Harem Training System: Every Girl I Train Makes Me Stronger!

He knew she was exhausted, not just physically but in her soul.

’But if I don’t,’ another voice whispered, ’she’ll go into tomorrow broken.’

’And maybe... maybe this is the only way to truly break down those walls she’s built around herself.’

He took a steadying breath, forcing his racing pulse into submission. He needed to be precise.

He needed to be a surgeon, not a predator. He needed to give her the choice, to make sure she knew she held all the power in this moment.

When he returned to the parlor, Lia was still seated in the armchair, staring absently at the dying embers in the hearth. The lamplight made her profile look delicate, almost fragile.

"Lia," he said softly.

She jumped slightly at the sound of his voice, turning to face him. "Yes?"

William didn’t sit down. He stood before her, holding the bottle, his expression unreadable but his eyes intense.

"Catherine’s not coming back for a while... And you’re still carrying all that tension in your shoulders from earlier." He paused, the silence between them stretching taut like a bowstring. "I know I’m not a trained masseur like she is..."

"But I know how to work muscles... and I know how to relieve pain..."

He stepped closer, the oil glinting in his palm. "Would you... would you like me to give you the massage instead?"

"I can help loosen those knots before you try to sleep."

Lia froze. The air seemed to vanish from the room. Her mouth opened slightly, but no sound came out.

A flush so violent and crimson it looked painful swept up from her collarbones to the tips of her ears. Her eyes widened, darting from his face to the bottle, then back to his eyes.

For the first time since he had met her, the composed, aristocratic Lia Valestria vanished completely. In her place was a girl caught in a whirlwind of pure, unadulterated panic.

Her breathing became shallow and rapid, her hands gripping the velvet armrests of the chair so hard her knuckles turned white.

"I... you... what?" she stammered, her voice cracking in a way that was utterly unlike her. "That’s... you mean... you would? Here...?"

William watched her carefully, noting the way her pulse fluttered visibly at the base of her throat. "Only if you want me to."

"I’ll stop immediately if it makes you uncomfortable... I’m not trying to--"

"No!" she interrupted, the word coming out sharper than intended. She immediately winced, lowering her head as her face burned even hotter. "I mean... I don’t... I don’t mind."

"I mean, yes!"

She looked up at him through her lashes, her expression a chaotic collision of terror and something else, something hungry, something desperate. Her mind was screaming warnings about propriety, about her father, and about the impropriety of a man touching her in the dark.

But beneath that fear was a stronger, more primal impulse.

’This is it,’ she thought, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. ’This is the moment where the distance between us disappears.’

’If I say no, I’m choosing my duty...’

’If I say yes... I’m choosing something real...’

She wanted to feel his hands. She wanted to know if the solidity she sensed in his presence was real or if it was something she could lose.

She wanted to be touched by someone who didn’t want anything from her except her survival.

"Okay," she whispered, her voice barely audible.

She deliberately loosened her grip on the chair and shifted slightly, exposing the line of her neck. "I... I would like that, Instructor Wade... Please."

William nodded slowly, his own throat feeling uncharacteristically dry. "Lie face down on the couch, Lia."

"I’ll try to be gentle."

As she stood up, her legs feeling like water, she could feel his gaze on her not as a threat but as a promise. She walked toward the couch, her heart singing a dangerous, beautiful song of surrender.

William watched her approach the couch, but as the practical reality of the situation began to settle in his mind, he came to a grinding halt. He stood there holding the glass of oil, his fingers tightening around the glass until his knuckles turned white.

The logistics of a proper massage, the kind that would actually relieve the deep, aching knots in her shoulders and spine, were impossible through layers of heavy wool and silk. To do this right, she would have to remove her tunic.

Her chemise... and even her undergarments. The barrier between his hands and her skin would have to be nonexistent.

The image flashed through his mind unbidden: the pale curve of her back, the delicate line of her spine, the vulnerability of her bare skin under the lamplight. His breath hitched in his throat, and he froze mid-motion, his entire body going rigid.

