Eiron nodded again, this time with excessive fake confidence.
He spoke in the tone of a man who knows everything about everything:
"Ah, of course… the magical sexual disease… very well known. I read about it in… some manuscript, maybe in the Portnar Monastery."
Garon leaned in slightly, his eyes wide with genuine admiration:
"Really? You know it?"
Eiron froze.
He sipped a bit of water to buy a few seconds to think… then cleared his throat.
"I mean… yes, but not intimately. I was in a long period of abstinence, in our private temple. No contact with the outside world… no women, no men, no… nothing."
He nodded with false reverence, as if speaking of a sacred vow and not voluntary sexual drought.
"I lived a life of serenity… literally, I haven't touched anything in years. Not even myself."
Selina raised an eyebrow subtly, her lips tightening in an invisible smile.
Garon was amazed.
He clapped lightly, smiling like a child who just saw a magician.
"Magnificent! That's wonderful! That's what true serenity is! I mean… how do you bear it? Even I, with all my discipline, couldn't!"
Eiron almost choked on his spoon.
"You son of a bitch, you're a killer and you say 'with all my discipline'...?"
But he simply shook his head, as if wisdom resided within him.
Garon sighed slowly, then muttered in a low tone:
"I wish I had discovered it earlier… before my body turned into a rag of curses."
Eiron looked at him, puzzled:
"So… what exactly is the disease?"
Garon clasped his hands on the table. His voice dropped, heavier:
"The official name? I don't know, I'm not a doctor or a curse mage. Some call it 'the Eternal Numbness,' or 'Forever Flaccid,' or… simply: the Curse of Yocam."
He exchanged a quick glance with Selina… but she didn't speak. She just watched him.
"They say it started from the Sea of Yocam, where the skulls of ancient giants fell. A curse that stayed in the waves, hid in the wind, and traveled through time without reason."
Eiron pursed his lips, pretending to understand deeply:
"Yocam… giants… oh yes, those legends that walk naked, eat humans, and leave curses in your balls."
Garon didn't catch the sarcasm.
He nodded with utmost seriousness.
"Yes. It's not contagious. But it's entirely random. Strikes whoever it wants… and leaves others alone."
Then he leaned in slightly, voice more bitter:
"It causes infertility. And sexual coldness. Men lose their erection… women lose their desire. And after that? Everything fades."
Eiron swallowed hard.
"Wonderful… that's worse than slow death."
Garon continued, stirring his soup as if spinning his own fate in it:
"And the worst part? It doesn't stop there."
A quick glance again at Selina… who drank from her glass without comment.
"Over time, the body becomes a host… for something else. We call it the Aran. And no, don't ask me about it. That's a story… better left unopened tonight."
Eiron felt something crawl under his skin.
"The Aran? For hell's sake, are we in a horror manhwa or a family dinner?"
But Garon spoke with painful honesty.
With eyes full of shame and defeat.
"I tried everything… I believed the charlatans, swallowed herbs that tasted like frog poison, sat under magical waterfalls, even—excuse me—even bathed in the urine of a virgin supposedly blessed by the sun."
Eiron choked on laughter.
But quickly pretended to be sympathetic.
"Man… that's a lot."
"I know."
Garon nodded, then suddenly smiled like apologizing for his sorrow:
"But I found the antidote. At least… it halted the collapse. Temporarily."
Eiron asked with disgust-laced curiosity:
"And if you don't treat it?"
"I become a vessel. Empty. From the inside… but the Aran takes my place."
"And the Aran…?"
"Don't ask."
Garon said it firmly for the first time… or perhaps for the last time.
Then he turned to Selina, still silent, her eyes on her plate, lips pressed as if hearing a conversation she wanted no part in.
"The important thing is I'm fine now. As long as the dose works… I'm fine."
Eiron didn't know what to say.
He just looked at him, then at Selina…
who finally raised her eyes and whispered:
"The dose treats the body temporarily… but it doesn't erase what it did to the mind."
Garon didn't understand, as usual.
He chuckled lightly, then raised his glass:
"To life!"
They all went to sleep.
The house drowned in suspicious silence.
Garon and Selina to their room.
And Eiron… to the guest bed.
The bed?
Ah, the bed.
Just a pile of cloth on rotten wood, but for him, it was a throne.
"Gods of Hell… finally, a surface that doesn't bite, whip, or breathe on me."
He sprawled over it, letting every bone in his body scream in post-war relief.
First time since arriving in this world he's slept on something bed-like.
No mud, no blood, no rocks pretending to be pillows.
"Am I… happy?"
He laughed to himself.
"A bed? That's enough? How pathetically relative."
Then he began to think.
Slowly. Like his brain was stuck in tar.
Since falling here, he'd been running.
