Chapter 207: Alone with the Empress [1]

Chapter 207: Chapter 207: Alone with the Empress [1]

For a full minute, my brain ran through every possible disaster scenario.

Worst case, if a daughter got caught pressed flush against a prisoner with a visible hard-on and damp evidence on both of them.

Even worse if that mother happened to be an Empress.

The black chains had snapped the instant Yelena entered, dissolving into dark mist as if they had never existed.

One second we were welded together.

The next we were simply standing too close with no excuse left.

’Damn. She’s really strong.’

[I did it voluntarily.]

’Stop lying. What happened, ego bruise? She looked at you, and you folded like a puppy.’

[Shut up. She’s just strong. Extremely strong. Want to fuck her?]

’You—’

"Who are you talking to?"

Yelena’s voice cut across the internal argument like a blade through silk.

Even without the chains, Giselle and I were still standing chest-to-chest, my hands half-raised where the links had been, her palm still resting against my sternum.

The shape of my cock remained obvious between us.

Giselle shoved me back hard enough that I took two steps, then turned and bowed to her mother with perfect court posture.

"We were training, Mother."

I cleared my throat and managed a nod.

"We were. Right up until about ten minutes ago."

Yelena’s red eyes moved from her daughter’s flushed face to the dark, tell-tale spot on the front of Giselle’s pants, then down to the equally obvious problem I was still failing to will away. She did not smile.

"What exactly was that black construction?"

"My weapon," I said.

"New variant. Still calibrating."

"It was blue during the exam."

"...Updated colour palette?"

Giselle’s glare burned into the side of my head.

I could practically hear her listing every way she planned to murder me once we were no longer under imperial supervision.

Yelena ignored the weak humour completely.

An Empress didn’t need to raise her voice to make the air feel thinner.

"Jenna Everheart contacted me again this morning," she said.

"She asked, politely, whether I would consider returning you to her walls for the remainder of the pre-academy period. I refused."

"I understand."

There was nothing else useful to say.

Jenna’s name landed like a stone in my stomach.

Somewhere in Sector 7, people were still waiting for messages I had not sent.

’Shen. Please be on time.’

Yelena flicked a glance at her daughter.

"You may go, Giselle."

Giselle’s eyes widened a fraction.

"Mother—"

"It’s all right. I have no intention of killing him. Not immediately."

The dismissal left no room for argument.

One part of Giselle clearly wanted to protest.

The larger part recognised the difference between speaking to her mother and speaking to the Empress of Sector 5.

She bowed a second time, lighter, and walked toward the door.

Yelena’s gaze tracked her the entire way, lingering on the damp evidence still visible on the fabric.

Only when the door sealed did she turn the full weight of her attention back to me.

I tried, desperately, to adjust my stance so the remaining tent in my pants became less of a diplomatic incident.

I failed.

The voice in my head dissolved into helpless, delighted laughter.

[You’re such a degenerate human, Revien.]

Yelena walked forward until she stood directly in front of me.

She wore a simple black gown that somehow looked more dangerous than full combat armour.

Her long white hair was gathered into a bun.

We were the same height.

Her red eyes met mine without any need to look up or down.

The faint scent of expensive soap and mana reached me.

For a moment the training hall felt smaller than the space between two heartbeats.

"Whatever you were doing with my daughter," Yelena said, voice calm and conversational, "do it with me now."

I stared at her.

The voice inside my skull made a sound of pure, unfiltered joy.

[Oh, this is excellent. Say yes. Say yes immediately.]

’Absolutely not.’

[Coward.]

Yelena waited with the patience of someone who had never needed to repeat an order in her life.

The same terrifying mildness she had used when she first walked in still sat in her expression.

She had watched her daughter leave with a wet spot on her pants.

Now she was offering, or commanding, the same compromise.

I opened my mouth.

Closed it.

Opened it again.

"That... seems like a significant escalation in observation protocols."

"Does it?"

"Yes."

"You bound my daughter in a non-standard construction. The least you can do is demonstrate whether the same construction answers to me."

[She wants the chains. Give them to her. Give her everything.]

’You are not helping.’

[I’m helping exactly the amount I want to help.]

Yelena’s gaze flicked downward once, acknowledged the ongoing problem in my pants with clinical interest, then returned to my face.

"Or," she continued, still mild, "you can explain the black chains, the gold edge Draven reported, the core discoloration in the S-rank dungeon. I am generous enough to let you choose the order."

The training hall’s containment field hummed in the silence.

I was standing in front of an Empress who had just asked me to recreate a highly compromising binding sequence with her, while a succubus entity in my head offered enthusiastic tactical support.

I did the only thing that felt remotely survivable.

I raised both hands, palms open, and let a single length of ordinary blue Submission chain form: slow, visible, and entirely under conscious control.

"Demonstration version," I said.

"No black. No surprises. If anything moves without my order, you have my full permission to put me through the nearest wall."

Yelena studied the blue links for a moment.

Then the corner of her mouth moved in what might, under laboratory conditions, have been considered the start of a smile.

"Acceptable. Proceed."

The voice in my head sighed with theatrical disappointment.

[Coward.]

I stepped forward, the same height as the most powerful woman in the sector, and began the slowest, most carefully narrated chain demonstration of my life.

The chains turned black again.