MPNS Ch 36

Chapter 36

Murmurs rippled through the crowd.

“What’s with that pale one?”

“They say he’s Royal Guard?”

“Since when did the Guard have someone who looks that soft?”

The mutterings from the Black Thorn Knights were only an affront to Nikiel’s masculinity. The Royal Guards’ own comments were no better.

“What, that prissy-looking guy’s supposed to be Guard? Who went and brought along a kept boy…?”

“Whose squire is he? Which lunatic is parading his personal bed-warmer around as a squire, with no respect for a knight’s honor?”

…A kept boy? What did these bastards just call this prince? Nikiel felt his temper spike.

Such insultingly prurient attention — the only recourse was to begin the match and demolish this ‘Tom’ fellow as quickly as possible.

It seemed that even in this world, the males were much the same — a pack of animals who, if you looked at all easy to handle, would instinctively try to press you down beneath their own rank.

As someone with a degree in animal ecology, Nikiel could hardly pretend ignorance of such low male behavior.

If he let himself be dominated here, the upcoming Subjugation Tournament would be far more troublesome.

If there were any in this place who still respected Nikiel as a royal while he sat at the bottom of the hierarchy, they would only be individuals not in possession of an XY chromosome. In other words: among males, only strength commanded obedience.

Whether prince or commoner was irrelevant. In a male body, he would have to prove his strength to them, at least to some degree.

What had begun as a plan merely to claim the Hiohkan tailbone for research and snag the stamina potion had now gained another aim: to assert his masculinity.

If he could beat even a single one of them here, it would be useful for his future designs.

Before stepping into the arena, Nikiel approached the olive-oil urn, scooped some onto his hands, and smoothed it over his torso. The golden oil slid over his white skin like a sacramental anointment.

Already pale and fair-skinned, his flesh now shone sleekly under the sheen. The assembled knights and guards alike fell silent — it was nothing more than a bare chest, as all fighters had, yet looking at him felt like committing a sin.

‘The hell… why’s that guy built like… that?’

Nikiel thought that months of training had transformed his physique into something respectably masculine — but in truth, even with the added muscle, his build still looked refined and lean.

In fact, conditioning had only sharpened a shape that provoked a strange, ambiguous response — the smooth oil running over rounded pectorals and tight rows of abdominals giving his skin the luster of silk.

Shoulder lines held the precarious aesthetics found only between boyhood and manhood.

Even his nipples were that unblemished pink unknown among ordinary men, now slicked to a gloss by the oil. Knights and guards alike swallowed hard.

But Nikiel interpreted the reaction quite differently.

‘The training’s working! They all thought I was a pushover — now they’re stunned by my muscle. Look, you bastards. This is a male’s strength.’

Ph.D. from the top natural sciences school in Korea though he might be, Nikiel had little self-awareness about his body’s aesthetic effect.

From a health and performance perspective, he was objective to a fault; but when it came to understanding how his body and face appeared to others, he was far from perceptive.

This world had few mirrors fit to examine oneself. Bronze mirrors gave only a blurred reflection, and he had never bothered with them.

Back in Korea, where clean mirrors were everywhere, Nikiel in typical STEM-male fashion glanced at his reflection maybe twice a year, on holiday mornings. Even in the army, as a sergeant, he had been much the same.

He had no idea how delicate his features looked under the headcloth, how his lashes fluttered like the wings of a moth, how clear and unclouded his blue eyes shone beneath them.

He didn’t know that months of exercise had yielded balanced muscle mass that framed the taut vibrance unique to young men just emerging from adolescence.

Nor did he realize that the oil trickling down his flat stomach had wetted the waistband of his beret-like bray, making its outline stand out.

Thus, he strode onto the arena floor with jaunty confidence, curling a finger at Tom — unaware that, to others’ eyes, the gesture looked like open provocation of a far more intimate sort.