Lia stopped mid-step, noticing the sudden shift in the atmosphere. The air in the room felt like it had suddenly become pressurized, thick, and difficult to breathe.

She looked up at him, seeing the way his jaw was locked and how his eyes had gone dark, unfocused.

"Instructor Wade...?" she asked, her voice uncertain. "What’s wrong?"

"Did I... did I say something incorrect?"

William didn’t answer immediately. He couldn’t.

His mind was a battlefield between the disciplined soldier he was trained to be and the man who was currently imagining every inch of her.

He cleared his throat roughly, but the sound came out strangled.

"The oil," he managed to say, gesturing vaguely at the bottle. "To actually get the tension out... Lia, you can’t wear your clothes."

"Not for a proper massage... You’d need to... you’d need to be bare."

Lia froze. The words sank in slowly, like stones dropping into a still pond.

Her first instinct was confusion—’Why would clothes matter?’—but then the implication crashed over her. Her eyes widened as she processed what he was saying.

The blush that had been a simmer moments ago now erupted into a full-body fever.

"Naked?" she whispered, the word sounding foreign and scandalous on her tongue. "You mean... completely?"

The silence that followed was deafening. Lia stared at him, her mind racing through every lesson on decorum she had ever received.

In her world, she either guarded nudity with steel as a vulnerability or wielded it as a weapon for calculated seduction. The idea of it being something simple, something healing, was terrifying.

William saw the panic rising in her again, the way her fingers began to flutter at her sides. He felt a pang of guilt. He had pushed too far, too fast.

"Look," William said quickly, stepping back to give her space, his voice dropping to a soothing murmur. "If this is too much, we don’t have to do it."

"We can just call it a night... We can pretend I never said anything."

"I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, Lia." William rubs his hair. "Your comfort is more important than any massage."

He waited for her to agree, to retreat into the safety of her noble persona. But Lia didn’t move.

She stood there, trembling slightly, but her eyes weren’t filled with the usual fear of exposure. Instead, they were bright with a strange, dawning curiosity.

She had spent her entire life being told what to wear, how to sit, how to speak, and how to hide herself. But this?

This was a different kind of exposure. It wasn’t about shame; it was about being seen. Truly seen.

"No," she said, her voice steadier than she expected. "I don’t want to cancel."

"I want to... I want to try." She paused, biting her lip. "I’ve never... I’ve never done anything like this."

"I don’t really understand why it’s considered so... complicated."

William stopped breathing for a second. In that moment, he realized something he hadn’t fully grasped before.

Despite her sharp intellect and her lethal skill with a blade, Lia was utterly untouched. She was a creature of discipline and duty who had never allowed herself the luxury of physical intimacy or even basic human vulnerability.

She was dangerously innocent.

"You’re serious," he said softly, a strange mixture of protectiveness and something darker stirring in his chest.

"I am," she insisted, though her cheeks were still crimson. "If it helps me fight better tomorrow, then I will do it."

William rubbed the back of his neck, feeling the heat of the moment. He couldn’t do this here, in the open parlor where she would feel exposed and watched.

He needed to give her privacy, a way to reclaim some sense of control over the situation.

"Okay," he said, forcing his voice to remain calm and authoritative. "Here’s what we’re going to do."

"I’m going to go to Catherine’s room upstairs... I’ll grab some clean towels and a robe." William pointed at her. "You go up to the guest room, lock the door, and get ready."

"Take your time... Don’t rush."

Lia nodded, though she looked like she might faint at any moment.

"When you’re ready, come back down to the other guest room," William continued, already turning toward the stairs to give her space. "I’ll be waiting here."

"And Lia?" He paused, looking back at her one last time. "There’s no rush... We have all night."

As he climbed the stairs, his heart hammering against his ribs like a war drum, William knew one thing for certain: when she came back down those stairs, nothing between them would ever be the same again.