Fate/Gamer Night – SE 008

[EMIYA SHIROU]
[THE GAMER]
[LV 20 – 2100/20000]
[HP: 2000][MP: 35][MC: 27][ST: 790][SP: 5]
[STR: 39][DEX: 40][INT: 21][WIS: 31][CHR: 77]

 

---

 

Shirou woke at dawn to the sunlight peering through the rice paper of his bedroom door.

[You have slept in a bed. HP, ST and MP completely restored]

 That’s what the usual message prompt said. Shirou, however, did not bother reading it. Or rather, he was in no condition to read it.

As soon as he opened his eyes, his field of vision was occupied by two pear-shaped mounds of tanned flesh with perky pink buds on top.

‘Breasts,’ his brain supplied helpfully. Having acknowledged that, he let out a sigh and closed his eye briefly. They shot back open immediately, nearly bursting out of their sockets.

Slowly, he dragged his gaze upward where he met a set of amber-colored eyes.

“Good morning, champ,” the breasts-owner greeted with a mischievous grin.

On that day, Emiya Shirou discovered that a human body can ricochet if propelled with enough force at the right angle.

He shot himself away from the futon, crashing against the wall behind him, bouncing toward the ceiling and from there onto another wall, only to finally crash on the tatami on the opposite side of the very naked woman, who leisurely rolled on herself looking highly amused.

“Well now, that reaction is a new one.”

“W-w-wh-,” Shirou stuttered as he scrambled backward, waving a panicked finger at his bedfellow.

“Hm? What is it, boya? Out with it.”

“Why are you naked?” a red-faced Shirou managed to get out at last.

The woman’s grin faltered. “That’s your first question? Not who are you or what are you doing in my bed? That’s odd even for a Magus.”

“I already know. You are Shihōin Yoruichi.”

“Huh, so you already saw through that,” she said as she slowly rose from the futon, covers sliding over her smooth skin and exposing what was left to expose. Her long dark hair fell down along her back and the few strands that had covered her front she casually pushed away with the back of her hand. If that wasn’t enough, she proceeded to stretch her arms above her head, letting out a silent yawn.

Shirou’s eyes really threatened to burst out of his skull.

“Would you cover yourself already?”

Yoruichi glanced at him sideways, smacking her lips as she relaxed her body, evidently woefully unconcerned with her nudity. She put a hand on her hips, while the other arm dangled at her side, looking as casual as humanly possible.

After a moment, she took a step toward him and he pushed himself further against the wall.

“O-oi! Didn’t you hear?”

She kept advancing until she stood right in front of him, where she sat down unceremoniously, legs crossed loosely. The posture did nothing to hide anything, even less so when she leaned forward with a playful smile.

“I can hear just fine, brat. I can also see fine, and for all your appeals to modesty you have made zero efforts not to stare at my tits. Perv.”

Thus, as his face became red enough to self-combust, Emiya Shirou felt like crawling into a hole and die.

It was the first time in his life, but it would not be the last.

---

“Mwah ha ha ha!” Yoruichi laughed, wiping tears from her eyes.

She was still comfortably naked but Shirou could not see her, as he was sitting seiza, facing the wall and repenting for his crimes.

“Don’t sweat the small stuff, brat,” she condoned, laughter subsiding. “It’s not like you’ll wear out my body just by looking. Besides you got me out of a real tight spot last night. Only this much service is not really enough to pay you back for that.”

“I don’t need to be paid back anything.”

“Oh?” she wondered, moving from her seating position and crawling on all four to where Shirou had confined himself. He didn’t see her coming until her head poked into his field of vision next to his arms. “You sure about that? I wouldn’t mind letting you do something more than just looking.”

Her low voice was mellifluous, inviting, tempting. Sweet honey on dark chocolate. He firmly refused to meet her eyes and stubbornly started at the wall in front of him.

“Y-yeah. I’m sure.”

Yoruichi smile grew even further, whether amused or pleased, he didn’t know. She pulled away and resumed a sitting position.

“No wonder Saeko-chan took a liking to you.”

