However, it was also because he had repeatedly infused Miss Mary's body with his positive energy over a long time.
That was why Miss Mary's power aura became so weak, and why she was targeted by the half-bodied vengeful spirit.
And today, for guiding him to track the half-bodied vengeful spirit, Miss Mary could be credited with some merit.
After purifying the half-bodied vengeful spirit, Hikari immediately handed the remaining lump of purified energy to Miss Mary.
"Absorb this; it should help your body recover quite a bit," Hikari said.
"Eh, I can absorb it? Hikari-kun," Miss Mary looked at Hikari, surprised and somewhat happy.
She was very pleased that Hikari was willing to let her absorb this precious remnant energy left after the monster was destroyed.
But more than the energy itself, what made Miss Mary happier was that Hikari didn't mind letting her regain some strength and wasn't afraid she might run away.
That trust made Miss Mary even more delighted.
"You can," Hikari smiled and nodded at Miss Mary.
Faced with his trust, Miss Mary smiled and said, "The rooftop is so cold. Let's go back to suite first; I'll absorb it there."
"Okay," Hikari agreed.
Miss Mary linked her arm through Hikari's, and the two returned to the presidential suite on the ninety-ninth floor.
———
After returning to the room, Miss Mary began absorbing the urban-legend energy left by the half-bodied vengeful spirit.
Hikari meanwhile tidied up the mess the half-bodied vengeful spirit had left in the hotel.
Their fight had damaged many parts of the hotel.
But for the wealthy Richter Hotel, these were small matters, he could just tell Louisa about it.
However, the people the half-bodied vengeful spirit had killed were not so easy to handle.
Hikari could lend a hand with that problem.
After dealing with it briefly, he awakened the hotel staff.
Then, after blurring their memories a bit, he left the remaining matters for them to handle.
After all, it was the Richter family's hotel; he trusted they could take care of it.
Having finished those tasks, Hikari returned to the presidential suite.
By now Miss Mary had finished absorbing the lingering vengeful energy of the half-bodied vengeful spirit.
Her white, tender calves wrapped in white stockings gently swung at the bedside.
When she saw Hikari enter, Miss Mary immediately jumped off the bed, smoothed her skirt, and solemnly bowed to him.
While bowing she said gratefully, "Hikari-kun, thank you so much for saving me today! If you hadn't shown up in time, when that thing reached here, it would probably have cut my body in two and devoured me."
"No problem," Actually, if Hikari hadn't tied Miss Mary up on the hotel rooftop, perhaps the half-bodied vengeful spirit wouldn't have targeted Miss Mary, but Hikari naturally wouldn't point out that causal link now.
"Thank you so much, Hikari-kun. Mary will always consider you a friend!" Perhaps because she had never received such help from anyone before, Miss Mary was somewhat emotional.
Seeing her so moved, Hikari smiled and said, "Saying thanks isn't enough, is it?"
At his teasing smile, Miss Mary's small face immediately flushed red.
She lifted her ski*t a little and threw herself into Hikari's arms, "I... I'll show my gratitude with actions!"
After saying that, Miss Mary first tilted her head up, puckered her soft pink lips, and kissed the corner of Hikari's mouth.
Then, she slowly knelt in front of Hikari...
———
Although Hikari had explicitly forbidden Miss Mary from just thanking him with words, Miss Mary ultimately chose to use her mouth to express gratitude.
After all, human mouths can speak and act, and the mouth of an urban legend might not be unable to as well.
After properly thanking Hikari with her mouth,
To further show her gratitude, the usually passive Miss Mary gave Hikari a full-body massage service from head to toe, something she rarely did.
After enjoying this puppet spirit's massage and other services for a while, Hikari lay back leisurely on the bed.
He tilted his head and saw Miss Mary sitting at the bedside, cleaning up the mess from the massage.
She tossed the torn white stockings into the trash can. Noticing Hikari's glance, Miss Mary looked up at him smiling, and suddenly said, "I suddenly understand why Hikari-kun was able to kill that half-bodied vengeful spirit so neatly."
Hikari raised a puzzled eyebrow, "Why?"
He had expected Miss Mary to analyze the rooftop fight, perhaps to say how his combat strength suppressed the vengeful spirit, or what flaws the vengeful spirit's fighting style had.
Instead, Miss Mary just shook her head and said, "She lost mainly because the half-bodied vengeful spirit only had an upper body and no lower body. For Hikari-kun, that thing is completely useless."
"Huh?", Hikari's brows lifted.
"Isn't that obvious? Even though she has long hair and her face is okay and she even has breasts. But without a lower body, she just can't 'use it,' so to Hikari-kun she's completely redundant, right?", Miss Mary said to Hikari, smiling.
"I say, Miss Mary, do you have some misunderstanding about me?", Hikari looked at Miss Mary with a vein-popping expression.
"Ah! Sorry, Hikari-kun, I was only joking!", Miss Mary quickly apologized, worried he might really be angry.
Hikari, however, looked serious and said, "Is it that having no lower body means it can't be used? Who told you that? Where did you learn such nonsense?"
"I'll tell you, even with only an upper body, it can still be used, and used very well, understand?"
"Ah?", Miss Mary stared dumbfounded at the man in front of her, feeling a chill along her spine.
