A Wing Massage from the Sidekick
I had no memory of ever actually learning how to give a massage. The whole of my experience came down to volunteer work, rubbing the shoulders, arms, and legs of elderly folks.
But the trait called Lustful Touch had nothing whatsoever to do with any skill at massage.
Even by an ordinary person's standards, the moment I awakened it, the lightest touch could drive someone to climax.
Heroes were different. Their mental fortitude and physical ability transcended human limits, and the being before my eyes was a Hero—a B-Rank Hero, granted, but whether my ability would work on her at all was still an open question.
Even so, I have to.
If I wanted to live, I had to. I was absolutely not doing this because I wanted to. I was only... trying to survive.
Really.
Srrk.
My hand moved first, beginning to stroke the upper portion of the wing. I didn't knead it right away. Even so, Lustful Touch was already working overtime on nothing more than a caress.
I'll stroke the whole wing and let it grow used to my hands.
If I started kneading out of nowhere, the wing would have no time to adapt, and the effect would clearly be cut in half. There was no need to rush in. Try to skip ahead too fast, and you only end up flat on your face.
Arang swept the wing gently from end to end. True to how closely it resembled an angel's wing, it was fluffy and soft enough to make him want to keep touching it forever.
It really does feel like I'm touching an angel.
He had never felt a texture like this. No matter how fine the cloth, even the best comforter in the world wouldn't come within a toe's reach of it. He went on that way for a long while, softly stroking every part of the wing, and after about thirty minutes he could feel the surface of the wing grow just a little warmer. Wings that had been faintly cool at the start were heating up.
Her reaction... still nothing.
Yuyeong showed no response at all. She wasn't growing wet, nothing of the sort—she wasn't even sweating.
So this much really can't stir her in the slightest.
It seemed he had no choice but to massage harder.
He began the massage in earnest, starting at the section where the wing bones lay. One might assume that working bone would hurt more than it pleased, but that wasn't the case at all. In the touch of Arang as he was now, bearing Lustful Touch, pain simply did not exist. There was only pleasure. While he kneaded the wing bones with stubborn persistence, he checked the overall condition of the wing as well.
Yeah... the wing does look a little damaged.
The feathers along the bone had come loose and torn, if only very slightly. One could chalk it up to molting, but if that were all it was, the feathers wouldn't have torn.
Is she under stress?
If not that, then what? What was making this wing sick? The thought occurred to him that figuring it out might well become part of his duty as a Sidekick.
Now the membrane...
Having finished every section that held bone, he immediately made the feather-covered wing membrane his next target. For the membrane, though, he decided on a different kind of stimulation than the kneading he'd used on the bones.
Skrr.
Skrrrk.
He raised his fingers and lightly scratched the wing the way a cat plays with a scratcher, controlling his strength just so as he went over the entire membrane until it would tickle. Lustful Touch, blooming from his fingertips, was faithfully carrying out the task assigned to it. This was almost too ambiguous to even call a massage. If he had to sum the situation up in a single phrase... membrane caresses, maybe.
He stimulated the membrane for a full hour after that, and still Yuyeong gave no reaction. The wing did tremble faintly now and then, but he decided it was nothing. Her wings had a way of moving like that even on ordinary days.
Do I have about an hour left...?
After an hour and a half of using Lustful Touch, he could feel his mental strength wearing down. One hour—that was all the chance he had left today. He refused to despair. Had he really thought a B-Rank Hero would fall to him so easily?
Not a chance.
But that didn't mean he could do nothing and wait until he died. Arang's touch soon grew steadily more persistent. He pushed Lustful Touch to its limit and did everything he was capable of, and that one hour passed in a flash.
"Miss Yuyeong. The massage is finished."
"...Mm. Already?"
When Arang spoke, she rose from her seat as if nothing at all had happened. Her back had been to him, so he couldn't see her naked body in full, but the gracefully curved line of her back, and the hips continuing down from it, were unmistakable. Of course, even that was quickly hidden behind her wings, and he could see no more.
"Well? Were you satisfied?"
"I think it's a little better. You could say the wings move much more smoothly now..."
She shifted her wings slightly, confirming the change that had come over her body. Her face was as expressionless as ever, but she looked fairly satisfied.
"I need to get dressed again, so would you step out for a moment?"
"Understood."
At Yuyeong's request, Arang opened the door at once and left the massage room, not forgetting to close it behind him.
The moment he was gone, and his footsteps had receded far enough that they couldn't be heard at all—
"Nnh..."
Yuyeong's body shuddered. It was unmistakably the sign of a body that had felt pleasure.
It was only a wing massage, so why... does it feel so much like when he held my hand...
No. It was more thrilling than the moment their hands had been clasped, and that despite the wings being a rather insensitive part of her. It was a mercy she had used superhuman endurance to keep any change from showing in her body. Without a physique and a mind that had left humanity behind, she never could have endured it.
I only met him today... Arang, was it.
What would happen if she received that massage not on her wings, but directly on her body? If that touch reached her skin, could she endure it the way she had this time?
