Harem Hero!

Leon froze in horror, grabbed Caitlyn's hand, and closed it forcefully. His dominance made her shiver in excitement, completely forgetting why he touched her.

"What did you just say?" He asked sternly.

"That your strike was masterful!" Lindy replied cheerily.

"No. Not that, the second part." Leon clarified.

"Hmmm? Oh yeah, I love you!" She replied ecstatically, "I just wanted you to know that you're the first person I've ever loved!"

Leon gripped Caitlyn's hand preemptively and made it clear he wanted her to keep it shut. Another wave of excitement made her forget why he was doing it.

Why was he closing Caitlyn's hand?

It was the hand holding Lindy's left arm 100 feet in the air. Caitlyn's head snapped 15 degrees, and she instantly loosened her grip on Lindy's foot when she heard her say [I love you].

Leon felt a wave of anxiety wash over him. He had a genuine phobia of manipulating a woman's emotions for sexual gain.

It was primal fear, not a moral issue.

Now he added a harem member, and less than an hour later, she confessed her love for him!?

"Caitlyn, please fly us up 14,000 feet so—" Leon began.

"Woah! Don't kill me!" Lindy cried.

Leon chuckled in madness and then sighed immediately after.

"Lindy, your situational awareness is legendarily bad." He chuckled breathlessly, "If we dropped you from here you'd die."

Lindy looked down towards the Earth and her eyes filled with terror. She had forgotten how uncomfortable it was to get dragged through the air by one arm, without panties, at a lethal height.

Her excited feelings made her forget all of it. Now she remembered.

"We must go up so most monsters can't attack us." Leon explained, "We're only down here because I wanted to bash monsters' brains in at high speeds. Now, Caitlyn—"

"Aghhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

Aware of her mortality again, the characteristic charge from Caitlyn's flying terrified her to her core.

When they got in the air, Lindy shivered. They were at a height meant for skydiving, not casually holding conversations!

"Okay, Lindy. Look," Leon began, "You're the first person my power's worked on, and I can say—with certainty—it's caused an obsessive and potentially enslaving—"

"Don't take it away!" She cried in a panic, perplexing Leon.

"That's the power talking." He sighed after a deep breath, "You're not in the right frame of—"

"No! You don't understand, Leon!" Lindy cried with tears in her eyes.

Caitlyn scoffed and turned away her head. Leon was far more patient and looked the brunette in the eyes.

"Understand what?"

Lindy's eyes welled with hope.

"Happiness, Leon! I've lived most of my life with clinical depression. It's untreatable!" Lindy cried. Her comfortability in sharing herself was wild.

Leon's eyes widened in surprise.

"You don't have emotions, so you don't understand," She said with teary eyes, "but it's the worst!"

He took a deep breath because he didn't want an emotional thesis.

"You spend years thinking you're a martyr of the truth. That way, you can claim you understand the world's true nature, and thus you'll never be happy." Lindy continued.

"But guess what!? I'm fucking happy right now! For the first time, I'm happy, and guess what? I like it! Please don't take that from me!"

Caitlyn scoffed. However, Leon's eyes widened with shock, and so did Sarah's. That's how he could confirm that her statement was significant somehow.

As a result of his currently minor bonding stat, he felt a slight twinge of pain. It was so insignificant that most people wouldn't notice it.

And it fucking sucked! What the hell was that!? Did she feel that way all the time!?

Leon was half a second away from asking Caitlyn to release her hand and put the wretched creature of her misery! Luckily, she continued before he did.

"Rationalizing this power and claiming cognitive dissonance is a formality!" Lindy cried.

"I'd give up my free will and be your mindless servant for life if I could stay this happy.

Depression sucks, and I didn't know how much it sucked until 50ish minutes ago when I experienced this forced happiness.

That's when I thought to myself—life fucking sucks. It rocks being manipulated! Crank up the slave juice and get someone to sexually please me during withdrawals."

Even Caitlyn was bewildered by Lindy's words.

"Please, Leon! This power isn't always rosy, but you have the option to let me be happy and take away that pain. Don't do that to me!"

Lindy burst into tears. His desire to put her out of her misery and her assertion he could by letting her be part of his harem collided instantly.

Leon looked toward the sky, hoping he could get some type of signal from Alcibiades that such behavior was okay.

Ultimately, if someone consented, he would use them however he wished. He had muted feelings for Caitlyn and used her as a tool. He just wanted to know if it were okay to manipulate people into consensual slavery!

He thought back to his conversation with her twelve hours ago. She was truly interested in whether the power could cure depression.

"As long as someone knows what they're getting themselves into, I suppose…." Leon sighed after a moment of contemplation.

He now needed to officially state that his power would essentially force women into obsessing over him if a member wanted to join his harem.

Worse, he couldn't casually add someone for the sake of survival without his phobia kicking in.

Leon hated his life.

However! His phobia was drawn from his obsession with his image, and now, his image was stellar.

Somehow, in this nonsensical, shockingly non-dystopian world, using Caitlyn made her shiver ecstatically, and enslaving Lindy into loving him forever made him a hero!

No… his [power] was nonsensical, not the world.

He'd wager that countless people would have always traded a partial amount of their freedom for happiness. However, his power didn't exist!

Now he understood what it meant to be [a god].

Leon was a narcissist, but that didn't mean he was delusional. He knew that [he] wasn't a god—yet. But he could recognize a god's power!

To think that there was a power where people would beg to be manipulated by him.

It was disturbing. However, it wasn't as though Leon was manipulating women into the arrangement. If some women wanted to live that type of life, what the hell did he have to do with that?

"Lindy." Leon said with a steady voice.

Lindy looked about at him with puffy eyes. Her emotional magnification took her fear and desperation and jacked it to the moon.

"As a man of culture and a gentleman, I must free you from your cursed affliction. It's the—"

Leon's eyes widened in shock.

—

[Ding! Bond with member Lindy….]

—

Leon didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the scene playing out.

Lindy was staring at him with the most beautiful, beaming smile he had ever seen from anyone other than Caitlyn. She was ecstatic to the maximum.

However, her grin wasn't nearly as wide or eager as the flying shark that had her body half in its jaws.

The thing was camouflage! It was a great white flying chameleon shark blended perfectly into the sky.

It was a next-level death platypus 2.0 that god rebuilt better, faster, and stronger when evolution did its job correctly! (1)

With Leon distracted, doing his best to deal with the highly emotional woman before him, he didn't notice it until its enthusiastic jaws opened wide.

Leon let go of Lindy's hand.