You had been staring at her for a while now; a tan young woman looking somewhat over 20, dressed quite immodestly with an orange miniskirt and blue tank top. Her midriff was exposed, and a good part of her cleavage too, but it was her feet that you captivated you most. Her sandals lay on the ground under the bench where she sat, and she had kicked out her legs, letting you see her soles as she stretched and scrunched her feet. You had been careful only to take an occasional glance at them but once, she sat back and closed her eyes, you couldn't help but stare at them.

You were staring so hard, it took you a time to realize when she had her eyes open again and had already seen you staring. You froze, terrified of what she might do, but she only grinned and beckoned you over. You were nervous, but after another look around to make sure you were alone in the park with her, you stood and walked over to her bench. “I'm... sorry I stared at you, miss,” you said, blushing. “I'll leave now if you want. Promise I won't bother you again.”

The woman smiled. “Call me Matilda. And you don't have to leave.” Her voice was like honey to your ears, a soft, sultry tone. She crossed her legs and her soles seemed to beckon you closer. You meekly obeyed. “You like my feet, don't you? It's okay, you don't have to hide it. I wouldn't have them out like this if I didn't want people looking at them.” Her feet scrunched and swayed; you couldn't tear your eyes from them. “In fact, I want to give you a closer look. Go ahead—I know you want to.”

So entranced were you by the movement of her feet that you failed to notice the strange blue light coming from the odd-looking dynamax band on her wrist. You felt an energy embrace you, but paid it no attention. All you cared about was getting closer to those feet. You walked up to them, watching them get not only closer but also bigger, until they stood over twice your size. In your obsession you didn't see anything wrong with that; only when Matilda moved her feet aside did you realize you'd shrunk down to a few inches tall.

Bewildered, you looked all around, trying to make sense of what had happened. “What's wrong?” she said. “Didn't you want a closer look at my feet? Don't you want to touch them now? To feel my soles against your body? Don't be shy! They're all yours, little guy!” She presented you with her looming soles again, and when she scrunched them, you just couldn't resist. Who cared that you'd shrunk? Who cared why or how? The only thing that mattered were Matilda's marvelous feet.

You walked up to her foot and planted your hands and face right on the woman's sole, taking in its softness, its scent, its warmth, its smooth texture. It felt amazing! Never in your life had you dreamt you would experience such heavenly bliss.

You were so moved by the sensation you started to kiss and rub the giant sole, eager to show your love and admiration to this strange woman and her lovely feet. But when you'd only just begun, all of a sudden her sole violently fell on you, pinning you to the ground with a big, booming impact that seemed to shake the earth itself. “Hey! That tickles!” she exclaimed with a delightful laugh, pressing her foot down. You then felt her soft flesh mold itself around your body, dimpling and molding to leave you almost encased between the earth below and her foot above.

In your initial fright at being so suddenly trapped, you tried to push her foot off of you, but you were so small and weak that you could barely even move under it. Slowly you realized that it didn't hurt, though, and you even started to enjoy being down there.

After a bit, Matilda slid her foot back to rest her toes on your face. “Heh! Look at you, all meek and mild. You're really gonna let me shrink you just 'cause I let you touch my feet?” Matilda wiggled her toes, massaging your head with those big, meaty digits. “You love my feet so much, I bet you probably want to stay with them for the rest of your life, don't you? You're such a freak, ha ha!” Despite her laughter, you could tell she was just teasing you, and even if she wasn't, you really didn't mind; you were too busy enjoying her toes, rubbing your hands up and down their lengths.

“You know what? You're pretty cute, and you rubbing my feet down there feels really nice. I kinda wanna keep you around so you can rub them anytime I get tired. What do you say? That sound good to you?” With her big toe smothering your face, you couldn't answer except by kissing it enthusiastically. “Ha ha! I'll keep that in mind, little guy. Although, maybe there's something else I could do with you instead.”

Matilda's foot slid further back until her first two toes sat around your torso. She curled them around you and, gripping you firmly, lifted you up to then grab you with her hand and hold you like a little doll in the shadow of her head. Her face filled your view, and her hazel eyes twinkled playfully behind her blue-rimmed glasses. Then she grinned and you turned away trying to hide a blush.

Her laughter rang in your ears. “You're so adorable, little guy! Why, I could just eat you right up!” She licked her lips, making a big show of it, and chuckled softly. You laughed too, albeit nervously, as you realized she really could eat you if she wanted to. But obviously she wouldn't do that it was just a little joke, right? So you told yourself even when she opened her mouth and the smell of the chicken she'd had for lunch wafted out, her hot breath washing over your body.

You started to have doubts when she took to panting hungrily over you, and when you looked into her mouth and found it positively dripping with saliva. Her eyes were those of a hungry animal as her hand carried you towards her gaping maw. Yet even now, when you were becoming convinced she meant to devour you, you still didn't fight or struggle against her at all, and not just because you knew you had no hope of escaping her grip—there was something morbidly alluring about the thought of her eating you. By the time you were almost at her lips, you had already accepted that you would be eaten, and a part of you was even looking forward to it.

Your heard was pounding away inside you when she stuck out her tongue and licked you. The feeling of her wet, slimy tongue against your face was thrilling, and you shivered in delight when it passed over the rest of your body, lapping away at your whole front side. “Ah, you're so tasty, little guy,” she moaned in between licks. “I can't hold back anymore. I have to eat you; you taste way too good! Sorry, little guy!” she said, sounding not sorry at all. Again she opened her mouth and stuck your head inside, carrying you deeper while her tongue molested your face, until, all of a sudden, she pulled you back out and started laughing.

“Ah-hahahahaha! Oh, wow, you should have seen the look on your face! Did you actually think I was going to eat you? Ha! I was just teasing ya, little guy; there's no way I'd ever eat you. I mean, it's not every day you meet a willing foot pet! Speaking of which...” Matilda turned you around to face her foot, which now rested on her lap. Her big, plush sole seemed to welcome you as you were carried to it, and soon your face and the rest of your body was being mashed against its soft surface, her hand holding you so firmly to it that you couldn't breathe and were happy for it.

After a minute of thoroughly mashing you to her sole, Matilda stretched her leg back out, and to your surprise you remained stuck to her foot, thanks to the layer of spit she had left on you. “Almost done; just a bit more force and you'll be really stuck,” she said, then she stood and her full weight came to rest on you. It didn't hurt, but it was hard to breathe under all that pressure.

You were relieved when she raised her foot, letting you get some air in again, only for her to then stomp her foot, smashing you against the ground and emptying your lungs. Your vision swam and you felt like you might pass out; that feeling remained as she kept on stomping her foot, over and over again, shaking the earth with each stomp, even grinding you against the floor as if she were trying to kill you. When at last she lifted her foot to look at you, you still weren't hurt, but you were so beaten you could hardly move.

“Perfect!” she said after scrunching her sole and seeing you remain stuck to it. “I'll talk to you again later, little guy. Hope you enjoy my feet in the meantime!” Then she set off with you on her foot. And though you were stepped on over and over again, you couldn't help but smile, looking forward to what would surely be a long day of intimacy with Matilda's beautiful feet.

“A shrinking curse? How interesting. I can't I'm familiar with this kind of hexes.”

“Are you saying you can't help me?” said the ant-sized Morgan sitting on the table before the black mage Tharja and her daughter Noire. After having finally escaped from the hellish confines of his aunt Lissa's shoes, the shrunken boy had wandered around the Shepherds' base until he had happened upon the mother and daughter pair and gotten their attention, begging for their help in getting him back to his proper size. Normally he would have asked his mom Robin for help, but she was away on a mission and wouldn't be back for a couple weeks.

“Where are you getting a foolish notion like that? I never said anything of the sort,” Tharja sharply said. “It's true I can't grow you back yet, but all I need is some time to research this and I should have a good idea of how to break this curse. I'll see if I can find this book you told me about. In the meantime, you can stay here with my daughter. Noire?”

“Y-yes, mother?” the shy woman said, snapping to attention at her mother's words.

“While I'm gone, I expect you to examine him thoroughly and ascertain any properties of this curse that might be useful to know about. Think you can do that?”

“A-absolutely, mother. I promise I won't let you down.”

“Good. I'll return after I finish my investigation, then.” Tharja walked out the room, her shoes clacking against the floor. Morgan then stood waiting for Noire while she just looked around awkwardly, every so often shooting him a quick glance before turning away and hiding her face from him.

“Er, sorry if I'm interrupting something, Noire, but aren't you supposed to examine me now?”

“Y-yes, of course. Sorry, I was just thinking about something else just now. Well... let's see what we can figure out. Is it okay if I pick you up for this?” After he nodded, Noire carefully grabbed the tiny Morgan, first putting her fingers down on the table and then moving them painstakingly closer until he was lightly squished between her fingertips. “I-is this okay? I'm not holding you too hard, am I?”

“No, this is fine,” Morgan assured her.

“Really? O-okay. Then... I'm going to lift you up now.” Very, very slowly, Noire lifted Morgan off the table and carried him over to her other hand, where she gently lowered him onto her palm and let go, leaving him standing in the middle of the fleshy platform. “How was that? I wasn't too rough, was I? I'm sorry, it's just you look so small and weak, I couldn't live with myself if I hurt you in any way.”

“No, no, it's alright. Really, you don't have to be quite so careful with me. Shrinking made me more resistant, so I don't get hurt easily. You could even step on me and I'd be fine, just a little winded.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Let's just say I know it from experience.”

“This is part of the shrinking curse, then?”

“I guess so. Why do you ask?”

“Well, my mother told me to examine you for any other effects the curse might have. If increased resistance is one of them, then I'm going to have to test it out to see how it works. I-if that's okay with you, I mean.”

“Go ahead. You have my permission to do whatever you need to do to help me get back to normal as soon as possible.”

“Alright. Just hold on a bit first; I'm going to put you down.” Put him back down on the table, Morgan thought she meant, so he was a bit surprised when she lowered him all the way down to the floor a step away from the table. Then he watched from there as Noire took off her boots one by one, leaving her smelly bare feet on the floor in front of him. “Ah! Much better,” she sighed, closing her eyes and stretching and splaying her toes to let the air cool them off, apparently forgetting all about him.

“Noire? Your feet...” Your feet smell horrible, he had been about to say, but quickly reconsidered. She probably wouldn't get mad if he did, but in all his time shrunk down he had learned it was best to be safe than sorry. “Er, I'm just curious why you took off your boots, and why I'm on the floor.”

“Oh, well, you said you could be stepped on without getting hurt so I figured I should test it, but then I thought stepping on you with my shoes would be too risky; it's better to step on you with my soft bare feet.”

“I guess that makes sense. Let's get this over with, then.”

“Right. H-here goes...” Noire raised her foot ever so slowly, holding it a few inches over the tiny Morgan while peering down at him. With her sole hanging so close, the smell of her foot was even stronger, and Morgan could see all the little beads of sweat on her sole.

He braced himself for the descent of Noire's foot, but it remained in place for quite some time. As it turned out, Noire was still gathering courage to actually step on him; even though he told her that he would be fine, he still looked so frail and tiny that she feared he'd be crushed if she touched him with so much as a single toe. Still, little by little she lowered her foot until it rested on him. “Are you okay down there?” she asked, and Morgan moved a bit to let her know that he was.

The sensation of tiny little Morgan squirming beneath her sole was so delightful, Noire couldn't get enough of it. It was so adorable how he could barely move even though she was hardly resting any weight on him. It made her feel so powerful, too, and after a while she pressed down more forcefully. IS THAT ALL YOU CAN DO? BAH! HOW PATHETIC! YOU'RE NOT EVEN FIT TO BE CALLED A HUMAN AT THAT SIZE. YOU'RE JUST A BUG NOW, AND YOU'RE LUCKY I DON'T CHOOSE TO CRUSH YOU.”

Morgan was shocked by the sudden transformation, but with how hard Noire was stepping on him now, he didn't have time to dwell on it. The immense pressure had emptied his lungs on the spot, and while he struggled to fill them again, pushing with all his strength against the warm, sweaty mass of Noire's foot, she just pressed down still harder and ground him against the floor, like she was genuinely trying to kill him. “THAT'S RIGHT! SQUIRM AROUND FOR ME, INSECT! LET ME FEEL YOUR PITIFUL LITTLE ARMS STRAINING UNDER MY MIGHT!”

Morgan's struggles continued until his strength failed him and he was just about to pass out. Once he fell still, Noire underwent another sudden change. “M-Morgan? Are you alright down there?” she asked, moving her foot to find the tiny guy gasping for air on the floor. “Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry! I swear I didn't mean to hurt you, I just got a bit carried away! A-ah... let me help you out.” She grabbed Morgan and dropped him on her palm to hold him closely under her gaze, stroking him with a finger to try to comfort him, though her nervous prodding only left him more breathless than before by the time she finally released him.

“There, there; are you feeling better now? I really have to apologize for what just happened. I shouldn't have let that side of me come out at a time like this. I hope you can forgive my... M-Morgan!?” Noire gasped as she noticed that the little guy wasn't looking at her face, but instead staring intently at her chest, and particularly at the bit of cleavage she had exposed. Her cry startled him out of his contemplation, and he hurried to apologize, but by then Noire's face had undergone another transformation, and she looked at him with red-hot fury.

“WORTHLESS BUG! HOW DARE YOU STARE AT ME LIKE THAT!? DO YOU LUST SO MUCH FOR MY BOSOM? WELL I'LL SHOW YOU THAT THESE MOUNTAINS ARE TOO MUCH FOR AN INSECT LIKE YOU TO HANDLE!” Noire clapped the hand that held Morgan hand to top of her breast, mashing him hard against it. She groped herself fiercely, leaving him completely smothered between her hand and boob so that he could hardly move, and squeezed him harder over and over again. “DO YOU SEE NOW WHAT YOUR STARES GET YOU? YOU SHAMELESS WORM; TAKE THIS!”

Noire dropped Morgan between her breasts, then pressed these together and started rubbing them up and down to roll him around between the great mounds of flesh, delighting in how easily and utterly she dominated him.

She kept toying with him for a while, mocking his feeble strengths while making sure he didn't get a moment of peace between her breasts, until she heard the door open behind her and jumped, quickly snatching him from her cleavage before turning around to greet Tharja. “Ah, b-back so soon, mother? Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Yes; I've read the book and memorized the curse,” she said, placing the tome on the table. “It's a most interesting one; I can't believe something like this had escaped my attention all this time. But tell me, did you learn anything while I was away?”

“Well... the curse has made Morgan much more resistant to damage than he appears. He can even be stepped on without being hurt. I confirmed it myself.”

“Oh?” Tharja said, looking down at her future-daughter's bare feet and the boots on the ground. Noire turned, blushing, away from her mother's gaze. Tharja quickly lost interest in that, though. “The book mentioned nothing about any increase in one's resistance. I take it that means the curse wasn't properly cast, so the one affecting Morgan isn't quite the same as the one in the book. Still, I might as well try the method given for lifting this curse and see what happens. Noire, put young Morgan on the table”

“Yes, mother.”

“Good. Now pay close attention so you can perform this yourself if you ever need to.” Noire and Morgan both watched closely as Tharja performed the lifting of the curse, gathering her magical energies and then releasing them in Morgan's direction. Her magical energies enveloped the tiny boy, were absorbed into him, and when they disappeared... nothing at all happened.

Tharja grunted in annoyance. “No good. It seems you seriously messed up this curse when you cast it on yourself. I'll need to think this over to come up with the proper way to lift it.” She sat at the table and grabbed the book, and then Morgan heard a pair of clattering noises coming from below. “In the meantime, you can start paying me back for this little favor by giving me a massage.” The black mage kicked her feet up one after the other, each heel giving a big THUMP when it landed on the table right in front of Morgan, leaving him staring up at her towering soles, each one sporting a band of thin black fabric from her stirrup stockings between the heel and ball of the foot.

While Tharja wiggled her toes and scrunched her sole, the smell of her feet—almost as bad as Noire's—wafted down to Morgan, and he covered his face while backing slowly away from them.

“Where do you think you're going? Come here and get to work immediately, you ant. Remember, I know the shrinking curse now, and I can cast it on you again if you displease me. How would you like to be so small that my toes will seem even bigger than I am now?”

The thought alone made Morgan shudder, and under Tharja's stern gaze and Noire's envious eyes, he walked forward to finally arrive at her heel, where he placed his hands against her bare skin and started rubbing it.

“Ah, how nice that feels,” Tharja sighed and scrunched her sole. “Once I figure out how to restore you, I'll have to look for some good victims to try this curse out on so I can have my own personal pets massage my feet any time I get tired.”

“Mother? Do you think I might... borrow him for a minute... just to see how it feels?” Noire slowly reached for Morgan.

“Absolutely not!” Tharja's heel barreled over the tiny Morgan, leaving him hopelessly pinned underneath. “You didn't even have to leave the room or walk around the base like I did; you spent all your time in here with him. If you wanted him to massage your feet you should have made him do it then. You'll get your chance only after he's done with mine. Do I make myself clear?”

“Y-yes, mother. I'm sorry for trying to take him from you.”

“Hmph.” Tharja slid her foot back, freeing Morgan from his war, moist prison. “If you want, you can keep watch over him to make sure he's working properly, and give him a little push if you see him slacking off.”

As Tharja went back to reading, Morgan went back to work, rubbing Tharja's foot under Noire's watchful gaze. Once he had rubbed as much as he could reach from the table's surface he climbed up her sole to reach the rest, trying not to be thrown off by the little movements of Tharja's foot, sometimes struggling to free himself from the folds of her skin when she trapped him with a scrunch of her huge sole.

Tharja seemed happy enough with his work until he reached the fabric of her stirrup socks. “Noire, little Morgan isn't doing a very good job anymore,” she complained then. “Help him out a bit, will you?”

“Yes, mother,” Noire replied, and, pinning him under her fingertip, she started rubbing Morgan up and down her mother's sole, really burying him in the flesh of the massive foot while she helped massage it. She slid him all over the smooth, warm surface, taking great joy in the closeness she felt with her mother, both women loving the feeling of the ant-sized young man caught between them, a puny thing so effortlessly dominated.

Once she finished with the first foot, Noire was about to move Morgan over to the second one, but she stopped when she realized something was off about that pitiful creature lying between her fingers. “Mother?” she said. “There's something you should see. It's Morgan. He's... smaller.”

“Smaller, you say?” Tharja reached out to receive Morgan from her daughter, then held him up to her eye. He had already been so small that she wasn't sure at first if Noire was right, but thinking back on her memories, she saw that he really had shrunk, by about half his size. “Morgan, has anything like this happened before?”

“N-no! The size you found me at is the smallest I've ever been,” the terrified Morgan shouted so she might hear.

“Fascinating. It seems my attempt at lifting your curse had some strange interaction with the altered version of the curse you cast on yourself. For some reason it's causing you to slowly shrink even smaller. But I need to confirm if that's actually the case. Noire! Try to lift his curse like I did just now.”

“What!?” Noire and Morgan exclaimed together. “But mother, what if it you're right and it makes him shrink even faster? We don't even know how small it'll make him, he might end up too small to see.”

“Then I'll have to entrust you with his safekeeping, daughter. He'll be all yours until I work out how to fix this little mishap.”

“All... mine?” Noire stared at Morgan with an expression he felt didn't bode well for him. He tried to call to her, to beg her not to do what Tharja asked, but she didn't pay him any mind. As soon as Tharja placed him on the ground, Noire started gathering her magical energies.

Morgan broke into a sprint, trying to get away before he was made to shrink still smaller, but it was a hopeless attempt; Noire released the spell before he had run even a single foot. As soon as she did, his shrinking, which until now had been so slow it was barely noticeable, accelerated considerably, and he saw the world grow bigger with each passing second. Then he felt the earth shake so powerfully it made him fall to his knees, and looking behind him he saw Noire's massive foot, already as big as a large hill.

“He's shrinking so fast,” Noire mused as she looked down at the tiny Morgan, “I... I need to put you away before you get lost.” Her giant fingers picked him up, completely encasing him in her growing flesh, and she carried him away. A moment later she let go and he fell down a great dark pit, screaming the whole way down, until he landed in a dark, leathery cave.

When he looked up, Morgan saw Noire's face peering down at him from beyond a tunnel opening far in the sky. “Hope you don't mind staying in my boot for now; it was the only place I could think to keep you. Don't worry, I'm sure my mother will figure something out in no time. Until then, at least you'll have my foot to keep you company. See you later, my little Morgan.”

A second after her face moved out of his sight, her foot appeared in the opening, sliding further and further down, wiggling toes that now seemed the size of mountains leading the hunt for the ever-shrinking Morgan. And though the tiny boy tried to flee, he was quickly barreled over by the unstoppable wall of flesh and dragged along with the ball of Noire's foot until it settled in its place to keep him captive under the countless tons of her weight.

Now a mere germ under her mountain of a foot, and soon to be even smaller, Morgan could only hope that Tharja would find a way to fix this soon, or else he might end up so small that the mere wrinkles on the sole of Noire's foot would be his entire world...

Barbara Gordon—alias Batgirl—was so excited to be having a sleepover with her friend Kara Danvers, the fellow-hero Supergirl. As soon as Kara opened the door for her, Barbara pounced on her, wrapping arms around her neck in a tight hug, before being led inside to her room, both of them chatting excitedly about everything they were going to do tonight. But after they entered Kara's room and the big buff blonde took off her boots, Barbara nearly ran back outside.

“Oh my God!” she cried out, raising both hands to cover her nose and mouth and keep out that horrible cheesy smell that assaulted her nostrils.

“Sorry,” Kara said, grinning apologetically. “I probably should have warned you about this, huh?”

“Kara, are those your feet I'm smelling? What happened? Did you get an infection or something? I don't remember them smelling this bad before.”

“Yeah, they've been smelling like this since yesterday when I came into contact with some red kryptonite; that always does weird stuff to us kryptonians. I'd keep my boots on but the kryptonite's also been making my feet sweat a lot and it's super uncomfortable; I really need to air them out. I've tried getting rid of the smell or masking it in other ways, but it never works.”

“Oh. Well, if this is all it did to you, I guess that's a good thing, right?” Barbara aid, slowly lowering her hands and giving Kara a forced smile.

“Are you okay, Babs? You're looking a bit, uh... sick.” Kara grimaced. “If you want we can postpone this until next week. I mean, there's no reason why you should have to put up with this smell.”

“No, no, it's okay! I'm already getting used to it anyways! We shouldn't let a little bad smell ruin the sleepover!”

“Whatever you say, Babs. Heh! Who knows? Maybe by tomorrow you'll even start liking the smell; I know I have! Anyway, let me go get some snacks and drinks for us. Be back in a jiffy.”

Barbara kept the smile on her face until Kara had left, then sighed and looked around the room for anything she might be able to use to cover up that smell—some sort of perfume or body oil she could put on her upper lip so she could at least smell something a bit more pleasant alongside that stench. Unfortunately there wasn't anything there.

It occurred to her to try looking in the bathroom for something, and was just heading out when she stepped on a strange wet spot. Looking down, she saw that she had stepped in one of a series of moist footprints leading out of the room and down the hall—Kara's sweaty footprints, she realized. Barbara groaned wiped her foot on the floor until all the sweat was gone from her sole; that's when she started to notice that something was off.

