Something warm and wet on her face. The newly bought Beastman dog had licked her.
Jiang Ying took advantage of him changing clothes to slip into the bathroom. She felt her way to the sink, turned on the tap, and cupped water to gently pat onto her cheeks.
It hadn’t really left a mark. But that faint, lingering scent of strong liquor from the close contact made her dizzy.
Probably Su Heng’s pheromones.
Humans aren’t that sensitive to pheromones. Before today, Jiang Ying had barely ever smelled them.
She couldn’t pinpoint the exact alcohol; it just felt overwhelmingly aggressive, at odds with his steady, reserved impression.
Spicy and rich, fiery and mellow. It crept into her nostrils but scorched her throat.
Far too intense.
Once she’d washed the scent away, she could finally collect her thoughts.
Why had Su Heng licked her face?
He’s a Beastman—more precisely, a Sub-Beastman. Mostly human in appearance, with only a few animal traits.
Jiang Ying didn’t know much about his species’ habits.
At least as a human, she struggled to explain that behavior.
She stood by the sink for a moment in confusion, then suddenly recalled something she’d seen online before transmigrating: kittens and puppies lick floors and walls, often because they lack certain trace elements.
Maybe Beastmen are the same?
They said most Beastmen from the employment agencies didn’t live well, which is why they accepted human employment.
Perhaps Su Heng had also suffered from a prolonged unbalanced diet before coming to her home, leading to malnutrition?
Jiang Ying grew a little worried.
Before transmigrating, she’d never raised a cat or dog, let alone knew how to care for a Beastman.
After hesitating, she took out her phone and used the voice assistant to open her earlier forum post.
The post titled 【Bought a Beastman guide dog—why does it keep making sounds after coming home?】 had blown up for some reason, piling on likes and comments from the moment she posted.
Even today, her profile kept spewing red message notifications. If she weren’t blind, she’d have been completely overwhelmed.
The voice assistant faithfully reported the likes, saves, and comment counts.
“Likes and saves 99+, new followers 99+, comments 99+. View?”
Jiang Ying hesitated. “Not for now.”
She had an important question to ask.
“Add a new reply to the original post. Content: Canine Beastman keeps licking me. Is he lacking some trace element?”
The voice assistant operated the phone and posted the new reply at lightning speed.
And, just as swiftly, gave feedback.
“This reply has received multiple comments. View?”
So fast?
Jiang Ying blinked in surprise—though she couldn’t see a thing.
Using a phone with a voice assistant was inconvenient. Compared to her pre-transmigration life tethered to a screen, losing her sight had absolutely robbed her of a lot of fun.
She issued another command. “View comments.”
“Okay. Now reading comments.”
“Id ‘Sheep’ commented: OP really treats the Beastman like a pet, LOLOLOL”
“Id ‘momo’ replied to ‘Sheep’: OP probably has Beastman Cognitive Disorder, this post is so adorably weird”
“Id ‘Rowlet’ commented: 《The Cat Kept Meowing》”
“Id ‘666’ commented: Doggy—human! I love you. OP—dog keeps licking, is he missing trace elements?”
“Id ‘momo’ replied to ‘666’: XDD”
“Id ‘EataSleepSleepaEat’ commented: Has OP ever considered, he’s in rut?”
“Eh?”
Jiang Ying blankly repeated a word from the comment. “Rut?”
The voice assistant thought she was asking a question and automatically activated the AI function.
“Rut is a physiological phenomenon unique to Beastmen and Sub-Beastmen. Some may experience drastic personality changes, becoming extremely sensitive, prone to whining, craving touch, and possibly accompanied by appetite loss or other physical discomforts.”
“Note: Male Beastmen or Sub-Beastmen become extremely possessive during this period, asserting dominance over nearby opposite-sex individuals and leaving their scent on them.”
“Ah…”
So he licked her because of rut… rut…
But they aren’t even the same species. How could he be in rut for her?
In her eyes, he was just like an ordinary puppy or kitten!
She could kiss him out of affection for dogs, or praise him as a “good boy” to encourage him. But even a pet dog rubbing against her leg or humping instinctively during heat would embarrass her, wouldn’t it?
If Su Heng licked her because of rut…
Jiang Ying felt troubled.
She frowned and said, “Reply to that comment: If that’s really true, what should I do?”
Just then, someone knocked on the bathroom door.
Su Heng’s low, hoarse voice came from outside. “Is something wrong? You’ve been in there a while.”
Startled, her hand jerked, sending her phone into the sink.
“No, nothing!”
He couldn’t have heard all that just now, right?
She’d heard Beastmen had excellent hearing, and Sub-Beastmen should be the same. How long had he been at the door? She hadn’t heard a single footstep.
Embarrassed beyond words, she muttered, “Coming out right away,” while reaching into the sink for her phone.
The screen was still on. Though she couldn’t see, she heard, “New reply received.”
In her frantic search, her fingers brushed the screen and triggered the voice playback for that reply.
“Id ‘EataSleepSleepaEat’ replying to you: Then just enjoy it! Beastmen are great at licking, especially Canine Beastmen. They’re practically the top choice for service-oriented partners—”
“?! “
Flustered, Jiang Ying scrambled to stop the voice, groping around for ages without success, only accidentally turning the volume up higher.
The voice assistant continued in an amplified tone:
“—OP should definitely try it. Totally mind-blowing. And during rut, it’s so stupidly good you won’t even know what planet you’re on, hehehehe…”
Only then, amid the rising heat in the air around her, did she remember voice commands. “S-Stop!”
Don’t say another word!
But it was already too late.
Outside the door, the man fell silent for a moment, his voice trembling. “…What are you doing?”
She was utterly mortified.
How could she let Su Heng hear such nonsense?
