VILLAIN'S HAREM IN OTOME GAME

Eren pulled up an empty wooden stool, sitting backward and resting his folded arms over the backrest.

"Now then," Eren began, his tone pleasant and conversational. "Who is handing you the shipments of The Substance? Tell me please."

Outside the cell, Seraphina, Aria, Cinon, and Emily watched in stunned, breathless silence as the guy who had endured seven days of torture without flinching opened his lips with mechanical obedience.

"Baron... Kiliyan..." the old man droned, his voice flat and devoid of will. "Overseer of the western border... he approached me... three months ago..."

"And his supply chain?" Eren pressed, his dark blue eyes sharpening like scalpels. "How he sending you those things?"

"He brings the sealed crates under the crest of agricultural fertilizer..." the boss muttered, his chest heaving with shallow breaths. "He didn’t take any payment from me...he said those who’ll approach me for those things would...pay enormous amounts of money."

Eren nodded slowly.

Pushing himself up from the stool, Eren dusted off his trousers, turning toward the exit. "Good boy, Santa. Enjoy the rest of your retirement."

Just as Eren laid his hand on the latch to leave, a wet rattle tore through the old man’s throat.

The haze in the old man’s eyes cracked slightly, replaced by a sudden glint of bitter malice. A broken, bloody smirk stretched across his swollen lips.

"Heh... heh... think you won, boy...?" the smuggler rasped, coughing up dark flecks of blood. "You’re stepping into a web... that’ll devour your whole..."

Eren paused, his fingers resting on the iron handle without turning around.

"And that girl... the one you asked about that day..." the old man wheezed, his laughter growing ragged and hollow, echoing off the damp stone walls. "I told you then, and I’ll tell you now... I don’t know if that substance got into her hands... but I know how that syndicate operates... they won’t leave her until she serves her purpose... they never do..."

The pink chuckle rattled out of the prisoner’s chest, echoing through the quiet cell.

Eren’s hand froze on the latch.

"I really don’t get why you’re so damn fixated on that one girl, boy," the smuggler wheezed, blood bubbling between his blackened teeth. "Must be special to you. But take it from an old hand who’s seen that syndicate chew through flesh... if they marked her as their vessel, she’s already a corpse. She won’t survive."

Eren’s arm dropped limp against his thigh. The quiet room felt suddenly airless, the dim manalight casting shadows over his motionless body.

He closed his eyes.

His index finger began drumming against the side of his leg in a mechanical cadence.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

In the dark behind his eyelids, the screams echoed. Flashes of shattered glass, blood stains on floor, the smell of alcohol. The horrific sensation of being helpless, of arriving too late, of watching someone he loved slip through his fingers while he stood paralyzed.

’Don’t remember it. Don’t remember it."

He repeated in mind helplessly and suddenly, his eyes snapped open.

He turned around slowly.

Outside the cell, Seraphina was frowning in deep contemplation, her arms crossed.

"Baron Kiliyan..." Seraphina murmured, glancing toward her knight. "Emily, we have any records on him?"

"Baron Kiliyan oversees the western border march, Your Highness," Emily reported promptly, her brow furrowed. "His territory holds negligible mineral value, minimal agricultural yield, and his household retains no notable standing in current power struggle. He has remained strictly neutral simply because he lacks the leverage to matter."

Aria’s golden eyes narrowed. "A harmless, insignificant border baron is precisely the kind of invisible vessel someone would use. Do we have to apprehend him? It’s troublesome to question a noble."

"We don’t have the luxury of hesitation," Seraphina said, turning to the mountain of a man beside them. "Cinon, investigate Kiliyan’s daily activities. Find if there’s anything useful."

"At once, Your High—"

BAM!

A thunderous sound rattled through the cell.

The two flanking guards shouted in panic, stumbling back. "Princess! Inside the cell—look!"

Seraphina, Aria, Emily and Cinon snapped their heads toward the cell. Their breath caught in their throats.

The heavy, bolted iron interrogation chair had been broken, shattered into twisted, mangled scrap.

Eren had hoisted the massive, two-hundred-pound smuggler clean into the air with a single hand clamped around the man’s throat, pinning him brutally against the back wall.

CRACK!

Eren’s right fist drove directly into the old man’s face with terrifying force.

The smuggler’s skull bounced violently off the walo, spraying mist of blood and fractured teeth across the room.

CRACK! THUD!

Eren didn’t utter a word. There was no theatrical taunt, no witty banter, no smug half-smile. His face was cold, terrifyingly still as his fist struck forward again and again with lethal, bone-splintering momentum. He was pulping the man’s head into red paste.

"Open the damn door! Now!" Seraphina screamed, her blood running ice-cold. "Cinon, break it!"

Cinon slammed the steel slab open with a violent shove. The three retainers surged into the chamber, Cinon leading the charge, but the scene inside made even seasoned palace veterans freeze in horror.

The syndicate boss was barely conscious, gurgling through a ruined face, his feet weakly kicking in the air. Eren’s face was splashed with flecks of fresh blood, his dark bangs falling over eyes. He raised his fist again, knuckles dripping, preparing to turn the prisoner’s skull into paste.

"Lord Volsver, stop!" Cinon roared, stepping forward and clamping both massive, armored hands onto Eren’s striking arm.

The giant pushed his full, earth-shattering aura into the hold and barely budged the boy’s elbow by an inch. Eren’s arm felt like solid iron, vibrating with a terrifying, untamed vitality that threatened to wrench Cinon’s shoulder out of its socket.

"Eren, stand down! That’s my order!" Seraphina shouted, rushing into the bloodied room. "We need him alive! Stop this!"

Eren didn’t look at her. He didn’t even blink. He cocked his fist back.

Seraphina stared at him, her heart thumping against her ribs in terror. It wasn’t the charming scoundrel who teased her mother in the rose garden. Standing before her was a monster—a carnage that looked ready to tear the guy into pieces.

Before the fatal blow could land, Aria stepped past the guards. Ignoring the blood, ignoring the feral presence radiating off him, the blue-haired villainess stepped straight into his blind spot and wrapped her slender arms around his waist from behind.

She pressed her cheek firmly on his shoulder, burying her face into his coat.

"Eren," Aria whispered softly, her hands locking over his trembling abdomen, squeezing with gentle warmth. "Stop. Look at me. We have what we need."

The warmth of her body seeped through his coat and his fist froze in mid-air.

The suffocating pressure in the cell slowly began to fracture. His shallow, ragged breathing hitched in his chest. As Aria’s soft voice murmured quiet comforts against his spine, the red haze blinding his vision faded, returning the cold blue light to his pupils.

Slowly, Eren opened his left hand.

The mangled syndicate boss collapsed onto the stone floor in a limp, bleeding heap, wheezing faintly as the guards scrambled to take him out.

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