Shirou’s head whipped around so fast he inflicted himself 1 HP damage and another one when he hastily forced it back toward the wall.

“Ack! You know… You know Busujima-sensei?”

“Let’s just say that we’ve met,” she said noncommittally.

“Is that so? … Wait, how did you even know that I know her?”

“Well, if using the Busujima-style last night wasn’t enough of hint, the fact that you had her smell all over you was a dead giveaway.”

The blood that had just started draining from Shirou’s face rushed right back to it.

“About time she loosened up and got herself a toy-boy, though I didn’t think she liked them this young.”

“Please, don’t jump to conclusions,” he implored.

“Hm? I don’t care much about that. Age doesn’t necessarily reflect maturity. More so for those that dabble with the supernatural. Isn’t that right, Magus boy?”

“I-I suppose,” he conceded tentatively.

“Well then. As you already know I am Shihōin Yoruichi. Do I get to know the name of the guy who saved my life or are you going to play Mister Mistery Hero with me?”

“Ah!” he exclaimed, realizing that through this entire debacle he had not yet given her his name. “I’m Emiya Shirou. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

He bowed, although he was still sitting and facing the wall.

Yoruichi rolled her eyes. She put both hands on his shoulders, spun him around and forcibly shook his hand.

“Yo! Let’s get along nicely, Shirou.”

“Let’s. Now, would mind getting dressed, please?”

Yoruichi sighed good-naturedly. “You do realize I had no clothes with me to begin with, do you?”

Shirou blinked once and then palmed his face very, very hard, its echo drowned out by the sound of Yoruichi’s laughter.

At least, Shirou told himself, things couldn’t get any weirder or embarrassing than they already were. He couldn’t have been more mistaken if he tried.

---

“It’s a nice place you’ve got yourself here, Shirou,” Yoruichi declared as she strolled leisurely on the patio of the Emiya household, feet bare as the rest of her body.

She disregarded all of Shirou’s plea to put on something -anything at all – and declared that she’d take a look around the place. Shirou could only follow after her as she poked her head everywhere she pleased.

He could not comprehend her behavior. He momentarily likened it to Saeko’s but they were nowhere similar. Sure enough, they were both stunningly beautiful women but they were as different as night and day and it wasn’t just a matter of skin tone.

Whenever Saeko bared her body to him, it was a purposeful, measured act to get a reaction out of him. Yoruichi on the other hand was simply supremely confident in her own nakedness and cared little for what Shirou’s thought about it.

In fact, she completely ignored anything he said and proceeded to do exactly as she pleased. She was almost exactly… like… a cat.

For the second time in the span of a few minutes, Shirou palmed his face hard.

Yoruichi looked back at the source of the noise with a half-smile.

“Something patently obvious dawned upon you again?” she asked.

“Something like that,” he grumbled.

“So, you live in this huge place all by yourself?”

“What? Oh, yeah.”

“No relatives at all? Zero parental supervision?”

“My father passed away a couple of months ago,” he said evenly.

“… that’s rough,” she replied shortly. “Well, that’s not good. Just one person living in this big mansion is a complete waste.”

“Well, you are not wrong, but that’s how it is.”

“Right. I’m moving in then.”

“I see… -WHAT?”

She grinned at his flabbergasted expression. “I’ve got to lay low for a while somewhere until that mess blows over. Plus, I was looking for a place to stay in Fuyuki anyway. It’s a win-win.”

“Wait, wait, wait. You can’t just move into my house,” he protested vehemently.

“Why not? Have you got anything better to do with all this empty space?”

“I don’t but-”

“And I’ll make sure to keep you out of my problems as as well.”

Shirou’s frantic thought process ground to an halt and was suddenly his mind was clear of confusion. He had been completely swept up her overbearing character and he had momentarily forgotten that just the previous night someone had tried to kill her.

[NEW QUEST: Can I keep it please?]
[Objective: Accept Yoruichi request for shelter and deal with the consequences]
[Reward for failure: none – Reward for success: Lots of headaches, ?,?]
[Accept?]
[Y/N]

Of course a Quest Prompt would show up now and of course it had to be so damn cryptic. There would be no consequences for turning down Yoruichi, or at the very least none that his Gamer Eyes could divine.