The two of them weren’t even the same species. How could they, how could they be partners? It defied all ethics and morals.
Would he think she was some strange human, and no longer want to be her guide dog?
No, he was the cheapest guide dog she could afford.
And their Mental Power Compatibility was so high.
Bringing him home had cost a fair amount already.
She had no money left to swap him for another one.
She had to explain.
She was only worried about his health.
Jiang Ying took a deep breath and pulled the door open. “Su Heng, I…”
Before she could speak, the man cut her off, his voice trembling.
“…I thought you hired me to be your eyes. What was all that just now…? I…”
For a long time, he couldn’t finish a sentence, then stopped abruptly.
Jiang Ying waited, but no follow-up came.
Even though she couldn’t see Su Heng, the way his voice had stiffened, barely holding back humiliation and anger, almost let her picture his expression.
Surely his mouth was downturned, brows knitted tight, his gaze fixed on her full of questioning.
This was a bit of trouble.
Without mutual trust, a guide dog’s work would be meaningless.
Jiang Ying sorrowfully wondered: did she have to replace him?
If the contract ended early due to the employer’s fault, she’d have to pay steep liquidated damages.
After that expense, she definitely couldn’t afford another guide dog.
Would she have to return to the darkness alone again?
That thought, surfacing in her mind, made her ache.
Amid the chaos of her thoughts, she suddenly felt a pair of large hands press down on her shoulders.
As Su Heng drew closer, the scent of strong liquor instantly enveloped her, freezing her thoughts, making her temples pound.
He seemed to lean in toward her.
The hot breath rushing at her face made her instinctively want to retreat, but his hands pinning her shoulders left her no escape.
In that instant, as she reacted, he seemed to subconsciously tighten his grip.
A Canine Beastman’s body temperature was much higher than a human’s. The scorching heat of his left hand seeped into the skin of her shoulder, his calloused fingertips grazing her through her clothes. Even through the fabric, she felt the roughness of his hand.
But the right hand, replaced with a mechanical prosthetic, was icy cold.
He’d just finished changing and hadn’t yet put on gloves. The hard, smooth metal sensation pressed into her shoulder, and Jiang Ying was dazed for several seconds before she belatedly spoke. “Su Heng, it hurts.”
“…Sorry.”
Su Heng let go as if shocked, seeming to only then realize his nearly inappropriate action.
The image of a nearly two-meter-tall man standing there completely at a loss was actually a little funny. His freed hands hung in midair, not knowing where to put them, and only dropped stiffly to his sides after a long pause.
Only when the scent of her pheromones wrapped around him again did he remember to step back and put some distance between them.
His spine straightened, standing ramrod straight, as if he had returned to the military camp.
Thankfully, the girl before him noticed none of this.
Still, the unusually long silence puzzled her. She tilted her face up, as if trying to meet his gaze with her sightless eyes to express her question.
But her gaze missed.
Her perception of his height seemed slightly off.
Her empty eyes wandered, landing unfocused on his Adam’s apple, motionless and eerily intent.
That was one of the most sensitive parts of his entire body. Being stared at like that now actually made him feel violated.
Just a gaze, yet it felt as though she had reached out and traced her soft fingertips inch by inch over him, making him tremble all over.
Yet this feeling wasn’t unpleasant.
Su Heng’s throat went dry, a restless heat suffocating him.
He swallowed unnaturally, his Adam’s apple bobbing minutely.
He stared at her vacant eyes for a long while before finally sighing lowly.
“Rut is an instinctive physiological phenomenon. Licking you when I couldn’t hold back was my fault. I will do my utmost to suppress that impulse. But if you take advantage of this and ask me to lick you… elsewhere, I’m sorry, but I must decline.”
Huh?
Jiang Ying froze.
In her impression, the dog she’d bought home rarely spoke such a long paragraph.
It took Jiang Ying a moment to react, and a while longer to somewhat grasp the meaning of his words.
She understood half, but not fully.
Conflicted, she asked him, “Elsewhere where?”
“…”
Su Heng looked down at her.
She had just washed her face, her lips still glistening with water droplets.
She seemed surprised by his words, the dimples that usually held a smile now smoothed flat.
He wanted to move closer, but feared losing control of his instincts and frightening her.
The comments he’d just heard from that post made him feel both ashamed and humiliated.
Reason and instinct collided continuously. Su Heng fought with everything he had to stop his legs from moving, standing rigidly in place.
During rut, a Beastman was especially sensitive to pheromones. The catnip scent on her, though odorless in a special sense, was fatally alluring to him… even though he wasn’t a purely Feline Beastman.
When he licked her face, he’d nearly lost control and done something else. If she really wanted him to lick somewhere else, he was afraid he might hurt her.
And yet, even so, he couldn’t stop his gaze from drifting to her lips.
He was grateful she couldn’t see, couldn’t detect the desire he could barely conceal.
Su Heng forced himself to look away. As he explained, his ears went red.
“It’s… the kind of place that would make you feel good. Nowadays, many people ‘keep’ Beastmen just for carnal pleasure. Weren’t you just looking into that sort of thing?”
He was the commander-in-chief of the Imperial Beastman Army, undercover here to uncover the Federation’s secrets.
Not—
Not to become some girl’s plaything.
Su Heng felt a profound shame, his hands at his sides clenching involuntarily.
Some old, rusty components in his mechanical arm creaked, and even his voice came out slightly trembling.
“The contract we signed clearly states that the employment relationship between us is only for the duty of a ‘guide dog.’ I have no obligation to—and cannot—provide any other services.”
A long silence.
Then, with difficulty, he spoke again. “At least for now… no.”
Jiang Ying was even more stunned.
She hesitated a long while before finally forcing out a single word. “Huh?”