Hellbound With You

”Agree to be my model first,” Iryz determinedly said.

When she was drawing Zeres a while ago, she was truly ecstatic. Drawing him was unexpectedly easy and exciting and her motivation had skyrocketed to the point that she felt that she could continue drawing without stopping even for her meals. Right now, she actually wanted to just go sit at her computer and start drawing.

Iryz was working on a BL series. A series that she was just so damned confident which would become very successful given the chance that she could get it off and running. She had been working as a webtoonist for three years and running now. And this hobby of hers was what had actually helped see her through financially since her grandmother’s sudden disappearance.

But her earnings were still not enough. She needed to earn more and make a successful series because she needed a huge amount of money to buy this house. She already had quite a big amount of savings now that she had gotten and saved up from working on a series for three whole years. And even if she added that up with the money that her grandma had left to her, it was still not enough to purchase this house.

Thankfully, the owner of this house was such a nice person that she had agreed when Iryz had asked her to give her four years to earn enough money to buy over the house. The owner apparently wanted to sell the house to her alone too, because the old woman said that she knew Iryz will not tear and demolish the antique bookstore if she were to be the one to buy it, which was the truth. The old owner was attached to the house, but her children were pestering her to sell it as they had felt that it was a waste of resource for their mother to have this old place stagnating there.

Iryz would have given up on this house since she heard that the owner was planning to sell it if she did not find a way to earn some money from her hobby three years ago.

But since she started earning from her comic series, she had made a goal to save up all of her money for this house. She really wanted to own this house. This place was important to her. This was her home that she had grown up in and she still believes that one day, Diana would return to this place here, which was her home as well. She also believes that this place was important not only to her but also to the witches and that was why she was adamant and could not just let go and give it up without fighting her hardest for it.

Now she had a year left to the time limit that was allotted to her. But her money was still not quite enough to meet the amount needed. She had initially planned to take up a loan if she could not reach her goal by this year. But then one day, she saw a contest which offered quite a big prize money for the first place. Iryz was fired up and wanted to launch a new series that she was confident would give her the money that she needed so badly.

She already had a plot cooking in her mind that she was so confident with. If this new series could be successful, then she would no doubt be able to reach her goal! Everything was going really well since she had launched the new series just the other day. However, what she had been struggling with was the conceptualisation of her male lead now. She had wanted to portray a man, the perfect man, that people will fall in love with – male and female alike.

She had already created quite a number of male characters based on her requirements, but she was still not satisfied with how they had turned out in the end. To her, the characters she created were somehow not hot enough, or not beautiful enough. In her mind, that perfect character needed to be both hot and beautiful. Iryz believed that having the perfect male lead was one of the biggest factors of a series’ success. And that was why she wanted to perfect her characters, most especially this damned male lead who needed to be the hottest and most beautiful of them all.

And now she had found him! This male witch is the answer to her prayers! Her perfect model! She would do anything to make him agree to be her model! Anything it takes!

”I will answer your questions only if you agree to this one and only request of mine. After all, you need to give back to me for what you will receive from me right? Sir?” She bravely bargained with him again when he had just stared at her quietly, not a word coming forth from his lips. His silvery foxy eyes stared unwaveringly at her. ”Don’t worry, you will not actually do a lot of troublesome things. You only need to sit or stand there, and I’ll draw you.”

Her smile was as sweet as honey now as she continued persuading him.

”That is all?” he finally spoke up and she nodded her head like a rattle.

”Yes. I just really need a model… uhm… a drawing reference.”

He stared intently at her again, but eventually, he sighed and the moment he said ”fine”, Iryz literally jumped up and down in happiness. She could not believe that this beautiful man actually agreed to her request.

”Wow! Thank you. Thank you so much, sir!” she told him as she beamed with so much excitement, as if something so incredibly amazing had just happened to her. ”You’re really my life saver, sir!”

”Life saver…” Zeres echoed in an inaudible voice before a small and forced smile curved on his face. He then lazily gave the sketch pad back to her and glanced back at her computer again. ”Alright, let’s start now, little girl. There’s no time like the present.”

His gaze instantly became a little steely as he met her gaze. ”But before that,” the force on his gaze gave her a chill that made her freeze for a moment. ”Don’t even think about lying to me…” his voice was not harsh. It actually sounded very gentle, but Iryz heard the clear warning in them. ”Don’t forget that I’m not one of those nice witches you know.”

Iryz smiled instead of cowering. She even stood straighter and gave him a playful but serious salute.. ”Yes, sir!” she said, causing Zeres to once again blink in speechlessness.