Transmigrated into Eroge as the Simp, but I Refuse This Fate - Chapter 154

Chapter 154: Her morning
“Shall we train—”

RUMBLE.

Damien blinked.

Then sighed.

“…Right.”

His hand pressed to his abdomen as another low growl twisted through his core, echoing faintly in the marble-lined bathroom. It wasn’t just hunger. It was emptiness. His last meal had been sometime yesterday—right before he’d sparred with Elysia for hours, forcing both their bodies past exhaustion.

And after that?

Well, he’d burned through far more than just calories.

“Shit,” he muttered, shaking his head with a dry grin. “No wonder.”

His towel slung low over his hips, Damien turned, water still clinging to his skin, steam trailing behind him like a ghost of his former self. He stepped out into the hall, barefoot, the cold floor biting against his soles in contrast to the heat of the shower. The Blackthorne Villa was quiet—still nestled in that dead silence between dawn and morning proper.

As he made his way toward the kitchen, intent on throwing together something—eggs, meat, anything to stop the gnawing ache in his gut—

Ding.

The system’s voice entered his mind again, smooth as ever:

[Notice: Host is operating in caloric deficit.]

However—due to the ongoing activity of the [Physique of Nature], fat stores will be prioritized as fuel.

Muscle mass will not degrade. Catabolism is inhibited.

Recommendation: Proceed to training. Hunger will not impair performance.

System urges: Burn it all.

Damien stopped.

Then looked down at his torso—still thick, still padded—but now tightening. Reforming. Burning.

A smirk curled at his lips.

“…You really want me back in the fire already, huh?”

Another soft pulse thrummed beneath his skin. Not a push—but a pull. His body wanted to move. It wasn’t resisting the hunger—it was feeding on it. Every cell had already decided: We’re cutting weight today.

“Alright, fine,” Damien muttered as he turned, abandoning the kitchen. “Let’s burn some fat.”

He rerouted himself back toward the training hall, bare-chested, half-damp, towel still wrapped around his waist like some monk preparing for war.

He’d eat later.

Once he earned it.

Besides—

Elysia would be waking up soon. Whether from the sun or the soreness, she wouldn’t be down for much longer. And when she came downstairs?

He wanted her to see him already working.

Already sharpening.

Already changing.

So that the next time they crossed blades—or limbs—

She’d feel the difference.

He stepped onto the training mat, the system’s quiet pulse humming behind his thoughts, and let the world fall away.

******

The soft brush of warmth on her face stirred her first.

It wasn’t abrupt. No jolt, no alarm. Just a slow, creeping awareness. Like rising from beneath water. Light touched her eyelids, and the scent in the air—clean, faintly masculine, and oddly familiar—tickled at the edge of memory.

Her eyes fluttered open.

She stared at the ceiling.

But this… this wasn’t right.

It wasn’t hers.

The molding above was ornate, far more intricate than the simple ceiling of her quarters. The light—soft and golden—filtered in through thick velvet curtains, drawn just enough to let morning spill lazily into the room.

And then—

Realization struck.

Her breath caught.

Her eyes widened.

This was not her room.

This was his.

Damien Elford’s bedroom.

The very space she had entered and cleaned every day, every week, with practiced, mechanical detachment. A room of routine. Of observation. Of distance.

But now—

She was in the bed.

Not standing at the doorway, not tidying his desk, not adjusting the sheets while he was away.

She was lying in his bed. Naked beneath the sheets. Her legs still sore, her muscles quietly aching from—

Her heart stuttered.

The memories crashed down all at once.

Damien’s voice. His hands. The press of his body against hers. The way her own instincts betrayed her, not with resistance, but with need. How easily her control—so sharp, so honed—had been stripped away, peeled back with every touch, every kiss, every whispered word.

He had taken her.

All of her.

Her first time.

Her breath came shallower now, fingers slowly curling around the edges of the sheet as she shifted slightly beneath the weight of it. Her eyes dropped—

To her wrists.

The bracelets.