It was subtle at first, so much that she thought it might just have been her imagination acting up, but the more she looked around, the more obvious it became that she had gotten about half a foot shorter. Alarmed, she hurried for the kitchen, avoiding all the spots of sweat Kara had left behind. “Kara! Kara!” she cried as she ran up to her kryptonian friend. “Kara, look! I got shorter!” She bounced from foot to foot, motioning to the top of her head while looking up at her friend.

Kara frowned and took a step forward, placing hand on top of Barbara's head and comparing the other girl's height with her own. “You're right,” she said, eyes wide in surprise. “Why is this happening? Do you have any idea?”

“It happened just after I stepped on some of your sweat. I wiped it off, and when I finished I was already this small. I think that's what did it, Kara; your sweat! That red kryptonite must have made it into some sort of shrinking serum.”

“My sweat did this?” Kara looked down at her feet thoughtfully. “I guess it's possible. But we should probably make sure that's really the case. If it is then we can just have my sweat analyzed to figure out how it's causing this and maybe work out an antidote. If it's not, then we can start looking for the real culprit instead of wasting our time with it.”

“That makes sense, but how are we going to test it?”

“Well, there's only on person around we can test it on,” Kara said, looking meaningfully at Barbara.

“... Wait a second, you don't mean... Are you really saying I should touch your sweat and maybe shrink even smaller? No way!”

“Oh, come on, Babs, it's just a little touch; I'm not asking you to drink it. And you'll probably only shrink a little bit, if you shrink at all. You already lost six inches; does it really mater that much if you lose another two?”

“I guess not.” Barbara sighed. “Fine, I'll do it.”

“Attagirl! Now he's a dose straight from the source.” Kara slid her foot over Barbara's, leaving behind a thin layer of sweat.

“EEK! D-didn't you say it would only be a little touch?” Barbara said.

“This is a little; I could have used both feet, you know. Look, it's happening! You're shrinking again!” Both girls watched in awe as Barbara slowly shrank, becoming smaller and smaller and smaller, losing not a couple inches as Kara had said, but a couple feet. By the end she was down to half her original height, looking up in horror at Kara from below her friend's waist.

“Oh no! this is way worse than I thought it would be,” Barbara said.

“Is it? I think this is an improvement. You're so much cuter like this!” Kara said, leaning over to pet Barbara on the head.

“Kara, quit playing around! This is serious! We need to get a sample of your sweat right away to analyze it. Quick, before the red kryptonite's effect wears off and we miss our chance!”

“Oh, don't worry, I'll get around to it. And hey, even if I don't, I'm sure Bumblebee will be able to grow you back somehow. So if you think about it, there's really no rush here. In fact, we could shrink you even smaller and I'm sure everything would turn out fine in the end.”

“Don't even joke about that kind of stuff, Kara! Everything's scary enough at this size, I can't imagine how much scarier it would be if I shrank as much as Bumblebee without any way to grow myself back. I really think we should at least call her. Maybe she can come over tonight and... EEK!” Barbara cried out as Kara's foot again touched her own, leaving it covered in sweat. She hurried to wipe the sweat off her foot and onto the floor, but it was already too late; she was shrinking again, and soon had lost almost half her remaining height. “Th-this is insane! Why did you do this to me, Kara?” She turned to her friend, ready to demand answers, but fell silent when she noticed a strange look in Kara's eyes—a look of intense obsession the likes of which she had never seen before. “...Kara?”

The kryptonian took a step forward, now standing just above Barbara, making the merely human girl crane her neck back to look at her. She noticed also the smell of Kara's feet, which seemed to have gotten even stronger than before, hanging so thick in the air that it made her cough and keep coughing until she was gagging on the floor, supporting herself on hands and knees. It stank so bad! And when she looked at Kara's feet, she saw them almost dripping with sweat and shivered in terror.

“Wow,” Kara said. “You're even cuter at this size than you were before, Babs. But you know what? I think you'd look cuter if you shrank even smaller. Let me just give you a bit more of my sweat...”

Barbara tried to scramble away as soon as she saw Kara's foot coming, but she was still coughing and gagging so hard she could barely crawl. Soon Kara's big, sweaty foot was at her back, pressing her against the floor and leaving her slathered in sweat. Babs fought hard to free herself, all the while feeling that monstrous foot growing ever larger at her back, but it was only when Kara decided to let her go that she could get away and try to dry the sweat covering her. By the end she no taller than Kara's ankles, as she saw in horror when the kryptonian's foot came down beside her. Kara herself was even bigger—over a hundred feet tall from her perspective. Just looking at her made Barbara shudder.

“Aww, that's so adorable! You're just like a tiny little mouse. I could put you in a little cage and keep you as a pet. Would you like that, Babs? I promise I'd be a good owner,” Kara said, stroking Barbara's back.

“Kara, please. This isn't the real you. The red kryptonite... it must have had some effect on your mind. You need to get ahold of yourself, before you shrink me down to nothing.”

“Nonsense! I'm just having a bit of fun! That's what we came here for, isn't it? To have fun together? Now, why don't we play a little game? You run away to my room and I'll chase after you. If you can get inside your bag before I catch you, you win and you can stay that size. But if you lose, I'll give you more of my sweat to make you even cuter. Since I'm so nice, I'll even given you a ten second head start. Ten... Nine... Eight...”

Barbara ran under the table towards the hall other side of the room. She had just barely made it to the hallway when Kara finished counting down. Then when Barbara looked over her shoulder and saw the hundred-foot kryptonian chasing after her like something right out of a giant monster movie, she pushed herself to her very limit and sprinted as fast as she could go.

Even that wasn't enough to make up for how quickly Kara gained on her just by walking. Within five seconds her giant sweaty feet slapping away at the floor right behind Babs, close enough she could feel the impact of each step.

Kara could have stomped on her at any time after that, but she was content to let the tiny girl run her heart out—Babs was so adorable running away like she had any chance of winning this little game. It would be a shame to break her hopes already, but she did want to make the game interesting, so she pretended like she was trying to stop on Barbara by holding her foot over the tiny girl and teasingly wiggling her toes, bringing it down only once Babs had walked out from under it.

Sometimes while she was playing with Babs like this, a drop of Kara's sweat would fall off her looming sole and splash on the floor, occasionally spraying a bit on her and making her shrink little by little. When she finally reached Kara's bedroom, she was barely any taller than Kara's toes. At that point Kara decided she should end the game and stomped her foot down right in front of Babs. The tiny girl ran right into her foot before she could stop herself and bounced back with some sweat covering her. When she sat back up, she was down to a quarter inch tall, looking up at the row of house-sized toes in front of her, all of them wiggling playfully and sending little tremors over the floor.

“Man, you're so tiny now! Like a cute little bug. I bet most people wouldn't even look at you twice before stepping on you. It's a good thing I have super vision so I can recognize you no matter how small you get.”

Barbara gaped in awe and terror at her massive friend. Kara looked as tall as a skyscraper to her—she honestly struggled to make sense of how big her friend was—and yet, Kara was still talking about possibly making her even smaller? Just how small would Barbara get!?

The tiny girl screamed and curled up into a ball when Kara's foot suddenly moved closer, only for it to stop so that she was between two of Kara's toes. Then she gagged as she was once more assaulted by the smell, a smell so strong it made her eyes water and threatened to make her pass out. “Kara... please,” she said once she could catch her breath, looking up from between the slowly wiggling toes. “I'm... scared. Don't make me any smaller, I'm begging you.”

“Oh, Babs, your voice sounds so cute at that size!” Kara cooed. “Don't you worry about a thing; there's nothing to be scared of because I'll be around to protect you no matter how small you get. I'll see you with my super vision and hear you with my super hearing and take very good care of you while you keep shrinking away at my feet.” The kryptonian pressed her toes together, gripping Babs with them even as the tiny girl struggled with all her might to escape, and wiggling them to roll her friend up and down between them. “I'll be your whole world from now on; your closest friend.”

Finally released from Kara's toes, Babs screamed as she fell back to the floor. When she landed, she stayed lying with her eyes closed for a bit, too scared to see how small she had shrunk now. She only knew that the air was hot and heavy with humidity, and still stank of Kara's feet; it felt like she was stuck in the worst-smelling sauna in the world.

“I'll be more than a friend, in fact. From now on, you can think of me as your Goddess. Now open your eyes, Babs; let me see what adorable little face you'll make when you see how insignificant I made you.”

Babs trembled with fear as she heard what Kara's voice sounded like now. It was grander than any clap of thunder she had heard in her life, more like the explosion of an atom bomb or the strike of a big meteor. The sheer intensity of its vibrations shook her and the whole world, but even that tremor was put to shame by the earthquakes that followed after. They so startled Babs that she finally opened her eyes to see a pair of mountains striking the ground to either side of her. They were so mind-numbingly huge it took her a while to recognize them as Kara's toes drumming against the floor. And Kara herself? She was bigger than Barbara could even comprehend, a huge celestial body almost like a moon or a planetoid. The tiny girl had never seen anything more frightening and awe-inspiring in her life.

She spent a whole minute just staring at Kara in disbelief before she noticed that something was very, very wrong: she was still shrinking! It had to be because of all the humidity; Kara's sweat wasn't just on her feet; it was in the air and all around her, invading her lungs with every breath she took. There was nothing she could do anymore to stop shrinking now—even if she tried to flee, the distance left for her to escape Kara's toes would be growing faster than she could run. She was completely at Kara's mercy.

“What a cute little speck you are,” Kara cooed. “If you just stayed that size forever and didn't shrink any smaller, I would be very happy. But you can shrink smaller, so I'm going to keep you on my feet and let you shrink away until you can shrink no more. Now get ready, Babs; here comes your new home!”

Kara's foot rose up and floated over Babs, hanging above her like a huge floating continent. The kryptonian's sole filled the sky and huge sweat droplets rained from above. Her sole scrunched, giving rise to great hanging wrinkles that were themselves the size of mountains now, and the spaces between them big enough to swallow cities whole. Then the foot began its descent, deepening the darkness on the floor beneath it, until lat last it came down on Barbara, flattening the tiny girl under an endless ceiling of sweat-covered skin.

Barbara passed out, and when she awoke she found herself floating in the middle of a vast ocean that seemed to stretch out forever. Was she off of Kara's foot now? Had she been transported somewhere else? But if that were so, then why was did she still detect that powerful cheesy smell, she wondered? Then she looked down and realized that this ocean was a mere drop of sweat on Kara's foo; far below the surface she could see the kryptonian's skin, with all its grooves and wrinkles now magnified to unearthly mountains and valleys.

“Finally awake, Babs?”

The voice was barely recognizable to Barbara's ears now, but a look upwards confirmed it was indeed Kara's as she saw her friend's face looming in the sky. Though she couldn't begin to guess how microscopic she was now, she sensed that Kara's pupils, each seeming like a sun or a moon, were fixed on her, almost as if claiming her for their own.

“It looks like this is the smallest you can get,” Kara said. “It's too bad; I wanted to see you shrinking smaller and smaller forever. But I guess this size is small enough. Anyway, I already took a sample of my sweat and I'll send it to Karen tomorrow so she can analyze it. Now all that's left is for us to enjoy the sleepover. Let me just give you a more comfortable seat than my ocean of sweat.” As finger the size of a planet reached down for Babs, the sight made her go out of her mind in panic and she tried to swim away from it, however impossible it was for her, as she feared it would end up crushing her. Instead, with perfect precision, Kara scooped Babs up with her fingernail and took her out of the drop of sweat.

Barbara was then dumped in the middle of Kara's big toenail, where there was nothing but the dry land of her fingernail for endless miles around—not a bit of sweat in sight. “There, that's perfect! Sit tight down there, Babs; I'll go fetch those snacks I was going to get and then put on a movie we can watch together. You may be smaller than a germ now, but there's no reason we can't still have fun together until they find a way to grow you back!” And so she went off, with Babs held safely to her toenail by the huge toe's gravitational pull, wondering how long she would have to live like a germ on her godly friend's toenail.

The following morning, Shinmyoumaru Sukuna used her Miracle Mallet as promised to grow Reimu back to her normal size. “Shinmy, I'm so happy I could kiss you!” The shrine maiden said as she saw the world take on its natural proportions for the first time in days. She hugged the Sukuna tight, so ecstatic that she didn't think anything of pressing the grown inchling's face right into her bare bosom. “I have to get going now! I'll let Yukari know what's going on so she can fix this for good!” she left the flustered inchling behind to go get dressed, rushing back out of her room a few minutes later in her red and white shrine maiden clothing.

“Reimu!” Sukuna called to her before she left. “Be careful out there! Don't forget what'll happen if you get hit with a strong enough attack! If you shrink again, I can't grow you back until tomorrow.”

“I'll be careful, don't worry! See you later, and thanks for everything!” Then Reimu was off, flying away to Yukari's place, fully determined to be freed of all this sizey nonsense by tonight. So focused was she on her goal that she didn't hear a voice calling her until she saw Marisa pull up on her right.

“Hey, Reimu!” said the witch rising her broomstick, holding down her hat so it wouldn't fly off as she kept pace with the shrine maiden. “Where've you been recently? I looked everywhere for you!”

“Hi, Marisa. I'm sorry, I can't explain right now; I need to see Yukari about something important.”

“The gap hag? Is she causing trouble for you again? Let me come with; I'm sure she'll back down quick if she sees she has to take us both at once!”

“She's not a hag, Marisa! She's a wonderful, beautiful, powerful... ahem! N-never mind that! This is private business between me and her. I can tell you about it after I'm done,” Reimu said and sped away, leaving Marisa behind.

“Reimu, hold up!” Marisa sped after the shrine maiden. “There's something weird going on here and I want to get to the bottom of it! Stop and tell me where you disappeared to and why you're going to see that hag!”

“Could you please stop calling her that?”

“Could you please turn around and talk to me?”

“I already told you, we'll talk later!”

Marisa sighed. “You really won't stop, huh? Guess I'll have to make you!” 

Reimu gasped and swerved aside as some magical shots passed right by where she would have been a second ago. “Oh, fine; have it your way! We'll fight until you learn to stop following me. I've been meaning to try out my new strength against someone else, anyways,” she said, turning herself around in the air to launch her own attack at Marisa.

The two girls kept shooting as they flew this way and that, dodging each other's attacks and striking when the opportunity presented itself. Neither of them got hit often—in fact, they both took the same number of hits, but while Reimu was still feeling fine, Marisa was already showing signs of wear. Soon the witch was forced to float down to the grassy field below.

“Man, you weren't kidding! You really have gotten stronger,” she said. “Where'd all this power come from? Were you training in the mountains all this time?”

Reimu smiled and landed in front of Marisa. “Something like that!” At any rate, Ran, Chen, and Yukari had seemed as big as mountains during her training. “Still think I need you for talking to Yukari? You wouldn't be much help to me all beat up like that. Go back and get some rest; I'll come visit you tomorrow and let you know how it went.”

“... Yeah, I guess that's for the best,” Marisa said as Reimu was turning to leave. “Oh, by the way, just one more thing before you go.”

As Reimu turned her head, a brilliant flash of light materialized from the corner of her vision, right where her magician friend was sitting. In the blink of an eye, the overwhelming energy of Marisa's Master Spark had engulfed the miko, blowing her back.

“Ha! No matter how strong you got, my Master Spark's still got enough punch to have you seeing stars! Now get up and let me see if you've still got the same smug grin from before!

“... Uh, Reimu? Hello? You there?” Marisa looked all around for the miko and soon spotted a pile of red and white sitting on the grass. She walked over to it, ready to rub her victory in Reimu's face, but her triumph turned to puzzlement when she saw that despite Reimu's clothes all being there, of the shrine maiden herself there was neither hide nor hair. “What the hell happened? Did I disintegrate everything but her clothes?” It sounded absurd, but it was as good an explanation as she had. Curious, she crouched to grab Reimu's dress, and when she picked it up, something fell out of it and made a little squeak. Marisa scanned the grass for whatever had fallen out, and as soon as she saw movement among the grass, she reached down and snatched the thing up. “Gotcha! Now let's see what we got here... Reimu!?”

She almost didn't believe it, but there was no doubting her eyes. There in her palm sat a half-inch Reimu, hands wrapped around her legs, her face turned away in embarrassment. “Guess the secret's out now,” she sighed. “I should have just told you about it from the start, huh? What an idiot I was.”

“Woah, Reimu, what's going on here? Did Shinmy shrink you or something?”

“No, it wasn't her. It was... Oh, Gods! Marisa, quick, hide me! I don't want them seeing me like this!”

“Them?” Marisa followed the tiny miko's gaze over to the south, where Cirno could be seen leading a group of fairies towards the duo. “Where am I supposed to hide you exactly? You know I don't have pockets.

“Put me in your boots!” Reimu was quick to say.

“My boots? You sure? Won't I crush ya like a teensy little bug if I step on you?”

“No, I'll be perfectly safe; trust me. Come on, they're almost here!”

“If you insist.” Marisa tugged on her boots collar and slipped Reimu down the front, where she slid down until she landed on top of Marisa's socked foot. There the miko held on tight while Marisa turned to face the fairies.

“Hey, Cirno! What's up! Are you looking for something here?”

“Matter of fact, I am looking for someone: Reimu! Where did she go? I saw her here with you a minute ago. You're not hiding her, are you?”

“Reimu? Hm, which Reimu are we talking about exactly?”

“Don't play dumb with me! It's the shrine maiden you're always hanging out with! The one I just saw you fighting with!”

“Oh, that Reimu! What do you want her for? Does she owe something?”

“That's none of your business! Just tell me where she went, or I'll freeze you rock solid!”

Marisa shook her foot, sending Reimu down to her toes which curled almost protectively around the tiny miko. “Heh! Hate to break it to ya, but that wasn't the real Reimu! See her clothes over there? I used them to make a fake one as a prank! I wasn't sure it'd work, but it looks like the dummy tricked you dummies after all! No hard feelings, right?”

“Grr! I'm going to make you pay for playing tricks on me! Get ready to meet with death!”

Another fight ensued, with Marisa flying around on her broom while the fairies chased after her. Inside her boot, Reimu felt the magician turning every which way in the air, making sharp turns and pirouettes more for the fun of it than for anything else. The movement would have had Reimu rolling all over the inside of the boot even had she tried to grip the white cotton of her socks, had Marisa's toes not kept her securely in place. Knowing she could depend on Marisa at a time like this was so reassuring for her.

The encounter didn't last long, with Marisa making short work of the fairies and leaving them all passed out on that grassy field.

“Hey, you doing alright in there? Move around if you are,” she said afterwards. Reimu made sure to move so she would be felt. “Okay, good. Anyway, I was thinking I should head home so we can talk in private. In the meantime, you can stay in my boot. That sound good?” Reimu squirmed again to answer her question. “I'll see you in a bit, then.” Marisa grabbed Reimu's clothes, wrapped them around the back of her broom, then headed to her home in the Forest of Magic.

Marisa flew at an easy pace, being in no rush to get Reimu out of her boot. To her surprise, she was finding that she actually liked having her friend in there—it made her feel all funny inside, but in a good way, to know that the little bug she felt squirming under her toes was the very shrine maiden she was so familiar with. And though she felt kinda bad for Reimu, thinking how scary it must be for her to be so tiny, she figured it wouldn't hurt to take this chance and play with her a bit—if asked about it later, Marisa would just say she had unconsciously mistaken the miko for a piece of lint.

Reimu, for her part, was conflicted. It felt so nice being back under a giant pair of toes like this, and Marisa's were so delightfully playful, and her sock so soft, that she would have been glad to surrender herself to them and become the magician's toy. Yet another part of her felt horrified at the prospect of being discovered like that.

Of all the people who might have seen her worshipping their feet, Marisa was in some ways the worst, precisely because she was Reimu's friend. The two saw each other so often, if she saw Reimu doing something that embarrassing, the miko wouldn't hear the end of it for the rest of her life. She couldn't let something like that happen. But Marisa's toes were so insistent, so warm, so huggable... surely it wouldn't matter if she gave into temptation here in the privacy of the magician's boot.

Caught under one of Marisa's toes, Reimu spread out her arms as far as she could and grabbed ahold of the sock's soft threads, burying her face deep into the slightly-moist sock to inhale the concentrated smell of Marisa's feet and digging her fingers as deep as she could into the fabric to try and touch of the magician's skin, all the while she was smothered and teased under Marisa's toe.

So she occupied herself until Marisa arrived at her house and hopped off her broom. When the magician's feet met the earth, her weight fell on the tiny Reimu, giving her a shot of crushing pain. Marisa jerked her foot back up as soon as she realized what she'd done, and meant to apologize to Reimu, but then she recalled that Reimu had told her she'd be perfectly safe even if she got stepped on and kept walking without bothering to move the miko somewhere more comfortable first, delighting in the feeling of the tiny girl being smothered under her toes.

Stepping inside, Marisa put her broom on the corner by the entrance, took off her boots and socks, and overturned the one Reimu was in to send the tiny girl falling onto her palm. “Comfy ride?” she asked as Reimu sat up. Then, frowning, she leaned forward and took a sniff of her friend. “Oof! You smell just like my foot now. I'm gonna have to give you a bath. Later, though; first you're gonna tell me what this is all about. And no more dodging the question, eh? Or I might just stick you in my socks until you start talking.”

Marisa took a seat at the kitchen table and set Reimu down on its surface, peering down at the adorably tiny girl for answers. Reimu took a deep breath and explained the basics of what had happened to her—how she had stopped doing her job as shrine maiden, how Yukari had kidnapped, shrunk, and trained her as punishment, how she had accidentally been returned to the shrine still shrunken a few days later, and how Sukuna had helped her temporarily get her size back this morning.

“Huh, I never thought her gaps had this sort of power.” Marisa tapped a finger thoughtfully on the table, each tap shaking Reimu's body. “Shinmy's Mallet takes a while to recharge, doesn't it? Guess you're stuck like this until tomorrow. Hope you don't mind but I figure I'll keep ya around in the meantime. No one better than your dear friend Marisa to take care of you like this, isn't that right?” Marisa grinned and reached for her friend. Reimu's heart started racing as the magician's fingers drew closer, but rather than picking her up they just came to rest on the table while Marisa compared their size to hers, flanking her with the swirly-patterned walls of her fingertips.

“Man, she really made you super tiny. If I wasn't looking right at you I'd think you were a bug or some lint from my sock. I'd probably swat you down the minute I saw you moving on my table. So much for all that strength you were bragging about earlier! At that size I bet I could even beat you with just my pinky finger.” Sure enough, when she lowered her pinky on Reimu, pressing down with only the barest effort, the tiny miko couldn't get out from under it no matter how she struggled.

“Marisa, let me go!” she said, but the sound of her squeaky little voice only made her friend laugh.

“Y'know, it's cute how you think you can boss me around when you're as small as an ant. And here I thought you said Yukari trained you to be more obedient. Looks like she didn't do a very good job of it!” She pressed down more forcefully, making Reimu gasp. “But I guess I could let you go, if little miss high-and-mighty can beg for it.”

“Eh!? You can't be serious!”

“Can't I? Go on, what are you so worried about? Or is it that you like being under my pinky?”

It was a good thing Marisa's finger was covering Reimu's blush, or she might have died of embarrassment right then. “Fine, fine! Marisa, please; I beg you to let me go.”

