I Lost
Suhyun put genuine care into every massage he gave. With his knowledge of the acupoints and hand techniques that moved exactly as he willed them, he eased both the body and the mind of every client who lay on his table.
But he had never unleashed Bicheon-gong at its full power to conquer a woman. He had never needed to — and he had never wanted to.
But if the client comes at me like this, that's a different story.
A martial artist never ran from a challenge.
Suhyun gathered inner energy into both hands.
The Flying Heaven Skill — a martial art born from chamber techniques. To unravel the profound mysteries of those arts, yin and yang had been brought into union, and to govern the surging energy that followed, the Flying Heaven Heart Method had been forged. Those who grasped its true meaning added forms one by one, and so Bicheon-gong came into being as a complete martial discipline. The original essence and hidden principles of the chamber arts ran deep within every fiber of it.
"Nngh?!"
Suhyun's fingers closed gently around her ankle — then drove straight up the length of her thigh in a single, unbroken stroke. Along the path his fingers carved, the inner energy pooled in his palms sank into her skin.
The internal power of Bicheon-gong belonged to an entirely different lineage from any other martial art. It had been refined for one purpose alone: to stir the senses, to set a person ablaze. The energy itself was no different from an aphrodisiac incense — or a bewitching fragrance that clouded the mind.
"Haaaah♥"
The moment that energy painted itself thick across her lower body, Park Soyeon's mouth fell open. A sweet moan spilled from her lips. The match was already as good as won.
But Suhyun did not stop. His hands slipped beneath the gown and found her ass through the disposable panties. A flimsy scrap of cloth like that could not keep his inner energy out.
"Th-that's impossibllle♥ Aaah♥ Hah♥ Haaang♥"
Park Soyeon began to pant. Her pussy was already twitching, pouring out yin energy in heavy waves. Suhyun's hands traveled between her ass and her inner thighs — unhesitating, unrelenting — and Bicheon-gong drove just as relentlessly into the flesh beneath. Skin and muscle trembled wherever his touch passed. That well-shaped ass shuddered hard.
"Haaah♥ Aang♥ Ah♥ I— I♥ lose…♥ Uuuuungh♥ Hnnngh♥ Aaaah♥"
Park Soyeon declared her surrender. Only then did Suhyun's hands still. He drew the energy back from his palms.
"Are you going to tell me your name now?"
"Nngh♥ Nh…♥ W-wait a second…♥ Ang♥"
Even after Suhyun took his hands off her, Park Soyeon kept panting. A dense, lingering pleasure still coiled inside her body. She buried her face in the massage table and fought with everything she had not to feel it. If she let her focus slip for even a moment, she was going to climax.
"Hah… hah… What the hell was that?"
"Felt good, didn't it?"
"It did, I'll give you that. But how did you make me… all at once, like that…"
Park Soyeon had more than her share of sexual experience. Her body was well developed and she felt things easily — but if she put her mind to it, she could also hold out and feel nothing at all. And yet here was a pair of hands that had ignored all of that and sent her over the edge in an instant.
"You still haven't told me your name. A promise is a promise, right?"
"…. Park Soyeon."
"Haha. Getting a name out of you was harder than I expected. Soyeon. Nice to meet you."
"Hey! I'm still way older than you, you know. Calling me by just my name is a bit much, isn't it?"
"Don't worry about little things like that. I'll start the massage again."
"W-wait♥ Ahh♥ Haaang♥ You bastard♥ You're too gooood at this♥ Aaah♥ Hah♥"
Suhyun's hands found Park Soyeon's thighs again. This time he did not use Bicheon-gong. But the aftereffects still lingered in her body, leaving every inch of her hypersensitive, and under his practiced touch she stopped caring about little things like how he addressed her or the way he talked.
"So how did you two end up fighting, anyway?"
"Aaah♥ Aaaah♥ I— I can't take any mooore♥ Aah♥"
The most basic skill in building a relationship with a woman was conversation. Suhyun tried to keep talking the way he always did. Park Soyeon, however, was in no condition to hold up her end. Her pussy was clenching, straining toward orgasm — and the instant Suhyun's fingers slipped into the crease where her ass met her thigh, right beside it, she came with a filthy, broken moan.
"Aaaaah♥ I— I'm cummiiiiiing♥♥♥ Hwaaaaah♥ Hwaah♥ Hwaaaah♥♥♥♥"
Park Soyeon's ass and thighs locked tight. The muscles contracted, and her pussy clenched with them. Her erector spinae and back pulled taut, lifting her upper body off the table; her neck rose with it, and the face that had been buried in the massage bed came up. Mouth wide, pouring out moans, Park Soyeon's face wore the raw, animal expression of a woman in heat.
"That felt really good, huh, Soyeon. Two in a row would be rough, so I'll ease up a little."
"Hnnn…. Heeung…."
Suhyun's hands stroked gently over her thighs, her ass, her waist — a slow, afterglow kind of touch that stretched the crashing pleasure in Park Soyeon's body and made it last. It was several minutes before the half-lidded look left her eyes and she came back to herself.
"Hah…."
"You with me?"
"Yeah…."
Park Soyeon answered meekly. For some reason, the competitive fire and the urge to push back that she'd felt before were simply gone. She didn't understand why.
"What do you do for work?"
"I run a bar…."