Still locked in place. Matte black. Silent. A tool of restraint.

Her Awakened strength—suppressed.

They were meant for training. A way to dull her natural edge so Damien could spar against her and she would not worry about her not being able to control her strength.

Yet now… they had served a different purpose.

She swallowed hard, throat dry.

If she’d had her full power—would she have stopped him?

Would she have fought harder, hesitated longer?

Or would she have still folded beneath him?

She didn’t know.

That uncertainty coiled through her like a wire drawn tight. Not pain. Not shame. But something… deeper. More complex.

Because when she closed her eyes again—just briefly—she could still feel him.

His lips at her throat. His breath against her skin. The warmth of his voice in her ear as he whispered the word—

Master.

And what terrified her most wasn’t that he’d said it.

It was that, in her heart, she’d accepted it.

Without a single ounce of resistance.

She shifted, slowly sitting up, the sheet falling away from her bare shoulders as she steadied herself against the mattress. Her body ached—not from injury, but from exhaustion. Deep and complete.

And yet… she didn’t feel broken.

She felt changed.

The silence of the room stretched out before her, golden light tracing soft lines across the floor, across the untouched half of the bed.

Damien was gone.

But his presence lingered—on her skin, in her pulse, in the weight of the word he’d left behind.

Master.

She reached for the edge of the sheet, drawing it around herself slowly, quietly. Her eyes flicked once more to the bracelets.

‘When did I start accepting him?’

There was no clear answer.

She sat there in silence, the sheet wrapped tightly around her bare form like armor made of fabric. It wasn’t cold in the room, and yet her body trembled faintly—an echo, a memory, a weight left behind by a night that had unraveled something she never meant to show.

Her fingers brushed over her lips.

They still tingled.

Master.

She had said it. Over and over again.

Cried it.

Begged with it.

Her voice—normally cold, calm, disciplined to perfection—had shattered beneath the pressure of his touch, of his words, of his presence. And each time it cracked, that word had spilled out of her like instinct. Like truth.

She lowered her gaze, her face warming.

‘How… am I supposed to look him in the eyes now?’

The question curled in her chest like shame, but it wasn’t shame she truly felt.

It was vulnerability.

Foreign. Frightening.

She’d spent her entire life learning how not to feel—how to obey, how to endure, how to remain unseen, even when standing right in front of someone. She was the blade in the dark, the ghost in the room. A weapon. Not a woman.

And last night—

He had made her feel everything.

Her thighs squeezed together without meaning to, a nervous twitch of memory chasing sensation, and her breath stuttered in her chest.

He liked it when she called him that.

He had smiled—genuine, wicked, proud—every time the word broke free from her lips. Every time she said it with desperation, or need, or longing. Like it wasn’t just obedience.

Like it meant something more.

And the worst part?

It did.

Her fingers reached, slow and uncertain, for the bracelets still locked around her wrists. Cold. Familiar. Suppressing. Comforting. She had worn them so often in training that she sometimes forgot they were there.

They dulled her strength.

They muted the Awakened power that lived inside her bones.

But last night, they’d muted something else.

They’d kept her from fighting.

They’d kept her from pushing him away.

She should’ve removed them.

She should’ve stopped him.

And yet…

She hadn’t.

Because a voice—his voice—lingered in her mind like a shadow of heat:

“You were taught to suppress… to obey… to vanish. But not anymore.”

She closed her eyes slowly, the words sinking deeper.

“You’re allowed to look at me with those desired eyes.”

He had said it like it wasn’t a request.

Like it was a law being rewritten in real time.

“You’re allowed to love me.”

Her breath caught.

Not because she rejected the idea.

But because—somewhere inside her—she didn’t.

She wasn’t ready to say it. Not aloud. Not yet.

But the foundation had been laid. The structure built without her realizing.

He was no longer someone she served because of command.

He was no longer someone she simply protected out of protocol.

He was her Master.

Not in title.

In heart.

Elysia gripped the sheet tighter, teeth catching on her bottom lip.

‘What… am I supposed to do with this?’