“Huh, that was faster than I expected.” Marisa lifted moved her hand away. “Guess your training must have been effective after all. Hey, what are you so pouty for? Chin up! It was just a harmless little prank. You look so cute at that size I can't help teasing ya! Or did I strike a nerve with that stuff about you wanting to be under my finger? Could little miss high-and-mighty be a bit of a masochist?”

“Don't be ridiculous!” Reimu stood to wipe herself down. “I hate being so small! That's why I was in such a rush to talk to Yukari; so she could fix me for good. If it weren't for you fighting me I could have been back to normal by now.”

“Well, if it weren't for you acting all weird and dodging all my questions—” Marisa poked Reimu, knocking her flat on her back. “—I wouldn't have had to fight to get you talking! Plus, you're the one who got shrunk in the first place for not doing your job, so when you think about it, it's actually mostly your fault that you ended up like this. Hell, you should be grateful I'm helping you out without asking for anything in return. I still haven't heard a 'thank you' for keeping you from those fairies back there, by the way.”

Reimu sighed. “Thanks for the help, Marisa. I really do owe you one. But can you please get me some water so I can wash this smell off now?”

“Later; no point in cleaning up when I'm just going to get you dirty again right after.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“Oh, you'll see soon enough. But first get over here, you little ant.” Reimu stood still as Marisa's fingers closed in around her. Smothered between those soft fingertips, she was carried downwards for a bit and promptly dropped to land on another wooden surface.

Reimu sat up grumbling, with the full intention of giving Marisa a piece of her mind, but the admonishment died out on her lips when she saw what she was faced with: a row of giant toes all wiggling eagerly in front of her, with Marisa's grin looming far overhead. The sight made her heart flutter and filled her with a longing to be smothered under those gorgeous toes. They looked so inviting; even their smell made her crazy for them.

“Just want to see for myself how resistant Yukari's magic made you. Hope you don't mind humoring me for a bit,” Marisa explained while she raised her feet ever so slightly and floated them over to Reimu, her sole scrunching and her toes wiggling.

Reimu could say nothing—she was transfixed on the spectacle taking place right above her, taking in every seductive wiggle of those toes, ever wrinkle on that sole, every little sweat droplet sparkling on Marisa's skin. She had just enough presence of mind to keep herself still while Marisa's foot descended on her, resisting the urge to hug and kiss and lick and worship the magician's feet, instead letting Marisa flatten her underfoot

The feeling of that thick warm sole pressing down on every inch of her body, its smooth skin dimpling ever so slightly around her minute frame, was nothing short of divine. She even welcomed the pain when Marisa pressed her foot down more forcefully and immobilized the miko.

For her part, Marisa liked having Reimu under her sole almost as much as Reimu liked being there. There was something so thrilling about being able to dominate her friend so effortlessly, about feeling Reimu writhing under her foot like a measly bug. She could do as she pleased with Reimu and the shrine maiden would never be able to fight back. Not that she meant to do anything truly bad, of course, but even just knowing that she could made her so excited! She just couldn't resist mashing Reimu against the floor over and over again, rubbing her back and forth underfoot to feel all those delicate features pressed firmly into her flesh, and then doing it all over again with her other foot.

“Still with me, bug?” Marisa asked and soon felt Reimu wriggling so pathetically against her foot. “Good! Let's see how you handle this, now.” The magician pressed her foot down ever harder, even grinding Reimu down, while Reimu struggled to remain conscious under the oppressive weight which didn't even let her even breathe. She was just on the verge of oblivion when Marisa slid her foot back so that her toes were lying next to Reimu

The magician looked down with a palpable smugness. “Is that really all you can take? Man, you're so weak and puny now, I almost feel sorry for you.” Reimu whimpered inaudibly, wishing that Marisa would step on her again. She got something like what she wanted when the magician closed her toes around Reimu, gripping the tiny girl with them. “I mean, just look at you down there; you're just a piece of lint!” Marisa wiggled her toes, rolling Reimu around between them.

“What, aren't you gonna say anything? You've been awfully quiet ever since I dropped you on the floor. Are you sure you're not enjoying this? Because it really looks like you love getting tossed around by my toes. Maybe that's why you wanted me to hide you in my boots; so you could spend time as a little bug at my feet. Maybe deep down you know this is exactly where you belong.” Marisa put her feet up on the chair with her soles pressed together then nudged Reimu down into the space between all her toes and started wiggling them around, rolling her back and forth from one foot to the other.

“You're such a cute little bug down there, I almost want to keep you like this. What do you say? Want to be my little pet for life? I promise I'll take good care of you and play with you all day long. You'd never be apart from my feet. Of course, I'll have to put you to work as payment for it, but I figure you'd be a great toejam cleaner at that size.”

“Oh Gods, yes! Make me yours!” Reimu desperately cried out in the heat of the moment. Luckily her cry was muffled by Marisa's toes and so went unheard.

Marisa kept teasing and toying with the tiny miko for a while longer, but finally grew satisfied and moved her soles apart to find Reimu lying on her toes, looking all worn out. “Can't handle much excitement at that size, can you? Heh! Well, come here, you little bug; let's get you cleaned up now.” She carried Reimu to the bathroom, where she opened the faucet just enough to let out a trickle of water that splashed softly onto her palm where Reimu stood, building a small pool a little higher than the miko's ankles. Then she watched curiously as Reimu stood under that trickle of water and scrubbed herself down, admiring the miko's figure. and wondering at the sensation of those delicate little feet of hers stepping around on her palm.

Reimu kept her back turned to Marisa until she had finished showering, then stepped out of the faucet and blushed as she found herself the center of the magician's attention. “All finished?” Marisa brought Reimu right up to her face, so close to her lips that Reimu thought she was about to kiss her. Instead she just sniffed the shrunken girl. “You still smell like my foot. Let's get a bit of soap on you.”

Dangling Reimu by the arm, Marisa carried her over to the bar of soap and pressed her back softly against it, rubbing the tiny girl up and down its surface until little suds started showing up on her body, then turned her over and did the same with her front. Finally she picked her back up and rubbed between her fingers, the soapy covering letting her slide effortlessly up and down the smooth surfaces.

The feeling of those giant fingertips, with their delightful texture, rubbing smoothly over Reimu's crotch and bare breasts, was more than the tiny girl could stand, and she soon started moaning and squirming in pleasure, much to Marisa's amusement. “First you get all worked up over my feet, and now you can't resist my fingers? It really doesn't take much to get you all excited at that size. I wonder if it's just me you're so attracted to or if you'd be acting the same with Cirno if she was the one who found you like this,” the magician mused while rinsing Reimu down. When she finished, she took another sniff and was satisfied to find Reimu smelling only of soap.

“There you go; all nice and clean.” She dried Reimu with a hand towel, then chuckled as the tiny girl fussed with her hair to get it combed down after the mess Marisa had made of it. “Better now, little ladybug?” she asked and gently stroked Reimu's side.

“I guess,” Reimu said, and after a pause added, “Thank you.”

“Don't sweat it; just doing what I can to help, seeing as you're too small to help yourself.” Marisa then took Reimu out back, where she had a hammock slung up between two trees. The witch climbed on and stretched out with a yawn, placing Reimu on her chest before tipping her big hat over to cover her face. She shuffled a bit to get comfortable and then lay still.

Reimu clung to Marisa's bosom, to the fabric of the dress stretched between the witch's breasts, where she was soothed by the sound of Marisa's breathing, the gentle rise and fall of her chest, and the puffs of warm air that washed over her at each exhalation. She grew relaxed, and it wasn't long before she thought to join Marisa in taking a nap, so she crawled a bit closer to the magician's face and curled up on the soft fabric at her bosom, where she promptly dozed off.

She woke up some time later to the sound of Marisa's snoring, an unpleasant raspy noise that kept her tossing and turning until at last she had to accept that she wouldn't be going back to sleep again. So, taking advantage of Marisa's slumber, Reimu decided to go for a walk over the magician's body. She climbed down her chest and walked along her belly, crawling under a pair of hands cupped over Marisa's navel and out the other side to emerge on the pelvis. The path sloped upwards when she reached the thighs, and before the knees she reached the end of the magician's dress, stepping onto bare skin, all soft and smooth and welcoming.

Finally, after walking up Marisa's shins, she reached the foot and climbed up to her friend's toes, sitting down between a pair. With Marisa's snores confirming the witch still slumbered, Reimu felt it safe to sidle up against her toe and embrace it. She trembled in excitement as she pressed herself against the mighty digit, and didn't hesitate one moment to put her lips against the toe to plant a kiss on it. As soon as she did, all her worries and her reservations melted away, and she calmly started worshipping Marisa's foot, showering it with love and devotion.

It was times like these when she wished she could stay like this forever—just give up on being a shrine maiden and spend the rest of her life as someone's pet or toy. Of course, she knew that couldn't happen, but there was no reason why she couldn't enjoy it in the meantime.

Reimu forgot about everything save for Marisa's toe in front of her, dedicating all her attention to it. She lovingly caressed every inch of it, running her hands over every groove and wrinkle, kissing every other second, even licking it from time to time to savor the taste of Marisa.

Working in this manner, basking in the atmosphere of Marisa's foot, Reimu didn't even realize that Marisa's snoring had long since stopped. Nor did she hear the rustle of fabric, nor truly feel the rocking of the hammock, and when Marisa's toes curled and started rubbing against her, she simply shut her eyes and let it happen, moaning with each little squeeze she received. But when they released her and she opened her eyes again, Reimu froze as she noticed Marisa wide awake and looking right at her.

“Oh, don't mind me! You just keep doing what you were doing. Wouldn't want to interrupt your fun, especially since you look so cute when you're kissing my toe like that,” Marisa said, grinning at her tiny friend.

“How... how long were you watching?”

“Oh, just a few minutes. I felt something between my toes a while ago so I looked to see if some bug had crawled between them. Turns out she had!” Marisa squeezed her toes together, bringing another moan forth from Reimu's lips. “And here I was teasing you about liking my feet as a joke. Never thought you were actually into them! But I guess it's fine. There's nothing wrong with having weird kinks, and if yours is my feet, that suits me fine. At least now I know I can always just go around barefoot anytime I want to tease you.”

“Oh, Gods.” Reimu buried her face in her hands. Why hadn't she gone about this more carefully? How could she look Marisa in the face after being found out like this? She would have to go into hiding, never show herself again; it was the only way she could deal with this embarrassment.

“Heh! You're so cute when you get all flustered like that, you know? Let me get a better look at you... ” Marisa turned her foot around, holding it in front of her face. Then she grabbed the tiny girl and gently pried her hands away from her face, and Reimu turned away so she wouldn't have to look at Marisa. “Wow, you're really blushing! Is there anything you want to confess to, little ladybug? How long have you been eyeing my feet for? I haven't noticed you looking at them before today. Either you've been hiding it really well, or maybe you only like them while you're tiny. Is that part of Yukari's magic? Something she used to train you?

“What, you're not gonna say anything? Never thought I'd see you acting so shy. Well, don't worry; I'll give you plenty of alone time with my foot so you can do whatever dirty stuff you're into without me looking. Let me just get you nice and stuck...” Marisa stuck out her tongue and pressed Reimu against it, moving her around until she was covered in spit, then mashed the tiny girl onto her sole, pinning her under her thumb. When she let go, Reimu was firmly plastered to her foot, able to wriggle around a bit but not to free herself from Marisa's skin. The magician smiled and scrunched her sole, letting the folds of her skin engulf tiny little Reimu, then stretched her leg back out and started rubbing her sole against the side of her other foot, enjoying the miko's pitiful struggles.

Reimu was still stuck to her sole when Marisa hopped out of the hammock some time later, and when the witch walked back inside and put her shoes and socks on, leaving Reimu trapped with her foot. “Gonna do a bit of shopping in town. I'm sure you won't mind staying there in the meantime,” she announced once she had both boots on. “Have fun, ladybug!” She grabbed her broom and then she was off, with Reimu nice and safe right under her foot.

Little by little, Marisa's sweat helped Reimu get unstuck from her sole. Then the tiny girl crawled on top of her foot, determined not to do be teased by or do anything embarrassing with Marisa's foot ever again. But right after Marisa landed and started walking, the motion dislodged her from her little perch and flung her down to the magician's toes, where she landed neatly nestled between a pair of them. They held her in place while Marisa walked, and whenever she stopped they would play with her, fiddling around to roll her between them or curling tight to give her a squeeze.

At first she hated how much she liked it, and especially hated that Marisa knew she liked it, but she couldn't keep it up for long; eventually she gave in and started kissing and caressing Marisa's foot again, not caring if the magician felt it. Then when Marisa hopped on her broom again and Reimu knew she wouldn't have to worry about being stepped on anytime soon, she spent the whole ride showering affection onto every inch of Marisa's foot, happily crawling around underneath and getting intimate with every last wrinkle on her warm, sweat-moistened skin.

After getting home, Marisa kept her socks on while tending to some chores, making lunch among them. When finished, she stripped off her sock and overturned it, letting Reimu fall to the floor. “Your food is ready, ladybug,” she said, and with her finger she smeared a bit of sauce between her toes before presenting her foot to Reimu. “I served it special, just for you. Go on, eat; don't make me have to clean it up myself.”

Reimu hesitated only a moment before meekly crawling forward and beginning to lick the sauce off Marisa's toes, savoring every lick of it all the better with the bit of sweat mixed in with it. Her tiny tongue tickled the magician, and every so often her toes would twitch and close around Reimu, smearing some food on her, but the miko didn't mind; if anything she welcomed it as a display of Marisa's might.

She licked the food down to he very last drop, and still kept on licking Marisa's toes even after the only taste she could detect in it was sweat. Meanwhile, Marisa pondered the tiny miko's pathetic display. The urge to tease and humiliate Reimu tugged at her, but it was kept in check by the strange tenderness she had come to feel towards the frail little thing that was her friend.

Once Marisa finished her own meal, she surprised little Reimu by moving her foot forward and barreling over the miko with her sole to pin her to the floor. Reimu struggled for a moment, but those struggles soon gave way to more tender worship when she saw that Marisa's foot was only resting on her, not crushing her with all the witch's weight.

Marisa spent most the rest of the day teasing and taking care of Reimu and enjoying the tiny girl's worship, while Reimu slowly grew more and more comfortable with Marisa knowing all about her strange attraction. Come nighttime she was happily cradled in the crook of Marisa's toes while the witch in her nightgown watched from above.

“A whole day at my feet and you're still not sick of them. Guess you like them even more than I thought. Are they really that nice?”

“They're wonderful,” Reimu said dreamily. “I love this. Thank you, Marisa.”

“Love? Heh. That's a side of you I never thought existed. Is that really you talking, or is being so tiny thing messing with your brain? I bet you wouldn't say anything like that if you were normal-sized.”

“Probably not. I'll probably be really embarrassed about it after I grow back. But right now it feels so nice. It's just for today, anyways; tomorrow I'll go to Yukari's and everything will go back to normal.”

“Normal, sure. Until I manage to figure out some way to shrink you back down anytime I want. Then I'll have an ultimate technique even more effective against you than my Master Spark. I'll have you kissing my toes anytime I like.”

“Ha ha. Um, y-you're joking, right? You're not actually going to start randomly shrinking me all the time. You wouldn't. Right?” Reimu looked to the witch's face for answers, but all she got in response was an unreadable grin.

“Good night, Reimu; hope you like your bed tonight,” she said, and blew out the candles with her magic before lying face down.

“Marisa? Marisa! Hey! Don't leave me in suspense! You didn't really mean all that stuff, right? Marisa?” She kept shouting from among the witch's toes, until the curled tight enough to leave her breathless for a second. Realizing on answer would be forthcoming, Reimu sighed and crawled up Marisa's sole to find a comfortable place to rest. Her question still kept her awake a while afterwards, but with Marisa's warmth blanketing her, she slowly dozed off. “Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to spend another day like this every once in a while,” she thought with one final yawn, and so fell asleep curled up on the witch's sole.

They appeared in a flash: three girls in armor that made them look like warriors straight out of a fantasy world, save for being strangely barefoot. Their hair and eyes glowed red, green, and blue, and a powerful aura emanated from all three. Standing in the middle of the street, they caught everyone's attention, but for their part they seemed not to see the hundreds of cars and people all around them, as if all were beneath their notice. They looked instead at the buildings—some ten stories on average over here, but growing ever taller until they reached the city center, where a thousand-foot behemoth towered over all the others, dominating the city's skyline. Yet, when their eyes fell on it, the trio just smiled derisively.

“Pfft! Is that the best these people can build? It wouldn't even take us a minute to destroy it. And here I was thinking this world was gonna be more of a challenge,” said the red-haired one.

“You know, Sasha, you don't always have to jump straight to destroying everything,” the blue-haired one said.

“I just can't stand containing my power around all these little bugs, Anne! I want them all to see how much stronger than them we are!”

“I totally get what you mean. But, you know, I think it's way more fun if we let them believe they have a chance of stopping us first and then show them how wrong they were. Don't you think so, Marcy?”

“Absolutely!” said the last of the trio. “Besides, it's not like it'll take us that long; give it a couple hours and we'll have this planet on its knees! Then we can move on to the next one, and the next one, for ever and ever—just the three of us conquering the multiverse!”

While they kept talking, the cars behind them started honking more insistently. The girls ignored it at first, but once the drivers started yelling rudely at them to get off the road, Sasha turned to glare at them. “Looks like these stupid bugs still don't realize who they're dealing with. Why don't we teach them who the new queens of this world are?”

The trio smiled at each other, then, holding their hands together, they their eyes and began to channel their inner power, wind and energy whipping all around them to silence all the onlookers and their honking. Everybody watched in disbelief as the three girls grew before their eyes, bodies surging ever higher until they stood head and shoulders taller than most nearby buildings. When their growth finally abated, they opened their eyes and turned to look at those people who had been honking so furiously just seconds ago, and who now tried to make themselves unseen by sinking into their seats.

Smirking at the drivers, Sasha placed her hands on her hips, proudly towering over them all. Then, while they were still staring dumbfoundedly at her and her friends, she raised her bare foot, pink-lacquered toenails glistening softly in the light, and placed it on the first car.

The vehicle creaked and groaned under the immense pressure, threatening to crumple up all at once if she simply applied more of her weight to it. The driver tried to speed away and escape this titan teen, but her sole wouldn't let him go forward, and her toes wrapped around the trunk wouldn't let him go back. When he floored the gas pedal his tires only squealed pitifully on the asphalt, and as Sasha increased the pressure, even that squealing came to a halt as the tires couldn't spin anymore. The car seemed like it would give in any second now, so the driver flung open the door and fell out moments before the car went crunch under Sasha's foot.

While this was going on, Anne and Marcy circled around their friend to attack the rest of the cars line up behind the first one, stepping on more and more of them, sometimes giving the people time to escape, other times simply crushing the cars with all their passengers still inside, laughing in delight at the fear and chaos that took over the onlookers and sent them fleeing.

After all the cars had been dealt with, Ann and the others then turned to the fleeing pedestrians and gave chase, quickly overtaking and encircling a group of a few dozen people, keeping them all fenced in with their bus-sized feet. “Where do you think you're all going?” Marcy said, and swept her foot into the group, knocking many of them down. “If you want to live, then you'd better prove yourselves worth sparing; get on your knees and start worshipping our feet, or else we'll crush you like the little bugs you are.”

Terrified beyond words, the people didn't hesitate even a second before doing what the titaness demanded, and feel to their knees in worship, crawling forward to kiss the girls' toes. Then Anne sat down and stretched out her legs, letting her soles loom over the puny mortals. “Be good little worshippers and massage my feet for me, will you?” she said, and the little group at her feet instantly got started, pressing their hands to the smooth, warm surface to rub it up and down.

“Alright, bugs,” said Sasha to her group, “I want one of you between each pair of toes and licking them clean. And not a word out of your sorry mouths, got it?” Eight people then crawled forward to kneel between her toes, sticking out their tongues to lap up all the sweat and bitter toejam on her skin, holding back their groans of disgust lest it upset the domineering teen.

“Doesn't this feel so nice, Sasha? We wouldn't be able to enjoy these people worshipping up like this if we just went and destroyed everything immediately!” Marcy said.

“Eh, I'll admit taking it slow does have its perks sometimes. Besides, if you girls are happy with it, then I'm happy too.” Sasha curled her toes playfully around her little toejam-cleaners, making them work harder from fear that she would crush their heads if they didn't.

For a while the girls were content to sit back and let those little people service their feet, enjoying the perks that came with their incredible power. But their relaxation was soon interrupted as a bunch of police cars pulled up all around them with sirens loudly wailing. “Finally a bit of resistance! This ought to be fun,” Sasha said, letting her little foot worshippers go as she stood to face down the cops with Anne and Marcy.

The cops left their cars at either end of the street, forming a barricade that would have left the trip trapped, if they hadn't been big enough to simply step over them all. “Attention intruders!” a voice blared from a set of speakers. “This is your only warning! Return to your previous size and let those people go or we will open fire on you!”

“Oh yeah? Go ahead! Try it and see what happens.” Anne stepped forward, slowly lumbering towards one of the barricades the cops had set up while Sasha and Marcy walked together to the opposite one. At the same time, their little worshippers scurried into the nearby buildings to hide.

“Stop it! Not one more step or we'll shoot!” the speakers blared again. But despite the warning, no order was yet given while the girls came ever closer, the sound of cracking asphalt accompanying each booming THUD as their bare feet hit the ground. The officers shuffled backwards as the girls' approach, until at last they were close enough that the cops could feel the earth shaking with each step. It was only then that the order was given and the officers frantically unloaded their clips against the towering teens.

Bullet after bullet bounced harmlessly off the three girls, unable to pierce even their bare skin. Unharmed by the barrage, the girls grinned smugly at the frightened officers, watching them grow more desperate by the second, until at last their clips were empty and they were left staring aghast at the unfazed trio. Slowly they started backing up again. “W-what are you waiting for? Reload and keep shooting them!” their commander yelled. The other officers moved shakily to obey, but Anne, Marcy, and Sasha all stretched a hand towards the officers to send out a wave of energy that disintegrated all their cars and weapons, leaving the cops standing amidst a pile of ashes.

When all of them turned to flee, the trio again used their powers, this time to pull the cops closer, setting them all down in the middle of the street between them. “I that really all you can do?” Sasha scoffed. “What a pathetic show. And here I thought you might be able to keep me entertained a few minutes at least.”

“Captain, please tell us someone's going to come rescue us,” one of the officers said.

“R-relax, son. I'm sure the air force will be showing up any moment. A few fighter jets will take down these monsters for sure.”

“Monsters? Oh, you silly humans!” Marcy laughed. “We're not monsters—we're Goddesses! And it takes way more than a dinky little fighter jet to kill a Goddess. We'll swat those things out of the air like a bunch of gnats. Too bad you won't be around to see it; I'm sure the look on your faces would be delicious! But you all need to be punished for thinking you can challenge your new rulers. Ready, girls?”

Holding hands once again, Anne, Marcy and Sasha were blanketed by their magical energies, and the pitiful cops between them watched in horror as the girls grew still bigger, expanding until they were as wide as the street and still growing beyond that, their bodies pushing up against the surrounding and growing over them as if they offered no resistance. Screams erupted from all those people who had chosen to stay inside to avoid the trio's attention, only to be silenced as the surrounding buildings collapsed one by one beneath the growing girls.

