Bathing with the Master (2)
Bathing with the Master (2)
Aika Ninomiya barged in on her disciple while he was bathing.
If their genders were reversed, it would have been a crime; even as they were, it was still a terrible thing to do.
Master and disciple or not, they were still a man and a woman. How could they possibly bathe together?
Yet she remained perfectly calm.
'I had always trained on my own, so I wasn't sure, but this happened all the time in comics, didn't it? Masters scrubbing their disciples' backs.'
Aika herself preferred novels to childish comics—Chinese wuxia novels in particular—but...
Masters washing their disciples showed up all the time in comics for children. And I was a woman, after all.
Surely this much was acceptable between master and disciple.
A major catastrophe born of warped common sense.
'And besides... it made me a little angry that he wasn't reacting at all.'
A slightly lecherous motive lurked behind it as well.
Hadn't Yujin been wildly aroused by the sight of her on the first day?
Yet only a week later, he was perfectly calm?
She was wearing nothing but a bathrobe and had even climbed on top of him, yet he showed no reaction?
Was I really that unattractive as a woman?
A woman twelve years older than you doesn't so much as make you flinch, is that it?
The thought had struck a serious nerve with Aika.
It was a thoroughly unbecoming thought.
'I banned him from using hypnosis, so he can't escape. This is a contest, my disciple.'
It wasn't that she wanted him to get all worked up at the sight of her, not at all, but...
She simply wanted him to show the natural physiological response of a man, even if only a little.
That thought made Aika act a little bolder.
Which left Yujin in absolute agony.
'I knew Master was surprisingly naive, but I never expected it to go this far. This is killing me.'
All he had on was a single towel wrapped around his waist.
He had barely covered himself, and that was all the towel was doing.
What if he ended up drawing his sword in the middle of this?
It would cause a disaster beyond anything the word could describe.
He had to endure.
But...
Inside the steam-filled bathroom, the woman he couldn't help but love was right there with him in nothing but a bathrobe.
Tsk. Could he really hold out?
Yujin grew anxious in spite of himself.
'I had to endure...!!!'
'Let's see just how long you last.'
And so began a breathless battle of wits between master and disciple.
"First, let me rinse you off. There—is it too hot?"
"Could you use cold water instead? I'm hot."
"Denied. This is precisely when you need warm water to loosen your muscles. Cold water is out of the question."
Round One: Yujin subtly tried to use cold water to calm himself, and Aika shot him down without a moment's hesitation.
Aika won decisively.
"Then I shall wash you. Now..."
-Rub, rub.
"I shall loosen your knotted muscles, so remain still even if it hurts."
Round Two: the real washing began.
Her lathered hands roamed freely over his bare skin.
It took less than a minute for dismay to cross Aika's face.
-Press, press.
'What do I do now? I don't think he'll react to something as tame as washing him.'
Aika wanted to bolster her self-esteem by seeing her disciple react, but she had no intention of doing anything lewd herself.
She wanted him to become aroused entirely on his own.
She was asking for quite a lot for an old maid.
Meanwhile, Yujin...
-Clench.
'Think of the Chairwoman's face. If I picture that old hag without makeup, even an erection would die...!!!'
He repeatedly pictured the face of the sixty-year-old chairwoman, Seol Hayeon.
Thanks to that brutally self-inflicted mental torture, Yujin kept his composure.
Round Two went decisively to Yujin.
Seol Hayeon, who could only smack her lips in regret over her shattered red-ginseng liquor, suffered a total defeat as well.
Aika's gaze turned cold.
"———Now, turn around."
"...Did I hear you correctly?"
"I told you to turn around. I shall loosen the muscles in front as well."
"What!?"
In other words, she wanted him to turn around.
Yujin's composure shattered.
Face each other outright, when both of them were dressed like this?
Was she trying to go beyond a hit-and-run and straight into negligent homicide, Master?
For the first time, Yujin resisted.
"I really don't think that's a good idea, Master! We're both dressed like this. Facing each other..."
-Poke.
"...Gurk!!?"
"The arm I loosened is still this bad. Do you think your other muscles are fine? Enough chatter. Turn around."
"Th-then let's at least do it after we're done here! It doesn't have to be in the bath!"
"Why make you sweat twice? Besides, I need the hot water to warm your muscles."
"...Haah. Yes."
Still, Yujin had no choice but to turn around.
For him, obeying his master was simply common sense.
And she was saying it for his own good.
He could not defy her.
Of course, he kept his eyes squeezed shut as he turned.
That gave Aika an unrestricted view of his Peach Blossom Spring.
-Gulp.
'N-now that I see him like this, it feels as though I'm doing something terrible...? I don't think even children's comics had scenes like this...?'
A belated pang of very real guilt came as a bonus.
After a moment's hesitation, Aika moved her hands anyway.
She had already crossed the point of no return. Hesitating now would only make things stranger.
Her hands, tinged with a blue aura, traveled down toward Yujin's lower abdomen.
"Your abdominal muscles are in terrible shape. I'll use my energy to loosen them, so move your hands."
"...Yes. Please do."
-Press-press.
He even moved the hand that had been holding down his towel.
For a while, only the sound of her hands kneading his bare skin filled the bathroom.
Both of their faces rapidly turned red.
'Th-th-this is... If I lower my hand just a little more, I'll touch it, won't I?! The lightest tap of my finger would expose it!!?'
