The master wanted the slave’s submission. Theodore, who grasped the meaning of that gaze in an instant, stretched out his trembling hands and pressed them against the marble floor.

He crawled on all fours. Holding back the urge to close the distance faster with terrible patience, he crept slowly toward his master on hands and knees, like a beast.

“Y-Your Majesty. I’m c-coming.”

Iberis, Iberis, Iberis!

He wanted to cry that noble name out over and over. His swollen, *rect member swayed painfully with every movement as he crawled forward.

Theodore let out a whimpering m*an at the stinging ache. His massive c*ck, which would deliver the greatest pleasure when thr*st into another’s opening, was heavy with its own weight.

“Hgh, hghh.”

When he finally drew close to her feet, Theodore trembled with excitement. What harsh words would fall on him now? Perhaps, like before, she would grind his member underfoot.

If she did, he truly thought he wouldn’t be able to hold back. If he came without permission, he would receive a severe punishment. The eyes of a man who had learned on his own to grovel and read the room like a slave lifted cautiously upward.

And their gazes met.

“Um, I-I’m here.”

“…Yes.”

“Hah, s-so.”

Quirking upward, her lips, as vividly red as crushed fruit, mocked him. Oh, a tingling pleasure spread all the way to his toes.

“You did well to crawl here like a dog.”

The tips of her white fingers drifted through the air, moving as though trailing down over him.

“But the mere sight of you displeases me.”

Without even being touched, a pleasure impossible to endure crashed over him, as though those fingers had pierced straight through to his bare skin.

“How shall I punish you for the insolence of raising yourself below the waist in the presence of your emperor?”

“Hgh, hghh, I, I was wr-wrong…”

“I told you I would use you as a tool, did I not?”

He shook his head frantically.

“Yes, yes! Do as you please, hghh, whatever you wish, Master…”

“Yes, you said you would endure any humiliation. Let’s see just how much you can take.”

The large-framed mage trembled with every muscle tensed, reduced to something like a helpless novice. Because permission to feel pleasure freely had not yet been granted.

As though that obedience pleased her, as though she found it at least somewhat acceptable, Iberis’s sharp edge seemed to soften just slightly.

Theodore was happy.

* * *

Iberis was beside herself.

‘Have I ever seen such a madman?’

First Lionel, then Kaian.

Having spent nights that were, quite literally, nights of burning flesh and bone, Iberis had brought back to the palace the criminal she had sent to the tower again as a deliberate punishment, and kept him waiting.

She knew well the abilities of the Black Mage, hatefully overflowing with talent as he was. She had not placed any binding restrictions on him, so he would have been fully aware of what kind of energy was surging through the palace and what situation she was in.

And yet, according to the reports she had received, he had stayed quietly in place. It was Sirak, who had stood guard outside her bedroom door and couldn’t even meet her eyes and kept removing himself from her presence, who had been far more visibly inflamed.

Then Theodore had appeared, and the moment their eyes met, he had changed entirely. The shoulders that had been hunched in a show of relative docility gave way, as though it had all been a lie, to a gaze filled with madness.

‘What an absolute mess.’

Iberis chewed the inside of her cheek, murmuring words that didn’t suit her.

F*cking. Literally beast-like coupling, six nights of it running end to end without pause.

The first with a man who regarded her as his enemy. The second with a fox-like man who seemed to want to melt her into pleasure.

‘Perhaps after letting me enjoy myself well enough, it’s now time to cast me into hell.’

Swallowing a savage smile, she watched the behavior of someone whose very sight often made bloodlust boil up in her.

A man who, when she beckoned with a gentle wave of her hand, crawled toward her like a dog in a show of compliance and meekness, yet whose eyes held nothing but gleaming madness and obsession. A hateful man.

“If you’re a slave, you ought to please me as befits a slave.”

Iberis deliberately extended her foot. Did this man truly enjoy all of this so much? She could not understand it.

What was there to find so wonderful about someone who declared she would reduce him from a position of standing to a pleasure slave, that he would gaze at her with that look of admiration and lower his head to her foot?

Looking down at the man’s round crown as he bowed, he lifted Iberis’s foot onto his hand without hesitation. He slowly lowered his head and extended his tongue, like a beast licking food off the floor.