If his hands touched me...
Laid out defenseless, unable to offer even resistance, taking the stimulation. It would only be a massage, and still pleasure she couldn't bear would come flooding in. And at the end of it, surely...
"Haahk...♡"
She had only imagined it, and yet a moan burst from her lips before she knew it.
"Hup."
Startled, she hastily covered her mouth and looked toward the door Arang had left through. Fortunately he seemed long gone; the door did not open again.
"Haa..."
Only then did she let out a sigh of relief and look over her own body—breasts a little smaller than watermelons, a slender waist, and skin so pale and clear that someone might have mistaken her for a Westerner. She knew it herself. She was beautiful. She knew every kind of gaze turned on her from every direction, and she had done her best to ignore them. Whatever other people thought had nothing to do with her.
But why, when all she had received was a single massage...
Why does Mr. Arang keep circling through my head?
Right now, the only thought in her mind was that she wanted to receive that massage one more time. How had Arang looked at her? What had he been thinking while he gave it? Surely he wasn't thinking the same thing as other men...?
To find herself worrying over someone else's thoughts—thoughts she had never once considered—and a man she had met for the first time today, no less.
For now... I should ask him again tomorrow.
It was a feeling she had never experienced in her life, so she needed to understand it better. This feeling rising in her chest—what was it? To find out, she would have to receive a massage every day... but that was fine. She could endure as much as it took.
After the massage, the two of them talked about ordinary things as if nothing had happened, then went to bed. Besides the massage room there were about three other rooms, so he took a small one and Yuyeong used the large one.
Once Yuyeong had fallen asleep and the night had grown deep—
...I need to make more opportunities.
Arang was still lying in bed, lost in thought. He hadn't expected her to show no reaction at all. As he kept going he had even started to wonder whether she might be frigid, but that wasn't it. None of her traits included anything of the sort.
Haa... I'm going to lose my mind.
To think the chance he had seized on the first day would slip away like this. If he kept failing, he would die. That was a hard fact he couldn't look away from even if he wanted to.
If I could manage it somehow...
No matter what it took, he wanted to finish conditioning her—without borrowing anyone else's hands directly, of course. The only one who could condition them was him. The only one who could have them all to himse—
...What the hell am I thinking.
An ugly thought had surfaced along the drift of his mind before he could stop it. The anxiety was probably making him like this.
I have to settle this somehow in the time I have left.
He didn't know about her, but for him his life was on the line. With that deep resolve, Arang finally closed his eyes. He had a separate schedule starting in the morning, and getting through it would require proper rest.
The next day arrived. Having finished our preparations early in the morning, we left the building at once.
First on the schedule, a cosmetics commercial shoot... second, a talk-show appearance, and last, an ad meeting with a famous game company.
She possessed a look that stood out even among B-Rank Heroes, so the work that came in was plentiful as well. In this world, a Hero meant more than simply cutting down Monsters and Villains.
Even in the car, Arang tapped away at a laptop, drafting documents and submitting them. He was the one handling all of her clerical work, so it couldn't be helped. They dealt with this and that as they went, and before he knew it they had arrived at the shoot.
Yuyeong and Arang got out of the car and headed straight for the set. She went off separately for makeup and a costume change, and Arang waited for her.
He had been waiting quite a while when—
"Um..."
"...Yes?"
Someone addressed him cautiously. He looked up and found a rather pretty woman. Judging by her clothes, she was probably a PD or a staff member working on site.
"What can I do for you?"
"By any chance, are you Miss Yuyeong's manager?"
"Ah, not a manager. I'm her Sidekick."
"Oh...!"
At the word Sidekick, her eyes went round, and she held out the smartphone she had been holding.
"C-could I possibly get your number...? You're really my type..."
"......"
The sudden ask for his number left Arang dumbfounded as well. Looking in the mirror, he knew for himself that this face was handsome. He just hadn't expected to be asked for his number out of nowhere. Still, he couldn't refuse her coldly, so he put on a smile.
"Haha... I appreciate the thought, but I can't give you my num—"
He was just about to say he couldn't, when—
Creeeak.
The door beside them opened, and Yuyeong came out. She was dressed like a saintess out of a fantasy tale, and the sight stole Arang's gaze completely. Yuyeong, however, ignored him and looked at the staff member who had been trying to get his number.
"You ought to be going. As you know, this is work hours, isn't it? If you want to earn your pay, you have to work."
Her face and her tone were colder than usual.
"Y-yes...! I understand!"
Frightened, the woman clutched her phone to her chest and ran straight back to where she had been.
"......"
Arang quietly watched. A moment later Yuyeong turned her head again, and their eyes met.
Whip!
She snapped her head aside and walked toward the set.
Click, click.
Her heels sounded light and brisk.
...She seems colder than usual.
Was it his imagination? Arang tilted his head and thought it over carefully. Nothing came of it.
Well, it'll be fine.
For now, assisting her at her side mattered more than a trivial worry like this. He followed her toward the set at once.