The contract parchment was covered in dense text.
But when you boiled it all down, the core boiled down to just six points.
Three of them were benefits for Shuya.
The first was the absolute heart of the ability.
After signing, Shuya would gain the contractor's Nen type and be able to cultivate that exact system.
As the contractor trained, he would synchronously receive every bit of growth they achieved, plus every Hatsu they awakened.
The second point was the shared-link bonus.
While connected to a contractor, Nen in both their bodies would be enhanced at a rate equal to the sum of their individual normal training speeds.
The third point was the stacking multiplier.
Every new contractor gave Shuya an additional boost to his own cultivation speed.
Those were all the gains Shuya received.
The next three points were the restrictions he had to bear.
First restriction: Manifesting the contract parchment consumed a permanent portion of his Nen. That split-off aura became the Nen seed planted inside the contractor, allowing them to awaken and control their life energy without side effects and master Ten almost instantly. Because the aura was permanently given away, it could never be recovered on its own.
Second restriction: After the contract, if a contractor ran out of Nen in battle, they could temporarily draw from Shuya's own reserves to keep fighting. The maximum they could pull was exactly the amount of Nen they had already fed back to him through their training.
Third restriction—and the deadliest one:
Once the contract was signed, it could never be undone.
If a contractor ever died—for any reason—the Nen and abilities Shuya had gained from them would automatically become the fuel to revive them. On top of that, Shuya himself would have to pay an additional price in his own hard-earned aura. The harsher the death, the higher the cost. The absolute minimum was the contractor's total Nen capacity at the moment of death.
If Shuya didn't have enough aura, revival would fail and the spent Nen would be lost forever.
Of course, this revival clause could only trigger once per contractor. After revival, all other contract conditions remained in effect, but future training results from that person would no longer sync back to him.
"Have you finished reading?"
Shuya's expression was calm as he looked at the flaxen-haired girl in front of him.
Miyamoto Rei nodded, then lifted her head to meet his eyes.
Her first thought wasn't whether she should sign. It was whether Busujima-senpai and the others had already done so.
"Yan-kun… Busujima-senpai and the rest…"
Before she could finish, Shuya answered directly. "Shizuka-nee and Saeko-senpai have both signed."
Rei waited a moment. When he didn't continue, she asked, a little puzzled, "What about Miss Minami Rika?"
"Same as you—I gave her three choices."
Shuya sounded a bit helpless. "She's just extremely competitive. She loves challenging things that look impossible. So she didn't pick an immediate contract. She wants to awaken Nen completely on her own first, then sign afterward."
"I see."
Rei thought it over. She had only known Rika for a day, but after last night's events she wasn't surprised at all by the choice.
She understood something else too.
Shizuka, Saeko, and now Rika—all three women who had been intimate with Shuya had either already contracted or were about to. And looking at the terrifying conditions written on the scroll, once Shuya contracted someone, he would never let them go. Ever.
Her heart fluttered.
Even though Shizuka and Saeko had already paved the way, and Rika had cut in line, Rei had still secretly clung to one last fantasy of someday having Shuya all to herself.
That fantasy shattered the moment she read the contract.
So… should she sign and fully join?
Or should she walk away right now?
The hesitation lasted less than a second.
Give up? Walk away?
Are you kidding me?
How could she possibly do that?
She had always known, deep down, that Shuya was the greedy type who wanted everything. She had just refused to admit it to herself. But her actions—getting close to Saya, forming alliances while competing—had already shown her true feelings.
Now that the world had turned into this, what was the point of clinging to old ideas?
Rei made her decision instantly.
"Yan-kun," she asked, voice steady, "which option do you want me to choose?"
Even though she had decided to join, she still hoped to become the most important person in his heart. So she handed the final choice straight to him.
"Second one," Shuya answered without hesitation.
The three options he offered only ever had two real paths anyway. The direct contract (option 1) could be skipped since pore-opening would lead to a contract regardless. And the third route—learning completely alone—was already taken by Rika. Rei's physical ability, willpower, and combat experience were all below Rika's elite level. No need to waste anyone else's time on that path.
"Understood."
Rei didn't overthink it. Once she had decided, she trusted Shuya completely. "Yan-kun, please open my Nen."
"Get ready."
Shuya gathered aura in his palm and lightly tapped her body.
Whoosh—
Every pore on Rei's body opened at once. Life energy poured out like a broken dam.
"Done. Rei, try to control the life energy flowing out of you. If anything feels wrong, tell me immediately and I'll close the pores again."
"I'll succeed," Rei said firmly.
The sensation of her entire body turning into an open faucet was strange and wonderful. But more than that, a thought burned in her mind.
Shizuka, Saeko, and Rika had all been with Shuya. The fact that he was opening her pores right now and planning to contract her… wasn't that his way of hinting at something?
In that moment, whether her guess was right or not, Rei planted a firm suggestion in her own heart:
If she successfully mastered Nen today, tonight she would sneak into Shuya's room for a night raid.
He probably wouldn't refuse, right?
After giving Rei the instructions, Shuya turned to the purple-haired woman beside them.
While he had been opening Rei's pores, Yuriko's water-divination test had already finished.
On the surface, the water in the cup and the leaf floating on it showed no change at all.
The result was obvious.
"Mmm, it's sweet."
Yuriko lifted the cup, took a sip, and smiled lightly. "Looks like I'm a Transmuter."