Whether the thought of it being filthy or shameful never even crossed his mind, he took her toes into his mouth without the slightest hesitation and sucked.

“……”

Slurp, sluuurp. The deliberate, wet sounds of his licking made even Iberis, who had given the order, flinch inwardly.

He sucked greedily, then moved his tongue slowly, dragging it in a languid sweep between her toes. The sensitive skin reacted to the stimulation, and a ticklish sensation spread across it.

He seemed pleased by the twitch of her body’s response, and rubbed his curved lips against the top of her foot, making wet, drawn-out sounds.

“Have you no shame?”

“Hii.”

Even so, his member remained *rect, swollen to the point of bursting. She had apparently seen to it that he was cleanly changed and fed, yet here he was, dressed like a palace attendant, daring to s*ck on her foot, and the front of his trousers was damp in a way that suggested he had come several times already.

Filthy thing.

A man without a shred of shame.

Hateful, and yet…

“Haa.”

Theodore, who had been nibbling and mouthing the top of her foot in a slow, pressing caress, looked up to meet her eyes at her brief exhale, as though delighted.

The flushed cheeks and the wet, glistening eyes were not entirely unpleasant to look at, but the hatred still came first.

In truth, even being touched should have felt repulsive, nothing but revulsion, yet because of this damned curse and this wretched Oracle, a flicker of pleasure grazed the skin where that soft tongue made contact, and the pain eased with the saliva absorbed into it.

It was truly a wretched situation.

“How dare you test my reactions.”

“Ugh!”

Iberis spoke with deliberate coldness and used the foot he had been sucking and licking, still slick with his mouth, to tip the man’s chin upward. She had known he was mad to begin with, but this man had genuinely not felt humiliation even once from the moment he stepped into this room until now.

When something is absurd beyond measure, a hollow laugh is what comes out. When he approached looking as though he might die of joy, she had nearly made the mistake of thinking she was some close acquaintance of his.

A man incapable of feeling even the smallest guilt.

Even Iberis, born of the dragon bloodline, sometimes thought of those who had died because of her. There were nights she shuddered under the weight of guilt. Her chest ached with remorse over the knight who had lost an eye on her account, and she felt a bitter pang for the lady-in-waiting whose own life had become fixed in place because of an emperor tethered to the palace.

But this man had none of that.

‘The demonic bloodline.’

Nothing but an empty shell.

And yet that shell spilled obsession and affection toward her and hungered for her attention. What part of any of it was she supposed to believe?

Amid the twisting hatred and rage, and the pleasure spreading through her body in spite of it all, Iberis surrendered herself to the sensation and leaned her upper body back lazily against the bed.

“I’m bored.”

“…!”

The busy sucking and mouthing grew more frantic. It seemed as though anxiety was driving him.

She had let him go on gnawing and mouthing at her foot with his fixation, but when he dared to subtly begin rubbing his *rect member against something, fury rose in her.

She shot him a sharp glare, and he quickly met her eyes and blinked his wet, glistening ones. It seemed he was hoping that if he crossed the line, she would step on his obscenely raised c*ck.

Should she grab him by the hair and shake him, or should she slap those cheeks of his, still full of expectations despite not knowing his place? She considered it, idly flexing her foot, while a thin frost gathered around her. A faint killing intent drifted through the air.

There was no way he didn’t sense it. The man, massive in frame, emphasized the meekness of his downcast eyes and lowered his head. Tears rolled down his face. He pressed his body close again and bit, mouthed, and licked the top of her foot once more.

“I, I’m a dog.”

Who doesn’t know that?

“I can do anything.”

Amid the pleasure spreading languidly through her, Iberis exhaled a slow breath. She ran her red tongue over her lips. She could see the Black Mage’s absurdly large c*ck gush again at her reaction.

“Please don’t, hate me.”

Was that s*men, or was it pr*c*m?

“Your Majesty, I, I’m your dog and your slave. We made a contract, a c-contract.”

So please be fond of me, that was what he was saying, and it was quite pitiable.

Had he not been the one who had begun to crumble Iberis’s abundance and warmth, she might have enjoyed this moment more at ease. It was a face that was handsome but gave no sense of peace.

The demonic bloodline, they say, whispers sweet words with a wicked tongue and snatches away the souls of men. This one was no different. Was that not precisely why he had deceived even the Grand Witch and now come flying to her?