Yet he had already found her once wounded and bleeding. Were his Gamer Eyes all knowing all seeing, after all? That was one thing that always troubled Shirou. The Mystic Eyes of Game Perception knew or read things that Shirou himself didn’t know, like the names of the people in his field of vision. Where did that information come from? What about Quests objectives and rewards?

Going on with the assumption that his eyes saw everything there was to see was a risky proposition.

[+1 INT for thinking things through]

 ‘Fuck,’ he swore inwardly. Pointless musings did not mete out INT rewards. Like any other STAT increase, they came from successfully clearing a relevant challenge.

He looked up at the Quest Prompt again.

[NEW QUEST: Can I keep it please?]
[Objective: Accept Yoruichi request for shelter and deal with the consequences]
[Reward for failure: ? – Reward for success: Lots of headaches, ?, ?]
[Accept?]
[Y/N]

It had changed! The consequences for turning down Yoruichi were no longer none but had become an unknown instead. Just like Saeko’s quest had no option for refusal because to Shirou himself refusing wasn’t possible. Now that his perception had changed so had the Quest Prompt.

Careless. He was being way too careless with an ability that he did not fully understand yet. He was lucky to have realized his own blindness before he let something bad happen.

“Are you still with me?” she asked as he had fallen silent all of a sudden.

“Yes. Sorry, I just recalled something important. Fine, you can stay but we’re gonna have a talk first.”

“Huh?” She blinked in surprise. “Just like that? I thought you’d be harder to convince. Even though you are a little pervert, you really strike me as the uptight sort.”

“I don’t think that an exhibitionist has any right to call anyone a pervert,” he replied with a deadpan glare, even though he had yet to stop blushing at her naked form. “Anyway, I’d like to ask some questions first.”

She crossed her arms across her chest. Shirou did not acknowledge the way such gesture pushed up her breasts in any outward manner. That was no accomplishment on his part. His face just couldn’t get any more flushed that it already was.

“Questions and I don’t really get along,” she replied sounding as miffed as she suddenly looked.

“Just one, then.”

“Just one,” she agreed, glancing at him sideways. “What is it?”

“How likely is that those people would harm bystanders to get at you?”

“… that is what you want to know above all?” Yoruichi asked back, disbelief evident in her voice.

“Yes. Why?”

“No, nothing. Anyway, no more and no less than anyone affiliated with the Moonlit World would. Unless they get in the way like you did last night, they’d rather sneak past ordinary people than harm them.”

Not indiscriminate murderers then. Shirou was satisfied with that much.

“Alright. I’ll set up a room for you in the detached building over there,” he jerked his thumb at the aforementioned building.

“Hold up, are you sure it’s fine just like that? You are not going to ask what I did to have people trying to kill me?”

“If you wanted me to know, you’d have told me by now, and if I had asked you’d have just evaded the question anyway.”

“I’m not saying that you’re wrong about that, but what makes you think I wouldn’t just make up a story instead?”

“Would you even bother?”

Yoruichi sighed. “To be seen through so easily after all this time… You really got sharp eyes, Shirou.”

He shrugged. “The Moonlit World isn’t a place you can live in without paying attention to the details.”

“I thought I already gave you enough details to pay attention to.” Shirou’s eyebrow twitched. His evident annoyance was offset by the color of his face. “Anyway, I thought you’d ask about my cat form, at the very least.”

“Yeah, I’m curious about that, but it seems like a very personal thing to ask. If you want to tell me though, I’m all ears.”

“You’re putting a whole lot of trust in someone you just met,” she remarked.

Shirou frowned at her. A woman confident with being naked front of him in his own home had problem processing his hospitality?

“You are not used to the kindness of strangers, are you?” he blurted out almost randomly.

Yoruichi made a complicated expression. Amused, yet bashful.

“To think that I’d meet a guy that couldn’t be satisfied by looking at my naked body but would want to reach even deeper. How greedy of you, Shirou.”

Shirou was so taken aback by the sudden vulnerability in her voice that he completely missed her double entendre. Clearly this woman had no problems exposing her body, but the same could not be said about

her heart.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to offend.”