When the energy finally receded and the girls stopped growing, they stood some five times bigger than they had before, towering over all nearby buildings and especially over the pathetic police officers now trembling in fear between them. As their tricolor stares fell on the sorry lot, the police all fell over themselves to apologize and beg for mercy, many even offering to serve the trio in exchange for their lives. The girls listened to their cries, taking great amusement in each sobbing voice to escape the lips of those pathetic insects who had once thought to challenge their rule.

Then, with a glance and a not at each other, the three raised their feet over the officers, taunting them with scrunching soles and wiggling toes. The cops' faces blanched and they started running to escape their impending doom, but instantly a wave of energy fell on them and pressed them to the ground, keeping them lying face-up so they could all see as the girls' soles came ever closer, slowly crushing the remains of whatever buildings happened to be in the way, whether or not there happened to be anyone inside.

All the officers screamed and struggled in vain against their supernatural bindings, until at last the girls set their feet down on the group. At first they applied no real force to enjoy the pathetic squirming of their victims beneath their feet. Slowly they applied more weight to them, ratcheting up the officer's desperation in proportion to their pain, until one by one they all went crunch underfoot.

Once the police had been dealt with, the girls examined their handiwork with great satisfaction. “That was more fun than I expected,” Sasha said, wiggling her toes over the remains of her victims. “You girls definitely had a point about taking it slow.”

“See? I told you it was more fun like this!” Anne said, wrapping her arms around her friends' shoulders. “Now, what do you say we have some more fun with all the little bugs here for a while. And when the military shows up? Then we can give them a real taste of our power! You hear that, people? ”

There was something alluring about the little green-and-blue sphere Hayase Nagatoro had received as a prize in an online raffle. It was about the size of a marble, and indeed that's what it was as far as she could make out—a very elaborate marble stylized to look precisely like a tiny little planet Earth. The attention to detail on it was impressive, to the point that Nagatoro thought she could make out tiny mountains and lakes, and even cities, on the little model Earth, exactly where they should be in the real world. Rolling it between her fingers, she could almost believe she really was holding the Earth with all its billions of people completely at her mercy.

Bzzzt bzzzt bzzzt.

A buzzing sound came from the little cardboard box that had held the sphere. Reaching inside, Nagatoro pulled out the other part of her prize: a new phone. She hadn't even touched it until now but apparently it had already received a notification from some weird app telling her she had... over a billion new messages? Was she reading that right? And without even being connected to the internet. This had to be some weird scam. Still, the app's name—“YourWorld”— got her curious, and she tapped on the notification to see what would happen.

After loading for a minute, the screen switched over to what looked like some sort of social media page, almost like Twitter. She found that she was already logged into the app, with a profile bearing her own name and a peculiar username: “Owner”.

Nagatoro frowned, wondering how these people could have gotten her name, until she recalled, much abashed, that she'd given it for the raffle. Still, it was kinda weird that the people behind the giveaway had gone and made an account in her name for this strange app. It definitely smelled of a scam. Better to uninstall this thing now, she thought, but hesitated a moment when she saw some of the messages that showed up on her feed, appearing at an impossible rate—so many messages you'd think the entire population of the world was talking about her.

“Huh, our new @Owner's kinda young” “Hi @Owner!!! You're looking cute today!!!” “I can't believe @Owner has the same shirt as me!” “omg you guys, @owner was looking right at me!” “hey @Owner r u single?” “So happy we finally have an @Owner! Please be nice to us, ok?”

On and on it went, just endless messages from a bunch of other accounts—probably bots—talking about how glad they all are to have an owner. Nagatoro couldn't even begin to guess what was the point of all this. Was it just meant to simulate a social media site where the whole world revolved around you? Because that as all she was getting out of this. What would happen if she replied to one of these posts, she wondered? Would these bots respond to her?

Then she noticed the option to see only those messages with media attached to them. She tapped on it simply out of idle curiosity, but what she saw gave her pause. It was a low angle picture of her in her room, right now, sitting down and looking at the phone, but with a beach and ocean landscape at the bottom of the picture that made it look like she was way up in the sky, looming over the entire world.

More and more came in after that one, all of them with photos or even videos of her sitting here and now, but at slightly different angles and with all sorts of different landscapes underneath. After scrolling through a few dozen of them, Nagatoro looked down at where the photos were being taken from and saw the little sphere she had just been holding. She reached over and grabbed it, wrapping it up in her hand, and when she looked back at the phone she saw a bunch of new photos of monstrously long fingers hovering ominously in the sky, coming closer and closer until little else was visible. Then these gave way to the total darkness within her fist. And yet the messages that accompanied the pictures merely quipped about the lights going out, or talked about how nice it was to be back in “@Owner's” hands.

Holding the sphere between her fingers, Nagatoro held it up to her face, slowly turning it around to look at it from every angle. No matter which way she turned it, though, the pictures that came in were all perfectly focused on her. And though she knew there had to be some totally boring and rational explanation for this, when she looked at the little colored sphere between her fingers, strange and fantastical thoughts started filling her head, thoughts so ridiculous she wouldn't have dared utter them even in perfect solitude. Still, she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something to them, and after a while...

She opened her mouth and popped the little sphere inside, where it settled on her tongue. Almost immediately, more and more messages started rolling in. “What the hell!?!?!” “is @owner eating us??” “@Owner what are you doing” “This has gotta be a joke. Ha! Good one @Owner! Now please get us out of here!” They were all such realistic reactions, but the thing that convinced her once and for all was a video of a guy looking up at a huge bumpy pink surface in the sky and showing great big globs of a clear liquid raining down on a city, covering the skyscrapers and flooding all the streets while people below all screamed in fear. After seeing that, there could be no doubt anymore: this really was a tiny planet, and all the messages she was getting were from the tiny people living on it.

This was insane. It was unbelievable. It was... so cool!

Nagatoro spat the planet back out, and while reading the flood of messages celebrating that they were out of her mouth again, she noticed a second tab on the app that was labeled “Controls”. After tapping on it, she was taken to a screen with a few different options. Most of them were totally boring things like “Barrier opacity” and “Time dilation, but three of them caught her eye: “Barrier Strength”, “Planet Size”, and “Reset World”. She tried out the first one, putting the slider all the way to the lowest setting. When she looked at the planet again it looked like nothing had changed, but when she grabbed it the difference was made clear.

Before when her fingers had closed in on the planet, they had been stopped many miles above the surface by an unseen barrier protecting all the puny planet's inhabitants, same as all the other times she'd grabbed the planet. This time, however, the barrier started to crack as soon as she held the tiny Earth between her fingers. Billions of people around the planet watched in alarm as a spiderweb pattern of cracks spread over the sky around those two fingertips until, suddenly, the barrier shattered and her fingers came together on the Earth, smashing into it with such force that more than half the planet's surface was destroyed on contact. The rest of it was wracked by a ripple in the crust and mantle causing mass upheavals that engulfed the entire planet's surface in a matter of seconds, leaving behind only an endless expanse of rock and lava. Even that was destroyed as Nagatoro ground the planet down between her fingertips, reducing it all to a tiny pile of dust lying on her bed.

When she switched to the other tab to look at the feed of incoming messages, Nagatoro saw that they had stopped completely. The very last message she saw showed the labyrinthine pattern of her fingerprint filling the sky and the planet's protective barrier starting to break. After that, the destruction of the Earth must have happened in a fraction of a second. And now all those people, all the tiny Earth's population, were dead—killed off by the slightest squeeze of her fingertips.

Knowing that she was responsible for billions of deaths filled Nagatoro with untold excitement. It had been so amazing to feel that little world crumbling between her fingers, and the mere memory of it made her shiver in delight. But then disappointment took over as she realized that now her little world was gone and she wouldn't be able to toy with it any longer.

Or, would she?

Switching back to the controls tab, Nagatoro looked at the reset button. The idea that she could reset the entire planet even after having ground it down to dust seemed too good to be true, but then again, was it any more fantastical than owning a tiny planet in the first place? Either way there was no reason not to try it, so she pressed the button and instantly that little pile of dust swirled together and the tiny Earth reformed to sit on her bed as if nothing at all had ever happened to it.

The tiny people were back too, as Nagatoro saw when she switched back to the feed of messages. What's more, it looked like they all remembered their deaths. This was perfect! Now she could play with the planet however she wanted, and whatever happened to it she could just reset everything and start again! She reached for the planet...

And instantly destroyed it again the very second her fingers touched it. “Oh, right,” she muttered, and this time turned the barrier strength up to about the halfway point before resetting the planet again. This time it managed to survive being picked up. “Sorry, everyone! Just a little accident. I'm still getting used to the controls. But you're back now so no harm done, right?” The tiny people all agreed, sounding very relieved to hear that their deaths had been a mistake on her part.

“Anyway, now that I got your attention, let's get some things sorted out. I'm your owner, and that means all you worthless little specks are my property. I can do anything I want with you. I can kill you and bring you back as many times as I want, or crush you all and leave you dead forever, and there's nothing you pathetic little germs could do to stop me. But if you obey me and worship me as your Goddess, then I can spare your worthless little lives and let you live in peace. To start with, all you have to do is build perfect statues of me towering over all you little mites and temples for all of you to worship at. What do you think? Sounds like a pretty fair deal, doesn't it?”

Just as Nagatoro had expected, the tiny people didn't agree to it. The sounded quite alarmed over her offer, and some of them were even indignant; apparently this wasn't part of whatever deal they were been given when they agreed to have their planet shrunk and given away. From what she could gather, they'd been told that they would become pets, living peacefully under their new owner's loving care without ever having to work again. Nagatoro's demands were unacceptable for them, and some of them tried to educate her as to how she was supposed to treat them. But obviously, Nagatoro didn't care what a bunch of tiny little specks she could kill with a tap of her finger had to say.

“Looks like you germs need to be taught a lesson about obeying your superiors! You don't want to be my worshippers? Then let's see how you like being my toys instead!” Nagatoro flicked the tiny Earth off her bed, making the tiny people dizzy as it seemed the whole world beyond their little planet was spinning wildly. Then, after the Earth bounced around a couple times and finally down on the floor, the planet's billions looked to the sky and were shocked to see Nagatoro's massive soles looming overhead, with the girl's mocking grin beaming down on them from even further above.

The high schooler's foot then descended on the planet, immersing it in darkness as her sweaty sole blocked off the light. Under her sole the tiny Earth was rolled around playfully, like a little marble, the smell of her foot growing ever worse the longer they were kept beneath it. Then, after a while, people everywhere noticed that it had started raining. It was not fresh water that fell from the sky, however, but rather a dirty, salty substance—Nagatoro's own foot sweat, seeping in past the protective barrier to flood her toy planet. The rain intensified into a violent downpour that flooded the whole planet little by little. Soon billions were swimming in an ever-growing ocean of Nagatoro's sweat, and while others were starting to drown in it. After a few minutes of so toying with the planet, even the mighty Mount Everest was submerged in a vast ocean of sweat, and almost everyone drowned or was drowning. Not the smallest bit of dry land remained, as she saw when she picked the planet back up, and those sparse survivors who clung to tree trunks or rafts or lifesavers held on for dear life, begging for mercy from their owner.

As if granting their prayers, Nagatoro pressed the reset button and watched as all her sweat was ejected from the planet, evaporating into the air, while the planet's surface reformed and everything went back to normal. “You know, maybe I can find some use for you even if you won't obey me; I think your puny planet is just the thing for cleaning my armpits!”

Pulling back her sleeves, Nagatoro pressed the tiny planet up against her armpit, at first simply holding it in place to let the tiny people get acquainted with the smell. It was stronger than the smell of her foot, and to them it seemed magnified by her gigantic size. It filled the whole planet's atmosphere, making everyone who smelled it feel woozy. At the same time, the heat of Nagatoro's body seeped into the planet along with the smell, making everybody start to sweat. Some of her pit sweat also started to rain down on them, but thankfully for the microscopic people her pit wasn't as sweaty as her feet had been so the planet wasn't entirely flooded this time. Instead they just had to suffer through the awful smell the whole time, while wading through a swamp of sweat. And while Nagatoro used the little world to scrub her pits with one hand, with the other she browsed everyone's posts, enthralled by their suffering.

Nagatoro was just finishing up with her armpits when she received a message on her normal phone. After reading it, she put the tiny planet down on her bed and left her room, giving the tiny people a moment of peace. Soon, however, they heard her returning with somebody else, and when her door opened again they saw a blonde girl about the same age as their owner and wearing the same school uniform step inside with Nagatoro.

“Check this out, Yoshi,” Nagatoro said, leading the other girl towards the bed. There she grabbed the tiny planet and handed it over to her friend.

“Eh? Is that a marble? Oh, that's cute, it looks just like the Earth! Look, Hayacchi; the mighty Yoshi is holding the whole world in the palm of her hand!” The girl giggled, never suspecting just how true her little joke was—at least, not until Nagatoro showed her all the new messages with photos and videos of Yoshi as seen by the tiny planet's inhabitants and shared with her the story of how she had gotten it and what she had done with it so far. After the story, Yoshi looked at the planet with newfound amazement, holding it up to her eyes to see all the little cities down below.

“Hey, why don't you try crushing it? Go ahead, just squeeze your fingers together until it goes pop! You wouldn't believe how good it feels!” Nagatoro said.

“You want me to destroy it? Well, you said you can just bring it back after that, right? Then I guess it should be fine! Watch out, tiny people; Yoshi's mighty fingers are coming to destroy your world!” Yoshi giggled, applying ever more pressure to the tiny sphere, until suddenly the barrier gave way and allowed her fingers to close on the planet's surface, once more reducing it to dust. Then Nagatoro pressed the reset button and the planet reformed in the palm of Yoshi's hand.

“Oh wow, that's so cool! We can play with these little guys as much as we want like this! He he! I think I have a fun idea for what to do with them. You don't mind if I play with them a bit more, do you, Hayacchi?”

Nagatoro waved her on. “Go ahead, do whatever you want with those little specks. It's not like it matters one bit what happens to them.”

“Okay! Hold on, tiny guys; I think you'll like this one!” Yoshi said, and quickly undid the topmost buttons of her shirt until she had her breasts exposed. The planet's billions of people all looked on in awe at the size of her boobs, each a mighty Jupiter from the puny planet's perspective—way bigger than Nagatoro's for sure. As Yoshi drew the planet closer to her chest, her breasts loomed ever bigger in their sky, until at last she let go of their little world, dropping it into her cleavage.

Her celestial breasts hugged the planet softly and her scent and body warmth seeped into the atmosphere and blanketed the tiny world, making the people feel as if they were all in her embrace. It was a soothing feeling, a welcome change from the destruction and suffering to which they had been subjected so far. Then, poking their world, Yoshi pushed them deeper inside, until they were in the very depths of her cleavage, surrounded on all sides by her soft flesh. In that near-total darkness, the tiny people heard her heartbeat, felt the whole world reverberate with it. At least for now, they felt at peace.

That feeling still remained even as Yoshi grabbed her breasts and started moving them up and down, delighting in the sensation of the marble-planet being rolled and smothered between them. The muffled sound of her laughter reached those billions of people in her bosom, adding to their tender feelings. Then, after a minute or so, Yoshi pressed her breasts together with ever more force. Even then the microbe people, still safe behind their protective barrier and in the total darkness of her cleavage, didn't realize that anything was wrong. It came as a total shock to them when the barrier finally shattered and Yoshi's breasts slammed into their planet, crushing it all at once.

Yoshi still giggled as she rubbed the planet's remains between her breasts, grinding it down into finer and finer dust, until she let go and the dust sprinkled down to the floor. “That was so much fun!” she laughed joyfully. “Hayacchi, you've got to try it! Just put the little world between your breasts and squeeze!”

“Uh... y-yeah! I think I'll try that some other time, maybe. While you're here, though, why don't we try playing with them together?” Nagatoro reset the tiny Earth and picked it up off the floor. “I figure there's gotta be at least a few million pathetic losers on this planet who've never kissed a girl in their lives. What do you say we give them a kiss they'll never forget?”

Nagatoro put the planet between her lips and motioned for Yoshi to come closer. Yoshi was a bit flustered at first, but after a second she stepped forward, almost pressing her body up against Nagatoro's. “Hope you're ready for your kiss, guys~!” she said teasingly before leaning forward. Her lips met Nagatoro's around the little world, making the pair of them blush a bit. Then, with their hands on each other's shoulders, they closed their eyes and started awkwardly pressing their lips together. The billions between them felt no less awkward, though a few of them were a bit excited by the whole thing.

After a couple minutes, their lips broke through the barrier and crushed the planet. As soon as it happened, they jerked their heads back in surprise and let its remains fall onto their chests. Nagatoro then reset the planet and grabbed it. “You little specks better be grateful for letting you experience a real kiss for once in your pathetic lives,” she said, her smug grin filling the pitiful planet's sky.

Next, Nagatoro instructed Yoshi to take off her shirt and lie down on the bed, and Yoshi happily obliged, curious as to what her friend was planning. Nagatoro set the barrier strength down to the minimum and very carefully moved her fingernail closer. With hardly any effort, her nail burst through the barrier and into the planet's crust.

At the nail's entrance, the whole planet trembled and threatened to break apart, great cracks spreading over its surface. Countless buildings collapsed under the cataclysmic earthquakes which consumed the tiny planet. Still, most people survived, and Nagatoro was able to scoop a small chunk of the Earth onto her fingernail, carrying it away from the planet to set it down gently on a vast, fleshy surface.

Those souls who had survived the trip to this new land looked around and took in their surroundings. Had they been a bit bigger, the land they were on might have seemed like a great, smooth plain, but at their near-microscopic size, it seemed covered in hills and valleys as great as any on their home planet. Putting all of those to shame, however, was the gargantuan pair of mountains rising high into the sky behind them—huge, fleshy mountains wrapped up in a lacy pink bra. They quickly recognized those mountains as the very breasts that had ended their lives just a short while earlier, gazing on them in silent reverence.

Meanwhile, Nagatoro tore off more and more chunks of the planet's surface, setting them down on Yoshi's body—some on her thighs, more on her belly, and a few on top of the teen's breasts, near where her nipples pushed up on the fabric of her bra. Billions died in the process, but the billion or so who survived to find themselves on Yoshi's body were in awe of their surroundings, and of the power so effortlessly manifested by the godly high schooler.

It wasn't only her movements that sent earthquakes through their pathetically puny worlds—she caused a commotion for her billion awestruck passengers simply by giggling at the thought of all those speck-people crawling on her body like germs. Those on her chest were especially sensitive to such things, as her giggles sent ripples all over the mass of her planet-sized breasts.

Even just by her breathing the people on her chest and belly were made to rise or fall many miles in a single second, giving them a strong sense of vertigo. And in the background of all that, everyone, all over her body, was rocked by a ceaseless series of lesser tremors caused by the pulse of her blood beneath them.

Once the whole planet's surface had been uprooted and laid on top of her, Yoshi and Nagatoro both looked in delight at all the tiny chunks of planet sitting on top of her, admiring how her body had been turned into a whole vast world to those little germs. Nagatoro grabbed her phone and together they looked at all the pictures and videos of the alien landscapes of Yoshi's body. Finally, Nagatoro climbed on the bed and held herself over Yoshi, looking down on all those pathetic people.

If Yoshi's body was a new greater Earth to all those billion souls, then Nagatoro's was the sky, held miles and miles above them all by the mighty pillars of her arms and legs. Everyone was in suspense as they waited to see what the two girls would do. 

As Nagatoro slowly lowered herself, her body seemed to grow bigger in the view of all the speck-people, who started to panic at the terrifying sight. Lower and lower she came, until at last her body crashed into Yoshi's like Heaven crashing into the Earth. First those on Yoshi's breasts were crushed, then those on her belly, and finally those on her thighs, until not a soul remained alive between Yoshi and Nagatoro and both teens were laughing over the remains of the entire planet.

Nagatoro then sat back up and reset the planet again, watching all its remains congregate together right at the edge of Yoshi's bellybutton. A slight movement from Yoshi's breathing sent them falling right into the great pit, where they were accosted by the powerful smell while the two girls laughed at their misfortune. After rolling them around under her finger for a while, Yoshi crushed them all again, and ground them all up together with the dirt and lint stuck in her navel.

Yoshi and Nagatoro had plenty of fun crushing the tiny world with various parts of their bodies—between their hips, their hands, their cheeks, their chests, their feet, their asses, and any other place they could think of, until late in the afternoon when Yoshi left to head back home, leaving Nagatoro alone with the planet once more. Nagatoro then stood in front of her mirror with the planet in hand, looking down at her chest.

Taking off her shirt, Nagatoro held the planet in her shallow cleavage and pressed her breasts together, trying to imitate Yoshi's feat. Even pressing them together like that, they still didn't have enough mass to completely engulf the planet between them like Yoshi had done—in fact, she could barely even roll it between her breasts like that. “Doesn't matter,” she thought; even if they weren't as big as Yoshi's, they must still look gigantic to those little specks.

“Your whole planet's about to be crushed between a girl's giant breasts; any last words before you're nothing but a pile of dust again?” she said to the tiny planet, trying not to let her embarrassment show. This was such a big mistake; she should have never even attempted anything like this.

Unable to stand the embarrassment anymore, Nagatoro ended it by crushing the planet again, then wiped off all the dust and put her shirt back on. When she grabbed the phone to reset it, though, she grew morbidly curious and decided to check in on what the tiny people had all been saying while she was teasing their planet. Scrolling down the feed, she saw message after message talking about how much cuter than her Yoshi was, how they wished they were Yoshi's pets instead of hers, and even joking about how small her breasts were compared to Yoshi's. It was worse than Nagatoro had ever expected, and she covered her face in shame after reading all that.

But her shame soon turned to indignation and she decided to teach those little specks a lesson.

When she reset the planet, the tiny people found themselves caught in Nagatoro's fearsome glare. “I thought you would have learned by now to show me the respect I deserve as your superior, but apparently not. Could it be you actually want to be punished? Well, I'll punish you, alright. I'm done playing around now; it's time I showed you all how worthless and pathetic you really are!”

Switching back to the controls tab, Nagatoro tapped on the size slider and moved it slowly to the left, watching to her great satisfaction how the marble-sized planet shrank smaller and smaller in her palm until it was the size of a sesame seed. Even then, with how small they had been before, it was hard for the microscopic people to tell how much tinier they were. It was only when Nagatoro put her finger down beside them that they saw how it utterly dwarfed their tiny planet, and they grew terrified at the realization of how truly insignificant they now were.

Nagatoro then scooped the planet up in her fingernail and brought it up to her eye. There her vast pupil filled the puny peoples' sky, seeming to them a massive black hole ready to swallow their planet up. Everybody hurried to apologize for all the bad stuff they'd said about her, but it was already too late; Nagatoro didn't care one bit what they had to say anymore. She moved the slider still further to the left and the tiny planet became still tinier, falling deeper and deeper under her fingernail until it settled into a pile of dirt like—just one more speck of dust among thousands.

“Well, it's been fun, but I'm done wasting my time on you worthless germs. Hope you like your new home because you'll be spending the rest of your pathetic lives right there, exactly where you all belong, as dirt under my nails. See you never, losers!”

Even as she said this, the whole planet was busy apologizing to her, swearing they would show her all the respect she deserved, even build those statues and temples she had asked for and worship her like a Goddess, but it was too late—after reducing the planet's size to its absolute minimum, she had uninstalled the YourWorld app from her phone, making it impossible for them to communicate with her.

