The Cam Broadcast
I want to talk about the hardest part of getting ready for a cam broadcast—a Half-Cam, strictly speaking, but still.
A concept explosive enough to blow the viewers' anticipation apart? A careful study of whatever talent might squeeze the maximum out of a Half-Cam? Neither.
The hardest part was makeup and clothes.
Makeup, first of all, went without saying. In my entire life, the only things I had ever put on my face were toner and lotion. When it came to cosmetics, utterly illiterate was the only phrase that fit.
The next item, clothing, was hardly any different. A full month had passed since I'd become a woman, and I still wasn't even wearing a bra—so how was I supposed to put on a skirt or a dress properly?
Looking back now, it really was a stretch of pure endurance. I'd already spent more than ten days cutting off every YouTube video I used to enjoy and watching nothing but basic makeup tutorials and clips about whatever fashion was in style. It still wasn't enough. So I came up with a drastic measure.
These days, if you have the money, anything is possible. There were surprisingly many shops that would handle everything from the hair down to the makeup. If I ever ran a cam broadcast that showed my whole face instead of a Half-Cam, I'd probably end up using one of those.
Makeup is way too hard.
The biggest worry was settled that way, but the ordeal of dressing like a woman remained. Even so, before the greater cause known as broadcasting, I made a serious decision at last. Over a figure I'd corrected with my ability, I carefully put on a bra. I drilled it into my head, over and over. I was absolutely not some kind of pervert.
Only after that profound exercise in mind control did I try matching a white blouse with a black skirt. A skirt. A skirt. A skirt... Never once, in all the years I'd been alive, had I imagined a day would come when I would wear one. Novels always describe the feeling as drafty down below, but there was nothing like that. Ah—maybe because there was no wind indoors? I did not, however, have anything like the courage to step outside and test whether the novels were right.
If I went out like this and landed in other people's sight, a kind of shame I couldn't even properly name would clamp hard around my throat.
I might end up past any hope of recovery from the self-loathing...
Proof that the body had become a woman's while the mind still carried a stubborn masculinity. People who didn't know me might call it making a fuss, but I couldn't help the revulsion that rose at wearing a bra or putting on a skirt.
Endure it. For the broadcast's success.
You learn, once you're an adult, that there are times you have to do things you don't want to do. That lesson is never gentle, and it doesn't sit quietly waiting until you've managed to overcome it. The spirit branded into me by harsh scolding and relentless pressure shaved the revulsion down.
A small breath. I quietly lifted my head and looked at the mirror on the wall. I started from the front, then turned my body just enough to check the side as well. Fine. No—better than I'd thought.
Once I shook off the resistance to wearing feminine clothes, choosing an outfit turned out not to be a problem after all. I was originally a man. And more than ninety percent of the people watching my broadcast were men. In that sense, all I had to do was pick something that looked pretty to my own eyes. Women calculate this and that and fret over the eyes around them, choosing clothes in some complicated way, but I knew better than anyone. Men are simple animals. Among the clothes I owned, I could say with confidence which style they would like best.
And now I was going to prove it.
Five in the afternoon. Time for the broadcast to begin.
I'd put up a notice beforehand that it would be a cam broadcast, and now even noona—a word you could hardly hear on an ordinary day—was popping out all over the place. Men's instincts, honestly... such pitiful animals. If I left them any longer, there was no telling what would happen, so I hurriedly flipped the setting from standby to live.
The viewers who had been charging in with all that racket soon came face to face with reality: a single lonely chair. In an instant the chat was plastered wall to wall with rock bottom, and the screen vanished under a terror of one-count Water Balloons.
"Hey, everyone, calm down."
The firepower was fiercer than usual. They weren't calming down easily, so I braced for total qi deviation and, in a voice I'd carefully smoothed out, put on a coy act.
"I-it's because I'm embarrassed. Just wait a little."
"What do you mean? Honestly, I've been forcing myself to act easygoing all this time, and it isn't easy."
I didn't want to, but this was strategy too. What if a BJ who had always reacted in that blunt, easygoing way and talked like a man suddenly went all girly on her very first cam broadcast? That alone would be more than enough to talk about, and it could poke at the viewers' sadistic (?) streak besides. How they wandered around with their eyes wide open, hunting for a BJ's weak points. I'd tossed them such a fine opening; even after this cam broadcast ended, they'd probably spend a good week biting, tearing, and savoring me to their hearts' content.
They'll tease me for being a BJ who only half-pretends to be feminine, or something. Not bad.
That was the intention. A BJ's personal charm is an important part of a broadcast growing, but getting close to the viewers—feeling familiar to them—is just as essential. They have to be comfortable with a BJ if they're going to keep watching for a long time without it feeling like a burden.
"Hoo, ha! All right, I'm going."
When the time I'd set in advance arrived, a gentle background track began to play. At the same moment the chat broke into a stampede. Water Balloons followed one after another, tail to tail. I had to meet expectations that looked ready to explode at any second. I carefully took a step and slipped into the frame, gave the viewers a small wave with my right hand—and promptly dropped into the chair.
The frame began exactly below my neck and ran down to my waist. The first reason the viewers were howling was that my face wasn't showing. And the second...
"It's just that the weather's a bit chilly. I'll keep the blanket on for a minute."
A cute yellow blanket. One covered, no less, in a crowd of tiny, adorable little chicks. I'd picked it myself to test the viewers' aggression, and I bundled my upper body up tight in it. To put it simply, all that was on screen right now was a cute yellow chick blanket and the hands clutching it.
Before the rock-bottom spam could start all over again, I tugged the blanket away from around my neck and spoke.
"If I show you everything from the start, there's no charm in it. Let's get to know each other sloooowly!"
I'd done the first half in Aring's voice and the second in Miss Pocheun's. The viewers collapsed on the spot. So this was the taste of training them? I eased the blanket down a little farther, revealing the line of my shoulders. For viewers sitting there with their eyes wide open it would be a real shame, but no skin was actually showing. Today's outfit concept was focused on just one thing.
The viewers bickered and split into camps. Tastes differ from person to person, so even exposure clearly divides into likes and dislikes. In that sense, what I'd shown of my outfit so far could well have been a disappointment to the exposure faction. They would have wanted a nape laid cleanly bare, or a cut that bared the shoulders altogether. How could a sparrow fathom the grand design of a phoenix?
A few short coughs brought the argument to a stop. At once, the gazes beyond the screen locked on. Carefully, I lowered the blanket to my knees. The secret weapon I'd prepared for today!
I leaned forward just a little and waved both hands in greeting. In that moment there was no sound to hear, and yet I definitely heard it—the viewers' crazed cheers.