"Hear… from my father?"
"Yes."
Nodding my head, I called Mio in front of Shizuka, and with Mio's help, who called Yoshio and put him on a conference call with us secretly, Shizuka heard everything.
Once Mio started asking about his situation in the name of the company, he spoke all about staying abroad longer and about the woman he had fallen in love with.
About thinking of extending the company's arrangements so he wouldn't have to return yet. About his divorce as a plan, and many more.
On my side, the more Shizuka heard him, the more she felt that the earth had shaken beneath her.
And while the call continued, I used the last fragment of control I still had over Yoshio using Control By Extension to make him say something he normally wouldn't.
—"Ms. Mio, I don't love Michiko anymore, nor do I want to be back and tied to that dull life with a child. Please help me settle the matter. I have already made my choice."
When the call ended, the room fell completely silent.
Shizuka didn't cry. She didn't move and simply stood there in silence.
The evidence was still on the table, and the words from the call were still echoing in her head.
However, she wasn't crying, not because she didn't want to, but because she hadn't been given the time to, as I spoke in a tone as if suppressing my anger before she could react.
"…Now that you've finally seen the truth, I guess this is it."
Her head snapped up, but I ignored her, turning slightly away from her.
"It was nice being here. Being with you... But I can't stay in a place where my presence is unwanted and where I'm seen as some kind of home destroyer."
I paused, letting the weight of my words sink in before I suddenly dropped the big bombshell.
"Especially when that comes from someone I love."
That was when I turned my back to her as if leaving, and at the same time, I activated the trait to magnify her guilt and dull her confidence just enough that shame would flow naturally.
After all… she already suspected and knew herself what harsh words she had spoken to me.
Even though this evidence still didn't clear my relationship with her mother, it had clearly shaken her to the core, and she had no time to care about her mother.
All she wanted was to stop me.
"…Wait."
She shouted, but I kept walking.
"No," I said quietly. "It's fine. You've made your stance clear."
At that moment, she rushed and grabbed my arm.
"W-What did you mean by that... earlier, when you said you loved me?"
I didn't turn around to look at her, but my next, straightforward reply directly pierced her heart.
"Exactly what it sounded like. I've loved you since the first time I saw you."
That single sentence was a more devastating blow than all the evidence combined, because to Shizuka, love wasn't a messy, personal emotion; it was a fairytale concept from books and movies.
It was sacred, pure, and holy, something distant and untouchable for a girl her age.
To hear me, the boy whom she admired and for whom she had a special place in her heart, but also whom she had just crucified, confessed such a thing... it broke her.
The contradiction was too immense.
Her guilt surged into a tsunami, her shame spiked to unbearable levels, and deep within her, the stats for Obedience and Corruption skyrocketed as her mind frantically tried to glue the shattered pieces of her world together, with me at the center of it all.
In that moment, she was utterly lost. Her body, however, moved on a pure and desperate instinct.
Her arms wrapped around my waist from behind, and her forehead pressed against my back like a heroine in some tragic princess story she'd once read.
Then, the dam finally broke, and she sobbed.
"I'm sorry... I was wrong. I didn't understand. Please don't go."
I stood there silently and let her apologize and cry.
I let her cry until her sobs subsided into pathetic little hiccups, until I knew she was completely hollowed out, ready to be filled with whatever I wanted.
Only then did I speak. "I don't need apologies." I gently pried her hands from my waist and turned just enough to see her tear-stained, miserable face.
"If you want me to stay… if you want me to forgive you… then you need to understand what you accused me of and what you rejected, and experience it all yourself. Understand me deeply."
Hearing that, she froze. Her red, puffy eyes were wide with utter confusion.
"H-How…?"
"Have sex with me."
"…W-what?"
"Once," I said, my voice perfectly calm as I raised a single finger. "Just once."
Shizuka, thanks to Mio's "education," knew exactly what sex meant. Her head shook frantically in panic.
"I can't. You know what that means. That's not something we just—"
"Isn't that exactly what you thought about love?" I cut off her words in the middle in a sharp voice. "Isn't that what two people in love do? Or is it that you don't love me, don't want to understand me, and that your apology was just a fucking facade?"
The gaslighting was absolute, and I didn't give her a second to process it before pressing my advantage.
"Didn't you always wonder why your mother chose me? Why she fell so hard, even after everything? Why she made those faces of pure pleasure while I was fucking her? Weren't you curious yourself about sex? About what it feels like?"
Her lips trembled, but no words came out.
"All your whys and whats end at sex, Shizuka. So let's have sex. You and me. Let's understand each other and settle this once and for all."
In a sudden, fluid motion, I turned and pulled her into my embrace. I was prepared for a struggle, but to my surprise, she offered none.
She simply collapsed against me as a final, weak excuse escaped her lips.
"I can't… my body, Aunt Mio said at my age…."
"Aren't we both the same age?" I said, finishing her sentence for her. "That's why I used Doraemon's gadget."
Her eyes widened, and she seemed to have suddenly understood something. Seeing her reaction, I nodded in agreement.
"Yes. I made a wish from Doraemon's gadget to give me adult capabilities," I explained, weaving the lie seamlessly.
"Basically, it lets me become an adult whenever I want. The reason I look the same is just part of the wish. But I can make a new wish right now. I can turn you into a complete adult, from the outside and inside. What do you think?"
I pulled her even closer, my lips brushing against her ear as I whispered, "Now, will you have sex with me?"
I didn't push further, because I didn't need to.
At that moment, her Corruption and Obedience stats spiked, and what little remained of her resistance simply disintegrated.
Finally, her shoulders slumped in defeat, and a whisper, so quiet I almost missed it, escaped her lips.
"…If it's only once."
She looked up at me, eyes full of fear, shame, and a fragile resolve and expectation.
"…I'll do it."
[Congratulations on successfully setting off the fall of a Most Important Female Character of this world, Shizuka Minamoto, and making her willingly accept sex.]
===============
The next world is My Hero Academia, and the MC will be Momo Yaoyorozu's brother, hehehe.
You can read this complete fic, and the sequel, all on my P@treon
patreon.com/ShadowParadox