Unbeknownst to her, uninstalling the app would have other effects on the microbe planet; after losing the signal from her phone, the planet would ever so slowly start to shrink still smaller and its barrier grow weaker, until, many days from now, the planet would fall into the dirt it was now an infinitesimal part of. These pathetic survivors would then be left to wander around on the dirt forever, doing their best to survive on the infinite and ever-growing universe under Nagatoro's fingernail, never to be thought of again.

The ground shook and the wind howled. A gash split the earth in half and spewed hellfire, filling the air with the smell of brimstone. Black smoke billowed ever higher, darkening the noonday sun, and while a hundred villagers looked on, a pair of blood-red hands arose from the great pit—hands whose fingers alone dwarfed the young oaks nearby. Those fingers gripped the earth; nails like great, blackened kite shields pierced the ground; and as the gash widened, out came a face as giant as those hands.

Irises aglow with the same demonic light as the hellfire shone fiendishly on the small village before them. Short, curved horns wrapped in iron chains protruded from the being's forehead, and in its mouth glistened twin rows of fearsome fangs, bared in a grin the moment it espied all the frightened villagers.

The demon rose from the pit to stand at its full, towering height. And while the onlookers all quaked in their boots, it—she—opened her mouth to speak...

And immediately fell into a coughing fit as her head was consumed in the billowing column of smoke rising out of the great pit.

“Ack! Stupid... cough... smoke... cough!”

She ducked her head and staggered forward, but as her foot fell into a slight depression on the ground, she stumbled and fell with a mighty THUD to land all sprawled-out just beyond the village. She slowly picked herself up, trying in vain to get her coughing under control, all the while the villagers looked on awkwardly, the weight and gravity of the moment all but vanished.

The pious folks took this time to get better acquainted with her appearance, taking in her dress and build. She was horned, fanged, and crimson-skinned, of course, like all of her kind. Her hair was short and dark, her face oval and youthful-looking. Her body was slim, and also quite youthful—by human standards she didn't look quite adult yet, but who really knew how demons aged? She may have been older than any of them.

The peasant women in particular also noted with disapproving tuts the way she was dressed—with all the sinfulness of a demon. It wasn't just that her skirt was much too short, being hemmed only a little below her knees and scandalously revealing her ankles; the neck of her blouse was too low as well, showing off—gasp!—her shoulders. Perhaps worst of all, though, was her footwear: no socks nor tights nor stockings clothed her legs, and instead of proper shoes she wore only a pair of skimpy sandals. Why, she was practically going barefoot! If this was how all demons clothed their young, they truly were the most evil of God's creatures.

At last the demon's cough subsided and she rose once more to her towering height, standing so immense that even the barns reached no higher than her ankles. She took a deep breath, then bellowed out a maniacal cackle.

“AH-HAHAHAHAHAHA~!

“PUNY MORTALS! TREMBLE IN FEAR! THE NEW DEMON LORD—DEMON LADY—DEMON QUEEN? WHATEVER! I, DEMARYS THE DREADED, HAVE COME TO MAKE THIS WORLD MY OWN! GAZE ON ME AND DESPAIR!”

Gaze on her the villagers did, but whatever effect her introduction might have had was much ruined by her earlier accident. Why, they didn't even have it in them to pretend to be scared anymore.

Seeing their reaction, or lack of it, Demarys's grin faltered, but it soon came back as haughty as ever. “I SEE; IT LOOKS LIKE YOUR puny LITTLE MINDS ARE SO OVERCOME WITH FEAR THAT YOU CAN'T EVEN PROCESS WHAT'S GOING ON! IT JUST GOES TO SHOW HOW WEAK AND PATHETIC YOU HUMANS ALL ARE. THAT'S FINE BY ME; THE LESS RESISTANCE YOU PUT UP, THE SOONER I CAN EXTEND MY EVIL REIGN OVER THE WORLD AND TURN ALL YOUR LIVES INTO A LIVING HELL! AND I'LL START WITH YOUR LITTLE VILLAGE. NOW, MORTALS; KNEEL!”

Her eyes flicked expectantly from one villager to the next, but not one of them moved to kneel. She gave them a few minutes, tapping her foot impatiently in the meantime, since she figured their weak little minds might need some more time to process her command, but despite the powerful impact of her foot upon the ground, the villagers did no more than mutter among themselves.

“HEY! DIDN'T YOU HEAR ME?! I TOLD YOU ALL TO KNEEL!” The demoness stomped her foot, but still the villagers stood their ground. “W-WHAT'S THIS? YOU REALLY WON'T DO WHAT I SAY? WELL... MAYBE YOU'LL CHANGE YOUR MINDS AFTER YOU SEE ME CRUSH ONE OF YOU ALIVE!”

As Demarys took a step forward and raised a foot over the villagers, all of them gasped and covered their eyes when they got a peek up her skirt. The demoness took it as a sign of fear and was much pleased. They didn't even try to run, making themselves easy prey for her, yet, after holding her foot over them for a few seconds, she merely put it back down away from them.

“ON SECOND THOUGHT, CRUSHING YOU LIKE THAT WOULD BE FAR TOO MERCIFUL AN END FOR YOU. BESIDES, WITH HOW PUNY YOU ARE, I'M SURE I'LL NEED AS MANY OF YOU AS POSSIBLE TO GET ANYTHING DONE WHEN I PUT YOU TO WORK AS MY SLAVES. INSTEAD I'LL DESTROY YOUR HOUSES ONE BY ONE UNTIL YOU ALL KNEEL TO ME!”

The demoness moved her foot forward again, lifting it back on her heel to rest the toes on the roof of the nearest house. For a second the house groaned and creaked under the immense pressure, but just when it seemed like it was about to break, the demoness let up on it. “Um, does anyone know if this house is empty? Someone had better check real quick. If not then maybe you could point me to one that—” Before she could finish, the house simply fell down of itself, having been so weakened by the pressure she applied a moment ago.

“Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean... Er, I mean... AH-HAHAHAHAHAHA~! IS THAT ALL IT TAKES TO KNOCK OVER ONE OF YOUR BUILDINGS? WHY, I ONLY SHOWED OFF A SMALL FRACTION OF MY POWER AND IT ALL FELL APART! DO YOU SEE NOW WHAT YOU'RE UP AGAINST? CEASE NOW YOUR POINTLESS RESISTANCE AND KNEEL TO YOUR NEW QUEEN!”

Again the villagers only shuffled around uneasily, until at last one of them came forward. “Um, excuse me, Miss... Demarys?”

“THAT'S QUEEN DEMARYS TO YOU, INSECT!”

“My apologies; I didn't mean to offend. But I have to ask, you're not really our queen yet, are you? I mean... last we heard, King Tristophon is still alive, and he's still the ruler of these lands. Or have you deposed him and taken the throne?”

“W-well, no, but... WHAT DOES IT MATTER TO ME IF SOME MEASLEY HUMAN KING SAYS HE OWNS THIS LAND? THE VILLAGE IS MINE. IF ANYONE SAYS OTHERWISE, LET THEM COME AND SEE IF THEY CAN TAKE IT FROM ME.”

“Of course you own the land, but that's not the same as being queen. And I'm sure you mean to conquer more than just our little village, yes?”

“OF COURSE! I WILL MAKE THE WHOLE WORLD BOW TO ME, AND BRING A NEW REIGN OF TERROR THAT WILL LAST A THOUSAND YEARS!”

“Right. Well, that would all go much smoother if you could show off a crown and scepter to prove you're the new queen. I'm sure you wouldn't even need to crush anything to convince people of it then. Isn't that right?” The others murmured in assent.

“YES... WELL... I-I KNOW ALL THAT! IN FACT, I ALREADY MEANT TO GO VISIT YOUR KING RIGHT AFTER I WAS DONE WITH THIS PUNY LITTLE VILLAGE. AND NOW THAT I'VE MADE ENOUGH OF AN IMPRESSION ON YOU PATHETIC MORTALS, I MIGHT AS WELL GO NOW. TELL ME WHERE I CAN FIND THIS KING OF YOURS SO I MAY PAY HIM A VISIT!”

The man pointed to the north-east. “His castle should be a few days' walk over that way.”

“ARE YOU SURE? I CAN'T SEE ANYTHING. IS IT BEHIND THOSE MOUNTAINS?” The demoness stood on tip-toe, shielding her eyes with a hand upon her brow. Then her heels came back down with another THUD. “YOU AREN'T LYING TO ME, ARE YOU? BECAUSE I DON'T LIKE IT WHEN PEOPLE LIE TO ME.”

“I assure you, it's all perfectly true. It's not far past those mountains you're seeing.”

“WELL, ALRIGHT. BUT YOU'RE COMING WITH ME, MISTER...”

“David.”

“DAVID! AND IF IT TURNS OUT THE CASTLE ISN'T WHERE YOU SAID IT WAS... I'LL EAT YOU! AND YOUR SOUL! NOW BE STILL FOR ME.” The demoness crouched and picked the man up, her fingertips more than sufficing to hold his entire body between them. “BE STILL, INSECT! DEMARYS THE DREADED COMMANDS IT!” she said while he fidgeted in her grip. “I MEAN IT! CEASE YOUR SQUIRMING AT ONCE OR YOU'LL MAKE ME DROP YOU!”

The man quit moving and allowed her to hold him in front of her. “NOW, YOU SAID IT WAS THIS WAY, CORRECT?” David nodded. “GOOD! THEN WE SHALL BE THERE SOON ENOUGH, AND THEN YOU'LL BE WITNESS TO MY CONQUEST OF THE KINGDOM OF...”

“Tourlevon.”

“TOURLEVON.” She dropped David on her head, then turned to the other villagers. “PUNY HUMANS! BY THIS TIME TOMORROW I WILL RETURN AS YOUR QUEEN! I EXPECT A BANQUET READY BY THEN, AND IF I DON'T GET ONE... I'LL HAVE TO EAT MY FILL FROM ALL OF YOU! AH-HAHAHAHAHAHA~!”

With that she lifted her lofty legs and strode away from the village. Though the mountains weren't too distant at her size, she walked so slowly, taking care to avoid stepping on anything at all even to the point of twice taking a big detour around a forest, that it was an hour before she even got to them.

“Oh, thank goodness,” she muttered as she sat at the base of the mountains, which stood only a few times taller than she did. “How much further will that stupid castle be?”

“Not much further now,” David ventured to say.

“EEP!” At the sound of his voice the demoness jumped and knocked the man down from his perch atop her head. He would have fallen right off had he not griped a strand of her hair on the way down to from it right in front of her eye. “Hold on! Let me help you.” She raised a hand and seized the man, holding him softly between her fingers. “Are you alright? I'm sorry, I completely forgot that you were... Ahem! FOOLISH HUMAN! WHEN DID I GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO SPEAK? FROM NOW ON BE SILENT UNLESS SPOKEN TO, OR NEXT TIME I MAY NOT HAVE MERCY ON YOU. YOU... DID NOT HURT YOURSELF, DID YOU?”

“Er... no. I'm fine. I... thank you?”

“PUNY MORTAL! I DON'T NEED YOUR THANKS! IN FACT, DON'T THANK ME EVER AGAIN! I ONLY SAVED YOU BECAUSE... IT DOESN'T MATTER WHY I SAVED YOU! MY REASONS ARE BEYOND THE KEN OF LOWLY BEINGS LIKE YOURSELF! WHY, YOU'RE BETTER OFF FORGETTING THIS EVER HAPPENED.”

“Yes, yes, of course. Um... I'm sorry, but... are you sure you're a demon?”

“WHAT KIND OF A QUESTION IS THAT!? OF COURSE I'M A DEMON! CAN'T YOU SEE THE BLOOD-RED SKIN? THE HORNS? THE FANGS? THE INDECENT CLOTHING? WHAT ELSE WOULD I BE IF NOT A DEMON?”

“I'm not really sure, but if I'm being honest you don't have a very demonic air. In fact, you don't seem very evil at all.”

“WHAT!? OF COURSE I'M EVIL! NOT JUST EVIL; I'M THE EVILEST CREATURE TO EVER WALK THIS REALM! HOW ELSE DO YOU THINK I BECAME AS BIG AND POWERFUL AS YOU SEE ME NOW?”

“You mean to say you weren't always gigantic?”

“OF COURSE NOT! IT ALL STARTED WHEN I SET OUT TO BECOME THE MOST SINFUL DEMON IN ALL OF HELL BECOMING THE FIRST OF OUR KIND TO BREAK ALL TEN COMMANDMENTS.”

“The first? Isn't that something you all do?”

“HEAVENS NO! We all break most of them at some point, but the first had never been broken until I took to worshipping Him only after worshipping the heathen gods every day. Since that day, my power has grown ever greater! When I was strong enough I broke the sixth by killing the old Demon Lord and his armies. I broke the tenth by taking all his stuff marrying his wives—that's same sex marriage so it's especially sinful, and to be even more sinful I divorced them after that. Then...”

Taking a seat on the mountainside, Demarys continued explaining how she had broken each commandment in the most benign way imaginable, only skipping over the seventh out of embarrassment. All in all, it more than confirmed David's suspicions about her. Despite her massive size and the threatening airs she put on, despite even her own claims to being pure evil, she was mostly innocent at heart. Innocent enough that he started to feel bad about his lies.

He had hoped to buy the others time to relocate, spread word of the demon, maybe even raise an army to fight her, by leading the demoness across the Risian deserts where no man lived in search of the king's castle. Now, though, he wondered if it might not be better to help her depose the king and take his throne. He doubted she could be any worse a ruler than Tristophon with he all his wars and demands, his corruption and absurd laws, and by the time she finished her story, he was convinced she'd make a better ruler by far. Of course, if he was wrong, she really might eat him as punishment for his deception, but that was a risk worth taking; he'd just have to be tactful with her.

“Queen Demarys, I have to come clean. When I said that the king's castle is behind these mountains, I lied to you. I didn't think you were as evil and powerful as you claimed, and I thought I could get way with playing a prank on you. But now that I've heard your tale and I understand what a monster I'm dealing with, I cannot risk your wrath any longer. I beg you: have mercy on me and I will lead you down the real path to King Tristophon's castle.

Demarys seemed surprised at his confession—almost hurt, even—but once he finished, her eyes hardened into a genuine glare, and he wondered if he might have made a mistake.

“YOU TREACHEROUS LITTLE SWINE!” she said, holding him so firmly he thought his bones might all snap if she pressed the slightest bit harder. “I TOLD YOU I DON'T LIKE IT WHEN PEOPLE LIE TO ME, AND THAT'S THE FIRST THING YOU DO. HOW DO I EVEN KNOW THIS ISN'T ANOTHER LIE? ANSWER ME! WHY WOULD YOU BE TELLING THE TRUTH THIS TIME AROUND?”

“Be... cause,” David said, straining to squeeze out what little air remained in his lungs. “I... I... don't... want... to die.” Demarys still gripped David fiercely, so glaring at him that he thought he could feel the heat of her glare. “Check the... other side... you'll see... it's desert...” The demoness grunted, and at last she relented, at least enough to let him breathe. She climbed up the mountains and, sure enough, standing at the peak she saw that there was nothing on the other side but desert as far as she could make out.

“WHERE IS THE CASTLE, THEN? ANSWER, AND KNOW THAT IF YOU LIE TO ME AGAIN, I WILL KILL YOU.”

“Yes, yes. I, understand,” David said, now struggling to catch his breath due to the drastic change in elevation. “South. It's south. A few days' walk for us. Much less for you. If I'm lying you'll know before the day is over.”

The demoness turned to where he had pointed. From this height she could see so much further than before, yet even looking out over all those leagues she couldn't spot any sort of castle. Maybe it was even further away, or maybe it was too small to see at this distance. Either way, she couldn't know if he was telling the truth yet. Still, even if there was no castle, there were some towns and villages over there; better than the barren desert at her back, at least.

So she started heading south with David riding on her shoulder, grumbling about her tired feet and her growing hunger, wishing she had brought something to eat before leaving Hell. Finally, after a few more hours of walking, the castle came into view. “See? I was telling the truth this time,” David said. The demoness said nothing, but quietly prepared herself for the encounter to come—there wouldn't be any stumbling or falling on her face this time! No, these people would see her for the monster she truly was. She fixed a fiendish grin on her face as she was approaching the castle, and stopped a few paces away to tower over it, peering down haughtily at the archers manning the towers and the guardsmen on the walls, all trembling most deliciously at the sight of her.

“PUNY HUMANS!” she bellowed, her thundering voice making all of them jump. “I HAVE COME TO CONQUER! SEND OUT YOUR KING! BRING ME HIS CROWN AND SCEPTER! OR I WILL... RAZE THE CASTLE TO THE GROUND! WITH EVERYONE INSIDE IT!”

She waited for a response, and after a moment the castle gates opened and an armored knight on horseback appeared, carrying a flag with an yellow eagle holding a fish in its talks against a blue and white backdrop—the standards of his house, she assumed.

“WHO COMES TO CHALLENGE ME? ARE YOU THE KING?” she demanded.

At the sound of her voice, the horse, already moving nervously and resisting its rider's attempts to get it moving towards her, reared up on its hind legs and nearly threw off its rider. The knight managed to hold the reins a while longer, but after the black stallion started bucking he fell off and landed on the ground. Then, while the horse ran off, the knight picked himself back up and turned to face the demoness.

“I... I am... King Richemond Tristophon.” he said, supporting himself with the flagpole while he caught his breath. “Demon! I come to defend my throne, and to put an end to thee! You have but one chance to make it out of here alive: give up your ridiculous aims and leave the surface world! Slink back down the hole you crawled out of, and I shall spare your life.”

“HA! DON'T MAKE ME LAUGH! IT'S YOU WHO SHOULD BE RUNNING AWAY. PITIFUL HUMAN—YOU ARE NOTHING TO ME! KNEEL AND SWEAR FEALTY AND I MAY JUST LET YOU LIVE.”

“I would rather die fighting than kneel to a wicked monster!”

“THEN COME AT ME! TRY TO STRIKE ME DOWN, AND SEE FOR YOURSELF HOW INSIGNIFICANT YOUR STRENGTHS ARE NEXT TO MINE.”

“With pleasure!” The king stepped forward, armor clanking as he made his way towards the demoness. Demarys waited... and waited... and waited as he slowly traversed the half-mile separating him from her, never faltering in his stride, until at last she grew impatient and took a couple quick steps forward and set her foot down right in front of him, almost knocking him down.

“HERE; CLIMB ON AND STRIKE ME ALREADY SO YOU CAN SEE HOW FUTILE YOUR RESISTANCE IS.”

The king stood without a word and walked up to the base of her sandals, giving a small jump to try and reach her insole. When that didn't work, he unsheathed a sword that seemed almost to glow with a holy light and thrust it into the sandal sole, almost down to the hilt. Pulling himself up by the grip, at last he could grab on to the edge of her insole and climbed up, almost collapsing as soon as he was on it.

King Tristophon then stepped up the demon's crimson toes... only to realize he'd left the sword half-buried in the sandal sole. He went back and with great effort pried it free, finally rising with it to confront the demon's toes which only then ceased their impatient drumming to accept the king's challenge. But instead of striking them, the king merely bowed his head once he stood before the house-sized digits.

“WHAT'S THIS? HAVE YOU CHANGED YOUR MIND ALREADY? HA! MAYBE YOU'RE NOT AS FOOLISH AS I THOUGHT! I'M TEMPTED TO CRUSH YOU ANYWAYS, BUT I SUPPOSE I CAN GIVE YOU ONE MORE CHANCE TO SAVE YOURSELF; KNEEL AND DECLARE YOUR LOYALTY TO YOUR NEW QUEEN! WELL? WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? MY PATIENCE IS WEARING THIN. I STILL HAVE A WHOLE KINGDOM TO TERRORIZE, SO MAKE WITH THE KNEELING OR I'LL– OW! Owowowowowowowow!”

Demarys shook the king off her sandal, then knelt and reached for her foot, carefully gripping the holy sword stuck hilt-deep in her flesh. A trickle of dark blood seeped from the wound, and he wiped it away over and over again, applying plenty of spit to her thumb as she did so.

“This... This cannot be,” the king said after failing to stand back up. “That holy sword is the very same that cleaved Xerael in twain when he came to conquer the world half a millennium back! No evil creature can survive the Lord's power imbued in it! Y-you should be burning to a crisp as I speak!”

“This... this is the Archangel's Blade!?” Demarys jerked her fingers apart, dropping the holy sword as though it were burning her skin. Yet even after a minute, she felt no pain at all save for that of the pinprick wound she had received. At last she dared to pick the sword back up, and saw that nothing came of it.

“Ha... Haha! AH-HAHAHAHAHA~! FOOLISH MORTAL! DIDN'T YOU KNOW? I AM NOT JUST ANY WEAKLING DEMON! I AM THE MOST EVIL OF ALL THE DEMONS! THE LIGHT OF YOUR LORD IS LIKE... IT'S NOTHING COMPARED TO MY DARKNESS! NOW DO YOU SEE HOW FUTILE YOUR STRUGGLES ARE? INSECT! FOR YOUR INSOLENCE YOU AND THE ENTIRE CASTLE SHALL PERISH!”

“No! Please! I beg you! I... I am no king; only a humble knight!”

“HA! DO YOU REALLY THINK I WOULD FALL FOR SUCH A BLATANT LIE?”

“'Tis the truth! I was but a ruse—a distraction! When first we saw you, His Majesty charged me with slaying you or at least keeping you occupied, while he retreated to safety. You see? I'm not the real king,” he said after taking off his helmet.

Demarys frowned and reached for the knight. Though he trembled at the sight of her fingers drawing nearer, he let her pick him and and lift him up to her face. “IS THIS NOT YOUR KING?” she asked David.

“No, not him. I think he's telling the truth. King Tristophon is a craven man; it would be just like him to flee as soon as you appeared.”

“HMPH. EITHER WAY, YOU'RE ANOTHER LIAR. I DON'T LIKE BEING LIED TO, YOU KNOW. AND I'M SO HUNGRY AFTER SUCH A LONG WALK HERE... I THINK I MIGHT JUST EAT YOU NOW...”

The demon's tongue slid over her scarlet lips. Her mouth opened wide, showing off her deadly fangs. A hot wind blew out of her throat and washed over the knight, so scorching he thought her mouth a portal to Hell itself.

“Wait a second, Queen Demarys,” David hastened to say amidst the knight's calls for mercy. “Don't waste your time killing this man. If you capture him instead you can parade him around as a symbol of your might. Think of how much more imposing you'll look with one of the king's knights as your trophy.”

“NOT A BAD SUGGESTION, HUMAN. IT'S SO DEVILISH! ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE NOT A DEMON YOURSELF?” Demarys laughed. “WORTHLESS KNIGHT! YOUR PATHETIC CRIES ARE MUSIC TO MY EARS, SO I SHALL LET YOU LIVE, AS LONG AS YOU KEEP AMUSING ME. NOW COME AND LET ME SHOW YOU TO YOUR NEW PRISON SO I MAY DEAL WITH THE CASTLE NEXT!” The knight tried to flee as he saw Demarys's hand approaching, but the demoness easily snatched him up and shoved him under her toes. His struggles persisted only until a slight curl of her toes convinced him it he was better off not testing her, and once he fell still the demoness stood and turned her attention to the castle, where she found all the guardsmen and archers gone, presumably hiding inside.

