---o---
The girl with closed eyes felt someone leaning down toward her.
Before she could react, warm breath sprayed onto her face, followed by lips carrying heat far exceeding her own body temperature.
"Mmph—"
The girl who was suddenly forcefully kissed widened her beautiful eyes, somewhere between amber and gold in color.
If it were just a small kiss, it would probably end like this.
However, a certain experienced rake's kiss clearly wouldn't stop there.
The young man, who had already wrapped one hand around the girl's waist, gently licked the gap between the lips of Miss Gudako, who desperately wanted to refuse.
Feeling all of this, the obviously panicked Miss Gudako tightly closed her lips, wanting to prevent it all.
But it was meaningless.
The desperate resistance of a girl with absolutely no kissing experience added nothing but a bit of spice, serving no other purpose.
His agile tongue easily pried open the girl's teeth through the gap between her lips.
The girl's saliva was absorbed by the young man, and his bodily fluids also entered the girl's mouth.
The most basic exchange of fluids had begun.
Miss Gudako felt her head getting a bit dizzy.
She could feel someone's abnormally high-quality magical energy entering her body.
Like a human receiving air with oxygen content higher than normal values, absorbing excessive magical energy all at once somewhat exceeded Miss Gudako's bodily limits.
As if she had done some strenuous exercise, Miss Gudako felt her body continuously heating up, her limbs going somewhat soft.
If no one was holding her waist, she would definitely have weakened at the knees and nearly collapsed to the ground.
The girl, whose entire bodily functions had malfunctioned somewhat due to inhaling excessive magical energy, let someone hold her waist while she gasped for breath.
After a long while, she finally recovered.
She raised her head, then looked toward the guy who had forcefully kissed her, and found he was also looking at her face.
Feeling that passionate gaze, the girl wanted to escape a little.
However, that person's arms—with absurdly high muscle strength—were still wrapped around her waist.
And moreover...
Her legs were a bit weak.
She simply couldn't run.
Miss Gudako, who had always been somewhat boyish, really didn't have the courage to meet the young man's eyes and lowered her head.
Being forcefully kissed was still a bit too stimulating for the pure-hearted Miss Gudako.
"Did you feel it? The power of the Plundering Circle."
But at this moment, the young man's very serious words reached the girl's ears.
"If you want to act like a rogue, just say so directly!"
The girl, who had already prepared herself for being taken advantage of or even worse possibilities when she agreed to be this guy's girlfriend for seven days, became somewhat exasperated.
Really, she thought she had misjudged this guy before, thought he was a decent person...
Turns out he's just scum, a pervert, a hypocrite!!
"Just be a rogue all you want in one go!!"
"I'm not being a rogue."
The young man who was seriously using the Ten Incarnations according to protocol sighed and said:
"My authority was stolen, it has limitations."
[Youth]
Verethragna's sixth incarnation—in this state, he uses Word Spirit, protection, and makes humans obey.
In Persian mythology, if a believer prays to Verethragna, Verethragna will share his power with that person to help them overcome difficulties.
It could be said this should be quite a reliable and legitimate authority.
However—
Li Zihan's authority wasn't the original version.
His authority, Eastern War God, was a castrated version stripped from Kusanagi Godou using the authority Prometheus.
Not to mention that the ten incarnations could each only be used once, each incarnation also had its own limitations.
And the limitation of the Youth incarnation...
Was that protection could only be granted through kissing.
"How could there be such an absurd limitation!"
Miss Ritsuka, who obviously didn't quite believe it, spoke with a somewhat shrill tone.
"I won't lie to girls I like."
The young man shrugged, sighed at Miss Gudako, then said very seriously:
"Moreover, you should understand—I'm very skilled at manipulating minds. I don't need to lie. If I wanted to do something bastardly, there's absolutely no need to make up such fake-sounding lies."
Hearing the young man's words, the girl who had seen someone deliver a heavy strike with Yuduchen to Gorgon fell silent.
Then her expression became uneasy and restless.
Li Zihan was right—he wasn't trying to take advantage of her under the pretext of transferring power.
If he wanted to take advantage of her, he could completely use more sophisticated powers or more forceful means.
Not to mention anything else, just the matter of exchanging Holy Grails could involve many machinations.
With him holding the seventh Holy Grail, even if he proposed some excessive conditions as the price for exchanging the Grail, she would have to agree since she must save human history, right?
She had indeed been too impulsive and wrongly accused him.
"Alright, let's not talk about this anymore."
The young man spoke—the one who, after the Immortal killed the Disobedient Monkey God King, consequently extracted the authority symbolizing the steel god's characteristics from Him and named it the Plundering Circle.
The somewhat ashamed girl felt her own body.
Then she really did sense a power that shouldn't have appeared in her body.
It was a very ethereal ring.
"The Plundering Circle symbolizes the essence of the steel god, that is, the 'Conqueror's' power."
Li Zihan, who had distributed part of his authority's power through the Youth incarnation, explained the effect of that authority.
"The effect is that when conquering—well, the simplest is when killing others—you plunder their power, knowledge, talent, and a series of spoils of war."
"Of course, there are limits to this, and that power will gradually disappear due to the passage of time and use."
So strong.
Miss Gudako, who completely hadn't expected someone would give her such protection, widened her eyes.
Even with limitations, this power could turn someone from zero foundation into quite reliable, even fearsome combat power in a short time.
Subsequently, her expression became even more uneasy.
Such precious power—if it could be obtained by just paying the price of a first kiss, if word got out, countless people would probably come rushing over.
At the very least, the vast majority of female magi in the Clock Tower wouldn't mind offering up everything they had in exchange.
And she, who had been granted this by this guy, had been throwing a tantrum at the person who bestowed power upon her.
Right now, Zihan should be very angry, right?
The girl, feeling somewhat anxious, secretly glanced toward the young man's face.
Then she was surprised to find that Li Zihan was not only not angry, but actually looked quite pleased.
Inexplicably, a sense of crisis crept into Miss Gudako's heart.
"By the way, Ritsuka, you said before to let me be a rogue all I want in one go, right?"
The young man with somewhat unusual focus had a carnivorous smile curl at the corners of his mouth.