Kairos turned to look at Kaede strangely, like he couldn’t believe what he just heard.
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
Nicole wrapped both arms around Kairos’ arm as she stared at Kaede with a frown.
“What are you trying to do!”
Kaede held up both hands as an awkward smile formed on her face.
“I-I just want to tag along!”
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
“Such a change of heart, huh? I thought you didn’t need anyone.”
Kaede began biting her nails.
“W-What happened to the other guy then?”
Hearing that, Kairos didn’t really know how to respond. However, Nicole seemed more than willing to speak back as a smile crept up on her face.
“Kairos killed him. That guy tried to kill himself, but he wasn’t even able to do that. Can you do something like that?”
Kairos’ eyebrow twitched. Honestly, he felt like he was giving more credit than he was due, mostly because he still didn’t really understand how Chen had died. It simply made him much more curious about the darkness spell, but he was definitely not going to test it on himself anymore if it could do something like that.
Though what was probably more strange, was when Kaede heard something killing someone before they could even kill themselves, she didn’t seem the least bit afraid. In fact, anything, she looked relieved.
“W-Well, couldn’t I tag along with you? I won’t do anything, I promise!”
Kairos blinked a few times. Normally, even if he didn’t fully understand something, he could make a few guesses here and there. However, right now he had no idea what her motive was. In the end, he let out a sigh and pointed to Nicole.
“Look, if she doesn’t agree, there’s no way you’re coming, alright?”
Nicole smiled brightly after she heard that.
“Hehe… that also means you’re not coming, if you didn’t know!”
The color drained from Kaede’s face. She held out a trembling hand.
“W-Wait, please! I’m really sorry for everything I said before, so…”
Unfortunately for her, Kairos and Nicole had already stopped paying attention to her and began walking toward the staircase. Most of the reason was that Kairos was getting tired of dealing with Kaede, but it was also the fact he could feel eyes on him. It was hard for him to see from this distance, but he definitely caught onto some people peeking out of their rooms.
All he cared about at this point was getting out of the dungeon, so he really didn’t want to waste his time with more fights.
And so, they made it all the way up the stairs, right next to the giant void in front of them. Right behind them was Kaede. Kairos slowly turned around to look at her.
“You’re still following us. Do you really think we won’t attack you?”
The corner of Kaede’s lip twitched.
“No, no, it’s not that! I just… happened to be here as well.”
Nicole held onto Kairos tighter, even unintentionally digging her fingernails into his skin. There was a fierce expression on her face.
“Get away! You can’t have him!”
Kaede was taken aback. She raised her hands to appear as non-threatening as possible.
“What? I never had any intention of taking anyone! If anything, I’d prefer to go with just the girl alone.”
Kairos pinched the bridge of his nose.
“…Why the hell do you want to go with us anyway? Do you really expect us to protect you for absolutely no reason?”
Kaede’s eyes darted around the room. Seeing this, Nicole slowly raised her hand. There was a dull expression on her face, but there was no mistaking the hostility she was emitting.
Kaede immediately spoke up.
“W-Wait! I’ll tell you! It’s because… I don’t want to get violated, ok! I have the confidence to hold my own and not die, but I still have to sleep at some point…”
Nicole blinked a few times, it seemed she had dropped that previous hostility. Kairos glanced at her.
“Is this something that happens rather often with women?”
Nicole tilted her head to the side.
“Um… there was one time when someone tried to do something like that, but another person was nearby and helped me. There was also another time when someone tried to touch me, but I got out of the way.”
Kairos’ eyelid twitched.
“You’re saying it like that’s completely normal.”
Nicole shrugged her shoulders.
“Some people are just… bad people.”
Kairos rubbed his chin.
“Huh. I’ve never experienced anything even close to…”
He cut himself off and then slowly turned to Nicole, who in turn was slowly averting her gaze. After a few moments, Kairos shook his head.
“Well, I guess at least I’m not clueless about it.”
Kaede relaxed slightly.
“So… I can come with, right?”
Kairos rolled his eyes.
“Normally, I’d just say no and be done with it, but if she wants you to come then I’ll just agree.”
Nicole smiled. This gave Kaede quite a bit of hope, but the words that came out of Nicole’s cheery expression shut her down.
“Ah! So it’s a no.”
Kaede felt like she was on the verge of losing it. She had actually already checked up on most of the rooms here, and as far as she could tell there were only men. As for Nicole, she was definitely ideal and while Kairos was also a guy, he also seemed incredibly disinterested in things in general.