Aika's hands kept hesitating.
She could imagine exactly what would happen with a single movement of her hand.
Just imagining it made her mouth go dry.
Yujin felt much the same.
'Seol Hayeon, Seol Hayeon, Seol Hayeon, Seol Hayeon....'
-Rustle.
'...Her sleeve keeps brushing against me and breaking my concentration!!!'
He desperately tried to picture the Chairwoman's face, but it was hard to concentrate.
Whenever he started to focus, Aika's sleeve brushed softly against him.
It felt like being force-fed the red-pill truth that his master was wearing nothing but a bathrobe.
And then there was their position.
He was seated demurely on the bath stool.
His master was kneeling in front of him, reaching out with both hands as though performing a solemn ritual.
What if he drew his sword now?
'I can't become a pervert who strikes Master's wrist!!'
A kendo technique that targets the opponent's wrist.
The wrist strike, known in Japan as kote-uchi, would be unleashed.
Only with a sword of flesh instead of a wooden one.
Growing desperate, Yujin gritted his teeth.
-Gnash.
"......!!!!?"
'My disciple's face is bright red. Was he truly that embarrassed!?'
The sight brought Aika slightly back to her senses.
Belated realization flashed through her mind.
Yujin was merely enduring with all his might, but...
with his face bright red and his teeth clenched, in a certain light it looked as though he was barely holding back his embarrassment.
Ah! No matter what, I had crossed the line this time!
Aika sighed at the realization.
She hurriedly pulled her hands away.
"I-I'm sorry. I didn't realize a young man would be so embarrassed. This really was too much."
-Flustered.
"I'm done washing you, so I shall leave now. Take your time coming out!"
She scrambled to her feet and backed away in a panic.
Her pride as a woman no longer mattered. Her disciple came first.
Had it ended here, it would at least have been a happy ending, but...
———Unfortunately,
-Slip.
"......!!!!?"
The bathroom floor was slick with water and suds.
Aika had practically launched herself to her feet.
Unable to stop her momentum, she tipped backward.
The most common bathroom accident: slipping and falling.
And now it had happened to Aika.
Of course, even on her worst day, she was still the S-rank No. 1.
She was the world's strongest awakener, capable of keeping her balance in any situation, but...
'I'll correct my posture....'
-Glance.
'...My disciple is, reacting slightly?!!'
Unfortunately, Yujin's endurance was nearing its limit at that very moment.
She failed to right herself and fell.
It was the first time she had landed on her backside since becoming an awakener.
-Splash!
"...Hyaet!?"
An embarrassingly girlish cry came as a bonus.
It wasn't a cry of pain.
She'd never tested it, but she was confident she could survive even a nuclear blast.
This was simply a sound of surprise from water suddenly splashing onto her body.
...Yet that sound was enough to make Yujin's eyes snap open.
'A falling sound!!?'
-Flash.
Good heavens, his master had fallen?
The S-rank No. 1, Aika Ninomiya?
Just how much energy had she expended massaging him?
More importantly, what if she'd hit something when she fell?
Worried, he immediately looked toward her...
"Master, are you all righ—..."
"I-I'm fine. I only slipped."
"Whoa."
———A healthy young man was crushed to death by an eight-ton truck.
He died happy.
"......? .........!!!!!!? I-I'm sorry! You saw something you shouldn't have!!"
-Scramble.
Realizing how she looked, Aika fled the bathroom on the verge of dying from embarrassment.
Amazingly, both of them were thinking the same thing, their faces bright red.
'H-he didn't see, did he?!'
'I-it didn't show, did it?!!'
They were truly a well-matched master and disciple.
* * *
Although something inappropriate had happened, we started dinner as if nothing had.
"M-my disciple. How is it? It's called chicken nanban. Since you said you liked chicken, I made it especially for you..."
"I-it's delicious...."
...Of course, something had happened.
Their flushed cheeks did not cool easily.
Worse, Master's reaction was worrying me to death.
It would have been one thing if she was only flustered because she'd seen something she shouldn't have, but...
What if she really had seen it?
I was so worried I couldn't tell whether the food was going into my mouth or my nose.
This bizarre standoff lasted until we finished the dishes.
"I'll do the dishes."
"I'll do them. Step aside..."
-Halt.
"...W-well, then. You may do them, my disciple."
Master, who insisted that 'housework is a woman's duty,' had actually put me at the sink.
The situation was more serious than I'd thought.
So I agonized over it while washing the dishes.
Should I prostrate myself in advance, like the first day, or not?
'I should apologize for showing her something she shouldn't have seen. I could be vague about exactly what it was. Yeah.'
After a long debate, I decided to start by prostrating myself.
I wiped my wet hands on my apron, turned around with grim determination...
"Master..."
"Wh-what... what on earth is this..."
"......?"
I found Master staring at her phone in confusion.
Her eyes were so wide I wondered if they could get any wider—just like the day she first saw my Yujindo.
"What's the matter...?"
"In Japan, the trending search... L-look at this! I truly have no idea what it means."
[1. 二宮愛佳ユジン結婚]
"This is going around!!"
"It's the number-one trending search? The first part looks like your name, Master. What does the rest mean?"
"———Aika Ninomiya and Yujin—marriage!!"
"......!!!!?"
My expression became much the same.
...Seriously, Japan? Why the hell were you spoiling someone else's life?