“You merely have to make sure I have no time to do so tonight, then.”
As Sol was stunned by this unexpected reply, Frederica embraced his left arm and looked up at his face with an expression that was a little too flirtatious to be written off as mere mischief. He might have gotten used to seeing her in risqué nightwear, but the sudden addition of the senses of touch and smell made it much harder for him to hold on to his composure.
Perfume he understood, but it had always been an enigma to him why girls simply smelled good as themselves. Her body heat and softness was being conveyed loud and clear through his arm, and her upturned eyes were trained on his face. Having a level in the thousands meant he could run at full speed for an hour and not break a sweat, but his heart was racing so fast that there was already a thin film on his skin. A detached part of him noted what an interesting phenomenon it was.
“I-Is that a challenge I hear? And I’m sure you’ll just get back up after I go to sleep.”
Determining that Frederica was only taking a step further than usual, Sol decided to play off the invitation as a joke. He knew her enough to know that all she was in the mood for was to go over what had happened today. She was probably a little shaken too, like he sensed, but it was in this princess’s character to take action to alleviate such emotions herself. So he was implying that he was willing to hang out with her throughout the night so she didn’t have to continue working all alone after seeing him to bed.
“Or you can see to it that I can’t get back up.” With an innocent face, Frederica wrapped herself even tighter around Sol. “Given where we are, I believe the surest way is to not let me sleep in the first place.”
“Wait, what?” With all the experience he now had, Sol properly read her message between the lines. That understanding, however, was what left him so bewildered by her sudden attack.
Despite her calm exterior, every inch of Frederica’s exposed skin had turned faintly crimson. In this case, however, the blush added to the impact of her uncharacteristically bold approach, and unlike before, there was no need to hide it or any point in doing so. After all, the impression that she was pushing through her embarrassment to appeal to him was speaking directly to his male instincts.
The sight of Sol getting more flustered than she had expected brought a happy smile to Frederica’s face. “I understand that guys can get into the mood at the drop of a hat. As for me, what happened today...”
She had just assumed that, since Sol had gone all the way with Reen, her own inexperienced attempts at seduction wouldn’t work on him. Consequently, she had opened with a move so bold that it had made her blush too.
Drip-feeding assets into a fight was, more often than not, a terrible strategy. In a fight where victory was guaranteed, the optimal tactic was to bring all of one’s forces to bear in one major push to end everything at once. After overestimating an opponent and mounting an inordinate response, however, there was a process that had to be followed. This wasn’t pulling one’s punches or giving up an efficient victory. The issue was that, no matter how great the difference in strength, there was no winning if there was no fight. To prevent that victory from slipping through one’s fingers, one had to first box the other side in. And at times, this required pulling back a little.
“Y-You’re suddenly ready?”
“Who can say?” Frederica giggled. Upon reaching the middle of the courtyard in front of her elegant mansion, she suddenly released Sol’s arm, dashed a few steps ahead, twirled around, then bent down a little and suggested, “How do you feel about a drink before your bath, then?”
Upon returning to this world, Sol had promptly tried to reproduce the setup of having their planet seemingly hanging in the sky overhead and succeeded. The fantastical sight of the blue orb covering the sky above Frederica’s head now lent extra impact to the pose she had struck.
Thinking he was being offered a way out and not seeing the trap in it, Sol sighed inwardly with relief but disguised it as caution. “I don’t think we’ll stop at just one glass if we start.”
“I’m in the mood to get a little tipsy,” said Frederica, fully aware of how coy she sounded. “Would you not indulge me?”
No man could say no to her when she turned on her charm the whole way, save her father and brothers. In this, Sol was just as hopeless as any other guy, Absolute Ruler or no. Furthermore, the influence of alcohol was an all-powerful excuse that was equally useful to both sides. Even though they would never admit it out loud to anyone, even to each other, getting the situation to where they could tell themselves “I wasn’t in control because I was drunk” or “I got so drunk I blacked out” was extremely convenient for both the one on the offense and the one playing defense in this game. When pulled off with success, self-deception gave humans the ability to march with sure steps and their heads held high into situations they would normally steer well clear of.
“Well...if you say so, I guess I can join you.”
“Thank you very much!”
And so, the gong for a battle—the outcome of which had already been decided—rang between the two of them.