“It’s not…” she trailed off and then sighed. “Gee, we sure are an odd pair.”

“Seems like it,” Shirou agreed.

They lapsed into silence. Awkward, yet not uncomfortable.

If waking up to a naked beauty who the previous night was a cat wasn’t surreal enough, here they were, two almost-strangers having threaded onto sensitive topics almost by accidents.

“Looks like I have been careless, though,” she said after a while. “I simply thought that Saeko-chan liked ’em young, but you actually charmed off her panties on your own, huh?”

And just like that, the magic was gone.

Embarrassment renewed, Shirou palmed his face for the third time in a row.

“Oh? What have you figured out this time?”

“That you are the kind of woman that’s always going to have the last word no matter what, and trying to change that will only make me more miserable.”

She ruffled his hair playfully. “Keep it up and we’re going to get along just fine.”

As the first of the promised headaches started to onset, Shirou wondered whether or not going along with this woman would be a good thing at all.

It wouldn’t be the last time he’d ask himself that.

---

 

In the following days, Yoruichi moved in Shirou’s place seamlessly, though perhaps moving in was too big of a word as she did not seem to own a single thing, least of all clothing. At least he had basic toiletries to spare for her.

However, after the first tumultuous morning it was almost like she wasn’t there at all.

She didn’t show up for meals, fortunately, since Taiga would be there too and Shirou wasn’t looking forward to explaining Yoruichi’s presence to his foster sister.

She did however accept any snack he came bearing but sometimes stuff disappeared mysteriously from the fridge. Shirou didn’t bother asking if it had been her doing since she’d just admit it and keep doing it anyway.

He gave her a room in the detached building, but to the best of his knowledge she never used it. During the day she would laze around the house, napping under the sunlight on the patio in her cat form, or tanning on the roof in her human form.

At night, however, she was nowhere to be found. Shirou excluded that she would hide from him specifically at that time, so he assumed that she went about her business under the cover of the darkness.

He would see her again infallibly every morning. In his room. She would either be on top of the covers as a cat or underneath them as a human.

That made waking up a very awkward experience.

At the very least, Yoruichi didn’t call him out or tease him about his evident arousal. In any event, Shirou couldn’t decide whether waking up with her arms and legs wrapped around him was heaven or hell.

It took Shirou every bit of his Magus discipline not to act on the instincts he was becoming more and more familiar with, not in small part because of Saeko’s sweet punishments.

Between the two women, Shirou’s head was filled by lewd thoughts almost all day long. To make matter worse, he finally found the downside of having a [Gamer Body]. There was no separation between ordinary and sexual stamina, therefore as long as he had even just one ST point left in his system, his arousal would manifest full-force. Moreover, his stamina was already beyond what he consumed during the day with the exception of when he trained with Saeko. Although, to be completely honest, it wasn’t the training that drained most of his stamina.

In any event, he was extremely troubled. Anyone else would have lost themselves to hedonism, but Shirou was far too dedicated in helping others to spend hours on end to relieve himself.

Still, once everything was said and done at the end of the day, in order to manage to fall asleep, Shirou had to empty his stamina or it would take him a very long time before he managed to close his eyes for good.

However, once again the Gamer Body showed exactly how double-edged it was, considering that during one of such “stamina-draning” sessions a message prompt showed up.

[Sexual Interaction has reached LV 8]

Even though his mind was half-blank from the self-imposed climax, Shirou still grimaced. It seemed like nothing was safe from the power of the Gamer Eyes and Body.

Still, leveling up a skill, how bad could it be?

---

“Hnn..!” Saeko stifled a moan as yet another orgasm shook her. It was her third that day. The second since they moved from foreplay to full intercourse.

It had been already three weeks since the two of them had started this immoral relationship. Three weeks since she had been saved. Three weeks since she had been liberated.

Almost a month. More than enough time to get used to something. At the very least, more than enough for the novelty to wear off, to lose its luster.

It wasn’t the case. Rather than diminishing, it had become more intense. Both of them had come accustomed with the act, losing the initial awkwardness and thus becoming able to enjoy themselves more.

