Villain: 10x Rewards Begins With The Protagonist's Mother

"Dante, wait."

He stopped with his hand on the door handle. A scheming grin spread across his face where she couldn’t see it.

’Got her!’

"...Come back." Natasha said, looking at his back.

She stood up from the chair and rolled her shoulder with a wince. "Now that I think about it, my shoulders do feel a lot heavier than usual."

She jokingly complained about all the things she had to deal with before adding with a small smile.

"Maybe your massage can make it lighter."

She didn’t know the rude blue screen she had been cursing at all day belonged to the same student standing in front of her.

All the problems weighing her down right now, her recultivation, restoring Eden’s Gate, dealing with her troublemaking son, he had the answers to every single one of them.

But the price for that was her becoming more than a master to him.

***

A few moments later, Natasha lay on her stomach on the bed. Her cardigan was gone, and that short nightgown had ridden up uselessly, barely covering her ass as the fabric of her underwear clung tight between her parted thighs.

Gulp!

’Damn... those are some spankable cheeks!’ Dante used the target feed to steal a peek from behind and was completely blown away by the view.

"Master, should I start?" Dante closed the feed and cracked his knuckles, sitting on the edge of the bed beside her.

"Yeah." Natasha said in a neutral tone, already justifying everything in her head. ’This is just a massage. He’s doing this to make up for the food and I’m doing this to stop his condition from declining.’

’There’s nothing weird about it. Juniors do this for their elders all the time.’

At the same time, she didn’t have much expectation for the massage itself. People actually studied for years to learn this stuff and Dante’s major was business.

There was zero connection between the two.

She closed her eyes and waited for him to start.

’He did offer it with that much confidence. So he should at least be decent, right?’ She thought as she felt his hands settle on her shoulders.

And she got the answer the very next moment from her own mouth.

"Nngh~"

Her eyes shot open and her hand flew to her mouth.

’Did I just... did that sound really come out of me?’

’WHY... WHY IS HE SO GOOD AT THIS?!’ Her ears were burning so hot she could feel the heat spreading down her neck while Dante kept massaging like he hadn’t heard a thing.

She tried to cover it up even though it was already too late.

Cough! Cough!

Seeing her futile attempt to cover it up, Dante chuckled internally. ’She’s probably wondering why I’m so good at this, right?’

A blue screen appeared in front of him.

[Golden Hands]

[Grade: Rare]

[Description: A forbidden massage technique created by a master who believed the fastest way to a woman’s heart was through her muscles. The target develops an overwhelming desire to never let those hands stop.]

[The deeper the tension, the sweeter the release!]

’A pretty good technique for 5,000 points, heh.’

Naturally, he didn’t buy this just for a single mission.

Once Emma came back, he would need an excuse to maintain close physical contact with Natasha, and it had to be convincing enough for both of them.

"Dante, w-where did you learn to massage like this?" Natasha asked, starting to doubt herself. ’Was I really that neglectful of him? First it was his physique, and now this? None of this can be done in a month or two.’

"Well, master..." Dante pretended to hesitate.

"If you don’t want to tell me, then forget it." Natasha said right away. She was just curious anyway.

"I... used to massage Ryan and Marcus sometimes." He spoke like the words were stuck in his throat. "After that, I got interested in it. So I just learned whenever I had the time."

"....."

Natasha didn’t say anything, but a flash of disappointment crossed her eyes.

She thought she couldn’t possibly be more disappointed in her son, but it turned out he was even bullying Dante who treated him like a brother.

Even now, he was trying to take revenge for him.

She didn’t bother thinking about Marcus and his family. They were already dead in her mind.

"Dante, from now on, don’t massage Ryan even if he asks you. Just come tell me." She said in a stern tone.

"But master, Ryan is already dead." Dante said with a puzzled look on his face while laughing his ass off inside.

’Shit.’ Natasha caught her slip and quickly added, "I mean even if he comes back from the dead."

"But master..."

"What?" She asked, her tone sharp.

"If I refuse, Ryan will beat me up."

"....."

Natasha was speechless again. ’Right... he was a bully.’

A look of disgust flashed across her face at the thought of her own son.

At the same time, it hit her that Dante had suffered a lot because of her.

He probably put up with Ryan all those years precisely because Ryan was her son.

She couldn’t help but feel guilty.

"Dante, do you want anything? Somewhere you want to go?" She asked in a soft voice.

"Just tell me. Master will make it happen."

’I slander the protagonist and get paid by his mother? Hahahaha! This is my fucking dream job!’ Dante had a hard time keeping a straight face.

’Should I just ask to be Ryan’s stepdad? Hehe.’

"I don’t want anything, master. Maybe we can go shopping?" Dante suggested while his hands kept working.

"Just shopping? You’re okay with that? You don’t want money? A new car?" Natasha asked in a puzzled tone. If anyone else was given this chance, they would have asked for billions of rollads without blinking.

"You’d give me those anytime I asked anyway, master." He said with a helpless tone.

He had been going hard at her with all those missions and wanted to take her out on something like a date. But it seems this woman might be a masochist.

"Oh, right..." She said as it clicked. "Well, if you’re okay with just shopping, let’s go tomorrow."

"Okay."

***

As the two of them kept chatting, Dante finished with her neck and shoulders and offered to do her hands.

Natasha agreed without hesitation. Her student was genuinely good at this.

Slowly, Dante moved from her hands to her back.

And as time went by, she slipped into a trance and just let herself enjoy it.

"Master..."

"Master..."

..

..

..

Seeing that she had completely zoned out, Dante leaned in close and whispered gently by her ear.

"Master."

A jolt shot through Natasha’s body and she snapped back to reality in an instant.

’Did I blank out?’ She turned to look at him with the corners of her ears burning red. "What?"

"I... just wanted to ask if I should do the legs too?" Dante asked, looking a little scared.

Natasha had the urge to say yes. But the moment she felt something, that thought was thrown out immediately.

"Dante, I think that’s enough for today." She said with a nervous laugh. "It’s getting late. Go get some sleep."

"Okay, master. I’ll head back to my room." He agreed without pushing it.

As he walked to the door, a thought crossed his mind. ’I guess that’s the limit of the technique.’

The fact that it worked this well against a Circuit Expansion awakener was already impressive. The technique didn’t require any mana to perform, so whoever created it was an absolute genius. What Dante didn’t know was that under normal circumstances, it wouldn’t have worked on her to this extent.

The person who performed it mattered more in this case.

And the proof of that was on Natasha’s fingers.

"Not again..." She stared at the sticky wetness on her fingertips.