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Angela heard a key turning in the lock. She nearly looked up, but then thought better of it. She wasn’t even sure what her face looked like these days. What if they saw it and there was some pathetic expression of hope on it?
In the more than ten days since her capture, Angela had had ample time for introspection. For better and for worse, she was an intelligent person. It allowed her to analyze herself. She had never done so before—partly because she hadn’t had time, and partly because she hadn’t felt it was necessary.
But now she knew what kind of person she was. She felt she had worked herself out in the broadest terms, and she thought she knew herself better than anyone. But...
“Angela Jindel.”
When that voice echoed through her basement cell, Angela trembled. She looked up before she knew what she was doing. Maybe her face was contorted with her disgusting desires, but it didn’t matter to her. In fact, she wanted him to see it. She wanted him to see those desires and despise her for them. She had never known anyone before in a position to scorn her—as much abuse as she had heaped upon others, there had been none who could heap it upon her.
“Yukinari... Amano...”
He stood before her now, this man with his incredible power. She wanted him to crush her, to control her. All her life she had been unfettered, free to do exactly as she wished, but as a result she was terribly lonely. Nobody ever criticized her; no one ever confronted her about anything. The view from the top of the mountain was spectacular, but she was alone there. There was no one she could cling to.
And so Angela sought a god who could rule over her. Something she could bow before, something even higher than the mountain’s peak. Something utterly, irrefutably stronger than her.
She had found some relief in the True Church of Harris. Their God filled that space above her, and absorption into the ranks of the Missionary Order allowed her to accept how she was. Or so she had thought, until she met Yukinari Amano.
The moment she had found herself close to this superhuman creature, this thing that looked like a man but possessed power greater than any person, she began to see how insubstantial and fanciful the things she had thought of as “God” had been.
Yes: God. Yukinari was a god. A god with flesh. A god with fists. He was more than just some ineffable force of fortune; he could intervene directly, an incarnate god who fought his own battles.
And she, who was just a human, deserved to be beaten by him. Trampled. Controlled, domesticated. Then she could finally be at peace. She would finally know she was not alone.
She wanted a collar, an unmistakable sign of her subservience. The thought was so intense it pained her. And that was why—
“Come out. I want to talk to you.”
—when Yukinari pulled out a chain connected to an iron ring, Angela thought she might burst with joy.
He understood. He would give her what she wanted. This man—this god—was the one she must worship.
“Yes—!”
As she went to him, she blushed like the maiden she was.