Gathering Wives with a System

Chapter 743: Reactions Of Wives, NTR, Compensation

"Oh, right, Isaac. What exactly did you do with Jasmine last night?" Celia asked, looking at him with obvious curiosity. "Her smell is still stuck on you, you know. Alice is going to kill you."

Isaac’s steps faltered for a moment, but he quickly recovered and continued walking as though he hadn’t heard anything unusual. Unfortunately, Celia had already noticed his reaction, and the mischievous smile spreading across her face told him she wasn’t going to let the matter go so easily.

"I thought you would try to hide it. Aren’t you afraid of Alice? You know how she gets when something related to you happens," Celia said.

Isaac shook his head and replied confidently, "I was going to tell her about it anyway. It’s not something I plan to hide, especially when I haven’t done anything wrong."

His confidence, however, wasn’t nearly as strong after he sat down at the breakfast table and explained everything that had happened with Jasmine the previous night.

Isaac gulped as an uncomfortable silence settled over the table, broken only by the occasional clicking of cutlery against plates. Selene and Alice were clearly furious, but what made the situation particularly frightening was that neither of them had said a word since he finished explaining. They simply continued eating their breakfast with expressions that gave absolutely nothing away.

Isaac opened his mouth, hoping to say something that might improve the atmosphere, but Selene placed her spoon down before he could speak. She wiped her mouth with a napkin, folded it neatly, and looked toward him.

"Let’s kill Jasmine."

"...What?" Isaac asked, wondering whether he had heard her correctly.

"I said we should kill her," Selene repeated calmly. "I never trusted that woman in the first place, and now she’s giving us even more reasons to get rid of her. She knows too much about us, and with her ability to see the future, there’s no telling what she might do if she decides to betray us."

Isaac stared at her, unable to determine whether she was completely serious or simply venting her anger. The problem was that Selene possessed a contract with the Elemental Spirit of Machines, which made her an especially dangerous opponent for a Technomancer like Jasmine. If she genuinely decided to attack, Isaac wasn’t entirely certain that even Jasmine’s future sight would be enough to save her.

"Let’s do it!" Celia suddenly exclaimed with an enthusiastic grin. "We can conquer her city afterward. Think about how many resources we’ll get from that!"

"Exactly," Selene agreed, nodding approvingly. "We could use those resources for trade, and taking control of a city of this level would establish our position as the dominant power in this region."

Isaac turned toward Emily, hoping she would say something sensible before the conversation developed into an actual invasion plan. Unfortunately, Emily avoided his gaze and quietly continued eating, leaving him with the uncomfortable realization that she wasn’t particularly opposed to Selene’s suggestion either.

Apparently, Emily was also angry about what Jasmine had done, even though she hadn’t complained about it openly.

"Stop," Alice finally said, just as Selene appeared ready to stand up.

Selene turned toward her with a displeased expression. "She touched Isaac. Are you seriously going to let that slide?"

"Did she?" Alice asked, shifting her attention toward Isaac.

Isaac immediately shook his head. "She jumped on me, but I can use Telekinesis as a shield now, so she never actually touched me directly. I was shocked when she did that, but I still have fast reactions. Setting up a shield quickly is easy."

"There, you have your answer," Alice said, turning back toward Selene. "Besides, Jasmine doesn’t like Isaac. I’m certain of that, and if anything, she probably hates him. What happened last night was simply an unfortunate incident caused by alcohol."

"But that doesn’t change the fact that—"

"Nothing happened, Selene. Let’s not turn this into something bigger than it needs to be," Alice interrupted sternly.

Selene frowned but eventually settled back into her seat, although her expression made it obvious that she wasn’t satisfied.

Isaac didn’t know how to feel about Alice defending him. He had expected her to be the first person to lose her temper, yet somehow, she had ended up being the one preventing the others from doing something unreasonable. Considering her usual attitude toward women approaching him, the development was almost unbelievable.

"You know, there’s something I’ve been wondering about," Catherine suddenly spoke up while taking another bite of her breakfast. "Isaac mentioned that Jasmine kept calling him darling, didn’t he? What if she saw some future involving the two of them and mistakenly believed she was experiencing that future while she was drunk?"

Isaac stared at Catherine in disbelief.

It wasn’t as though he hadn’t considered that possibility himself. In fact, he was almost certain Jasmine had seen some ’unpleasant’ future involving him, which would explain why she disliked him so intensely. She probably believed he would use some unscrupulous method to make her his wife, although Isaac had absolutely no intention of doing anything like that.

But did Catherine really have to bring it up now?

When he noticed the faint smile on her face, Isaac finally understood. She was getting revenge for all the teasing he had subjected her to during their journey through Sky City.

A helpless sigh escaped his lips.

