The Idol Hero
Watching her react so transparently, the smile on his lips grew only deeper.
"I looked up your old articles."
"......"
"And your old videos, too."
"......Stop it."
"I read the comments, as well."
"Stop it already—!!"
Little by little, like snow piling up, her face grew whiter and whiter, pale as death.
"Checking that there are still people out there who remember you—that's how you barely manage to soothe yourself."
"......"
"The Lovebell of back then really was something else."
He closed his eyes for a moment, as if recalling something.
Against U Haru's silent prayer that he would simply never open his mouth again, the silence didn't last long.
"When people gave you their love, you gave it right back to them, didn't you?"
"......"
"When you stood on stage, countless eyes were fixed on you."
"......"
"When you sang, people went wild."
"......"
"And when you smiled... someone watching must have clutched their chest and been happy for the whole day."
He brought his mouth close to her ear.
"But... there's no one now, is there?"
"......"
"No stage."
"......"
"No cheering crowds."
"......"
"No one who calls you Lovebell anymore."
U Haru's gaze finally dropped to the floor.
"That's why you go looking for those old articles, isn't it?"
"......"
"Reminiscing about the person you used to be."
He took her nipple between his index finger and thumb, then gave it a long, slow pull upward.
Tuuuumph—
"Hah...?!"
"Confirming that you haven't completely disappeared yet. Like touching yourself to feel alive."
"......No, I'm not."
The brief stimulation to her nipple brought U Haru back to her senses, and she desperately pushed back.
But there was no strength in her voice.
Not even sincerity.
What lay inside it instead was... a tremor.
"That's not true."
"Oh?"
"I would... never do something like that."
"Really?"
"......"
"Then why do you keep averting your eyes? Look me straight in the eye and say it... and I'll believe you. U Haru... you're not that kind of person."
U Haru looked straight at him.
Because looking away would mean admitting it—so deliberately, even more straight.
"Ah...."
Her eyes... like sinking into some deep, dark abyss.
The mouth about to deny it clamped shut.
And in the end, U Haru said nothing at all.
He let go of the nipple he'd been toying with and spoke.
"It's all right."
"......"
"You don't need to be ashamed."
"......"
"I understand."
A brief silence.
"You still haven't let go of Lovebell. You can't let go—because it's everything. Other than that, there's nothing left of the woman called U Haru."
"......"
"So why are you still smiling?"
"......"
"Why do you keep smiling, even where no one can see you?"
"......"
"Because without that smile, it feels like Lovebell will truly be over."
"......"
"Like the last trace that Lovebell ever existed will vanish completely."
"......"
"Ahh... what a pitiful... heartbreaking... tragic person you are..."
That pitying remark—it may have been the final blow.
Clunk— clank—!
"What would... what would YOU know about it...! How dare you—!!"
For the first time, U Haru flared up in fury, her body straining against her restraints as if she might tear free and bolt at any moment.
Her eyes—long since gone distant—now held a clear, burning emotion: rage. She glared at the man before her, who was still smiling, as if she would devour him whole.
Because her raw, hidden heart had been pried open against her will, and she wanted nothing more than to stuff that humiliating mouth shut, forever.
U Haru had known, too.
That her throat was getting worse.
That the people around her had worried about her.
It probably really was... for her own sake.
But knowing and understanding belonged to entirely different worlds, and so a small fragment of doubt had always drifted through some corner of her heart.
Still... wasn't that supposed to be a decision I made for myself...?
...
I didn't quit by my own choice...
I... wanted to keep going...
But at some point, no one ever asked me what I wanted anymore...
...
Being loved by people. Standing on stage and singing. Lending others strength. Giving back to those who needed her.
That was... everything to U Haru.
It was what allowed the person called U Haru to exist at all.
An indispensable... absolutely essential element of her life.
Like a fish out of water, gasping for breath until it finally went still.
Like a plant denied sunlight, rotting away into nothing.
For U Haru, the forced, one-sided retirement she never wanted wasn't merely losing a job—it was closer to losing a reason to live.
U Haru had never once thought they were wrong.
That it had all been out of concern for her... she'd vaguely known.
That it was a decision made for her own good, too.
And yet......
Why did it still hurt this much?