“INSECTS! COME OUT AND SWEAR FEALTY TO ME, OR MEET YOUR END AT MY HANDS!

“... COME OUT, I SAID! DO YOU THINK I'M PLAYING GAMES HERE?

“... HELLO? IS ANYONE INSIDE? YOU HAVEN'T ALL LEFT, HAVE YOU?” Bending over, again almost sending David falling off, Demarys reached down and begin tearing off chunks of the castle until she saw some people inside. “THERE YOU ARE!” she exclaimed, but when she reached for them they scurried deeper inside. “HEY! GET BACK HERE! WHY, YOU LITTLE INSECTS, JUST WAIT UNTIL I GET MY HANDS ON YOU ALL!”

“Queen Demarys, maybe you should send me in to speak to them. I'm sure I could convince them to obey you.”

Demarys plucked David from her head and glared at him. “DO YOU SWEAR YOU WON'T TRY TO ESCAPE IF I LET YOU GO INSIDE?”

“Of course not. How could I ever escape, when you cover all the exits and can just crush the castle at any time?”

“YES, OF COURSE I CAN! AND I WILL, TOO, IF YOU DON'T COME OUT QUICK! NOW GO AND DO MY BIDDING.” The demoness carefully lowered David in through the opening she had made, then sat waiting patiently for him to come out, toying with the captured knight in the meantime.

Just as she was starting to grow impatient, a few dozen people all marched out of the castle together, David among them. “Great demon, we beg you; have mercy on us!” the guardsman at the head of the group said and fell to his knees. Behind him, everyone else followed suit, clasping their hands together and giving her the most pathetic faces as they entreated her. “The castle is yours—we surrender it without a fight. The throne is also yours, and the crown, and the kingdom, and our service if you desire it; we ask only that you spare our lives.”

“FOOLISH HUMANS! WHAT USE COULD I POSSIBLY HAVE FOR SUCH A PATHETIC LOT AS YOU?”

The guardsman looked over his shoulder at David, and at a nod from the peasant he turned back to Demarys and raised his voice. “We hear that you're quite hungry. If you give us a bit of time, we'll have a feast ready for you to.

“A FEAST, YOU SAY?” Demarys licked her lips. “WELL... ALRIGHT! YOU'LL HAVE THIS ONE CHANCE TO PROVE YOURSELVES WORTH SPARING. NOW GO PREPARE MY FEAST!”

At her command, the entire castle staff, not only cooks but also guards and archers, stablehands and steward, and everyone else who could work, all hurried back inside, as did David, leaving her alone a while longer. When at last they came out again some time later to announce the feast was ready, they found her stretched out in front of the castle, on the point of dozing off. Hearing their announcement she yawned and sat back up, just in time for them to carry out dish after dish of whatever they could make in such a hurry.

There was nothing artful about the dishes, some of which were burnt while others more were undercooked, but she scarfed them down all the same with clear satisfaction while the staff kept bringing out more and more food for her. It was the dessert she liked the best, though, and she thoroughly savored every pastry she was given. “Goodness, this is so sweet! HUMANS! I DEMAND MORE OF THESE!” she said, and banged her fist on the ground for effect.

The staff all hurried to fulfill her desire, emptying out the storage room of every last ingredient they could use to hastily cobble together some pies and tarts for her, while each time she kept calling for “MORE, MORE, MORE!” Her appetite was insatiable, and even when she had devoured all they had to offer she still called for more until they meekly informed her that there was no more to give.

“HOW DISAPPOINTING. I SUPPOSE THIS IS ENOUGH FOR NOW... BUT YOU HAD BEST GO FETCH ME MORE TOMORROW, OR I MIGHT JUST EAT YOU ALL INSTEAD! AND YOU...” she said to David, “WILL MAKE SURE EVERYTHING IS DONE AS I SAY. DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?” Everyone nodded. “GOOD! THEN BRING ME THE ROYAL CROWN!”

The coronation was a simple affair, with hardly a bit of ceremony. The crown was brought out, and its bearer carried up to place the crown on the very tip of her horn, where it sat hardly visible on the titanic demoness. And once she'd been named queen, Demarys stood and called out for all the land to hear.

“HARK, PEOPLE OF TOURLEVON! AS OF TODAY, YOUR PEACEFUL, EASYGOING DAYS ARE OVER! NOW BEGINS MY REIGN OF TERROR! PREPARE YOURSELVES, MORTALS, FOR THE COMING OF HELL ON EARTH! AH-HAHAHAHAHA~!”

So began the golden age of Tourlevon, a time without wars nor bandits, without harsh laws nor onerous taxes. The kingdom's new ruler would have only one demand : to provide her with all the cakes and pies and tarts she could eat. Despite her terrifying appearance, her subjects soon enough learned they had nothing to fear as long as they gave their share to her pastry empire. 

Gregor had been keeping an eye on the city of New Athens for a while now—ever since he started to hear reports of Griffin readying its forces for an offensive in the area. The place had been captured by Sangvis Ferri years ago, around the time when those machines first turned against humanity. It had remained under their control ever since, but Griffin's troops had been pushing those bots back in sector after sector recently, and if all went well, New Athens would be the next place they liberated. Once word of it got out, every scavenger in the vicinity would rush in to grab any valuables around, and Gregor was perfectly positioned to be the first one there, if indeed Griffin could secure it.

The battle was something terrible to see. Not that Gregor had been to witness it—he'd only seen clips people had posted online—but even that painted a chilling picture. It wasn't only the vicious SF troops that made him feel that way, either, or even mostly them. What really scared him were those monstrous T-Dolls Griffin had been using recently—Dolls big enough to crush a man, or even a whole house, in a single step. What kind of madman thought it was a good idea to build those things? It made him shiver just to think about what one of those could do if it turned against humanity like Sangvis Ferri before them.

But no point in dwelling on what-ifs; not when he had a city to loot.

As soon as he heard the SF forces had been pushed out of the city and the Griffin troops were busy chasing after them, Gregor seized the opportunity and drove to New Athens. Ruined roads and buildings as far as the eye could see greeted him on his arrival. Some of the destruction was still fresh, but most of it was much older—over a decade old, in fact, dating from the third World War. The place had been abandoned ever since, except for those SF units he supposed. In the years since then, just about everything of conventional value must have been scavenged and sold off—normally there would have been little point in looking for anything new here, but there had been a bit of a fad for memorabilia of the great war, and Gregor was sure he could find enough otherwise-useless trinkets here ignored to satisfy any too-rich-for-his-own-good collector.

Failing that, he could at least sell off some of the SF units, of which there were plenty in various states of destruction: burnt down, pumped full of lead, blown to bits, circuits fried... and stomped flat in the middle of giant shoeprint-shaped craters.

... Well, maybe he'd stay away from those last ones, but everything else was fair game if he could take it back to his truck. Unfortunately the streets were so wrecked and full of rubble and that he couldn't bring his vehicle any further than a couple blocks into the city, so he had to make many trips of increasing length to get all his findings back to the mostly-intact building where he'd left it.

Gregor was right in the middle of his deepest foray into the city yet—“The last one for today,” he told his tired legs, as he had the last time around—when his ears perked up at the sound of a distant impact. Another one came soon, telling him it hadn't been his imagination, and another two followed. “What was that?” he wondered. It didn't quite sound like artillery fire, nor explosions, nor collapsing buildings. If anything, it sounded like...

Gregor hurried back to his truck with his bag full of what trinkets and doodads he had managed to collect, keeping his strides smooth so his cargo wouldn't make noise. For a while all was quiet, but about halfway to his truck the noises started up again somewhere to his right. Whatever their cause, they were getting closer by the second, and at the risk of someone, or something, hearing him, he quickened his pace.

Then, while he was crossing an intersection, he saw it: the giant Doll behind all the sounds he'd been hearing. She appeared a mile or so to his right—too close; much too close for comfort—a monster taller than any of the buildings still standing in the city, so massive the asphalt crunched beneath her feet with each step. Also a cutie with a black and white outfit, light-blonde hair styled in a pair of buns, and nylon stockings going halfway up her thighs. “Why do they have to make these monsters look like fashion models?” he thought.

It was funny how fear and attraction could mix at a time like this, almost canceling each other out to make one stand in place like an idiot. Had the Doll looked less human he would have quickly scurried away before she could see him. Instead he stood dumbfounded until she turned her head and her gaze passed right over the intersection. He then bolted for the nearest building, instantly regretting it as the knick-knacks in his bag clattered against each other, each clacking sound a gunshot to the frightened man. Hiding behind the building, trying to get his breathing under control, he waited to find out if she had noticed him.

“Yoo-hoo. Is anybody there?”

Her voice made his heart skip a beat. She was walking again now, right towards him. Gregor stayed put, and made sure not to move a muscle.

“Hm, that's funny; I thought I just saw a little mouse run by.”

She was getting closer. Gregor thought he could feel the ground tremble with each step. Not only thought; it really was shaking now.

“Where are you hiding, little mouse? Come say hello. I promise I won't bite... I'll just swallow you in one go!”

Her steps were so loud now; the earth shook so much. And still she wasn't here. How much further did she have to go? How loud would it sound, how much would it shake, when she finally stood next to him? Gregor didn't want to find out; he had to leave, now.

He put down his bag as gently as he could and ran. Then the Doll's voice rang behind him like cannon fire.

“There you are!”

A glance back showed her standing at the intersection, those demonic red eyes of hers staring right at him, as if calling for his soul. With a cry, Gregor turned left down an alley, putting her out of sight. He zig-zagged, turning left and right by turns, to try and lose her in this maze of ruined streets and half-fallen buildings, sticking to the alleys when he could and making sure he was at least moving in the general direction of his truck. If only he could get to it ahead of her, he would be free.

But though he managed to stay out of sight, the Doll always remained a street or two away; never could he lose her, no matter how he tried to mix up his movement. Could she hear him, even over the sound of her own booming steps? Or did she have some other way to track him? God help him if the madmen who built her had given her infrared vision.

Maybe she was only guessing at his movements, though, and if he stopped running she would walk right past him and never look back. It was worth a try, at least—Gregor knew he couldn't keep running from her forever—so he stopped in the middle of a particularly tight alley, under the doorway of a building that didn't look very likely to collapse on him, and waited.

On the next street over, the Doll continued at her usual leisurely pace, until she stopped exactly opposite the block between them. There was the shuffle of giant feet on the ground, and then Gregor heard a faint cracking sound overhead. He looked up... and saw two full sets of gloved fingers gripping the roof of the very building he stood under, chipping the walls and sending a shower of tiny brick fragments raining down to either side of him.

With the door behind him tightly shut, Gregor could only flatten himself against it while the monstrous Doll's head loomed over the building to scan the little alley.

“Come out, little mouse,” she whispered softly. “I know you're hiding from me. I don't want to trash the city to catch you but I will if I have to.” Her hands tightened on the building until she crushed the upper ends of the wall, and rubble from them pounded the earth. “What are you so afraid of? Don't you see that being eaten by a superior being like myself is a blessing you should be honored to receive? The only purpose of a mouse like yourself is to serve as sustenance for a goddess like me, so do yourself a favor and come out now, will you?”

Gregor didn't even dare to breathe with the Doll so close to finding him. He covered his mouth with his hand, and did his best not to shake too much so it wouldn't give him away. It felt like he spent an eternity down there, but at last the building groaned as she straightened up and a bit of dust fell when her hands let go of it.

“Where did you get off to?” she muttered. A moment later he saw her walk past the far end of the alley without so much as a glance his way. “Come back here, little mouse~. Don't bother hiding from me; you know I'll find you, sooner or later.”

Not until the Doll had been walking away for a minute did Gregor feel safe enough to move. It looked like his plan had worked, at least somewhat; she wasn't running from her anymore, but now she was patrolling the streets ahead; he'd have to find a way around her if he was going to make it to his truck and escape.

Slowly he made his way forward, moving ahead only when he knew he wouldn't be spotted, hiding inside whenever she was passing by, and generally keeping his head down as much as he could. Progress was slow, but better slow than dead, as much as it wracked his nerves to have to sit still when he could feel the ground shake with her footsteps.

And all the while she kept closing in on him, passing more and more often through the very streets he had just been traversing. Even the alleys weren't really safe anymore, as every so often she would reach in and feel around for him. Besides, as he approached the outer parts of the city, the buildings grew shorter and more damaged, making it easier for her to peer into more and more streets from her towering height.

Progress became even slower—he had to be more careful now than ever, slinking right up against the buildings and making doubly sure she wasn't looking his way before even thinking about crossing a street. And through it all she kept calling him in that same chillingly-playful manner.

“I can't wait to finally meet you, little mouse! To see your adorable eyes going wide with fear, hear your cries for mercy, and feel you squirming in my hands and in my mouth and in my stomach. Won't you come out and let me taste you?” This she said while he was cowering in a half-ruined building, waiting for her to leave. “Ah! You're so scared, I think I can even smell your fear!” Now standing right next to the building, the Doll made a show of sniffing the air. “Fe, fi, fo, fum! I smell the blood of a little man!” As she knelt to peer in through a hole in the wall, Gregor lay flat behind the dusty, broken sofa. “Be he alive or be he dead... Well, seeing as I can't make bread, I think I'll eat him whole instead!”

While the Doll's laughter rang in his ears, Gregor watched through the thin gap under the sofa as her face left the opening and was replaced by her monstrous hand reaching into the room. Fingers longer and thicker than him brushed along the floor and walls, shoving aside furniture and rubble alike as they groped around blindly, like a group of great wriggling earthworms.

Gregor couldn't take it anymore. When those blind beasts approached him he ran for the door on the other end of the room, but before he could get to it, the giant hand brushed against his him and knocked him down.

“There you are, little mouse!” The Doll reached to grab him, but he had already scrambled away and was at the door. Something was blocking it from the other side, however, and he could just barely budge it pushing with all his strength. The Doll kept groping blindly for a second, but then, all of a sudden he heard a crash and a glance back showed most of the wall was gone and the monster was peering into the room. “I've got you now!” she exclaimed. Gregor squeezed out the door and ran for the open window, yet even then the giant hand punched a hole in the wall to keep chasing after him. He just barely made it out ahead of its fingers, jumping out the window to run into another building on the opposite block. From there he ran out to another and another, crossing three more streets before he heard her calling out again. “Have it your way, then; there's more than one way to catch a mouse,” she said, and before long he heard her start walking again.

It took him a moment to notice she was moving away and not towards him. He was confused, but still relieved. It wasn't until he tried to plan out his next move that her realized she was actually walking towards his truck.

“God dammit!” Gregor muttered. How had she known where to find it? He must have made his path too predictable. Even if she didn't know what he'd been running to, she at least knew where he'd been headed.

What was he to do now? He needed that truck—to leave the city and traverse the open fields around it on foot would make him easy prey to this monster. Yet all she had to do was stand in the middle of a street between him and the truck and keep looking both ways; eventually he would have to cross it and she would spot him easily. Unless, perhaps, there was something to cover his crossing.

Whatever the case, he'd have to try something or else be stuck playing this game of cat and mouse he couldn't hope to win, so he headed for his truck, moving as stealthily as he could while trying to think of how to get past the Doll.

The city was unnervingly quiet as he approached his destination, the Doll's footsteps having long since grown quiet. Strange as it was to say, he really wished he could hear the terrible thundering of her walking—better to know where the monster was than wondering each time he crossed a street if she was lying in wait around the corner. He almost would have welcomed even some small glimpse of her, if not for the risk of her seeing him too.

Come to think of it, it was strange he hadn't seen her yet either, with how short the buildings were here near the edge of the city. Were she standing, the Doll would surely be able to see and be seen by him from several blocks away or more. And yet there was still no sign of her.

Gregor wondered if she might not have left the city without him realizing. Maybe he'd be able to reach his truck without even seeing her again. He was almost there now; just a couple more streets and he was home free. But as he rounded the last corner, he found the Doll lying there, pushing his truck back and forth on the street. “Oh, there you are! What took you so long, mousey?” she said as she kicked her legs playfully behind her. “Were you looking for this little toy? Hope you don't mind me playing with it. I mean, it's not like you'll have much use for it in my belly. Anyway, now that you're here, why don't you hop right in? I've been keeping it nice and warm, just for you!”

The Doll opened her mouth wide and pointed right inside. It was the sight of her gaping maw that finally broke the spell keeping Gregor rooted in place. He turned around and sprinted as hard as he could, pounding the ground with his feet as he strove to escape this monster.

“How rude you are, little mouse! After waiting here for you all this time, you're just going to run off and ditch me? Well don't think for a second I'm going to let you get away! My belly's been rumbling all this time, and you look like the perfect snack!”

Gregor ducked behind a row of buildings just as the Doll stood back up. “Where are you running off to? Do you still think you can hide from me? Don't you know I've only been playing with you this whole time? But playtime is over, little mouse; now it's dinnertime.”

Chills ran down Gregor's spine as he ran down the city streets, trying his best to lose the Doll. Her steps were coming steadily closer now, the booming sounds carrying a beat not much slower than the frantic beating of his heart. Even at this distance the buildings around him shook and rattled more intensely than they had since yesterday's battle, loose bricks falling from the edges of damaged walls, and as she got closer the shaking even threatened to collapse the more weakened buildings.

Running was no longer an option now; he needed to hide, but few options inspired confidence. In the end he could only make do with hiding in the first building that looked like it wouldn't fall over from a hard enough sneeze. He hunkered down inside, waiting and praying for the terrible monster to pass him by, and almost had a heart attack when he heard a crashing sound unlike anything he'd heard before. He thought at first this building was falling in on him, but no, it was another one, closer to the Doll. Had one of them finally succumbed to the tremors? But then there came a second and a third one, all at regular intervals, all getting steadily closer.

Without moving from where he stood, he ventured a glance out the back window and promptly saw the building across the street come crashing down. Where it had stood before now stood the monster's boot, half-hidden in a thick cloud of dust. A second later, her other foot came down right outside another window, dimming the room.

“Hm. I wonder, where could my little mouse be? Could he be in... this one?” A roaring crash came from Gregor's right a the neighboring building was knocked over, hitting the ground with an impact as sent dust falling from the ceiling. “Or maybe he's in this one...” Another crash came on the opposite side.

“Ha ha! Oh, P90, quit playing with your food! You already know the little mouse is right... in... here!”

Gregor curled up on the floor, waiting for the building to come fall in on him. But though there was a mighty crash, it all happened behind him, and when he opened his eyes he found himself looking up at the Doll crouching over him—the three upper floors had been ripped clean off the building and thrown out into the street. Now the fallen buildings had him fenced in with her.

He tried to run all the same, the animal instinct pulling his strings him not caring one whit for such things as the impossibility of escape, but only three steps had he taken when he was lifted up by the waist and wrapped up in those trunk-like fingers, imprisoned in a cage of the Doll's synthetic flesh. Soft yet unyielding her grip was, and however he fought he couldn't budge it one inch.

“Hoo hoo hoo! Is that really all you can do, little mouse? How pathetic. Why, even a mouse in the hands of a human could do better than that. I guess you're not mouse after all; a tiny bug is more like it. Or, could it be you're putting up such a poor fight because you actually want to be eaten? What do you say, little bug? Are you ready to become a part of me?”

The giant Doll turned Gregor around to hold him between her thumb and fingers. The next thing he knew, he was being pressed right up to her stomach, rubbed in tight circles around her navel. “You like it? That's gonna be your new home, you know. Oh, what's the matter with you? Are you scared? Don't worry; your miserable existence will be over very soon. Now be a dear and squirm a lot for me on the way down, m'kay?”

As the Doll held him over her face, her mouth opened wide, letting him see all of it in bone-chilling detail. Beneath him her tongue formed a platform to receive him, and as he was lowered towards it, dangled by his arms, he kicked his feet frantically, as if in so doing he would fly up and away from this nightmarish scene.

“Aaaaaahhhhhh,” said the Doll, drawing him ever closer, her hot breath rushing up at him from her throat.

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaand, scene!”

Suddenly, Gregor was dropped, not in her mouth, but on her open palm. There he sat up—his legs were shaking so badly he couldn't hope to stand—and backed away from her looming head, until his back bumped against her half-curled fingers.

“How was that, little guy? Did I play the part well?” she asked, smiling warmly at him.

“P... P... Part?”

“Yeah, you know; the part of the evil giantess.”

“Evil... giantess? That was... a role you were playing?” Gregor stared at her blankly, breathing heavily all the while. 

“M-hm! Ever since I got this bigger body I started doing research into what roles I could play at my new size! Turns out there's a bunch of drawing and stories and other stuff online about giant people and giant women specifically—like, wayyy more than I was expecting!—and a bunch of them feature this sort of evil giantess character. I didn't really get it but I thought I'd try it out with you to see how it went. I had a lot of fun doing it, actually! I can totally see why people like it so much now! But, what do you think? Did I do well?”

The Doll lifted him right up to her big red eye, so close he could see his own reflection in it. A pupil bigger than his own head shrank to focus on him. Then, with a loud groan, he slumped over and passed right out in her hand.

“Uhh, little guy? Hello? You okay?” P90 nudged the little man, but she got no response. Looked like he was totally out cold. “Poor little thing; looks like he got way too into his part,” she thought. “I can't leave him alone like this; guess I'll just have to bring him with me.” Softly she lowered him into her chest pocket, and after patting him to make sure he was still sleeping, she went back to looking for whatever ammo dumps or other supply depots Sangvis Ferri may have left behind, happily reminiscing on this little roleplay session.

She'd definitely have to read some more of those stories when she got back to the base—get herself some new ideas for her next try at this role. Of course, she'd also need someone to play the role of the helpless victim for that. Maybe the Commander; he'd make a cute one for sure!

“A whole city gone!? What's up with that? The whole world wants to know what happened to Mesagoza! Well, tune into the Iono Zone tonight and I'll tell you, in a super-special stream about the mysteriously vanished city! #IonoZone #MesaGone #Exclusive”

Shortly after that message went up on Iono's social media pages, it exploded to the very top of the trending tab, becoming the most viewed post in the history of every site it was posted to. Her stream soon became the second most talked-about thing on the web, only behind the disappearance of Mesagoza itself. Much of the talk was skeptical, or even negative, criticizing her for exploiting the tragedy for views. Despite that, when she started streaming later that day, a hundred thousand people were already tuned into her channel, waiting for her big reveal.

“Ladies and gentlemens! Are you readyyyyy?!” Iono's voice gave the streamer's usual greeting. Immediately the chat exploded with messages and emotes whizzing by so fast that they were gone almost as soon as they appeared. A second later, the camera finally turned on and Iono appeared on the screen with a big, toothy grin. “Your eyeballs are MINE—caught in my electroweb! Whosawhatzit? Iono! 'Ello 'ello, hola! Ciao and Bonjour! It's time for the Iono Zone, everybody!

“That's right! And tonight it's a very special episode! I'm sure everyone saw my announcement earlier today, but if you didn't... Really?! Why aren't you following all my social media pages yet?! Go do it right now! But since you're already here, I might as well tell you all that we're going to be talking about my trip to Mesagoza and how I discovered what happened to that little city. He he!

“So there I was, at the edge of that big empty crater...”