However, a disparity was starting to form between them.

Shirou was lasting longer and getting better at it each time. It took Saeko a great deal of willpower to maintain her composure while Shirou kept thrusting inside her even though she had already climaxed twice while he still hadn’t.

It didn’t help her that his troubled face as he lost the battle against instinct was so adorable. It made her want to torment him more and more with her body, even though she was the one whose consciousness was being eroded faster.

If he kept improving like that before long she wouldn’t be able to resist him, much less punish him.

‘Fuh uh uh,’ she chuckled in her head. ‘It looks like that even this will turn into a battle between us, after all.’

To think that he would end up rousing her fighting spirit and her lust at the same time…

She had already admitted it, but she was being forced to acknowledge it yet again. Emiya Shirou was truly something else. Even if she’d end up losing to him, she probably wouldn’t mind. However, she wasn’t willing to give up the upper hand just yet.

Little did she know that the greater the difficulty level, the faster Shirou would progress. Still, it wasn’t like she’d regret it either if it would end up backfiring on her.

---

[EMIYA SHIROU]
[THE GAMER]
[LV 25 – 1300/20000]
[HP: 2500][MP: 35][MC: 27][ST: 810 ][SP: 10]
[STR: 41][DEX: 42][INT: 22][WIS: 31][CHR: 77]

 

Time passed, without anything worthy of notice happening. Shirou kept grinding his STATS, doing simple Quests around town and fighting undeads on top of the mountains during the full moon.

Destroying those manifestations of malice net him more experience points in a single night than several weeks of doing quests in town. On that night his level had reached 25 and he finally maxed out the Busujima style of swordplay.

At dawn, after he and Saeko returned to her place, she gave him his graduation present.

“Here, you can have this, Shirou,” she said as she offered him a long-shaped object wrapped in white cloth.

Shirou received it with both hands and unfurled the satchel, exposing the hilt of an elegant-looking katana.

[Shisui]
[DMG+150]
[Description: A blade passed down the Busujima family since time immemorial. The one wielding it is recognized as the next head of the clan. After being used for generations to cleanse the souls of the damned, it has achieved an affinity against the supernatural]
[DMG against supernatural entities x1.5]

“Sensei, this is…”

“That sword is called Shisui. It was my father’s blade and his father’s before him. It belonged the Busujima family since the foundation of our clan.”

Shirou knew that. His Sword affinity had already told him as much. He also understood what receiving the sword meant.

– Become my family –

 “I cannot accept it,” he said, returning it back to her.

“I knew you would have said that, but may I ask you why all the same?”

“I have made a promise to my late father. To become an ally of justice. A hero that can save everyone.”

He said it completely seriously. It might have sounded like a childish dream, particularly coming from a kid his age.

Saeko did not laugh, though. Had anyone else said it, she would have thought it silly, but a woman who had already been saved by him didn’t have that right.

She would not belittle his dream, but she would not lie about it either.

“Such a thing is unattainable, Shirou.”

“Yeah, I know that already,” he replied without missing a beat.

“Then, why?”

“Because I think it’s beautiful. Even if it’s something that cannot be reached, it’s still something that’s worth pursuing.”

“To live for an ideal.”

“Yes,” he nodded solemnly.

“You never cease to amaze me, you know that?” Saeko smiled.

“I’d hate to become a man you would consider mediocre, Saeko.”

Saeko’s face blushed prettily. “Now, now, Shirou. Saying something like that after rejecting me it’s just mean.”

“Sorry,” he scratched his cheek, looking away. Sometimes words escaped his mouth before he could think them through as result of his high charisma and wisdom. Still, he did not regret it. Saeko’s blushing face was very charming.

“It’s fine,” she shook her head. “And it’s also fine for you to keep that sword.”

“But…”

“Father wouldn’t have wanted for it to be left to rust, and I believe he wouldn’t have found fault in the man I chose to wield it either.”

“I’m honored.”

“I ask only one favor in return for it.”

“What is it?” he asked eagerly. If he could, he’d repay her in any way.