Why, even now......
......
...
"That part is simple."
U Haru came back to herself and looked at the man in front of her.
"They—the people around you—trampled U Haru underfoot."
That's what he said.
That they had trampled her.
"Wrapped in the goodwill of 'for your own sake,' they used a blade to cruelly carve out a part of you—the part that was Lovebell."
Cruelly. Carved out.
...I don't want to hear this.
"No... that's... it was all out of concern for me...!"
Empty words, nothing but pretense.
Without a single ounce of force behind them, they would scatter at the faintest breeze—gone, beyond the horizon, out of sight.
He let out a small sigh and spoke to her, to the woman desperately turning her face from reality.
"For all their 'concern,' they never once asked you the most important thing, did they?"
He drew close and gave her the words she'd longed to hear for so long.
"U Haru—did you still want to keep being a hero?"
"......!!"
"It only took that one question, and they never asked it... Don't you think so?"
Nnngh—
U Haru clenched her teeth.
She didn't want to hear any more of those words that kept forcing their way into her heart and throwing it into chaos.
But... what he was saying struck, with surgical precision, the most painful spot of all.
Not that they retired her out of concern.
But that, knowing full well she would have chosen to continue, they took away her chance to choose—
"U Haru."
"Ugh...!"
He kneaded the soft, springy fullness of her breasts as he spoke.
"Even if it truly was a decision meant to save you—then why is U Haru, right now... dying like this?"
Dying.
He was right.
Ever since that day, U Haru had been living a dead life.
More precisely, a life of slowly dying.
"Three hundred and sixty-five days of gloom without a trace of joy, drooping listlessly like a diseased flower, doing nothing at all—can you really call that being alive?"
No.
Even alive, she wasn't living.
Like a taxidermied doll.
Eyes open, yet holding nothing inside—an empty, silent void.
"...Was that really, truly for your sake?"
No.
Even if it was.
They should have clearly asked the person herself.
No one—no one at all—had the right to make such an arrogant decision on her behalf.
"If it were me, I would have at least asked."
"......Asked, what."
"Whether you wanted to keep going."
"Even if your voice was ruined."
"Even if people never loved you the way they used to."
"Even if one day you could never sing again."
"And even so—did you still want to live as Lovebell?"
"For that answer alone, I would have made you say it with your own lips!"
Finishing there, he slowly stepped back from her, a few paces.
Her head hung low, her whole being in complete disarray... a woman's body, ripe to its fullest.
So deliciously tempting that drool escaped him before he knew it, and he swallowed—a figure of unrivaled rank, a body made to be devoured.
He wanted to bury himself in that wickedly inviting hole right this instant, but not yet.
He had to wait.
A moment even more fitting than this one was coming.
"U Haru."
"......"
"Be mine. Then you can have back everything you lost."
"......"
To her silence, he simply smiled, as if it didn't bother him at all.
"You don't have to answer right away. I'll give you some time to think."
He picked up the rotor's remote control.
"You'll need time to sort through that complicated head of yours."
He gazed at her a moment longer, then added:
"Ah—I'll leave this on."
"...What?"
"The restraint frame has a rather interesting feature, it turns out."
Turning his back to her, he said:
"See you later."
"What do you mean by—"
Bip—
Wuuuuum—
"Ahnn...♥?! N-no... stop it... stop...! W-where are you going...?"
Wuuuuuum—!
"Yaaang—♥?! Why, why is it getting stronger...! Hnnn...♥!"
Screeeech— clunk—
"Don't... go...! You, Rim... Riiim—! Nnngh...♥! How am I supposed to think like th-this... hnah—♥?"
"No... ahhngh...♥ It's coming... I'm cumming... cumming—! Cumminggg... hnnnngh— cu... ming... a...?"
......
......
......
"I-it stopped...?"
Wuuuum—
"Aaahn—♥?! Hnggh...♥!"
"Nnngh...♥ Hnngh...♥!"
"Aaah... ahhhnngh...♥ It's... coming again... here it comes... I'm cumming—♥ cu... a...?"
"And it stopped, again...!"
Wuuuuum—!
"Aaahn—♥?!"
U Haru's shameless moans continued, on and on, until he came back.