“As if that hurts.”

Iberis felt another hollow laugh rise in her at the absurdity of it, and with her fingertip she pulled at the leather strap bound so tightly it looked ready to burst his chest, then snapped it.

“Liar.”

“Ghk!”

She had aimed deliberately upward when she struck, and it smacked against his n*pple, clung, then slid down.

“……!”

That alone seemed to be more than enough to undo him, and his large member shuddered violently before scattering hot fl*id without permission.

“Hgh, ugh, ngh!”

The thick liquid that shot into the air splattered onto Iberis’s thigh, shoulder, and even her cheek as she sat on the bed. She rubbed the hot substance on her cheek with her fingertip and stood, tilting her head down toward him. Smiling with a slight curl of her lips, as though she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

“You come like this……. and you say it hurts?”

“Hgh, ugh, ngh. Th-that’s.”

His red eyes, dazed and unsteady from having just come, dared to trail down her neck.

More precisely, he traced the path of his own thick fl*id as it ran down her skin. Along her collarbone, and then inevitably lower, following the line of her chest where it spread open.

The emperor, who had been letting that insolent gaze go unchecked, reached out and gripped the thick shaft that had come without any command.

With a sharp gasp, he bowed his head under the pressure, and she smiled at the sight.

“Where do you think you’re looking?”

The one whose eyes had wandered did not lie about it.

“At Y-Your Majesty. I was looking at Your Majesty. I always, always look only at you.”

It was a fairly bold thing to say, but that was not what she needed to hear right now.

“That’s not it. You should be asking for forgiveness.”

A slave ought to act like one.

At the cold command, tears gathered in the man’s eyes.

“Hgh, ngh, ugh, yes, I, I was wr-wrong, I was wrong, ngh!”

Again, the grip of her hand tightened around him, and the force of it was considerable. Iberis whispered coldly, the way one drives back an enemy.

“Who asks for forgiveness that boldly? Listen well, Theodore. Every drop of your s*men and bodily fl*id ought to be used for my treatment, so where do you think you’re leaking it.”

She deliberately used the pad of her thumb to roughly work the smooth head, stimulating it.

He seemed to be struggling to bear it, and the muscles of his rock-solid thighs surged. The bulging muscles of his forearms also swelled, looking ready to burst the leather straps binding his body.

“Theodore. You need to look at your master.”

“Hghh……”

She whispered softly while roughly probing the twitching opening at the tip, and the Black Mage, wearing an expression pitiable enough to draw sympathy, wept with all his past dignity cast into the dirt. He drooled as he looked at her, broken.

“Yes, just like that……”

A tingling pleasure made her lower belly clench again. The parted folds on the inside of her thighs were unmistakably hot. The tight opening inside her soft s*x, which had been stretched and stretched again, clenched.

It was practically demanding that she shove the c*ck in her hand inside her right then. For this moment at least, Iberis was willing to let her lips curve.

“I like seeing you broken.”

The man, undone and looking as though he might cry, lit up at those words and his eyes shone. He panted and asked with something like shyness, his gaze shimmering with madness.

“Hghh, ugh, d-do you, like it? Really?”

“Yes. Right now I could be fond of you.”

She twisted her grip in his hair and studied the face of her enemy up close, drinking in his panting breath.

“Bear it a little longer.”

“Hgh, ugh, yes, yes.”

“Cry prettily. And when you’re struck, come obscenely.”

“Th-then.”

The man bore it remarkably well. Truly, sincerely, like a male desperate to win Iberis’s favor. Like an ordinary human.

“Then, Your Majesty.”

At that moment, Theodore, who had been forcing out labored breaths, suddenly bit down on his own lip.

The bite was hard enough to make a cracking sound, and blood ran down in a streak. Iberis raised an eyebrow. What is he trying to pull now?

“I’ll t-tell you a secret.”

“What?”

Up close, the man’s lashes were thick as he smiled. His body, flushed with heat from holding back his release, was like a great white horse returned from a race.

“I’m not human, Your Majesty.”

Dark magical energy surged richly along with his low voice. As though the year of isolation had been nothing at all, he was exactly as he had been when he stood at the Grand Witch’s side and drove the Snow Princess toward her death.

Her own power rose instinctively on guard, crystallizing into ice and leveling itself in every direction.

