The Monster Girl Iris ambled beside her guide, their hands holding each other. After that mysterious white-haired lady disappeared, the guide woke up. Confused, embarrassed, and tired, she profusely apologised. Her teary voice gave rise to an urge to caress her until her tone descended into incoherent gasps.

Unfortunately, as she slept through the event, the guide had no recollection of Iris and Parmin’s identities and the arrival of the white-haired True Master. The two Monster Girls lacked a compelling motivation to seal Iris’s lips, and thus they let her innocence prevail.

“Iris, Lady Parmin, there are other attractions to visit,” the guide said. “I can still hold on. A short refreshing walk will rejuvenate me.”

Parmin giggled. “The next part of our date will be quite intimate; would you like to join in?”

The Monster Girl Iris paused in her footsteps. Her eyes darted to Parmin, glaring at her as if to scorch her with the fiery gaze. It wasn’t that she hated it, for she had some experience with such an event during her time within the cosy cave. But to experience it with someone whose appearance and quality so uncannily resembled her—she didn’t want to defile her innocent self. She didn’t want to admit that desire.

There must be at least a version of her where her innocence endures through the end of time.

“Your gaze is making my inside feel fuzzy,” Parmin said. “What about you, Other Iris? Do you still want to go with us?”

“I . . . have to decline.” The guide swallowed her saliva, yet her throat remained dry. She turned her head groundward, resisting the urge to lick her lips. “I’m merely your guide. My job is to enhance your feeling and commemorate your happiness.”

A palpable regret permeated her tone, but everyone ignored it.

“Your presence will surely commemorate the occasion. Two people are quite common, but three is a rarity.” Parmin crept closer to the guide Iris, but the Monster Girl Iris stepped between them.

“Parmin, this is our date.”

“State your intention, and I won’t ask her anymore.” Parmin playfully crooked her head.

The guide Iris expected a direct rejection, a firm refusal to share a beloved with someone else, but it never came. She looked at the other Iris and found conflict in that pair of clear eyes; it wasn’t inconceivable.

“I appreciate your offer, but the matter of love is delicate. Our time together is short, too short to conclude that the feeling in our chest is the lasting kind.” The guide smiled. “If you make a mistake, it’ll hurt all of us, and I don’t want to hurt lovely persons like you.”

The two Monster Girls ceased their eye contact and shifted their sights to the guide. Though they expected the refusal, they didn’t expect such a resolute one.

“Your belief is magnificent, Iris,” Parmin said. “I won’t annoy you any further. We’ve indeed spent too little time together, but we’ll remain friends, won’t we?”

“If a chance comes to pass, I’m willing to be your guide again.”

The Monster Girl Iris grasped Parmin’s arm and clung to it. She looked at the guide Iris, her pupils growing muddy. “We’ll inform you when we decide to come again.”

When the group returned to the ordinary path and found comfort of the crowds, the guide Iris led her clients to the main road before she bid farewell to Parmin and the other Iris, whom she thought of as her long-lost sister.

“You’ve helped us immensely. Please accept our gift.” The Monster Girl Iris handed a raindrop-shaped miniature made of green crystal. “You can think of it as a charm or a keepsake.”

Knowing that rejection was impossible, the guide Iris thanked the Monster Girls before she departed.

“She bested us at our game, didn’t she?” Parmin said.

“She reminded me of what I’ve lost.”

“The loss of innocence? How cute.” Parmin wrapped her right arm around Iris’s waist, pulling her beloved closer. “Shall we further defile you?”

Iris glanced at Parmin’s playful, caressing fingers and leaned herself on her partner’s soft shoulder. “I don’t want to believe in Fate, but meeting her is an exception.”

“Do you regret your choice?”

“Even if I did, I’ve fallen too deep to recognise it.”

“And I shall pull you deeper and make you mine. That way, you won’t ever regret your choice.”

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“I’m starting to regret it now, Parmin.” Iris chuckled.

Coming out of the mountain, Iris and Parmin decided not to visit the circus. They’d had enough fun in the jungle, and the appearance of the white-haired lady unsettled them. Moreover, their little teases got them frisky, needing to unleash their welling heat.

“I supposed you’ve already picked a place,” Iris said. “A quiet, soundproof, tranquil place?”

“Would you like otherwise?” Parmin bit her lips and stared into Iris’s flickering eyes.

“Any disturbance will break my delicacy.” Iris shifted her gaze away from Parmin. “Only silence should observe our embrace.”

“There exists a place in which we may stay forever. A soft, floating residence hidden near the edge of the forest, concealed from the public eyes.”

“I’ve never heard of such a place.”

“It is my secret cottage, near a still lake, surrounded by tall trees. Excluding me, only Morbi have ever been there.”

“In the place where you embraced her, you also wanted me to embrace you?” Iris harrumphed.

“I didn’t just embrace her; I explored, tasted, moulded her with my hands. Will you do unto me as I did unto her?” Parmin’s trembling voice tickled Iris. “I love you both, equally, indiscriminately.”