Tom, who until then had been staring at him with fierce anticipation, now gazed with eyes slightly glazed. Nikiel, seeing that look, decided he had already won the battle of wills.

To win the psychological skirmish before the match itself began — this one was in the bag. He regretted not placing a bet on himself before stepping into the ring.

Tom mounted the slightly raised arena with hesitant steps. Nikiel wound the sash used in Sitata bouts like a wrestling mawashi over his bray and cinched it at the waist.

The oiling, he figured, was meant simply to make the bout more “interesting.”

Proud of his months of training, he stroked his own muscles while waiting for Tom to set his stance and the referee to start the match.

But the arena stayed oddly silent. It felt like everyone’s eyes were glued to the way he moved his hands over his body. Nikiel arched an eyebrow at the referee.

“…Well? Why aren’t we starting?”

“A-hem, well, ah… Tom. Get ready, now.”

“Y-yes…!”

The referee, somewhat dazed, snapped back to himself with a cough and urged Tom into position. Tom’s face flushed suddenly as he took his stance.

Finding their reactions strange but thinking no more of it, Nikiel seized Tom’s belt-grip the instant the referee gave the shaky-voiced call to begin.

Shoulders and upper arms locked, and the sound of dry gulps filled the air.

‘What’s with them?’

Was this some distraction tactic to break his focus? If so, it only meant he needed to focus all the more. His eyes glinted with resolve.

Then, with the first step, he hooked his leg inside Tom’s and toppled him.

“Urgh—!”

“Ni… Nibendi, one point!”

“Wooo!”

“One point” seemed to be the Sitata equivalent of a one-bout win in wrestling. The match was, by default, best of three, so they would lock up again.

Tom, still wearing a bewildered expression after going down without even making a move, was helped up by Nikiel, who grinned slyly in satisfaction at the roar of the crowd.

‘Seen that? I’m awesome, right?’

By no means a natural attention-seeker, Nikiel nonetheless knew there were moments to take the spotlight — and this was one.

Having attended all-male middle and high schools, majored in the natural sciences, served in the army, and gone to a STEM graduate school, he understood the currency of strength in male status games.

Ecology studied the dominance hierarchies of mammals in depth, and under the maxim that “knowledge is power,” Nikiel was confident in navigating such rank battles.

Though his personality was generally placid, he could not abide anyone “pressing down” on him — so he naturally took the upper hand among his own sex whenever possible.

Barring outright disadvantages in physical size, he often ended up the “boss” among equals — not for pleasure, but for convenience.

Once recognized as “the capable one” among males, the unspoken understanding became: No, don’t mess with that guy.

Through this Sitata match, Nikiel wanted more than the Hiohkan tailbone and stamina potion — he wanted that social leverage.

Later, he could reveal that the Sitata rookie who had come out of nowhere was none other than Prince Nikiel, easing his way in the Tournament.

So he pulled Tom up by the wrist until their chests met and, still clasping him, called boldly toward the referee:

“Referee, what are you dawdling for?”

“A-ah, ready, se—”

And then—

“Have you truly lost your senses, my prince?”

Someone wrenched them apart with brute force.

“Ugh—!”

Tom grunted as he rolled across the arena floor. Having lost his counterbalance when his opponent was yanked away, Nikiel staggered.

From above his head came a voice, snarling as if chewing the words — the predator’s breath hot against his ear, enough to raise gooseflesh.

The next sensation was of a cloak settling over his oil-slicked torso, carrying the scent of faint fig and crushed grass.

It was the mingled scent of a wild horse run in from the plains and wildflowers ground under its hooves.

Nikiel tilted his head up in puzzlement — and saw Yullan Balt.

“What are you staring at? Turn around before I gouge your eyes out.”

From below, Nikiel couldn’t read his full expression — but he saw the firm column of his throat, the clenched line of his jaw.

The beast’s thick pheromone all but radiated, like a territorial warning to anything that had dared trespass.