"I just caught you cheating on me with this bitch!" Maria said with a judging glare in her eyes,

"I know you won't believe me if I said this, but this is not what it looks like."

"Of course!" She nodded and smiled forcibly. "Next, you will say, 'It's a misunderstanding.' And then what?"

"Lu Bela and I went to see the castle and returned. And before you taunt us with a remark, no, we didn't even touch the castle. As you know, the island had sunk, so I just took care of this."

Maria squinted her eyes and asked, "Why did you take 'her' with you, though?"

"Because she knew where the castle was?"

"She could have just told you the coordinates. Why did 'she' have to go with you?"

"That's" Rudy raised his brow and placed his hand under his chin. He rubbed his thumb on his cheek and pondered, 'Right. Why did I take her with me?'

Rudy glanced at Lu Bela while pondering, and his gaze fell on her two balloons.

'Argh! Stop it, Rudy. You already have many pairs available to squeeze. But damn Lu Bela was right when she said she made her body and appearance to my preference."

SIGH!

Maria let out a frustrated sigh when she saw Rudy looking at Lu Bela's body. She couldn't do anything even if Rudy was having an affair with Lu Bela. Of course, she knew Rudy was telling the truth; she trusted him.

Undoubtedly, Rudy wouldn't hide about his new or old relationship with any of his lovers. That was something obvious that none of the harem members needed to tell him.

"Daddy~ Maria is getting jealous seeing you and Belala flirting in front of her," Lilim teased Maria, Rudy, and Lu Bela at the same time with just one sentence.

Maria raised her brow at Lilim and asked, "Belala?"

"That's what I call her. It's a cute nickname, right?"

Maria puffed her cheeks in anger and shouted, "You lived with her for a few days and started calling her by a nickname, while I have lived my entire life with you, and you never gave me a nickname. Until last year, you used to call me 'Miss Maria' all the time."

Lilim shrugged her shoulders and said, "Your name doesn't mix with nicknames. You can suggest one to me, and I will call you that if you want me to."

Maria thought of a cute nickname for a few seconds but couldn't come up with one.

"See?"

"Hmph!" Maria turned her face to the side and looked at Rudy. "Rudy! There are three billion girls in this world. You can have a relationship with all of them if you want, but not with this woman."

Maria pointed her finger at Lu Bela and said, "She is not what she pretends to be. You can't trust her. She will betray you when you let your guard down."

'I was touching Lu Bela when she told me about herself, and I can tell she wasn't lying. Obviously, Maria is not lying either. She must be speaking from past experience. Something nasty must have happened between Lu Bela and Maria that she hates her to this day,

I want to ask her all the details right here, right now. But doing that would be just like digging my own grave. Not to mention, I am not interested in Lu Bela. Well maybe a little after her image change, but still I can't imagine Lu Bela and me in a romantic relationship.

She herself said that artificial humans can't fall in love, so even if I do develop a thing or two for her she wouldn't do the same for me. There is no point of having feelings for someone that I know will never love me back.

But having sex with her in this body would argh! For fuck's sake. My brain seems to have been taken over by my dick. My lust meter has been going crazy. It's not just for Lu Bela, but even for stranger girls I have never seen before.'

"Princess, I know you hate me, but you can't hate me when I am trying to please your man. If you do, that would mean you don't want to see your lover happy, which would mean you are a terrible lover."

"That's some nice logic you got there," Maria taunted. "Anyway, stay away from him. You can talk with him, but don't touch him unnecessarily."

She separated Rudy and Lu Bela's hands and said, "And holding hands is lewd!"

"Daddy, Maria told me a few things when we were eating," Lilim quipped.

"Oh, come on~" Rudy groaned while looking at Maria. "Why would you do that?"

"I thought she already knew."

"Now she is going to make excuses." He shot a judging glance at Lilim and remarked, "Just you watch her dodge my every question like a pro."

"I won't do that since now you know everything" Lilim muttered under her breath. "And I would have told you before, but Rebecca would have chewed me alive, and you know it. She goes crazy when it's something about you.

Even when baby Rudy was given to her, she didn't let anyone go near him. She was like your guardian angel no, more like your guardian demon."

Lilim shivered and hugged herself.

Rudy heard multiple footsteps approaching from all the hallways. Seemingly, the guests were returning from the dining hall.

"Well, since you are ready to talk about it, we can discuss it later." he turned to Lu Bela and said, "I leave the other matter to you."

Maria stood in between Lu Bela and Rudy to stop them from looking into each other's eyes.

"What other matter?" she asked with a jealous look on her face.

"The castle matters. Sheesh, now you are acting so possessive all of a sudden. Relax, I won't do something that upsets you or any of my harem members."

Maria squinted her eyes and remarked, "I was pretty upset when I found out my sister-like friend-cum-bodyguard had sex with you the night you met."

"Wow. Now that she doesn't have anything to taunt Belala with, she switched to me." Lilim hugged Rudy's arm and said, "Daddy, you better be careful, or she will burn everything from jealousy."