'Hikari-kun, turns out... he's that per*erted?'
As a human, not only did he dare to have deep relations beyond friendship with a monster, even a half-bodied vengeful spirit with only half a body couldn't escape his menu?
Seeing Miss Mary staring at him in shock, Hikari chuckled and didn't say he was only joking in passing.
He simply smiled and said, "You know I killed her purely for justice, and it had nothing to do with whether she could be 'used,' right?"
"That creature slaughtered the innocent and killed without pause, how could I let her remain in the world?"
"Of course, there was another very important reason I dealt with her so cleanly."
Miss Mary looked at Hikari curiously, "What reason?"
Hikari said to her, "That she tried to hurt my friend, wanted to use my friend's life as nourishment to increase her power. Such a creature is absolutely unforgivable, right, Miss Mary?"
"Hikari-kun...", Hearing Hikari's words, Miss Mary's eyes reddened and her soft lips trembled.
Even a fool could hear he meant her when he said 'my good friend.'
So Hikari's reason for putting that half-bodied vengeful spirit down so cleanly was related to her having targeted Miss Mary.
If Hikari hadn't arrived in time today, she might have indeed been killed by the vengeful spirit, he truly had saved her life.
Looking at the boy whose face somehow seemed to be getting more handsome over time, Miss Mary, who had never felt the warmth of someone caring for her, was overwhelmed by emotion.
Miss Mary didn't know exactly when she stopped disliking being imprisoned in the hotel by Hikari.
At first, when she came to punish him but was defeated and imprisoned, she constantly wanted to break free and fight him again.
Later, when Hikari forcibly infused her with positive energy to seal her, making her belly swell, she grew even more angry and eager to escape and take revenge.
But sometime later, she began to think more about what tasty human food Hikari might bring her today.
Perhaps from that day on, she gradually forgot about escaping her cage and even became friends with this human.
Maybe it was Stockholm Syndrome. Although she resented being imprisoned and constantly infused with positive energy, the delicious food Hikari brought made her happy and even grateful.
Later she even asked Hikari to infuse her with positive energy, promising a little more food would do; but Hikari never agreed, saying he could already tell what she cared about, food or something else.
In short, during her time at the Richter Hotel, Miss Mary had good food every day and tasted delicacies she had never tried before.
Although now and then Hikari would punish her harshly as education, which felt humiliating,
But... perhaps it was like the delicacies she had never tried before.
The taste of a cream pie... maybe it wasn't so hard to accept?
"Hikari-kun...", Miss Mary suddenly spoke.
"Hmm?", Hikari looked down at her.
"We're friends, right?", Miss Mary asked.
"Of course," Hikari pinched her soft, pleasant-to-touch cheek.
"Forever?", Miss Mary asked anxiously.
"As long as you behave and don't do bad things," Hikari smiled.
"Hikari-kun!", Miss Mary suddenly straddled Hikari's thigh and hugged his neck.
Her lips trembled and her eyes were wet.
Tears poured out like a storm, thoroughly soaking Hikari's pants and the bedsheet under his butt.
[Ding! Miss Mary's affinity +1!]
[Ding! Miss Mary's affinity +1!]
[Ding! Miss Mary's affinity +1!]
Amid that torrent of sobs, Hikari kept hearing the system prompt tones in his mind.
Through Hikari's unrelenting effort and a bit of luck, his hardened will finally became like a spear that forcefully pried open Miss Mary's tightly shut heart.
Miss Mary, whose affection had been stuck around fifty, saw her affinity steadily rise under the spear of his will.
Accompanied by the system's choked-voice prompt sounds, Hikari found it very pleasing to his ears.
———
A few hours later.
Miss Mary, breathing heavily, collapsed onto the special swing in the presidential suite and said weakly, "Hikari-kun, I'm tired from playing, my stomach's hungry, I want something delicious."
Hikari touched her bulging little belly, "What, you're still not full?"
Miss Mary rolled her eyes and said, "I want the breakfasts you usually bring me, something cooked in a pot, not sprayed out of a machine."
"All right, get dressed. I'll take you downstairs to stroll around," Hikari said casually.
"Eh?", Delight instantly lit up Miss Mary's face.
"Can I come down with you?", Miss Mary had expected Hikari would do as before, order takeout or bring food up to her. She didn't expect him to agree to take her downstairs this time.
"Sure."
Upon his affirmation, Miss Mary happily picked up her Lolita dress and quickly dressed.
"Hikari-kun, help me pull up the zipper on the back," After putting on her white stockings and skirt, Miss Mary came to Hikari and, with her back to him, said this.
"You, as an urban legend, actually need someone to zip you up...", Hikari shook his head smiling as he looked at Miss Mary's smooth, jade-like back.
After getting dressed, Miss Mary cheerfully trotted behind Hikari as they headed to the elevator.
While waiting for the elevator, Miss Mary even took Hikari's hand.
Hikari let her tug him along. Although they were holding hands now,
Because Miss Mary was so peti*e, probably not even 1.5 met*rs tall, the contrast with Hikari was striking.
Plus her exquisitely d*ll-like face, the two didn't look like lovers at all; they looked more like father and daught*r.