She had almost answered more formally than she meant to. It was a situation that ought to have left her confused — and yet her heart felt remarkably at ease. Was it because her body was so comfortable? Or because she had just come? She didn't know. Park Soyeon stopped thinking and gave herself over to Suhyun's hands.
At some point the gown she'd been wearing had come off, and the disposable panties and bra were gone with it. It didn't matter. She was going to take them off anyway — and when she felt this good, what did it matter?
"A bar? The one Yena said she worked at? Then that makes you the boss, Soyeon."
"Yeah. That's right."
"I see. How'd you end up running a bar?"
"Ah, haah. Well…."
Every so often Suhyun's hands found an acupoint, and a moan slipped out of her on its own. But it wasn't the kind of destructive pleasure that had smashed through every defense she had before. This was something faint and warm and simply good — a massage that left her body pleasantly, languidly spent.
"The Chilsung Gang? Wow, so there are ruffians around here too. Ah — sorry if calling them that rubbed you the wrong way."
"No. It's fine. My husband's into some shady stuff, that's true. But it's not like the old days, when they were doing really bad things…. Aaah, right there…."
Park Soyeon found herself telling Suhyun things she would never have said to anyone else. She usually avoided talking about her husband altogether — and yet when she spoke with Suhyun, even the words sitting at the bottom of her heart came spilling out. She didn't think that was a bad thing. If anything, it felt like she was getting closer to him, and that left her feeling good and at ease.
"That spot felt good?"
"Haah♡ Mmh…."
"Too bad. Time's up for touching you there."
"That's…."
"I'll touch you more next time you come. Turn over onto your front for me."
"Next time…. You're going to massage me like this next time too?"
"Yeah. Come by whenever you want and I'll make you feel good. So you'll come back, right?"
"Yeah. I'll definitely come back…."
Maybe I should've set the price even higher.
That was what Lee Inhwa thought as she looked over the reservation schedule. The premium Bicheon Massage Course had been rolled out not long ago. Suhyun's bookings had been so backed up that getting the owner's approval had been easy. Lee Inhwa had privately expected that once a premium course at twice the price went live, Suhyun's reservations would ease off a little. That was how markets worked.
She had been wrong. Even with the premium course in place, the reservations still overflowed. No — if anything, getting a slot had become even harder than before. Word of Suhyun's otherworldly skill had spread like wildfire. The way Ryu Yena had brought in Park Soyeon, the way Kim Miyoung had brought in Cheon Yuhwa — other clients were dragging in still more clients, eager to share the Kim Suhyun massage they thought of as their own private secret. And those new clients brought others. A virtuous cycle of growing business, over and over. Besides, word of mouth followed the trustworthiness of the person doing the recommending, which made it far more convincing than any of the glowing reviews littering the internet.
"Welcome."
"I'd like to get a massage."
"Of course. If you could take a look at the therapist roster and name who you'd like?"
"Ah, I was hoping to see Kim Suhyun."
A client had come in. From the fidgety way she stood in the doorway and the way her eyes kept wandering around the room, Lee Inhwa knew at a glance that this was a first-timer. And sure enough, she asked about Kim Suhyun.
"I'm afraid that's a problem. If you look here… all of this is Kim Suhyun's bookings. Even if I put you down now, you'd be waiting three weeks. Shall I make the reservation?"
"Ah…. I have to wait that long?"
"Yes. And even if it isn't Kim Suhyun specifically, the therapists at our parlor are all very skilled. Why not try a session with one of them while you're here?"
Clients like this one had come because something in their body actually hurt. They folded under Lee Inhwa's enthusiastic pitch. Another customer gained, just like that — and this, too, was thanks to Suhyun. Getting a massage from him was so difficult that the ones who failed to book him went looking for someone else. A kind of trickle-down effect. And the ones who captured that trickle-down most cleanly were the therapists who took Suhyun's massage lessons in whatever scraps of time they could find — Gwanghyun among them. They studied the acupoints on their own and picked up Suhyun's know-how directly, which meant their hands came closest to his. The other therapists benefited from the trickle-down too, but when you compared booking rates and return visits, the difference was meaningful.
"Mmm, that was so refreshing. There's a reason you recommended this place. I might just become a regular."
"Right? Most of the therapists here have really good hands."
"But you said you tried that one. Kim Suhyun? What are his hands like?"
"What is there to say…. Just look at how backed up his reservations are. If it weren't for the one-session-per-person rule, I'd book every single day and come every single day. Haah, two weeks left now…."
"No way. You're talking like that? I should try booking him once too."
Two young housewives came down the hallway trading gossip. They were the type to pick apart everything they encountered — and even they had nothing but praise for the therapists' skill. Lee Inhwa dipped her head lightly and got ready to take a reservation.
"Did you enjoy your massage?"
"Yes. Would it be possible to book another?"
"Of course. Which therapist shall I put you down for?"
"The one I just had…. The name was…."
"Choi Gwanghyun."
"Yes. Please book him — and Kim Suhyun as well."
"Kim Suhyun is fully booked, so the earliest would be three weeks from now. Would that be all right?"
"Yes, well, it can't be helped. Go ahead and put me down. Ah — the reminder texts still go out, right?"
"Yes. A confirmation text is sent starting three days before your appointment. You can opt out of those if you'd prefer."
Another regular, added to the list. As long as Suhyun was here, it seemed L Massage Parlor's business would keep flourishing.