Saeko smiled mischievously and leaned forward to whisper in his ear.

Shirou’s jaw slackened as he processed her words, face paling at first, then reddening rapidly and lastly settling in a resolute frown.

“I definitely will!”

Saeko smiled and kissed his lips sweetly.

Emiya Shirou had long since chosen to live for the sake of helping others, regardless of the hurdles that would come his way. Nonetheless…

– When you’ve become a hero, help me rebuild my clan. –

 … some promises he was looking forward to fulfill more than others.

---

[You have slept in a bed. HP, ST and MP completely restored]

 “You’ve gotten stronger. Much stronger than yesterday.”

That’s what Yoruichi said when he opened his eyes in his bed the next morning. She was on all four, limbs tense, like a cat in human form would. Her butt was sticking up in the air and her breasts dangled in his vision.

It would have been a powerfully erotic image, except it was anything but.

The intensity of her gaze was unsettling to the point that Shirou forgot all about her nakedness and their position.

He was being scrutinized, measured, judged.

“Cliche as it may sound, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he admitted.

Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t play coy with me. I’m very good at telling people’s strength and you’ve gotten much more powerful than yesterday. I would say About 25% stronger.”

‘Whoa. Accurate,’ he thought as he recalled going from level 20 to 25 in the course of fighting undeads the previous night.

“Your point being?” he asked.

“No one can improve that much overnight. Even Magecraft cannot provide permanent increments in power like that.”

“True, but I still don’t see your point. You are accusing me of something, but I don’t know what. If you’d stop speaking in riddles maybe I could understand what I might have done to upset you.”

“No need for words.”

Yoruichi threw off the covers of the futon. Shirou had no time to move that she pinned him down by the neck. Yoruichi other hand went for his chest and ripped open the shirt of his pajama, only to stop at the sight of his unblemished chest.

“… no hole. Why?”

“I think… I’d have noticed if there had been a hole somewhere on my chest, Yoruichi-san.”

Her eyes returned to his, still scrutinizing yet uncertain.

“How have you become so much stronger all of a sudden?” she demanded to know.

“I have my own secrets, you know? You don’t see me prodding at yours, so kindly return the favor.”

She tightened the hold around his neck. “Have you killed Saeko-chan?”

“… Hah? What? No! What are you talking about?”

“There is no way for power to be created from nothing,” Yoruichi explained while searching his eyes for something. “But it is possible to take somebody else’s strength for oneselves.”

“What? That’s ridiculous. How would anyone go about doing something like that?”

“By killing them and devouring their soul.”

Shirou’s eyes narrowed and his face morphed into a snarl.

“Are you saying that there’s people who would do something like that?”

“Obviously. Which leaves me with quite the conundrum seeing a kid, who on top of being stronger than he has any right to be, suddenly got even stronger in the span of a few hours.”

“I’d never do something like that.”

“Yes, I think so too,” she nodded, finally releasing the grip on his neck. “If you were the type of person who would do something of the sort, you would have tried to devour me already.”

“… That’s why you were clinging to me every night,” he realized. “You were baiting me.”

She nodded. “No Hollow would miss the chance to consume someone who is several times stronger than themselves. Not if they stumble upon them while defenseless.”

“Hollow?”

“The name given to those who consume other people’s souls to steal their abilities and lifespan.”

Shirou squirmed as she wiggled away from underneath Yoruichi. “I’ve never heard about them before.”

“Unsurprisingly. Unlike beings such as Dead Apostles, they aren’t territorials and don’t kill just anyone. They only pick those with enough strength that they would benefit from it.” she explained. “They also don’t act as an organized group. In fact, I doubt most of them know who the others are.”

“So, you thought I was one of them,” he concluded.

“Indeed. You are far too strong for how young you look, but that would only be normal if you had slowed down your aging process by consuming human souls.”

“You’ve suspected me from the start?” he asked.

