Jiro’s brain refused to accept what his eyes were reporting.
Steam still curled lazily from the surface of the pool. The soft golden light of the bathhouse lanterns turned every droplet on the girl’s skin into a tiny, mocking spark. She sat there with water lapping just below her shoulder blades, dark hair floating around her, and the unmistakable soft curve of a fully developed breast visible every time she shifted. The body in front of him was slender, young, and unmistakably female.
His mouth opened wide, heat reaching into his ears.
“Y-you… Why are you naked?” The words came out rougher than he intended. He swallowed hard and forced the rest out before his courage failed completely. “And how come y-you… your chest has gotten bigger? How did you turn into a woman?”
The girl turned fully toward him. Water slid down her collarbones. Her expression shifted from mild surprise into something that looked almost wounded.
“Huh? What are you saying, Sage-sama?” Her voice was soft, a little hoarse, and carried the faintest stammer when she grew emotional. “I have always been a woman. Isn’t that why you bought me from that lich of a merchant? To save me and make me yours?”
Jiro felt the tips of his ears catch fire. He took a full step backward, nearly tripping over the raised stone threshold of the doorway.
“H-how did you come to that conclusion?!” He waved both hands in front of him as if he could physically bat the idea out of the air. “No…forget about that. How can you say you’re a woman? You were not a woman when I bought you back there. Were you?”
The girl’s lower lip trembled. Tears welled up with startling speed and began spilling down her cheeks. Mixing with the bathwater already present, she really pulled off the look of a pitiful girl.
“Why is Sage-sama being so mean to me?” Her voice cracked on the last word. “I have always been a girl. Are you… Are you too drunk to see straight? Or…” Her eyes widened in sudden, horrified realization. “Is Sage-sama into that kind of thing? Boys? Is that why you’re angry I turned out to be a girl instead?”
“Huh… I am not into….!” Jiro’s voice jumped an entire octave. Heat flooded his face so thoroughly he was certain he must be glowing red. The image of water sliding over her soft curves burned itself into the back of his eyelids. This was the first time he was seeing a woman of the same age naked, and this close, too.
He spun around so violently that the hem of his formal robe nearly tangled around his ankles and bolted out of the bathhouse as though the steam itself had turned poisonous.
The corridor outside felt blessedly cooler. The two drunken knights still sat slumped against the opposite wall exactly where he had left them. Roland’s head rested heavily on Rudolf’s shoulder; both men snored with the deep, shameless contentment of the thoroughly intoxicated. The soft, rhythmic sound grated against Jiro’s already frayed nerves. Get faster updates on novelping.com.
He grabbed Roland’s shoulder and shook it hard enough to make the big knight’s head loll.
“Oi. Roland. Wake up. Wake the hell up.” He slapped the guy’s cheek hard.
Roland’s eyes cracked open a fraction. A slow, satisfied, wine-soaked smile spread across the big guy’s face.
“Ohhh… Sage-sama. You’re already out? Done already? Heh, that’s fast. Don’t worry, next time I’ll give you a tonic to last longer; don’t feel bad!”
Jiro’s fingers dug into the fabric of the knight’s sleeve until his knuckles went white. He felt like slapping the heck out of this drunk guy. After all, nobody would know it was him. At most, Roland would remember someone took out a grudge on him while he was out of it.
“What the fuck are you saying, you bastard? Done with what?”
Roland blinked blearily, still half-lost in whatever pleasant haze the alcohol had left behind. His voice came out thick and unbothered.
“Why? Was the girl too skinny for your taste after all? How come you bought her then…? Forget it. I’ll find you a better one tomorrow. For now just…Let me sle….”
His eyes drifted shut mid-sentence again. Within seconds, the soft snoring resumed as if the entire conversation had been nothing more than a brief interruption in his very enjoyable dream.
Jiro stood over the two sleeping men for a long, helpless moment, chest rising and falling too quickly. From inside the bathhouse, the girl’s soft, teary voice drifted out again, calling for Sage-sama, asking if he was still there, if she had done something wrong to offend him. Read the latest chapters at novelping dot com.
The sound snapped the last of his composure.
He turned on his heel and strode down the corridor toward his own chamber as though the entire Temple had caught fire behind him. His formal boots struck the polished stone with sharp, irregular force. Every few steps, the image of that slender, naked body tried to surface again, and he shoved it down with increasing willpower. To him, there is no temptation that can come between him and the future dream girl of his. He wanted a pure-hearted, uncorrupted girl, as always. That conviction of his didn’t change at all, even after seeing a fully naked beauty right in front of him, who was even asking for his company seductively.
By the time he reached the familiar door of his guest suite, his breathing had gone ragged, and the high collar of his robe felt like it was trying to strangle him. He still hadn’t been able to adjust himself with the robes this Temple gave him.
Shoving the door open, he stepped inside and slammed it shut hard enough to rattle the frame. His fingers fumbled with the heavy wooden bar until it dropped into place with a solid, final thud. Only then did he allow himself to lean back against the door and slide down until he was sitting on the cool floor, knees drawn up, face buried in both hands.
‘What the hell was that?’
The question circled uselessly inside his skull. He had bought a skinny, sickly boy. The merchant had said “boy.” The clothes had been loose and covering. The frame had been thin and flat-chested. Everything about that transaction had pointed to a male slave. Yet the person sitting in his private bath had been unmistakably, undeniably a female. Soft in places no boy should be soft, and with a voice and tears that clearly belonged to a girl.
Had the merchant lied? Had someone switched the slaves after the purchase? Was this some kind of elaborate prank the Temple knights thought was funny? Roland’s drunken comments certainly suggested the big knight believed the girl in the bath was the same slave Jiro had bought. Which meant either Roland was in on some joke or the entire Temple staff had somehow failed to notice a gender change that should have been impossible to miss.
Jiro dragged both hands down his face and let his head thump back against the door.
The absurdity of it all threatened to turn into hysterical laughter in his mind. He swallowed it down and forced himself to stand. The wide, soft bed in the center of the room looked like the most inviting thing he had ever seen after enduring the most brutal night he ever had.
He crossed to it on unsteady legs, climbed onto the mattress without bothering to remove the formal outer robe, and pulled the nearest blanket up over his head like a child hiding from monsters.
His body, exhausted by travel, social pressure, an attempted kidnapping, and now this latest incomprehensible humiliation, finally surrendered. The frantic loop of questions and images slowed, then fragmented, then faded entirely.
Sleep took him before he could decide whether tomorrow would somehow make any more sense than today.