head and pull her back against my wet, lonely nipple.

Then I let my head fall back on my pillow and ready myself to win my latest challenge against Yunyun.

Because, no matter how it ends… it will be hard to think of it as losing.

***

Darkness

He’s under me.

He’s exhausted, drained, and sleeping hard enough that he didn’t even notice when I took the time to slowly impale myself on his cock so that he would wake up with me around him.

It’s… It’s hard to fall asleep like this. To keep edging myself without outright coming as he just molds me.

I love it.

I love every time I wake up in the middle of the night, drool pouring out from the corner of my lips over that little hollow spot on his breastbone that seems custom-made for my lips to reach and kiss over and over again.

I love knowing that he will be there. That I didn’t dream these past few days.

I love that he says he loves me.

And… And I sometimes believe him.

I believe that he cares for me as much as he says he does. That the other girls are also there, and that we can enjoy all of us being together. That we all could love one another.

That I’m not alone.

That I’m not a delusional noble praying for a single friend at her father’s house, longing for adventure and true nobility.

That Megumin, Aqua, Yunyun, and Wiz are… that they are my friends like Chris first was. That Lady Eris finally answered my earnest prayers, and not just with Chris’s presence.

That I am loved. Cared for. Appreciated.

It’s… it takes some effort to believe it. Them. Him.

But when I lie here, on top of him, his broad chest beneath me, his warmth seeping into my body, his scent saturating my lungs, his cock reshaping me…

It gets easier.

It gets so much easier, that I could cry in sheer relief.

So I close my eyes and kiss the perfect spot on his breastbone once more, finding it out of sheer practice as if his body was already something so familiar to me as my own.

I relax, letting sleep drift closer as I feel safer than I ever have, even if my armor is off. Even if I am naked. Even if I am on top of an orc.

I let the day wash away until only Kazuma being under me, cradling me even as he unconsciously sighs hard enough that my bangs flutter, remains.

Until only my… my lover fills my exhausted mind.

And I smile all the way.

***

Eris

I look through a tiny window of light into the realm below. Into the rooms of a big mansion filled with five girls and a single orc.

An orc that is cuddling Darkness even as she drools herself into unconsciousness while being filled by the thickest cock I’ve ever seen that I could still safely take.

A cock that’s been about to fuck me twice before Aqua pulled him back just to spite me.

And Darkness, in her sleep, smiles blissfully and warmly like she never has before.

I try not to touch myself. Not to bring even more shame to my divine status.

I fail. And then I slap my hand away.

Again.

This is all so unfair…

  

=======================

Well, there you have it: Kazuma’s shipping has finally been as realized as he could have realistically expected it to be.

And then the next chapter comes along.

Let’s just say it didn’t go as I planned it to, much to a certain character’s ongoing frustration.

As always, I’d like to thank my credited supporters on Patreon: aj0413, Niklarus, Tinkerware, Varosch, and Xalgeon. If you feel like maybe giving them a hand with keeping me in the writing business (and getting an early peek at my chapters before they go public, among other perks), consider joining them or buying one of my books on Amazon. Thank you for reading!