Sheila stopped dead in her tracks when she saw a human guy sitting right in the middle of her private hot pool.
Her blue eyes locked onto his face, but her expression remained completely indifferent to the entire situation.
She didn't scream for the guards, and she certainly didn't look embarrassed to find a naked man soaking in her personal tub.
Kai, on the other hand, panicked completely and lost all his cool guy composure.
He instantly stood up from the underwater bench, sending water splashing everywhere and exposing his entirely naked body to the cool air of the bathroom.
"I am so sorry for the intrusion," Kai stammered out quickly, already taking a huge step toward the edge of the pool so he could grab his new clothes and run away to save his own life.
But right before he could pull himself out of the tub, the soothing hot water surrounding his legs instantly turned cold.
The sudden temperature drop sent a shiver straight up his spine, and he realised Sheila was already using her magic to trap him there.
He looked back over his shoulder to see exactly what was happening behind him. Sheila was calmly walking down the stone steps right into the freezing pool, and she was completely naked.
She had dropped the white silk top somewhere on the floor behind her, and her eyes were absolutely glued to his face as she waded deeper into the water.
"Sit," she ordered, and her voice echoed loudly against the walls of the bathroom/
Kai didn't argue with her at all because he knew better than to disobey a high-level boss when he was trapped in her own territory, so he immediately took his place back on the stone bench and submerged himself up to his chest in the icy water.
Sheila glided smoothly through the pool and sat down on the bench at the opposite corner.
The water level was just low enough that her beautiful boobs were half inside the water and half outside, glistening perfectly under the blue crystals floating near the ceiling.
'Holy shit, I want to touch those so bad,' Kai thought as he stared across the pool at her flawless figure.
But he knew his system would not let him finish the job without totally embarrassing himself again. If he gave into his urges and got too close to her, he would trigger that high-level target warning and just pass out face-first into the freezing water.
He would probably drown before he even got to enjoy the reward she promised him, so he forced his hands to stay flat on his knees safely under the water.
The silence stretched on for five solid minutes, and it felt like torture. The only sound in the giant bathroom was the gentle bubbling of the spring fighting against Sheila's ice magic, and the tension in the air was thick enough to make him sweat somehow.
Kai just couldn't handle the quiet anymore.
He felt like he was sitting in the principal's office waiting to hear his death sentence, so he opened his mouth to make the awkward atmosphere disappear and get the conversation moving.
"Uhm, Sheila, you look really busty today," Kai blurted out without putting a single second of thought into his words.
'Fuck my life, why did I just say that out loud?' Kai thought immediately after the stupid words left his mouth.
He didn't speak another word after that total disaster, choosing instead to stay completely still and pray she wouldn't freeze his tongue off for making such a ridiculous comment to a powerful witch.
But Sheila actually looked highly amused by his complete lack of a verbal filter.
A tiny smile played on her pale lips as she leaned her back against the edge of the carved stone tub and studied him carefully.
"What exactly are you, Kai?" Sheila asked, tilting her head to the side as she looked at him with genuine curiosity.
"You are quite unlike any humans I have ever seen from the human continent, because you act so boldly around me, yet your physical body is incredibly weak."
Kai swallowed hard, feeling incredibly grateful she was actually talking things out instead of attacking him with a barrage of ice spears.
"And why exactly did you pass out on my bed that day?" she continued, her icy eyes narrowing slightly as she tried to figure out all his hidden secrets.
"One moment you were completely confident and ready to take me, and the next moment you were completely unconscious on my pillows."
Kai knew he couldn't just tell her the system cockblocked him because his level was too pathetic to handle her overwhelming boss aura.
That honest explanation would completely ruin his cool image and destroy any chance he had of keeping her on his side for the upcoming fights.
He decided he needed to spin a lie to cover up his low level, repackaging his weakness into something that sounded way more impressive and mysterious.
"So here is what happened," Kai started, doing his absolute best to bluff his way through her intense interrogation.
"You see, I occasionally get those terrible fainting spells when I can't properly control my powers."
Sheila raised a delicate silver eyebrow, looking highly intrigued.
"Your powers?"
"Yes," he answered smoothly, trying his hardest not to look directly at her eyes because her intense stare was intimidating.
But looking down at her half-exposed boobs was honestly even worse for his heart rate, so he compromised and stared at a very safe middle ground right around her collarbone.
"It is a very rare and complicated condition that I have had for a while. Whenever I get really excited or my adrenaline spikes too high during a fight, I get a massive surge of power running through my veins. But the problem is, if I experience a sudden overflow of that power, my brain just forces me to faint so my body doesn't tear itself apart from the inside out."
It was easily the biggest lie he had told since arriving in this crazy apocalypse world, but he delivered it with total confidence like a seasoned actor playing a tragic hero.
Sheila looked interested in his fake medical history, and she didn't call him out on the lie at all.
Instead of questioning his story, she pushed off the stone wall and slowly swam across the pool right toward him.
The cold water rippled softly around her waist as she smoothly closed the distance between them.
Since she was naturally taller than he and he was sitting down on the submerged bench, her chest ended up floating dangerously close to his face as she stopped right in front of him.
She looked down at him with a predatory look in her eyes, her wet silver hair falling over her bare shoulders and sticking to her pale skin.
The proximity of her naked body was sending his gamer senses into absolute overdrive, and he was mentally begging the system not to flash any red warning screens and ruin his life right now.
"What about now?" Sheila whispered, leaning in just a fraction of an inch closer so he could actually feel the magical warmth radiating off her wet skin despite the freezing water surrounding them.
"Are you excited?"