While those going on the date with me to the amusement park got ready, which took place inside of Delphi’s tower for whatever reason, I sat outside by Valkyria with my back resting against her ruined treads as somebody else rested their head on top of my lap.

And that somebody else just opened their eyes, looked up at my face, and smiled.

“Nya… I must be dreaming still,” Clawdia said before reaching up and looping her arms around my neck. “Drake,” she purred, “let’s continue what we were doing, nya.” Closing her eyes, Clawdia pursed her lips as if waiting for me to kiss her as she lifted herself up a bit to make it easier for me to reach.

Now, she obviously believed she was dreaming because there was no way that she would be this bold except for when under the influence of catnip.

But she was also one of my girlfriends now. Well, we technically never officially stated that anywhere or anything, but it was kind of the assumption that every humanoid woman in this pocket universe, aside from Lake, was my girlfriend. They were also all each other’s girlfriends. And I was the assumed boyfriend of them all. Basically, every single humanoid person in this universe of ours was in one giant relationship while Lake did her own lonely cat lady thing.

So, with that logic, it was perfectly okay to kiss Clawdia in her sleep because she was my girlfriend and was already dreaming about it happening in the first place.

That was why I gave her what she wanted by leaning my head down and pressing my lips against hers.

I felt her lips curl into a smile against my own as she tightened her arms around my neck, keeping herself in place as she mewled and purred. After a couple minutes of kissing like this, she stopped kissing just so that she could whisper, “I thought we were continuing where we left off, nya?” I had no idea where we must have been in her dream, but she made it a bit more obvious when she grabbed my wrist and brought my hand down to her chest. “You couldn’t stop kissing these a couple minutes ago, nya.”

That was when I figured we were probably going just a bit too far for somebody who believed she was still asleep and had no idea that this was actually happening.

But at the same time, my girlfriend just put my hand on her chest. She might not have been as large as Delphi, but she was still my girlfriend, her chest was still soft and felt great underneath my hand, and I was still a man.

Therefore, I did give her a couple of squeezes. And then a few more. And then we kissed some more while doing it.

It was only when I realized that we were getting a bit too caught up in the moment that I remembered two things.

One, Clawdia still believed she was asleep and dreaming.

Two, I still had my back against Valkyria. I was able to feel her emotions regarding the whole situation, and I realized just how embarrassed and awkward she felt being used as a wall for us to basically make out against. She felt like our third wheel and she couldn’t even slip away from us.

So, to spare both of them, I grabbed Clawdia by her shoulders and said, “I’m sorry, you’ve been awake this whole time.” I figured I might as well get straight to the point with it.

Clawdia opened her eyes and blinked a few times as her cheeks slowly turned red. Or rather, it was more like she began blushing from the base of her neck, and the blush slowly crept up her entire head to the point where even her hair became dyed red. Then she looked down and I realized something.

I thought I placed both of my hands on her shoulders… but I only placed one hand on her shoulder.

My other hand was still squeezing her breast.

When I realized my mistake, I looked into her eyes and said, “I’d just like to remind you that you put my hand there yourself.”

That wasn’t too effective since she began to look even more panicked.

Right before she looked like she was about to explode and potentially slap me, she let out a heavy sigh and grumbled instead. “You… you really believed I thought I was asleep?”

“Wait, you knew you were awake?” I asked.

“Don’t make me admit it, nya!”

“Then why’d you get so embarrassed after I pointed it out?”

“Because I thought it’d be cute! You’re supposed to think my reaction is adorable and then pin me down to make me look even more embarrassed like some sort of sadistic, ruthless king who captured the princess and wants to ravage her!”

“That’s not going to happen just because you looked embarrassed! And I’m never going to react like that in the first place!”

“What was the point of conquering me if you’re not going to break my body and mind until I do whatever you want while happily purring the whole time?!”