"I don’t know, and frankly, I don’t care," Isaac said, looking between Alice, Selene, and Celia. "I don’t like Jasmine, so there’s no possibility of us getting together."

"But Sir Sage Sea said God Domains can develop because of your Fate," Celia pointed out thoughtfully. "And you have the God Domain of NTR—"

"I don’t have it yet," Isaac immediately interrupted.

"You’re on your way to obtaining it, though, and Jasmine already has a husband. So, if we consider what Catherine just said, everything matches up. That means..."

Celia chuckled without bothering to finish her sentence.

Isaac gave the little devil a long stare, wondering why she seemed so determined to make his situation worse. Sometimes, he genuinely believed Celia would happily throw him into a fire just to see what kind of reaction she could get out of him.

He massaged his brows before speaking again.

"Jasmine is Gael’s wife, and I would never do something like that to him. Whatever her reasons for behaving that way last night, I have no intention of getting involved with her."

His words were sincere, but Isaac knew they probably wouldn’t convince everyone at the table. After all, he had already told his wives that Gael disliked Jasmine being referred to as his wife, and their relationship appeared to be rather complicated.

Fortunately, the conversation gradually moved on, allowing Isaac to finish his breakfast without another argument breaking out. He was just beginning to believe the troublesome matter had finally been settled when two familiar figures appeared at the entrance.

Jasmine and Althea had arrived.

The two entered the resort’s dining hall just as Isaac and the others were finishing their breakfast. Althea greeted everyone with a polite smile, while Jasmine followed a step behind her, looking as composed as ever despite the events of the previous night.

"Good morning, everyone. I hope we aren’t interrupting anything," Althea said, glancing at the dishes still spread across the table.

"Not at all. We were just finishing breakfast," Isaac replied, although his attention was already shifting toward Alice and Selene.

The two had immediately fallen silent upon seeing Jasmine, and Isaac could feel the mana around them beginning to churn. Neither had made any threatening movements, but the sudden change in the atmosphere was noticeable enough that even Catherine stopped eating and glanced between them.

Isaac looked toward Alice, feeling another headache coming on.

She had been the one calming Selene earlier, but now that Jasmine was standing right in front of them, it seemed even Alice was having trouble controlling her anger. Her expression remained relatively composed, yet the mana gathering around her told Isaac that she was nowhere near as calm as she appeared.

Althea also seemed to notice the hostility directed toward her mother, and her expression briefly changed to surprise. However, instead of becoming worried or offended, she glanced at Alice and Selene again before a strangely happy smile appeared on her face.

Isaac found her reaction rather confusing.

’What’s she so happy about? Does she actually enjoy seeing her mother get into trouble?’

Before he could make sense of Althea’s reaction, Jasmine stepped forward and turned toward him.

"Isaac, there’s something I need to say to you," she began, her expression becoming noticeably serious. "I’ve already learned about what happened last night, and I came here to apologize for my behavior."

For a moment, nobody responded.

Even Alice and Selene appeared surprised, while Isaac stared at Jasmine with raised eyebrows. He had expected her to either avoid mentioning the incident entirely or become defensive if someone brought it up, so hearing her apologize of her own accord was the last thing he had anticipated.

Jasmine noticed their reactions but continued without allowing herself to become distracted.

"What I did last night was completely inappropriate, regardless of how much alcohol I had consumed. I behaved shamefully and placed you in an extremely uncomfortable situation, even though you did nothing to deserve it," she said, lowering her head slightly. "I’m genuinely ashamed of my actions, and I hope you’ll accept my apology."

Isaac remained silent for a moment, studying her expression.

There was no trace of the possessive woman who had clung to him the previous night, nor did she seem to be offering an apology merely to protect her reputation. If anything, Jasmine looked genuinely uncomfortable discussing the incident, but she was still taking responsibility for what she had done.

"Well, since you’ve apologized so sincerely, I don’t see any reason to hold it against you," Isaac finally replied. "You were drunk, and nothing serious happened in the end, so we can just forget about it."

Jasmine visibly relaxed at his response, although she still looked somewhat embarrassed.

"Thank you for understanding. I assure you that nothing like this will happen again."

"That’s fine!" Celia suddenly chirped in, smiling brightly at Jasmine. "Since you’ve apologized, we won’t hold what happened against you anymore. That said, I think you should compensate us for the trouble you caused."

Isaac slowly turned his head toward Celia.

The girl was sitting beside him with a small, perfectly innocent smile, as though she had merely made the most reasonable suggestion in the world.

’When did this little devil become so clever?’

Isaac stared at her in disbelief, realizing that Celia had somehow managed to turn an awkward apology into an opportunity to extort compensation from the Seventh Queen.

And judging by the way her smile widened when Jasmine looked toward her, she had absolutely no intention of letting that opportunity slip away.