The moment it becomes safe, and the tension breaks, the bite on my arm begins to sting.
You could say it’s hot more than painful, and every time my heart pumps another beat, *doki, doki*… I guess it does hurt, after all.
I feel a jerk at the yukata sleeve covering the wound.
When I look, Obana-chan is there with me.
Kei: Ah……
Kei: Obana-chan, thank you. I’m alive right now thanks to you. I’ll give you a whole bunch of manjuu to eat later, okay?
Bearing the pain and forcing a smile, as I reach my hand to give him a pet, he burrows himself smoothly underneath my open sleeve.
Kei: Eh!? Wait a sec… Obana-chan!?
The sensation of his soft, warm hairs touching my skin is almost ticklish enough to make me forget the pain.
My body cringes, and while I’m bearing a ticklishness that makes me want to wriggle away, another sensation I didn’t expect takes me by surprise.
Kei: Uhya!?
Rolling up the yukata sleeve, I see Obana-chan lapping noisily at the marks of the snakebite.
Kei: Are you going to patch me up, then?
With the diligence of a child grooming their parent, he licks assiduously about the mouth of the wound. The blood that had dyed the surrounding skin has already been licked cleanly off.
After last night, this would be the second time he’s licked me like this, but——
Unlike my fingers, my upper arm isn’t really a place that other people touch on a daily basis, so it sort of… you know… sends a shiver up my spine, and makes it hard to calm down.
Kei: Umm, Obana-chan, I think it’s fine, now.
The tail that had been wagging left and right stops, and Obana-chan looks up at me.
As the licking movements of his tongue stop, new blood comes bleeding out, but it’s not enough to form a bead, and before long, it appears to have stopped.
Strangely, the two fang marks are now nothing more than the pricks of a shot, and the pain is almost gone.
Kei: That’s strange… It seemed like it was deeper, but……
If it were a normal snake no bigger than a garden hose, I could imagine a bite this small, but this was a humongous snake, the likes of which you couldn’t see outside a zoo in Japan.
When I look up, Obana-chan’s eyes meet mine.
Kei: Obana-chan, did you heal this?
They do say that byakko are the servants of Oinari-sama. (TN: Byakko – white foxes)
Those movements from before were not the normal (fox?) fare, and if he is a servant of a goddess, healing wounds would be a cinch, I bet.
Kei: Hey, Obana-chan?
With nary a “ken” nor a “kon,” as if disinterested, his tail flips my way. (TN: Ken and Kon – special powers mythological foxes have over Heaven and Earth, respectively.)
Kei: Hey, Obana-chan, come on—— wai- huh?