My Taboo Harem!

Chapter 851: Phei’s Simps

"What does that even mean?" Emily shot back, her voice already sharpening with that signature feral edge.

"I mean hobbies," Lydia clarified. "Movies. Anime. Games. Comics. Music. Human joy. Literally anything that exists outside a spreadsheet."

"HEY! That’s ridiculous. I have hobbies!" Emily protested, puffing her cheeks into an indignant little ball of outrage, arms crossing tightly like a tiny dragon guarding her precious hoard.

"Such as?"

Emily thought for a moment. Visibly, her pause stretched longer than it should have, and Phei watched the gears turn behind her single visible eye with the quiet fascination of a man witnessing someone ransack an entire cathedral in search of a single misplaced coin.

"I like reading."

Catrina twisted around immediately. "Actual reading or Emily reading?"

Emily looked deeply offended, her single eye narrowing into a cute, feral glare. "What’s the difference?"

"The difference," Lydia said solemnly, "is whether your books contain emotions and anything actually fu or pie charts."

Phei started laughing again, softly.

Emily ignored them with the practiced dignity, she had been ignoring incorrect people since childhood, though her puffed cheeks and twitching eye betrayed her completely.

"I like classical music," she continued hotly, voice climbing with adorable ferocity. "And financial news. Actually, last week there was this fascinating article regarding—"

The car exploded.

Not literally — though the interior sound levels achieved something comparable:

Catrina nearly choked on her own breath, Lydia smacked the steering wheel repeatedly, laughing so hard the Rolls-Royce developed a gentle wobble that its two-million-dollar suspension absorbed with quiet long-suffering grace while Phei bent sideways into the leather seat, wheezing helplessly, tears forming.

Emily’s single visible eye twitched violently. "What exactly is funny?!" she demanded, leaning forward like an outraged kitten ready to claw the upholstery to shreds.

"No wonder your brain went straight to human trafficking," Lydia gasped. "Girl, you are boring."

"Get a life, Em," Catrina added mercilessly.

"Hey!" Emily snapped, slamming her small fist against the seat with surprising force, cheeks burning as she bared her teeth in the cutest feral snarl imaginable. "What is that supposed to mean? Also, I’m your boss! I could dock you out of the group for this outright mutiny, you traitors!"

Lydia cleared her throat dramatically. "Actually... wouldn’t that technically be, Boss Phei?"

Silence.

Emily blinked...

Catrina slowly turned around toward the backseat with the grin like she about to commit atrocities she fully intended to enjoy.

"Oh my God."

Phei immediately looked out the window. "No," he said weakly.

"Yes," Lydia said.

"Yes," Catrina echoed.

Emily narrowed her eyes, puffing her cheeks even harder in maximum defensive mode. "What are you people talking about?"

"Well," Lydia continued sweetly, "if Cat were lying, you’d probably know what enslavement in fantasy means." She even made air quotes with one hand. "’In this day and age.’"

Catrina instantly joined. "’In this day and age,’" she repeated with matching air quotes and the solemn gravity as if she were quoting a scripture.

Emily’s eye twitched harder. "You’re all incredibly annoying! I have perfectly refined and productive hobbies!"

"And you’re financially evolved beyond human emotion," Lydia fired back.

"That’s not even an insult!"

"It is to us."

Emily turned toward Phei with the expression like she was demanding that civilization restore order immediately or face the consequences, her voice rising into an adorably feral squeak. "What do they mean Boss?!"

This was the first he saw her cornered and this...

’Gods, she’s cute with puffed annoyance and a pout.’

Phei cleared his throat and scratched the back of his head. "Well... in novels—"

"Actual novels," Catrina inserted.

"—the fun kind," Phei corrected. "Not Rich Mommy Poor Mommy or Rules of Money or whatever finance horror books Emily reads—"

"They are not horror books!" Emily protested, slamming her fist against the seat again with maximum feral pout.

"Debatable," Lydia muttered.

"—in fantasy novels, anime, manga, webnovels and stuff like that," Phei continued, "enslavement usually refers to magical contracts, servant bonds, domination abilities, summoning, soul chains, rune seals... things like that."

Emily stared blankly.

Phei realized he had to go deeper.

"So like... imagine a supernatural contract that forces loyalty. Or magical marks connecting a servant to a master. Or summoned beings bound through mana... or any other methods."

"With catgirls," Lydia added immediately.

"With catgirls," Catrina echoed with religious seriousness.

Emily looked genuinely disturbed, though her cheeks stayed adorably puffed. "Why specifically catgirls?!"

"No reason," all three answered instantly.

Phei continued before he started laughing again. "Basically, fantasy enslavement usually isn’t treated like real-world slavery you just assumed. It’s more like powerful abilities and magical energies of sorts."

"Sometimes emotionally devastating," Lydia added.

"Sometimes suspiciously romantic," Catrina contributed.

"Sometimes both," Phei admitted.

Emily’s expression slowly changed. Understanding dawned across her face piece by piece, the gradual illumination of a woman who had spent her entire life in a world of numbers and was now, for the first time, being introduced to a world where catgirls were a legitimate category of romantic interest.

"...Oh."

Catrina gasped theatrically and hugged herself. "Ooooooh! The heavens open! Enlightenment descends!"

Lydia nodded wisely. "Some truths require sages before mortals can comprehend them."

"Remember Sage Arthur?" Catrina asked.

"The one who invented cultivation?"

"No, the one who discovered shampoo."

Phei laughed again. At this point tears were genuinely streaming down his face, and the leather seat that had been engineered to his exact body specifications was absorbing the shaking of a seventeen-year-old who was laughing so hard his ribs hurt — which, given who he was, took considerable effort.

Emily looked at all three of them like she was reconsidering every life decision that had led her to this vehicle, arms still crossed in full feral pout mode. "You people seriously consume too much fiction."

"Impossible," Phei answered immediately.

"Physically impossible," Lydia agreed.

"Reality already sucks," Catrina added. "Without fiction we’d all walk into traffic."

Emily crossed her arms tighter, cheeks still puffed in maximum defensive cuteness. "Well excuse me for not knowing anime slavery terminology. My hobbies are refined and productive!"

Lydia gasped. "She said ’anime slavery terminology’."

Catrina looked out the windshield silently. "...We failed her as a society."

"I hate all of you."

"No, you don’t," Lydia said. "You just don’t understand us."

"I understand enough."

"No," Catrina said softly. "If you understood enough, you’d already have a favorite anime character."

Emily looked horrified. "Why would I have one of those?!"

Phei wiped tears from his eyes. "See? This is what happens when your hobbies are spreadsheets and economic depression."

"They are not—"

"Emily," Lydia interrupted gently, "when was the last time you watched something with explosions?"

Emily opened her mouth. Paused. Then, with one final, adorably feral huff which Phei found so cute he wanted to press a soft kiss on her: "...Documentaries have explosions sometimes."

The entire Rolls-Royce erupted again — all three of them, Phei and Lydia and Catrina, laughing so hard the two-million-dollar vehicle shook on its suspension, the hand-stitched leather absorbing the vibrations, the bulletproof glass containing the noise, the disguised hotel car carrying a Cosmic Dragon and his CrushSimp girls through the glowing streets of Paradise while the boy who didn’t own a single vehicle on Earth wheezed in the backseat of his grandmother’s secret love letter on wheels.

And somewhere beneath all the laughter — beneath the roasting and the chaos and the sound of Emily Hartwell being publicly and affectionately sacrificed by an army of two while the man she worked for covered his face and cried — the original question quietly disappeared into the night.

Completely unanswered.

Which, for Phei, was honestly the best outcome possible.