Iono went on to recount how she had arrived at the empty land where Mesagoza had once been and how she had wandered around for a long time, showing off all the photos and videos she'd taken there, really spicing the story up, making it sound to all her viewers as if she had gone over to investigate the city's disappearance, all the while the viewer count climbed ever higher, surpassing two hundred thousand without any sing of slowing down.

Finally she recounted her call with director Clavell. “He's the director of the Academy over there, don'tcha know? Real smart guy! Anyways, I called him and, whaddaya know, he actually picked up! He sounded super scared and was literally begging me for help! 'Please, Iono, you're the only one who can save us!' Of course I had to help them out; wouldn't want to let my Mesagoza fans down, y'know! I saved all their lives, and they were all so grateful that they agreed to come on my show so you could all see them. And now... here they are!”

The stream switched over to another camera showing hundreds of people, with even more out of frame, all huddled together on a glossy pink floor, looking not the least bit happy to be there. In fact, anyone who was looking at the stream objectively would have told you they looked haggard and scared, many of them shivering visibly.

“Here they are! Say hi to them, chat! Wave hello, everybody!” The Mesagozans were hesitant to wave, until all of a sudden it looked like the place they were standing on shook. Then they all waved frantically at the camera. Many of them shouted something too, but the sound wasn't picked up on the stream at all.

“You see? All safe and sound, thanks to your beloved streamer! But, some of you may be wondering, what's up with that super-trendy pink color in the background? Well, if we just zoom out a little bit...” The camera zoomed out as she said this, showing the thousands of Mesagozans who had been out of frame, and still kept zooming out further, until the ground they were standing on was shown as a convex surface so big that the people were barely visible on it—it had to be as big as a city. “Do you recognize it yet? No? Let's go further out, and...” As the camera zoomed out once more, the pink, convex surface was finally revealed to be the nail of a pinky toe. With the camera now zoomed out enough to show two feet in frame, the Mesagozans were so small that they were totally invisible, even at the highest resolutions.

“Ta-da! That's right, everybody; allll the population of Mesagoza is standing right here, on yours truly's pinky toe! Aren't they just the cutest?” As Iono gave a little wiggle of her toes, a second camera, zoomed in on the shrunken people, showed their terrified reaction in a corner of the screen. Instantly the chat exploded again as over three hundred thousand viewers expressed their amazement.

“Yep! And would you believe that's almost exactly where I found them, too? Well, they weren't on my toe, but they were right by my foot, in their little city. Mesagoza was so small I didn't even see it at first and I came so close to crushing it! They're super lucky I didn't, isn't that right, little guys? Even when I did see it I thought it was just a pebble until I looked really close at it. Obviously I had to get them out of there, so I took off my boots and told them to climb on my lovely feet so I could bring them home. They were sooooo happy, you wouldn't believe how quickly they ran out of their itty-bitty city to climb my little toesies! Hehe! I bet a lot of you guys wished you'd been in Mesagoza last night so you could be with them now, isn't that right?

“And like I said, after I saved them, they all agreed to come on the stream so we could put on a special show for you guys! Here's how it's going to work: we're going to put these tiny people through a series of games, and the losers of each round will be subjected to whatever punishment you guys decide! Anything's fair game, even having me step on them! And don't worry; even if it looks like they're dying or getting crushed, remember it's just special effects to make it more realistic! They'll be totally fine and you'll even see them again in my next stream. Now, is everyone ready?” Another wiggle of her toes soon had all the Mesagozans nodding their heads. “Good! For this first game, you're all going to run and jump and climb from my pinky toe allll the way over here, to my right foot. The game ends after fifteen minutes, or when half of you make it over. Oh, and try not to tickle me too much while you're crawling around on my toes, or you might just make them twitch and get thrown off! Are we clear on the rules? Then readyyy, set, goooo!!!”

The sound of a starting gun played on the stream and just like that the tiny people were off, running across the surface of Iono's toenail on their way to her ring toe. The view of Iono's feet retreated into the corner while the zoomed-in view took its place as the main screen, letting the viewers witness the progress of the tiny mites across the vast, pink plain that was Iono's toenail, occasionally zooming in closer to track individual runners.

Forced to participate in this sick joke of a stream, the Mesagozans ran as hard as they could, vaulting over the microscopic grooves and crevices on Iono's toenail, crawling over the folds of her skin, climbing down one toe and jumping over to climb up the next one. Some faltered and fell off, getting wedged in the depths of the valley between one toe and the next where, except for a handful who managed to climb out, they were crushed by some minute movement of the streamer's toes causing the vast walls of flesh to close in around them, instantly reducing them to microscopic smears on her skin.

Still more of the unwilling contestants were caught off-guard by a wiggle of Iono's toes and thrown off her toenail, falling all the way down to the red carpet below. Even with how soft it was, at their size the fall was so immense that most died on impact, and of those who survived most were severely hurt, hardly even able to crawl away. Some contestants even fell into the minute sweat droplets pooling at the mouth of her pores, and however hard they tried to swim out, the water's surface tension was too strong for them and they quickly drowned.

It was a massacre; even without Iono actively trying to kill them, they were so pitifully small that simply trying to get around in this monstrously huge world was a deadly challenge—one broadcast to hundreds of thousands of eager spectators around the world, their lives and deaths mere fodder for entertainment. But despite all the death going on around them, the Mesagozans didn't even have time to mourn the loss of their friends and loved ones; they couldn't, not if they were going to survive this twisted competition.

“Wow, and there goes another one! Such a shame! And to think she was doing so well. Just goes to show that no one is safe when you're this pitifully small,” Iono said, commentating on the death of the latest poor soul to drown in her sweat. “Anyway, there's still a minute left in the game, but it looks like half of you already made it to my other foot so I'm gonna call the race now!”

Iono moved her left foot away from the other one just as the last few contestants who had been about to reach the goal made a desperate leap to try and get on her right foot at the last second, only for all of them to fall to their ignoble deaths between the young streamer's feet.

“Let's have a great big round of applause for our little winners! They gave it their all, so they won't be getting punished... yet! And now, let's take a look at our losers...” The camera slowly panned from her right foot over to her left one, all zoomed-in on her toenails so the viewers could see all the people who had lost the race. Most of them were on her big toe, but there were also some people on her second, third, and fourth toes, and even a couple stragglers all the way back on her pinky! “Wow! You guys really couldn't even get off my pinky toe? Man, I almost feel sorry for you! Hmm, maybe we should give you a second chance to prove yourselves. What do you say, chat? Should we show them some mercy?”

The two stragglers held their breaths, waiting for their fates to be decided by the arbitrary whims of the hundreds of thousands of spectators so engrossed by this massacre, while Iono scanned the incoming flood of messages, her expert eyes quickly processing dozens of comments per second to arrive at an answer. “The people have spoken! You're both getting a second chance. Here, hang on to this.” Carefully placing a cotton swab down next to the two microbe-humans, Iono waited for them to climb on it before lifting it up and carrying them over to her right foot as the thousands of other losers watched their passage despondently, thinking that if only they had stayed back they might now have been accompanying those lucky two to their salvation.

“Okay!” Iono exclaimed once the two were safely on her other foot. “So with that out of the way, now it's time to decide how we should punish these losers on my left foot! There's a poll going up right now so be sure to vote for your favorite option! And if your choice doesn't win, don't worry; there's gonna be another chance for all of you!”

While she waited for the poll to close, Iono idly drummed her toes while the thousands of people still on them clung desperately to their tormentor so they wouldn't be thrown off. After a couple minutes, the poll closed with a clear winner. “Wow, you guys really want me to step on these little guys! I wonder why~? Could it be  all of you wish you could take their place as tiny specks of dust under your beloved streamer's feet? Oh, don't act so surprised! It's my job to know what all my lovely viewers want and give it to them! Trust me, if I knew how to shrink you down, I'd for sure let you all spend a day as tiny specks on my feet! But we're getting off track. Now, everyone give your good-byes to our unlucky contestants! You tried your best, but your best wasn't good enough. Thanks for playing!”

After one last pan over her left foot to look at the pitifully tiny losers sobbing or begging for their lives, Iono slowly lifted her heel up until only the tips of her toes were touching the floor, almost perpendicular to it. The weeping Mesagozans were sent tumbling down the great slopes of her toenails to finally land, not-too-safely, on the carpet below, joining the hundreds of others who had survived their earlier falls. Those who still clung desperately to her toes were flung off or else crushed between them as she raised her foot and gave her toes a vigorous wiggle. Finally, she held her foot over the tiny people, letting the survivors gape in awe at her sole as it hovered miles above them.

Iono gave one last teasing scrunch of her sole, as much for her viewers as for the little specks beneath her, savoring the sheer terror on their pathetically adorable faces as seen on her screen. At last she set her foot down on the soft carpet, pressing down forcefully as she twisted her sole left and right.  When at last she finished, the camera zoomed in but could see nothing at all as their remains blended perfectly together with the red of the carpet.

Only a few dozen remained alive, cowering unseen in the furthest depths of the carpet, beyond the reach of Iono's camera, and peering out at the monstrous toes looming far above.

“Well, that's that! Now, I hope all you other specks took that chance to rest up, 'cause it's time for the next game!” Iono moved her foot back next to the other one, with the sides of her big toes touching very firmly. “First I need half of you to cross over to my other foot. Come on, get movin' you mites!” Iono egged on the Mesagozans while more and more of them crossed back over to her left foot, until each big toe held something like half of them. “Great! That's enough, I think. And now I can tell you that your next challenge iiiiiiiis... Tug-of-war!”

Iono bent and reached down to her feet with both hands, carrying a strand of silk so fine it was almost invisible to the naked eye, with a second one knotted around the middle. Carefully she placed it between her feet, where it stretched from the peak of one toenail to the other, the second strand, hanging right down into the crevice between them. “Everyone, grab the rope! Whoever pulls the knot in the middle all the way across to their side's toenail wins!” she announced, and the Mesagozans hurried to do as she said, thousands of them grabbing on to each end of the silk strand, which was about as thick around as one of them. Then at Iono's signal they all began pulling.

Though it was slow-going at first, soon the game snowballed in favor of the side that had stayed on the right foot, as it boasted a few more people who were also less tired since they hadn't had to make the lengthy trek over to her other toe. Even so, it took a while for them to finally pull the strand of silk all the way over to their side, simply because of the great distances involved. It was taking so long, in fact, that Iono called the game early when she saw her viewers expressing their boredom.

“Wow, wasn't that a great show? Well played by both teams; especially the winners, obviously. But now, what's gonna happen to the losers? Time for all of you to decide! Poll number two is a go!”

With the previous poll winner removed as an option, this second poll was much more hard-fought, with the top two choices staying neck and neck the whole time, one briefly overtaking the other whenever a viewer made a donation to tip the scales over to their punishment of choice. Finally, though, a winner did emerge courtesy of a generous donation of a hundred thousand pokédollars.

“Wow! Thank you so much, IonoChanFan87! Well, guys, the people have spoken! Looks like you're all going to a very special trip into the Iono Zone. That's right; you've all won a one-way trip to my mouth!”

As Iono bent over, the losing side started to flee, all of them dispersing to try to get away before she could get them, but before they could get anywhere, the tip of Iono's finger, covered in her own spit after she had licked it, descended on the shrunken people. A huge portion of them were crushed instantly, while the rest were stuck to the moistened surface, struggling feebly to escape the endless swamp of sticky spit as they were brought up.

The stream switched over to Iono's facecam, where she held up her finger for all her viewers to see. “Here we go! Enjoy your trip, little guys!” Iono opened her mouth wide as she brought her finger closer to it, sticking out her tongue to receive the Mesagozans. Its massive, pink surface loomed ever larger in their view until at last they were all licked right up, caught in the vast expanse of taste buds as big as hills to float in an ocean of saliva. “Hmm...”

Iono moved her tongue around around, making a big show of tasting the tiny people, who were caught up in the immense currents of her spit moving inside her mouth. Dashed against taste buds and teeth, gums and cheeks, the tiny people were soon disintegrated by the unrelenting forces of the streamer's mouth and swallowed along with her spit.

“Ah! All gone!” Iono announced, opening her mouth wide for the camera. “Too bad I couldn't taste anything. Guess they were just too small for that. Moving on! I think we have time for one more game, but... what's it gonna be? Hmm... Oh, I know! Everybody, hold on tight down there!”

The view switched back to Iono's foot just as she lifted it back on its heel, slowly turning it upwards until her toes were pointing straight up. The sudden change threw off many of those who still remained on her toe, and left everyone else clinging desperately to the tiniest of imperfections on her nail, looking down at the huge fall that awaited them should they slip. Then, reaching down with a pen in hand, Iono left a tiny black dot at the very tip of her big toe.

“Are you still hanging on? Great! Now, for the last competition, all you have to do is get to the little dot I just drew on the tip of my toe. Either that or be the last one holding on. There's only one winner here, so everyone do your best because this is your last chance to show the world what you're made of! Are you ready? Then on your marks, get set, go!”

The Mesagozans had already started climbing even before Iono finished, clambering towards the distant finish line knowing full well that their lives depended on it. There was nothing else on their minds save their own survival; some were so eager to be the sole winner that they strove to pull down whoever happened to be above them, sometimes even getting themselves pulled down in the process.

Even at their size it was hard to hold on to the glossy surface of Iono's toenail, let alone climb it. Hundreds had already fallen off by the towering toe gave a slight wiggle that knocked off hundreds more. Their numbers grew thinner by the minute, and before long they were down to a mere one thousand people left on her toenail.

After some ten minutes, the first few people managed to make it over the edge of her toenail and dropped down to her skin to continue the race to their destination, only for another toe wiggle to send them tumbling down to the depths beneath her toenail. At last, though, just a short while later there was a definitive winner as Florian, a young student from the Academy, ran panting up to the black dot on Iono's skin, immediately collapsing on the inky surface.

“Wow! Congrats, little guy! You made it! Hang tight; I'm gonna pick you up.” Again Iono lowered the cotton swab to her toe, letting the young boy climb onto it, then put her foot back down and brought him up to show all her viewers. “Well, ladies and gentlemens, here is your winner! Everybody give him your applause!” As the camera zoomed in on the young boy hanging on fearfully to the cotton swab, the chat overflowed with emotes cheering for him. “That's right, you're the lucky winner today, and do you know what you've won? It's a very special reward, something I'm sure my followers would kill for! That's right; you get to kiss me on the cheek. Are you ready, little boy?”

Trembling on the mass of cotton fibers, Florian watched as he was pulled towards Iono's face. Soon her cheek alone filled all his field of view, and still he was pulled even closer, until he was pressed ever so slightly into her soft skin, nearly being crushed in the process.

“So, how was that?” Iono asked after pulling him away. The camera zoomed in, showing he had fainted on the cotton swab. “Aww~, looks like it was too much for him. Anyways, that's all for tonight, guys! Thank you all for watching, and remember to subscribe to my channels and follow me on all my pages so you can catch all my streams and updates! Buh-bye, Iono-Fans; see you again soon!” With that the stream ended and Iono sighed as she turned off her “streamer-mode”.

“Ah, what a day! Man am I ever tired. I still can't believe I managed to put everything together for this stream on such short notice. It was definitely worth it, though; this stream must have broken, like, every single record! You can bet Iono's gonna be the name on everyone's mind tomorrow! And it's all thanks to you little guys,” she said, looking down at her feet. To be honest, she didn't even know if any of the Mesagozans were still alive, but she assumed at least a few of them must have made it through all that unscathed. Not that it mattered much. She still had some more of those shrunken people stored away in a Petri dish in her room so she could keep milking them for views. As far as she was concerned, these ones might as well be dead already. “Anyway, I'm going to my room now. If any of you are still alive, good luck surviving down there; I'm sure you'll need it.”

And so she left the survivors to fend for themselves in the vast new world that was her streaming room, scurrying around in her carpet to try to make a new home for themselves where they could survive for at least a while longer, knowing full well that they'd be spending the rest of their lives beneath the feet of the young streamer.

It happened early morning, when most people were barely waking up for work or school. There was a blindingly bright flash outside, and when people went out to see what had happened, they all looked up and saw that instead of the morning sky there was an infinitely distant ceiling over them, with a light bulb that seemed as big as the sun. Not only that: looking around they found themselves to be on the floor of a room easily as big as a continent. They gaped in fear and awe at a bed that stretched miles into the air, at more gigantic pieces of furniture, and other monstrous objects—at a baseball the size of a small country far off in the corner of the room, discarded socks and shorts littering the floor, and mountainous dust bunnies sitting under the bed.

They were terrified and bewildered, and they weren't the only ones. All over that same bedroom, a hundred other cities, and hundreds of millions of people, all found themselves in the same situation. Having disappeared from their home worlds, they had reappeared here, as little more than spots of dust littering this room. They all struggled to comprehend what had happened and what would happen next, but their thoughts were interrupted when they heard the distant sound of a door closing, followed by a quick series of footsteps growing ever nearer. It seemed they were no longer alone in this giant home, and the millions of tiny specks held their breaths in suspense as this new arrival kept coming closer, until at last the footsteps came to a halt, right outside the bedroom door.

The handle turned, the door came open, and in stepped a girl in sporty clothes, with sun-tanned skin and short brown hair—a girl so gigantic and moving so quick that she threw the millions of people into a panic. Huffing to catch her breath, she stepped inside, and down on the floor those cities right in front of her saw her massive foot rise up and swing towards them, the rubbery black-and-white sole of her tennis shoes appearing suddenly overhead, engulfing them all her shadow even as she flicked on the lights. They barely even had time to scream before her foot slammed down on them, immediately obliterating over a million souls. Her footstep shook the floor so much that dozens of buildings collapsed in those cities closest to her foot, and even those people in the furthest corners of her room were rattled by the impact.

Taking one more step, blissfully unaware of the millions of people trembling in fear of her on the floor below, the girl closed the door behind her and sighed, wiping the seat off her brow and carelessly flinging it away, never suspecting that those droplets would splash over the miniature cities on her floor, destroying whatever buildings happened to be in their path.

She dropped her backpack by the door, slipped her shoes off, and kicked them aside, never suspecting she was bulldozing a handful of cities in the process, all of them annihilated under the rubber or fabric of her shoes. Then she stripped off her socks and tossed them to the corner, where they razed two more cities as they slid across the floor before coming to a stop with their fabric tented over a third city.

Had the socks landed even a centimeter to the left or right, that city would have been crushed like the others. It was a miracle that they had managed to survive, yet one they wouldn't enjoy for long.

As soon as the sweaty socks settled down round them, the speck-sized people were accosted by the powerful smell coming off the moist pile of fabric. At their minute sizes, it was as if the stench of the tomboy's feet were magnified a hundred-fold, making them all gag and cough uncontrollably. At the same time, moisture from the socks also radiated off the fabric and,with nowhere else to go, formed droplets of condensate all over the city, droplets bigger by far than any of their buildings. These flooded the streets and buildings wherever they appeared, drowning anyone who was caught in them while those outside were left to suffocate under the terrible air quality. It took only a little over a minute before the whole city was dead, only its skyscrapers remaining as monuments to those who once inhabited them.

At the same time, the girl lowered herself and lay down, letting the floor tiles cool her off. A few more cities were crushed under her body, while those an inch or two away wondered if they might still meet the same fate.

In one city, two million souls trembled in the shadow of the tomboy's foot and looked up in awe at the massive wall of tan flesh stretching into the sky before them, all the way up to the mountain-sized toes curling and stretching impressively in the air. Though the heat, stench, and moisture of her foot assaulted them, since the air could flow freely it didn't prove fatal to them as it would to those under her socks. But there was another threat to them all: a single drop of sweat sliding down the tomboy's sole. Along its path the drop snaked left and right on its descent, but always it swerved back and fell ever closer to them, until at last it touched down at the very edge of the city.

To the little speck-people it was as if a lake had been dumped on them all at once, and as the water spread out from there, it flooded street after street, knocking every building in its path down, capturing hundreds of thousands and leaving them to drown if the great mass of water, if they hadn't already died as they were dashed against the ruins of some building. In the end, only an uneven outer crescent of the city survived the catastrophe—for now.

They weren't the only ones to meet such a fate, either. At the girl's armpit, another city was flooded with sweat, and here there were no survivors. More fortunate was a third city, one that had ended up between her thighs, where there was no threat of flooding by sweat. Even when the girl moved her legs closer together, with thigh closing against thigh, the city still survived in the small gap running between the lower curves of her thighs.

As all those cities who yet lived looked upon the resting titan, an overwhelming sense of futility crept up on everyone. This girl, likely not even in high school yet, was to them a living landmass, a monster so huge they wondered if they were even visible to her. Even the largest city there could easily be crushed in a single step—could fit on a single fingertip, even, and with plenty of room to spare. If that was what a single child could do to them, then what hope did they have of surviving in this monstrous new world? All it would take was for someone to sweep or vacuum the floor and they all would be swept away like so much dust, without anyone ever suspecting what had happened to them.

Some people among those cities closest to her, eager to avoid such a fate, drove out across the floor tiles towards the titan's body, braving the myriad minute imperfections which for them were blown up to the size of hills and ravines. There they started climbing up her skin, hair, and clothes, hoping to somehow get her help or, if nothing else, at least to get off the floor for good so they wouldn't be crushed.

Small as they were, though, they had barely made it a fraction of an inch up her body when the girl stirred, throwing off many of her climbers to die as they hit the floor. Others were crushed as she shifted her weight. Only a tiny fraction remained on her,  most of them on her hair or her clothes, hanging on like tiny mites unseen and unnoticed, though how long they'd survive there was anyone's guess.

Though she stirred, the girl remained lying on the floor, and it was only after several minutes more that she finally stood up, after a shout from outside her room. “”Stacyyy!” Some unseen woman called; “Don't forget your homework today!”

The girl sighed and yelled back. “I know, mom!” Her voice exploded all over the room like a thunderclap, threatening to burst the eardrums of all the speck-sized people in her room. Then, with a grunt, she jumped to her feet and walked over to her desk, crushing a few more cities under her bare feet as she went. She pulled back the chair, completely oblivious to the two little gray spots that had appeared on it, and sat down, pulling a notebook from one of the drawers.

Opening the notebook to the latest page, Stacy reached out to grab her pen, but failed to grasp anything as there was nothing there. Then as she was looking around for her pen, she noticed a handful of gray spots that had appeared on her desk, seemingly overnight. They looked like spots of dust, or maybe mold. Curious, and welcoming any excuse to procrastinate on her homework, she leaned in real close to one of them, resting her chin on the table, trying to see what it was.

Stacy's face, and especially her mouth and her nose, came to dominate the view from the tiny city which now found itself the center of the monstrous girl's attention. All the people there looked on in fear, half expecting her to blow them all away in a puff of wind. She didn't, but her natural breathing proved bad enough, as the hurricane-force winds blowing out of her nostrils knocked whole buildings over and blew thousands of people away. Then when she snorted air, thousands more were carried upwards into her nose, inhaled like so many specks of dust, too small to even tickle her nose hairs.

Tilting her head to the side, Stacy slid a hand right up to the little gray spot and held a finger over it. Her fingertip, easily twice as big as any of the little cities in her room, filled the sky of the tiny people, and they all cowered in fear, certain that their time had come.