Surviving. Hiding. Eating monster crumbs. And… yes, let's be honest:
Trying to bang anything that moved.
"That was my goal? Survival… and sex?"
He laughed silently.
A laugh poisoned with regret.
But he wasn't wrong.
At first, that's all he could do. No sword. No magic. No system exploding with rewards.
Just a naked stray… with an eager dick and a system that lagged like a drunk kid on Twitter.
But now?
The game changed.
A royal ghoul?
In his hands.
On the run. Precious. Her existence alone could spark a war between kingdoms.
And it seems he's responsible for bringing her back… or hiding her… or simply not dying because of her.
"Me? Responsible? What a joke."
He sighed, then…
Reached down.
Grabbed himself.
Squeezed lightly.
"Thank God… still working. No Aran yet."
Because the disease Garon spoke of?
Not something to laugh about.
An eternal curse, infertility, loss of desire, then turning into an unknown being called the Aran.
A name that sounds like an insult… but is terrifyingly real.
"Lovely. A magical world where you can turn into a failed sex doll at any moment."
He sighed again.
"If only I had a system like other isekai heroes… a system that throws legendary swords and overpowered skills at me… instead of messages like: 'Try again, you perv!'"
Even his main weapon?
A groin kick.
What the hell is this?!
Then he thought about the old isekai stories.
How the useless protagonist enters another world…
And turns into a prince, or dragon, or chick magnet.
But him?
Still him.
Same humiliation, same urges, same cursed luck.
But wait…
He looked at the ceiling. Smiled.
A wicked smile slipping through the cracks.
"Despite all that… I've done more here in days than I ever did in my entire life."
Yes, that's true.
He killed, lied, touched, jerked off, survived, disguised, persuaded, and even got an offer from two giantesses to sleep with him.
And on the way?
He got close to a royal creature with legs long enough to trigger atheism.
Then… suddenly.
A small blue light ignited in his mind.
Inspiration. A thought. A winged lust.
"Wait a second…"
Garon.
That mountain of muscle. With eyes that make women fall off balconies.
The husband. The killer. The sovereign hero…
But him?
Sexually cold.
"The man is a weapons locker on the outside, and a meat fridge on the inside."
This changes everything.
It means… Selina, that tight slice of hell, lives with a man who doesn't touch her.
A man who doesn't feel.
A man who thinks abstinence means not cumming for three months.
"Emptiness… breeds desire. And desire? Creates cracks."
Eiron's eyes sparkled suddenly, like his mind stepped on a cunning switch.
"The dull monk might be the key… to screwing his wife."
He smiled.
The kind of smile a devil wears before the candle of a foolish villager.
He turned on his side, hand behind his head.
"Alright, world. I'll play your game. But this time? I write the rules."
He was about to fall asleep.
Mind melting, body surrendering, and the pillow… felt like the chest of a sad ghoul.
Then…
[System Notification]
A message appeared above his head. In loud color, in letters too big, as if the system wanted to scream into his eyes:
[Go immediately to Old Mork's Forge. Ask the dwarf for the Black Sword of Gilos.]
Under it?
Only one button.
Not two.
No "Decline." No "Later."
Just:
[Accept]
Eiron stared at the screen.
"Seriously? Now? In the middle of the night? Is this the time to fetch legendary swords from drunk dwarves?!"
He wanted to curse.
At the system.
At the sword.
At any dwarf named Mork.
"And how do I even get to Mork's forge? Send him a pigeon? Look him up in the dwarf directory?!"
Suddenly…
As if the system was offended by his stupidity,
a map appeared.
A blue arrow pointing to the edge of the village.
And a countdown timer:
[30 seconds to complete the task. Or else… penalty.]
Eiron laughed.
A mad laugh.
"Oh, a threat? Lovely. Give me a gun and raise your banner, you lunatic system!"
He turned on his pillow.
Closed his eyes.
And muttered:
"Cut my balls off if you want, I'm not going."
At second thirty…
The system accepted the challenge.
Then…
Came the pain.
No, not normal pain.
Like his balls were skinned, electrocuted, crushed, then each wrapped in barbed wire and dipped in boiling oil… just to be reattached and felt again.
A scream escaped his mouth without sound.
His eyes nearly popped from his skull.
He twisted, arched, bit the blanket like giving birth, then choked on his saliva, then screamed again internally.
"Aaaaaakhhhh!!!"
The system wasn't done.
[This is your final warning.]
[Ignoring instructions will result in a worse punishment, you idiot.]
Eiron panted heavily, hand over the source of torment, fingers checking if he was still a man or had become a human clam.
He muttered through tears:
"Damn it… the Aran is kinder than you."
Then he stood up.
With a groan like the creak of a graveyard door.
"Alright, system… let's go get that cursed sword out of the dwarf's ass."