Despite the implication, no such revolt appeared inside Iris. She felt no disgust nor reluctance to share her love in a private home where Morbi and Parmin rested in each other’s arms. If possible, she would like to take in their vestige, their embarrassing trace of love.

What has happened to her? Why did she . . . such perverse thoughts . . . they weren’t hers. No. Parmin, it was all her fault!

“Your expression is mesmerising, Iris,” Parmin said. “Should I take you right now?”

Iris pinched Parmin’s arm, though her hands were shivering. “Don’t say such tasteless words.”

“But you’re such a tasteful person that I couldn’t help but covet.”

“Let’s go. If we wait any longer, you’ll ruin my reputation.”

“Yes, my dear Iris. And when Ludmint inevitably come for me, you must hold me dearly, like how I shall do to you.”

Iris forced her gaze groundward. “She won’t come for you. She will, as she should, resent me. I’m unworthy of her promise, aren’t I?”

The look on Iris’s face tucked Parmin’s heartstring, yet she decided against using her power to forcefully weave the Red Threads. She swiftly bent down. Her right hand wrapped around Iris’s shoulders while her left hand held onto Iris’s legs. As she lifted Iris from the ground and the myriad worry, Iris lightly cried.

“What are you doing?” Iris’s meek, trembling voice echoed. “Everyone is watching. Drop me down this instant!”

“Do you love me?”

“I won’t if you keep embarrassing me.” Iris looked around. The gazes directing at her, although cheery, fell on her like tickling feathers that turned her inside mushy and warm. “I can’t believe you’re like this, Parmin. What if Morbi hears about this?”

“I’ll make up to her later. I love both you and her; she’ll understand, Ludmint will understand, but you, will you understand?”

“That you’re taking advantage of my weak heart?” Iris held onto Parmin’s back and planted her face on Parmin’s soft, comforting chest. The intimate warmth helped little to numb the lingering gazes and faint exclamations. “Please . . . please don’t do this. I don’t want Ludmint to know I came here with you.”

“Will you love her less if she knows?”

Iris squeezed Parmin’s back. “How could I? No matter what she does, I won’t ever love her less.”

“Do you think it’s the same for her as well?”

“I . . . I betrayed her trust. I made love with you while wearing her and my engagement ring. Even if it’s for the sake of power . . . it’s wrong, isn’t it?”

“How will she punish you?”

“She’ll surely demand me to compensate her. She’ll lock me up in my bedroom and discipline me with her hands, then her mouth, and . . .” Iris froze. Her burning shame coursed through her veins, turning her face boiling red. “She’ll . . . cuddle and comfort me as if she were in the wrong, even though it’s me who hurt her, who made her worry.”

“Why did you stop, Dear?” Parmin licked Iris’s right ear. “You’re a naughty lady for not telling her, but you still love her the same, right?”

“Even if she forgives me, I’m still guilty.” Iris’s eyes slightly reddened. “It . . . hurts that I’ve come to expect love and affection of others, that I’ve allowed my passion to command me, to rationalise my selfishness. Yet, they . . . she’ll still forgive me. Why?”

“Because we love you. We believe in your ability to amend your mistake. We can forgive you, but only you can absolve your sin. Ludmint, I, and all whom you’ve ever embraced, none of us want you to despair.”

“Then don’t spoil me. Don’t . . . give me too much, or I’ll get greedy and hurt you all.”

“We don’t believe that.” Parmin laughed and tightened her grasp. She proudly held her head high, met the curious onlookers with confidence, and carried Iris out of Rising Mirth Park.

Clinging onto each other, the two entered a carriage. After giving the driver a tip, Parmin covered the windows with the curtains and lay Iris on her lap.

The rhythmic rocking of the carriage dissipated the ambiguous tension in the air. Iris, who’d been keeping her silence, sighed. Her yearning yet ashamed countenance induced a smile on Parmin’s face. If not for the muffled chatters of the outside street, Parmin might have already granted her lover paradise.

“Should I have invited Ludmint?” Iris said.

Parmin perked up. “That would be . . . a special time indeed, but I’d like to be greedy and only have you for myself first. We can welcome Ludmint the next time.”

“There won’t be the next time!”

“Are you trying to monopolise her?”

“How about we invite Morbi instead?”

“No!” Parmin faintly paled. “Although she appears otherworldly and gentle at work, she turns into a different lady in the matter of love.”

“Are you trying to monopolise her?”

After the carriage dropped the two at a remote village, they sneaked into the wilderness and followed an isolated path until they reached a lonely house by a lake. With trees and curtains and the lake as a mirror, the sounds made within the cottage echoed only within.

“I hate you,” Iris said. Her voice resounded multiple times, lessening in intensity but amplifying in sensuality.

“Is it not the best?” Parmin grinned. “Our cries of pleasure will permeate us until we can no longer hear anything but ourselves. With an isolation formation I set up, we can be as loud as we want.”

Ignoring Parmin’s teasing, Iris opened the cottage. The soft, freezing wind greeted her, blinding her for a moment. When she regained her vision, her eyes widened, her heart racing.

Ludmint lay on the bed with her back facing Iris, overlooking the still lake, where fish occasionally jumped up and danced in the air.