I felt myself getting annoyed. She expected something out of me that just wasn’t who I was, so I felt the need to prove to her that I could satisfy her even without meeting those absurd expectations of hers. That was why I pushed her down onto her back against the grass and positioned myself over her, holding her by her chin as I pressed my lips against hers.

Clawdia raised her fists as if she was about to either smack me or try to push me away, but she instead opened up her hands and lowered them to the ground next to her head.

A single strand of saliva connected our lips together once I ended the kiss. “There,” I said, staring into her eyes. “I can do that for you, and it can go even farther when we’re alone. But if you want me to be rougher than that, then—”

I stopped myself when I realized that she wasn’t paying any attention. Clawdia’s eyes were spinning in their sockets with spirals replacing her pupils as she giggled incoherently, her smiling lips and blushing cheeks telling me what I wanted to know—well, I assumed they meant what I hoped they meant.

She might have had some pretty intense expectations and fantasies, but a simple, rough kiss was all that was actually needed for her.

I felt relieved because, seriously, if she actually wanted me to act like she explained then there was no way I would ever be able to satisfy her. One, I wasn’t into that. Two, I couldn’t imagine myself ever acting like that. I considered myself a very vanilla kind of man. A bit of roughness here and there was alright, but I liked things… normal.

But I had a feeling what Clawdia said she wanted was far more extreme than what Clawdia could actually handle.

There was no problem as long as that was the situation.

So, while Clawdia recovered from the kiss, I reached back and gave Valkyria a couple of pats on her treads. “Thanks for dealing with us. With how this world works, you’re probably going to turn into a girl eventually, and I promise to make it up to you when you do. Alright?”

Valkyria’s turret began spinning in circles and I could have sworn that I even saw it grow a tiny bit red. But while I might not have been sure about her turret blushing, I was sure about the fact that I could feel an overwhelming sense of embarrassment radiate from her.

I never expected to find myself in the position of wanting to tease a tank.

“What? Are you saying you don’t want me to?” I asked.

Valkyria stopped spinning to instead shake her barrel from side to side.

“So, you do want me to make it up to you?”

She nodded her barrel up and down faster than I’d ever seen it nod before.

“Wait, I just thought of something that’s probably going to kill the mood, but… are you sure that it’s alright for me to step all over you? You can feel it when I step on you, can’t you?”

She hesitated for a moment before nodding her barrel.

However, before I could feel bad about walking all over her…

I realized she felt even more embarrassed after bringing it up.

“Valkyria,” I said. “You… you like it when I step on you, don’t you?”

And just like that, she began spinning her turret again while the feelings I felt from her were so overwhelming and scattered that I had no idea how to tell what she was truly feeling.

All I knew was that between these two and Miss Archer’s obsessive love for all things related to boys, the girls around here had some pretty unique interests.

“I’ll let you cool down now,” I told Valkyria. “I’ve got to take the others on a date. We’ll have our own in the future.”

With that, Valkyria nodded her barrel once again with a bit of a stutter in her movements.

I then scooped Clawdia up into my arms as if she was my bride and carried her back toward where the house was. She realized her current situation after a few moments and asked, “Wha-what do you think you’re doing, nya?!”

“I’m taking you back. Don’t you want to freshen up and get ready before the date?”

“The—the date?! That’s tonight?!”

“Yes. You also slept through the reveal of the archer tower.”

“I did?!”

“Yup.”

“I—I’m a horrible girlfriend… I missed her reveal…” That gave me even greater proof that we basically all considered each other lovers even if it was never officially stated anywhere. “A-and what’s with this—this carrying?!”

“Before you complain that I’m not slinging you over my shoulder like some sort of brute, I think this is more fitting for somebody like me.”

“You nuked my castle.”

“Window set me up.”

“E-even so! I didn’t expect somebody as brutish as you to… b-be so gentle… nya…”

“Contrary to popular belief, I’m not a horrible person.”