“I was almost sure you were Hollow the moment we met, but instead of eating me right there and then, you protected me and that threw me for a loop. Hollows can be some very twisted individuals though so I figured you were the type who’d play with his food first. Yet you rejected all of my advances and never took advantage of any opening I’ve left on purpose. That worked in your favor, I admit, but you had no background prior to the fire from five years ago. Pretty convenient for someone who’s not aging, isn’t it? In addition your foster father, the famed Magus Killer died from an undiagnosed illness and you, who are not related by blood and thus shouldn’t have been able to inherit his Magecraft are a Magus yourself.”

“You thought I ate Kiritsugu’s soul?” he asked in shock. Then he registered what else she had said. “Hold up, Magus Killer?”

“You didn’t know?” she tilted her head. “Your dad was pretty infamous in our circles.”

“Dad was… he didn’t want to teach me Magecraft at first and he didn’t talk much about his past either.”

She shrugged, uninterested about his personal drama. “I was really confused about you. Everything pointed at you being Hollow, but your behavior was completely wrong for one. Attending school diligently every day, putting up with that nutjob of your guardian, spending days helping out people around town with no evident benefit -”

“You have been following me?” He hadn’t noticed it, even with his [Detect Presence] and [Sense the Unnatural]. How good was she?

“- so I was about to consider you a mere abnormality,” she continued, “but then your returned home with a power boost that only being Hollow could explain.”

“So, why do you think I’m not?”

She tapped his bare chest with a slender finger. “After they consume a human soul, a hole appears on the Hollow’s chest. It’s why they are called such in the first place. After a few weeks, it disappears, but it’s impossible to conceal right away. I thought I had you, but there’s no hole.”

“I’d say. I would never do something like that.”

“Hm. That’s what I would have liked to think too,” she nodded. “But then, how are you like this?”

“I have a special constitution,” he explained trying to remain vague. “Unlike ordinary humans who need time for their physical strength to grow, I’m only bound by the amount of effort I put in regardless of time.”

That was what sold his particular brand of Mystic Eyes. Humans couldn’t get stronger just by investing effort. They needed proper nourishment and proper rest. The Gamer Body bypassed it entirely and made getting stronger just a matter of grinding or leveling up. If a normal human tried it, forget about getting stronger, they would hurt themselves instead. It was only in shounen manga and videogames that one could get stronger by training like a madman day and night. No wonder Yoruichi who could tell people strength apart had suspected him of being one of those people who cannibalized human souls.

“Huh-uh. Sounds like bullshit.”

“Also, my Element and Origin are both Sword,” he admitted begrudgingly, hoping that it would be enough an explanation for her. He’d rather not speak of the Gamer Eyes.

Yoruichi blinked. “Well, that would go a long way to explain things. You are a little sword prodigy, ain’tcha?”

“Something like that. Those people the other night, were they Hollows?”

“Who, those chumps?” she laughed. “As if. Their grudges had nothing to do with my job as a Shinigami.”

“Shinigami? Death God?”

“Lofty title, huh?” she shrugged. “That’s what Hollows call us. Those who bring them the death they have cheated. We’re just glorified sweepers, though.”

“So, who were they?”

“Let’s just say that my people aren’t above squabbling among themselves. I got a friend out of a spot of trouble with the law, so to speak, and got myself exiled from my clan in return. Some people decided that lacking the protection of my family gave them the opportunity to settle some old grudges without reprisal and they found me right after I got out of a fight against a very tough Hollow. That’s as much as I’m willing to share about the matter.”

“Well, alright. As long as you’re sure you can handle it yourself, I won’t pry. That being said, would you mind telling me what you know about my father?”

“Sure, it’s not like I knew him personally anyway.”

“Also, get some damn clothes on now that you’re done trying to tempt me.”

“Who said anything about being done?” she snorted. “I still enjoy messing with you.”

“Yeah. I had figured that part on my own, thanks,” he sighed. Of course, why did he expect any different from her at this point? This was a woman who did precisely everything she wanted. Shirou had no doubt in his mind that helping a fugitive from the law had been just an excuse for her clan to finally throw her out. Knowing her, they had been probably as vexed with her as he was right then.

Unaware of his thoughts, Yoruichi kept smiling at his obvious discomfort.

At least, he’d get to know more about Kiritsugu. He supposed it was a small price to pay for that.