A Perfectly Constructed Cage!

(Five thousand very educational, yet morally ambiguous, words have been omitted.)

…

“Despicable! Utterly, despicably despicable! I will never accept this! To use such a cowardly, underhanded method!”

After the spring storm had finally passed, Ewan launched a feeble verbal protest against his captor.

However, his protest clearly lacked a certain… conviction. Perhaps it was due to his post-battle exhaustion, or perhaps it was because, in his current state of complete and utter, glorious nakedness, he didn’t have much of a leg to stand on.

“At times like these, the Young Master is just like a petulant little child.”

Anne’s cheeks were still flushed with the rosy afterglow of their encounter. She slowly began to dress, with no intention of hiding her breathtaking form from his gaze. Ewan, in turn, stared daggers at her—or rather, at her body—as if trying to win back some small, pathetic measure of his lost dignity through the sheer force of his gaze. But not only was Anne completely unabashed, she would occasionally shoot him a teasing, sultry glance, as if to ask, “Would the Young Master care for another round?”

Ewan’s teeth ached. He glanced at a certain damning crimson stain on the floor and couldn’t help but curse inwardly. Why is every single woman in this world a superhuman monster? Celicia had been perfectly fine to engage in a life-or-death battle right after their encounter, and Anne was acting as if nothing had happened at all, as if she could easily go another three hundred rounds with him.

He, on the other hand, felt completely and utterly drained, and was, for the foreseeable future, in no condition to rise to any occasion.

Is it me? Am I the problem?

No, that can’t be right. That whole ordeal went on for at least two hours. And with the potion’s… assistance, I felt like an absolute beast!

“It’s because I’m still too weak,” he concluded with a grim, world-weary certainty. “If I don’t get stronger, I’ll be doomed to a lifetime of being dominated and conquered by these terrifying women!” Ewan gritted his teeth, the urgency of his need for power once again burning in his gut.

“It is getting late. The Young Master should rest for a while now.”

Anne casually picked up Ewan’s discarded clothes and, as if she had once again slipped into the persona of his devoted, prim, and proper personal maid, gave him a respectful bow. “I have some other matters to attend to, so if you’ll excuse me.”

“Wait!” Ewan cried out in a fresh wave of panic. “You can go, but give me back my clothes!”

“Hm?” Anne tilted her head, a look of genuine, innocent confusion on her face. “Does the Young Master have any need for clothes right now?”

“Of course I do! I’m a living, breathing person! Don’t people need to wear clothes?!”

“Oh? Has the Young Master already forgotten our little promise?”

“Promise…”

“Yes. Our promise.” Anne lowered her head, a bewitching, intoxicating smile on her face. But within that smile, Ewan sensed a chilling, terrifying darkness, as if some unspeakable, cosmic monster were peering at him from behind her eyes.

“You are my property now, my dear Young Master,” she whispered, her voice a silken caress. “That means I control everything about you, including whether or not you need to wear clothes. And my decision, for now, is… that you have absolutely no need for them. After all, there is no one else here but me. And besides,” she added, her smile widening into something truly predatory, “you will likely be staying here for a very, very, very long time.”

“…” Although the room wasn’t cold, Ewan began to shiver, his teeth chattering uncontrollably. Being watched by her smiling face was somehow infinitely more terrifying than being stared down by a pack of bloodthirsty beasts.

“There now. Rest well, my Young Master. Once I have finished my business, I will come back to play with you again~”

Anne gently, possessively, patted Ewan’s head, then left with his clothes, disappearing into the oppressive darkness.

Ewan watched until she was completely gone.

…

“Is she gone?”

“…”

…

“Anne? Are you there?”

…

“Moshi moshi? Anyone home?”

…

“I know you’re still out there! Stop pretending!”

“…” The darkness remained utterly, completely silent.

Confirming that Anne had indeed left, Ewan finally let out a long, shuddering sigh of relief. And then, his expression immediately turned ferocious. “What do you mean, ‘your property’?! I don’t remember agreeing to anything of the sort!”

Well…

He did have a vague, hazy, and deeply humiliating memory of agreeing to something while under the influence of the drug.

But that was because of the drug! How could that possibly count?! Can you trust anything a man says when he’s thinking with his lower half? And a decision made by the lower half is the lower half’s business! What does that have to do with his upper half, the rational, intelligent part?

What my little brother decides has absolutely nothing to do with my brain!

That was his story, and he was sticking to it! As for the part about “never leaving Anne’s side,” he would simply pretend he had never heard it.

In any case, the most urgent matter at hand was to escape this place. He had no intention of becoming Anne’s personal, life-sized doll, imprisoned for the rest of his life!

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way! There has to be a way out!” Ewan pumped himself up, a flicker of hope in his heart.

…

After calming down, he finally had a chance to properly survey his new home.

It was a basement. The walls and floor were smooth, forming a perfect, featureless square. A single, dim oil lamp hanging from the ceiling was the only source of light. Directly in front of him was a set of cold, heavy iron bars, each one as thick as his wrist; there was no way he could bend them. The gate in the bars seemed to be the only exit, and when Anne had left, she had thoughtfully hung a lock on it that was bigger than his fist.

“Damn it. I’m already in shackles. Did she really need to be this cautious?” Ewan cursed under his breath.

As for the other areas… Ewan reached out and touched the wall behind him, then scraped his foot on the floor beneath him. A deep, soul-crushing chill ran down his spine.

Metal.

The walls and floor of this basement were made of solid, seamless metal.

In other words, to ensure his complete and utter imprisonment, to give him not a single, sliver of a chance of escape, Anne had built him a perfect, indestructible cage. There would be no digging a tunnel to freedom like in that famous movie.

And the only other opening was… Ewan tilted his head back and looked up. In the far corner of the ceiling was what looked like a ventilation shaft. But it was tiny. The only thing that could possibly fit through it was a sewer rat.

“How am I supposed to win this?”

A wave of pure, hopeless despair washed over him. A secret room made entirely of metal, with no guards and no viable escape routes. The only exit was the main gate, and he knew that Anne, who was meticulous and flawless in everything she did, would never forget to lock it.

She was the person who knew him best. She knew his strength, his habits. She knew he couldn’t use magic, that besides his first-rank martial artist abilities, he was utterly, completely useless. So she hadn’t bothered with any special locks or restraints. She had simply made the ones she used so strong that he couldn’t possibly break them.

She had anticipated his every move, plugged every possible loophole, and completely and utterly strangled his hopes of escape in their cradle. And right now, he didn’t even have a way to get out of his own shackles.

“Does this mean…” he whispered to the silent, oppressive darkness, “that I really am doomed to spend the rest of my life as Anne’s property?”