(press X to doubt)

me: *spams X*

I bit the top of Window’s body since my hands were busy with Clawdia and swung my head to throw Window.

“S-see?! You bit her and threw her like some sort of wild animal!” Clawdia shouted.

“That’s because it was Window.”

“She’s the mother of your child!”

“But she’s still Window.”

“Then… if I want to be treated like that… I—I have to dress up as an informational status window! That’s it, nya! I’ll order a rectangle suit to wear!”

“I’m not going to bite and throw you just because you’re dressed up as a rectangle.”

“Why no—”

I lifted Clawdia up a bit more and brought my mouth to her neck, biting her as hard as I could without seriously trying to hurt her.

Clawdia squirmed within my arms and wrapped her arms around my neck as she mewled out, her tail coiling around my arm as heavy breaths escaped her delicate lips.

By the time I was done with her neck, a large and noticeable hickey was left as her eyes spun around just like they did earlier.

“There, I bit you. Happy?” I asked.

Clawdia might have been barely conscious after that, but she was at least able to nod and purr.

An hour later, while still waiting for all the girls to finish getting ready for the date with Clawdia now among them, I waited outside with Vala who decided to play her game while sitting on my lap. She turned out to be a pretty good commentator who was happy to explain everything to me.

“You should be a streamer,” I told her.

“Nah, no way,” Vala answered without missing a beat in her game.

“Why not? You’d be great.”

“Because I’m a super cute dragon waifu. Can you imagine how much thirst there would be? I don’t want to deal with a bunch of creepy guys begging me for feet and armpit pics even if they’re throwing a ton of money at me while they do it.”

“That’s fair, but couldn’t you just… you know, change how you look with a snap of your fingers?”

“I could, but I’d still be cute no matter what I do. It’s my curse. It’s impossible for me to be anything but cute.”

“Uh-huh.”

“It’s a shame.” She forced out a sigh. “I’m doomed to forever be cute.”

“Then what about that other thing everybody started doing lately? Using avatars to stream with?”

“Ooh! Vtubing! I love that!”

“Yeah, that seems like something you’d like.”

Vala’s reptilian tail wagged against me as she talked about all her favorites. Dog girls obsessed with fingers and relaxed cat girls, war-crime-committing bunny girls and horny pirates, virtual idols and virtual gorillas—she had no shortage of virtual content creators to talk about.

“So, why don’t you do that?” I asked. “Then you could use an avatar instead of show off your real self.”

“Unfortunately, it wouldn’t change anything. I’d still be too cute,” Vala said. “All it would take is for me to be involved in any way and I would ultimately be irresistibly cute even with an avatar designed to be as hideous as possible.”

“You’re awfully confident in your cuteness.”

Vala paused her game and looked up at me with quivering eyes. “Dr-Drake… fore-forehead kisses? O-or am I not cute enough…?”

My lips pressed against her forehead before I could even think about what was happening. It was only when she turned her head back toward her game and unpaused that I realized what just happened. “You’re… you’re right. You really are irresistibly cute.”

“Hehe. Told ya so.”

“By the way.”

“Yeah?”

“Want to go inside the house for… you know. Everybody is busy inside Delphi’s tower. Even Luca is over there to hang out. So, we’ve got the privacy and probably the time for that.”

Vala paused her game again and, without looking back at me, nodded. “Bu-but first… why so suddenly?”

“Clawdia got me kind of excited earlier, plus you’ve been sitting on my lap wiggling around this whole time.”

“O-oh. Um… s-sorry about that. I didn’t even realize I was—”

“I like it, so don’t apologize.”

“Then… so… should we—should we hurry and do it before they’re done? Wa-wait, won’t that make you dirty and sweaty?”

“We have a bathroom that we never even need in the first place, and said bathroom has a working tub in it. I won’t get dirty and smelly if we’re in a tub full of hot water to keep us clean during it.”

“I-is that really how it works?”

“No idea. Let’s find out.”