As such, she really wanted to cling to them.
However, it really seemed like it wouldn’t work out. Countless thoughts flashed by her mind before she eventually stumbled on a stroke of genius.
“Wait! I’ll teach you how to seduce guys better if you take me!”
Hearing that, both Nicole and Kairos froze in place, but for different reasons. Nicole blushed slightly, but then looked back at Kaede curiously.
“So… how do I know it will work?”
Kaede smiled confidently when she heard that.
“Well, you can test it as soon as I tell you, can’t I?”
Kairos felt a sinking feeling in his heart. Things were definitely progressing in a far stranger way than what he would’ve preferred. But after a bit of thought, he imagined a solution.
“Whatever you’re thinking of, we have to enter this place first.”
His natural thought process was that if nothing was visible, then it would be quite difficult to do anything too weird. Though Kaede only clapped excitedly.
“Ah, that’s great!”
Kairos felt a little uneasy, but he decided to ignore it. With that, the three of them stepped inside. From there, Kaede began whispering, and from the sounds of it, she was a bit excited.
“First, I would’ve introduced how you should position your bust and butt to be a little more prominent, but that will wait until later.”
Nicole let out a dissatisfied hum.
“So what are you going to show me?”
Kaede cleared her throat.
“The first thing you have to understand is the mood. If the man has even a little bit of reservation, they will be put off if you come on too strongly! And well… that guy has a little bit too much reservation.”
Nicole sounded skeptical, but was willing to listen.
“Ok… so when is the right mood?”
Kaede giggled.
“The secret is you create the mood yourself!”
Nicole sounded annoyed.
“But you said they would be put off if you come on too strongly!”
Kaede seemed to forget that she was begging to come with them, and exclaimed rather confidently.
“First of all, you have to tease them, just a little bit. I’ll teach you how to flaunt yourself a little bit later, but other than that, there’s how you can touch them.”
Nicole let out a small gasp.
“Ehhh? But… that seems pretty strong, right?”
Kaede sighed.
“No, no. It depends on how you do it. You have to touch them very gently, caressing them. If you touch them somewhere normal, then it won’t feel too invasive, but the way you touch them matters a lot. When you do it, try to imagine that you’re incredibly delicate, like your entire body is actually made out of cotton.”
Shortly after she said that Kairos had a hand gently brush by his shoulder, and given how dark it was along with the whispers from the red crystals, it felt like something straight out of a horror movie. Kairos let out a small sigh after that.
By now, Kaede was no longer whispering and in fact, was talking loudly. Though, Kairos could hear everything from the start. As for whether that was good or bad, he did not know. Instead, he just picked up a few red crystals as he went through.
Though Nicole was focused on something else.
“U-Um, do you feel anything, Kairos?”
His eyelid twitched.
“…It felt like a ghost touched me not too long ago.”
Nicole gasped.
“A-Ah! Really?”
Hearing this, Kaede quickly spoke up.
“Oh no, that’s not how it should be. Agh, I should’ve given you more of the basics. When you do touch him, you also have to make it purposely seem like you’re touching him more than you need to. When you lay your hand on him, start by just barely touching before laying your entire palm and also subtly moving around.”
She giggled.
“This makes it feel like you’re trying not to be obvious, but it’s clear that you want him. A lot of guys can’t really handle that.”
Kairos clicked his tongue.
“And how exactly will it work if I literally just heard the entire process behind it?”
Kaede scoffed.
“It doesn’t matter if you know. If I had to explain it… er, it’s more of a subconscious thing.”
Nicole let out a gasp of awe.
“Wow! You really know a lot…”
Like this, Kaede continued to coach Nicole on various ways to touch Kairos, which would be experimented on shortly after. In the end, it seemed the three of them completely forgot about the passing of time as they went through the empty black with no goal in sight.
Kaede raised her finger in the air proudly, now talking rather loudly and quickly.
“Also, make sure you catch when their mood begins to change. See if their breathing gets a little heavier. A good indicator of that is if they are breathing out their mouth instead of their nose. Their temperature will also rise a little, and they will probably end up looking at you if you properly attracted their attention. From there, you can move on to the next step.”
Nicole gasped.
“T-The next step?”
Kairos grimaced.
“Um, Nicole maybe we should just-”
“Wait, just let me hear this!”
Nicole cut him off completely. Kairos was beginning to regret his decision of not stopping her earlier.
And seriously, why were the both of them treating it like he wasn’t just right there?