Dozens of lance-like shards of ice stood ready to skewer him through, poised to pierce his skin the moment Theodore made even the slightest wrong move.

A languid breath. The tense air.

“I’m not, not attacking.”

Silver eyes gleaming with killing intent met red eyes slack with pleasure.

“Look. If my magical energy circulates…… you can recover right away.”

The demonic bloodline’s magical power, the kind that raised goosebumps. If the s*men carrying that power spilled inside her body, it would become a powerful anchor capable of halting the curse’s progression. Yet it was still unpleasant.

Unpleasant, and yet.

The man’s split lip slowly healed and the bleeding stopped, and he smiled like a fool.

“So you can hit me even h-harder.”

And that was what he had to say.

“…… Are you telling me you revealed your secret so I could beat you to my heart’s content?”

“Yes, yes. It’s fine even if I bleed.”

As though right now Iberis was all he could see, unable to use his bound arms, he lowered his head instead and rubbed his cheek against the ice shard that had been aimed to pierce his neck.

“Hii. G-good, isn’t it?”

Like a massive beast trying to be endearing, his gaze drove into her with relentless fixation.

“I don’t die. So the masters at the mage tower would skewer me, and tear me, and set me on fire, and experiment on me, and feed me potions that burned me, and burn me again and again……”

“……”

“Your Majesty can do the same.”

Iberis had investigated the life of her enemy in full detail. Even knowing that the Black Mage before her carried a bloodline that made it difficult to live as a human. Even knowing that he had done things far from ordinary since childhood.

‘The things done at the mage tower were perfectly suited to drive even a sound person mad.’

She had read all of those records.

Of course, not a trace of sympathy had stirred in her.

It would remain that way.

And yet she could not help but ask.

“Why are you telling me this?”

Bound by his own creation, blinking those docile eyes as he spoke, the sight of him made the vengeance and hatred that had seemed ready to burn without end waver, just slightly.

“Why, because you can st-stab me with a blade.”

He had not always been like this.

“I wanted to tell you that you can torment me in all sorts of ways. Because I, I don’t mind. Because you said if I bear it, you’d call me good. So, so please be fond of me like that……”

Iberis blinked slowly.

He hadn’t seemed like such a fool before.

Over this past year, while she had been suffering under the relentlessly surging curse, had something changed inside that madman’s head as well?

She reached out and pinched his raised n*pple, twisting it. Struck as it had been, it stood out red and taut, the size of a pomegranate seed, easy to grip.

“Hi, hiik!”

When she twisted harder, he let out a m*an as though showing off. He blinked rapidly and swayed his large body with a languid, boneless motion. The white masses of muscle compressed and straining against the leather straps before her eyes were dizzying to look at.

Even though he could recover in an instant by channeling his dark magical energy, the places she had touched remained, with uncanny precision, exactly as she had left them.

‘Ha.’

Cunning, wicked thing.

“This one h-hurts. That spot, that spot is a bit.”

And yet, somehow. Watching him act with that careful, watchful manner, she did not feel as displeased as before. No nausea rose, nor did endless anger surge.

“Where does a slave get off lying again?”

“It’s, it’s the truth……!”

“Getting this hard just from having your chest twisted.”

“Hk!”

She flicked the taut head sharply with her other hand, and he reacted with eyes rolling back, trembling all over. Drooling, Theodore held back what had nearly come, and everything about him was red.

Watching him go limp, a laugh came out of her. He had come in with his member fully raised and dripping, yet at a single word from her he was holding back his release, and if she found that rather impressive, did that mean she was going mad alongside him?

“You did well this time.”

“Hgh, hghh, d-did well?”

“Yes. Quite.”

The sight of him panting and holding back his release like a dog in heat made her laugh. She reached out with a show of gentleness and stroked his forehead, then grabbed the sweat-damp hair and gripped it hard. She looked her fill at the expression stained with pain and whispered.

“Today you can do nothing without my permission. Do you understand?”

“Hghh, yes, yes! Master, I’ll, I’ll do that. So please handle me however you want. Anything is fin……!”

“Refrain from chattering noisily as well.”

“Mmm.”

The unpleasant, prickling feeling still remained, but she had come to understand clearly that the gaze this madman turned on her was genuine.