But something told her not to touch the little thing yet—what if it really was some sort of mold, after all? Instead she went over to her drawers to dig out the old magnifying glass she had been gifted a couple years ago and hardly ever used since. After a couple minutes she found it, pulled it out, blew off the dust, and took it back to her desk, where she tried looking closely at the little gray spot. And while she was no expert on little gray spots, she did think there was something weird about it, with how geometric its surface looked, and how there seemed to be a bunch of little structures rising up above the surface, not at all how she would expect it to look if it was just a spot of dust or mold. If anything, it reminded her of a city; those weird patterns looked like streets and roads while the little structures looked like skyscrapers. But that was silly, she thought, and kept contemplating them.

Then she noticed something weirder: the little patterns and structures lit one after the other, as down in the little city everyone turned on as many lights as they could. They all rushed to seize what might well be their best chance to let her know of their existence, even turning on their cars' headlights and honking while driving around in hopes that the noise and movement would help her recognize what she was seeing.

They succeeded. Though it took her a while, Stacy did finally realize that this little spot really was a tiny city. It sounded ridiculous, like something out of a dream, but she thought of one way to test it out. “If you can understand me, turn off all the lights,” she said, keeping her eyes fixed on the tiny city as she waited for something to happen. It only took a minute for nearly every light in the city to be turned off again. All the people waited with bated breath for whatever came next.

“Now turn them on again,” Stacy said. Sure enough, after another brief wait, the lights went on. Then the tomboy grinned. “Off!” The lights went off. “On!” They went back on. “Off! On! Off ! On!” So she called out, over and over, while the tiny little microbe-humans all but danced to her whims, just standing at the light switches and flicking them up or down as the girl's  booming, godly voice demanded. Finally she burst out laughing. “Man, I can't believe you guys are still keeping it up! Ha ha! What, don't you have anything better to do than to turn the lights on and off?”

The people on her desk looked at each other uncertainly. “I'm kidding, I'm kidding,” her voice thundered out. “Just messing with you a bit. I mean, it's not every day a tiny city shows up on your desk. Or a bunch of tiny cities, I guess. Man, you guys are all sooo puny,” she said, moving a hand up close to the city. “I mean, you're all wayyy smaller than even my pinky finger.” Her finger came down gently next to the city, looming over them like a Mount Everest. “Look: I could crush you all with just the tip! All I gotta do is slide it a liiittle bit closer, and then...” Stacy started doing just that, but her finger stopped just a hair's-breadth away from the city, so close to it that they could feel the heat coming off of it.

“BAH-HAHAHAHA! Oh man, I can just imagine the look on all your faces! I bet you tiny little germs were so freakin' scared! Don't worry, I'm not really gonna kill you. I just like teasing you is all!” Stacy thankfully held her hand back up, resting her chin on it while she looked down at the little city. “But seriously, what are you even doing here? Like, how did you get so tiny? I mean, you did shrink, right? Or are you some weird species that no one's ever heard about? Are you tiny aliens or something? Did you come from outer space? Don't worry, I won't tell anyone if you are. But I guess you can't tell me anyways; not unless you have some sort of super loud megaphone . Or maybe... could you call me if I give you my phone number? Might as well try, I guess. Okay, listen up: it's three-five-one...”

“Stacyyy! Are you talking to someone up there!?” her mom shouted.

“No, mom! Just listening to something on my phone!” Stacy replied, turning to the door and absentmindedly letting her hand fall to the desk again. Then she turned back and spoke more softly. “Like I was saying, it's... Oh.” To her dismay, Stacy realized that her hand had fallen on the little city, and when she lifted it up, she saw it had been crushed right under her palm, leaving a tiny grey spot on her skin.

Just in case, she grabbed the magnifying glass again and inspected the city with it, but nothing of it remained; it was just an indistinct mass of gray now, without any light or movement or structure, same as the spot of dust it had left on her hand. Just like that, all those people had been crushed, their lives extinguished, and all of it was her doing.

Lightheaded, Stacy stared blankly at the little gray stains, trying to process what that meant. That city had surely held hundreds of thousands if not millions of people, and now they were all gone—dead at her hands. Surely that meant she was a murderer, if not something worse. And yet... she didn't feel the least bit guilty. At the end of the day, whether those puny things had been humans or aliens, they couldn't really count as people if they were too small for her to see even with a magnifying glass. More like bugs, or even germs, if anything, and who cared if a few billion dumb germs died? No one, and certainly not her.

In fact, the more she thought about it, the more she felt the whole thing was actually kinda funny. Hilarious, in fact, to think about how all those tiny little “people” had been killed in the most casual way possible, without her even trying to kill them. “How pathetic,” she boasted, wiping their city's remains from her hand. “They all just went and died like that while I wasn't even looking. Honestly, if they died off so easily, they were probably going to die no matter what I did. Too bad I couldn't play with them some more before they went crunch. Oh well; at least there's still a bunch of you around!”

Cheerfully she waved at all the other little cities scattered on her desk—about a dozen that she could see. “Hi, everyone! My name's Stacy; pleased ta meetcha! Your names don't matter, seeing as you're all going crunch in a little bit. I know, I know, and I'm sorry, but I don't wanna have an infestation in my room, you know? Besides, if my mom sees you she's gonna make me clean you up anyways, so I might as well get it out of the way now, don't you think? Don't worry, I won't make you suffer; I figure the least I can do is give you all a quick death, like I gave your little friends over here. So just sit tight and I'll get to you in a second, 'kay?”

Of course, as soon as they heard her words, everyone started trying to escape their cities, but they'd have a tough time of it with the deeply uneven surface of the wooden desk making it impossible for them to drive away; instead they had to slowly and painstakingly climb and clamber over every rugged hill and valley, giving Stacy ample time to deal with them all.

She started with the city closest to her, holding her finger overhead and waggling it teasingly up and down, keeping the little microbes guessing as to when she'd finally crush them all. Then, after stretching it up all the way, she let it fall right past their city. Just the impact knocked down a few of their buildings, and as the microbe people looked at the gargantuan finger dominating the sky, Stacy dragged it back to raze everything to the ground.

For the next city she leaned in real close, letting them see her grin across the sky. She closed her mouth for a second, gathered spit, and slowly pushed it out, until a little stream of it slid out and splattered onto the desk, obliterating the city on impact.

The other cities she had fun exterminating in other creative ways. She blew them away with a puff of wind or snorted them up to then sneeze them back out; licked them up to see if she could taste anything or grabbed a fallen strand of hair and dragged it over the city, letting it demolish everything in its path; crushed them with her lips in a playful kiss or kept tapping away next to their city until all its buildings collapsed under the incredible stresses; and all the while she kept taunting them over how tiny and weak they were.

“Come on guys, can't you even handle a little bit of my spit? Honestly, how can you call yourselves men if you're all gonna die like that?”

“Ah-CHOO! He he! That really tickled my nose! Did they all go up it together? I was just trying to see what it smelled like!”

“Wow! I didn't even touch your buildings and they all fell over! Couldn't you have made them a little stronger?”

Her playful digs stoked despair in the hearts of all those at her mercy as they came to realize they were now nothing but her disposable playthings, to be swept away for her boundless amusement. There was no point in even trying to run, they thought, and curled up in their homes to await death at her hands.

Finally, when there was only one city left, Stacy held her hand over it but hesitated to destroy it. Once it was gone, that be the end of the tiny cities—probably forever unless more of them magically appeared. Better to keep this one alive so she could keep having fun by teasing them for as long as she wanted.

“Actually, I think I'm gonna spare you guys. Should be fine to keep you around if it's only one city. Just gotta put you somewhere safe so you don't get crushed by accident. Wait here,” she said, and put a bracelet around the city to mark its place for her.

Turning around, she looked all over the room for some place to put the city, and was surprised to find many more little grey spots down on the floor. She grabbed the magnifying glass and got down to look at one of them, and sure enough, she saw it was another tiny city. “Were you little guys down there all this time?” she asked, sitting down in front of it. “You really should have said something. I mean, I could have stepped on you all without ever knowing it! But I guess it's fine; now that I found you, I can have fun stepping on all of you on purpose!” Stacy giggled and moved her feet forward, holding her soles an inch above the city.

Stacy let her soles loom over all the little people for a bit, filling the air with the moisture and smell of her feet. As she teasingly scrunched her soles and wiggled her toes, the movement dislodged bits of dust and dirt and previously crushed cities that all rained down on her helpless victims like a massive meteor shower, bringing chaos and destruction wherever they fell. Finally she brought her foot down and put the pathetic little things out of their misery.

After that she turned her attention to the dozens of other cities still littering her floor and went to destroy them one by one. She sat on them, stepped on them, swept them away, dropped her dirty clothes on them, and killed them in every other way she could think of. About halfway through she was running out of ideas, though, and she figured she might as well practice picking some up to see if it was even possible. She tried scraping up chunks of a city with her fingernail, but when she looked at what she'd picked up, it looked like a total mess; she didn't think anyone could survive something like that.

Stacy tried sweeping them up on a piece of paper, but everything was destroyed in the process. She tried asking them to climb on it, but they didn't trust her enough to do it. In the end, the only thing that sort of worked was when she used a cotton swab to slowly sweep over the city, as it managed to at least keep some buildings mostly in one piece. She figured that'd be how she gathered up the city on her desk.

Next she tried putting the buildings back down without wrecking them all. She pulled her foot closer, turned it around so her sole was facing up, and held the swab just above her sole, tapping it ever so gently to shake its tiny passengers off. When next she looked through the magnifying glass, she found a bunch of buildings nestled in the tiny grooves and wrinkles of her sole, and even thought she could see a bunch of people crawling out of them, though with how small they were it was hard to be sure she wasn't just imagining it. Still, she liked to believe she was seeing things right; it was so funny to think of all those people scurrying around on her foot like little germs. It made her feel so big and powerful, too.

It was such an intoxicating sensation; she just wanted to have more of those tiny things crawling on her, so she scooped up some more of the nearby cities and sprinkled them all over her sole, with some even falling in the valleys between her toes, before having another close look.

The tiny people she'd collected could hardly believe what they were seeing. The girl's footprint was like an alien landscape to them, one marked by an endless series of hills and valleys here and there dotted by sweat pores like small lakes, easily big enough to drown a city block. The foot's heat, stench, and humidity lay thick in the air, making it hard for them to breathe, and the ground subtly pulsed along with the vast rivers of blood rushing beneath the surface. And above them all hung the godly tomboy's grinning face, her eye magnified to a monstrous degree by the glass in her hands.

There really was no denying it now; whatever else they had once been, now they were nothing but germs on this young girl's foot, completely at her mercy. Knowing there was nothing they could do, they simply stood looking at her, awaiting her next action, sensing deep down that whatever she did now would spell the end of them.

After a minute, the earth beneath them shook and all of them screamed when Stacy started to scrunch her sole. As she curled her toes ever tighter, her skin deformed, folding up and bulging outwards, giving rise to new, greater wrinkles that were like great mountains next to the hills of her footprint.

The puny people rolled and slid down the slopes of those mountains, pooling together at in the depths of the valleys between them, and as Stacy finished scrunching her foot, those mountains closed up around the people ad trapped them all in the folds of her skin. Their screams were all silenced in an instant as they were crushed by her scrunching sole, and when she straightened out her foot again, on most of her sole there was no sign left of any of the little people nor their buildings, save for the unrecognizable specks of dust they had left behind.

“Man, you're all so freaking weak,” Stacy chuckled as she turned her sole aside and wiggled her toes, sending those specks of dust falling back to the floor where they belonged. Some of the survivors fell off with them, while others clung to her foot, but when she put her foot back down, they all died anyways. “Are you even trying to survive? It's almost like you actually want me to step on you all. Is that why you came here? Because you wanted to be crushed like bugs under my feet? Well, I guess I can give you what you want!” she said, stepping over to another city. “I mean, you're all so cute, I couldn't possibly say no to you guys! Here; you can get crushed under my big toe.” She slid her foot right up to the city with her toes up in the air, then after a teasing wiggle she let it fall on them and laughed.

“How was that? You like it under my big ol' feet? I bet you love it, you little weirdos. Hope they're as sweaty and smelly as you like them!” Going around her room, Stacy squished every last city she could find, enjoying the feeling of all those buildings crumbling against her skin and reveling in the thought of all those puny little lives being ended by the lowest and dirtiest part of her body. This was so much more fun that doing her stupid homework!

When she was finished with all of the cities on the ground, she turned her thoughts back to the little city on her desk, wondering where she might put it. Then she remembered some Petri dishes that her sister Tanya had in her room—another gift from their uncles trying to get them into science.

Stacy went over to her sister's room to “borrow” one—Tanya never used them anyways so she figured it should be fine—and returned with a short while later, sitting back at the table with it in hand. “I'm back, guys! Time to get you all moved into your new home!” She put the dish down next to them, then grabbed the cotton swab and carefully put it down right behind the little city. “Okay, here goes! Try not to die all at once, will you?”

The great mass  of cotton slowly swept towards the city, fibers as thick as two story houses sweeping over everything on the street level and razing it to the ground, at the same time picking up many of the taller buildings like so many specks of dust, leaving them tangled up in the mess of white fibers. Inside them it was pandemonium as the slow, careful sweeping of the cotton swab had them turned on their side, upside-down, and in every other direction you could think of, sending all their contents tumbling around. Many people fell right out the windows to land on some cotton fiber or on the table's distant surface, usually dying on impact. Others were crushed by furniture or various other heavy objects falling on them violently. Even so, there were still tens of thousands of people alive at the end of the little swab when Stacy finished sweeping up their city. As she held them up for a closer look, all those poor, frightened souls looked out at her monstrous eye gazing back at them—the eye of a god, it seemed.

Her pitch-black pupil, big enough to swallow their city whole, flitted up and down the cottony surface, taking in the little specks whose lives she so casually held, and the rapid sweep of her eyelashes when she blinked blew a soft gust of wind at them all. He laughter resounded in their ears. “You're all mine now, little germs,” she declared, and all the survivors trembled knowing she was right.

Carefully she lowered them to the Petri dish, and, setting the cotton swab down, told them to climb down. They all did, fearing this was their sole chance of survival, and she watched their journey from above through her magnifying glass. She gave them ten minutes—would have given them less had she thought enough of them could make it off in time—and then, when most of them had gotten off already, she picked the cotton swab back up and used it to clean her toe jam, giving everyone still on it a most fitting end at her feet.

“Did you make it off? How many of you are down there?” she asked. She knew there were at least some people down there—they were gathered in such numbers that she could see them all together as a little dark spot on the plastic—but couldn't tell any more than that. “I'll have to get a stronger magnifying glass, or maybe even a microscope, so I can actually see you guys. Oh well, I guess it doesn't matter. What matters is you're all safe now! Aren't you glad I could get you out of that dangerous little city and put you somewhere you can actually survive? And it's the perfect home for a bunch of tiny little germs like you! I bet you're all super grateful!” Stacy lifted the Petri dish, turning it this way and that as she held it up to her face, imagining the tiny people all being sent rolling around on the plastic surface.

“You look so cute down there! I just know I'm going to have so much fun playing with all of you every day for the rest of your lives! But, I should probably get started on my homework now. I spent plenty of time playing with all of you already. I'll just leave you all down here while I finish it.” Placing the lid on top of the Petri dish, Stacy carefully lowered it to the floor, where she left it right under her desk. “See you later, guys!” she said, and, scooting her chair forward, she placed her feet down on the dish, leaving her little pets staring up at her huge soles pressed up against the plastic lid.

Even with the lid protecting them from her feet, some of the smell still reached them as did the warmth radiating from her soles, and even the slightest twitch of her toes was felt as a tremor shaking their new little world.

When she finished with her home work, Stacy gave her new pets some foot in the form of a tiny crumb that had been on her desk, and water in the form of her own spit. She left them in her shoe while she went down for dinner, and when she got back she sat down on the bed with them, holding their tiny home lidless between her soles and idly rolling it around, wondering what it must be like for them.

While she contemplated them, she started getting sleepy. She bid them good night and lay down to sleep with their tiny dish right next to her face, still lidless. Her soft breath blew over the tiny people, sometimes strong enough to send them rolling over the plastic. Then, after she had fallen asleep, her hand nudged the dish even closer, until it was pressed to her cheek, her half-open mouth hovering right above all the tiny people.

In the darkness of her room, drool seeped out of her mouth and into the Petri dish, ever so slowly pooling at the bottom. The tiny people tried to run away, but all it took was a slight change in the inclination of the dish to send the pool of spit flowing down towards them. It quickly overtook them, sweeping them all up in huge waves of spit, leaving them floating in the vast and growing ocean. And though they tried their hardest to make it to the surface or to the shore, they couldn't fight against the powerful currents and soon ended up drowning.

Stacy would be saddened to find them all dead when she awoke the next morning. But even as those thousands met their end, thousands more people all around Stacy's room spread out over the tiled floor, seeking out any place they could settle down in. They were the survivors of her rampage, people who one way or another had escaped being crushed, whether by hiding in some tiny hole on the floor, or having gotten far enough from their cities when she came to destroy them, or even being lucky enough to have ended up safely under some tiny groove on her skin when she crushed the city.

Many of those thousands would perish in the days to come, being stepped on, mopped up, swept away, or even just starving to death. Still, some would learn to survive, living off the various other forms of microfauna populating Stacy's bedroom, feeding off her dead skin cells and other detritus when need be, and hiding away in the tiniest of crevices whenever she was around to avoid her monstrous feet.

Over time their life cycles and metabolism would speed up as their bodies adapted to life at this tiny size—a day to her would be a year to them, and so they would spread and reproduce all over the floor, and soon there would be entire civilizations living in her bedroom, surviving unnoticed in her shadow and sometimes being wiped out by a single footstep.

Though their orders had been simple, the assassins knew from the start that the execution would be anything but. To kidnap a Nohrian noble and spirit them safely back to Hoshido for use in negotiations would be the riskiest, most difficult task ever assigned to them in all their years of service. An airtight plan was necessary, and for that they first had to focus their efforts on gathering intel.

It took them nearly two months in Windmire to get all the information they needed, but at last they had settled on the time, place, means, and of course, target: Elise, the youngest Nohrian princess. Then all that remained was to make preparations and pray for success.

Come the day of the kidnapping, Everything was going off without a hitch. They stole into Castle Krakenburg undetected and made their way through the corridors in silence, led by one of their number who had secured a position as a castle servant to gather intel. Soon they arrived undetected at the door to Elise's bedroom, where their intelligence said they would find the young princess.

Gripping the doorknob, their leader quietly tested it and, finding it unlocked, he nodded to the others. The moment he threw the door open they all rushed in, ready to pounce on the young princess and silence her before she could raise the alarm. But as soon as they stepped into the room and saw that their target wasn't there, a brilliant circle appeared at their feet, shining with magical energies—a trap!

Before any of them could do a thing, the bright glow enveloped them, and in that moment all went dark. It was a long time before their leader awoke and, groaning under the headache that accosted him, picked himself up to see what sort of dungeon he had been thrown in. But what he saw when he looked around was no dungeon at all. Why, it was the very room he had passed out in... yet to him it looked like a whole other world, as the room and everything in it was in all dimensions near a thousand times larger than he had known it.

That trap, it hadn't just knocked him out; it had cursed him and his companions, shrunk them so small that they were of a size with ants.

How had this happened? There had been no such trap here when he had come before as one of the castle servants. Had someone, somehow, learned of their plan and set this trap for them? If so, why hadn't that someone come for him and his companions yet? Surely that would have been the first thing they'd want to do.

Whatever the case, the fact that they hadn't been found yet meant they could still make it out alive, but they would have to move quick. Wasting no time, he went and roused his nearest companion from his sleep, helping to ease him into an understanding of their predicament, before getting his help in waking and assembling the others.

Soon each of them had woken one more, and all four were making their way towards the last, but they still hadn't reached him when they all noticed a thumping noise drawing near, and a tremor shaking the floor. Then came the singsong voice of someone humming a tune; a girl's voice.

As soon as the leader recognized that sound, he ran towards the last of his companions to wake him up with the others running after him, but before he could get there, the door suddenly swung open, and the gust of wind it blew scattered them and pushed them back. Then all of them were left gaping up at the massive figure at the entrance, the Nohrian princess Elise.

Taller than any building they'd ever seen, Elise stunned her would-be kidnappers with her mere presence, especially the just-awakened fifth. Their puny minds struggled to come to terms with the sight of a human being the size of a mountain, moving at speeds which seemed unnatural. All of them were still struggling to understand it when she closed the door and turned towards them, her black boots wrapped in pink ribbons thumping against the floor, each step an earthquake for them. The spell was only broken when they saw that gargantuan foot of hers rise and swing towards them, then fear took over and sent them running.

Boom Boom BOOM! came her steps, each louder and stronger than the last, until the floor was shaking so hard that the Hoshido agents could no longer keep their balance and fell down. From there they watched as her foot, now but a single step away from them, swung closer. In less than a second the sole of her boot appeared overhead, threatening to crush them all. It came down in still less time than that, and the shrunken men didn't even have enough time to follow its descent and see it fall on the distraught fifth, granting him a swift end to his nightmare as the countless tons of weight crushed him on the spot, leaving him a little dark stain on the floor, hardly worth any attention.

Even his companions wouldn't notice his passing until later, being more concerned for their own lives as the impact of Elise's foot sent them flying back again and they tumbled head over heels along the floor for dozens of yards—or, to Elise, a couple inches. By the time they stopped, she had already stepped past them, and soon left them behind entirely on the way to her desk.

While Elise pulled back her chair and took a seat, grabbing her diary to jot down her thoughts no the day's events, the Hoshido agents reconvened around their fallen comrade, still shaking from the adrenaline rush, feeling sick to their stomachs as they looked at his remains. What in the world were they to do now? Was there anything they could do, mere insects that they now were? It had been easy enough to be somewhat optimistic at first, before now that Elise had shown them a mere fraction of what they'd be up against, their situation seemed hopeless. Their leader tried to calm their fears, even though he could hardly calm his own, and to keep them focused on finding some way to escape the castle, but the others wouldn't listen to him now. There was no way they could get out by themselves, they said—their only hope was to get the princess's attention and ask her form help. She was a kind, innocent girl—maybe she'd take pity on them.

But their leader was unconvinced, and since no agreement was found, they were forced to part ways, he going by himself towards the door to try and find some way out of here, and the three making their way to the princess.

After trekking for several minutes, the three assassins approached Elise's feet, looking warily at her giant boots. One of them tapped to the beat of the song the young princess was still humming, shaking their minuscule world each time it hit the floor; the three gave that one wide berth on their way to her other foot, until they arrived at her heel, the first stretch of what would be the hardest climb of their lives.

Despite their trepidation, the assassins walked forward and began climbing the princess's boot, finding it easier than they'd expected thanks to their meager weight and the tiny imperfections so prevalent on the leathery surface, just the right size for them to use as footholds. The climb went fast relative to their size, but it still took them half an hour to reach her knee and start walking along her thigh, and a few minutes more to reach the inch-wide gap between the collar of her boot and the hem of her dress.

Climbing down the former onto the skin of the princess's thigh, they started making their way towards the dress, but only two had climbed onto it when everything started moving. Having finished writing now, Elise pushed her chair back and stood up, her thighs going vertical and sending the fourth of the unnoticed assassins falling into her boot. Briefly he stopped around her knee, wedged between her leg and boot, but her next step snapped him loose and sent him falling further in, sliding deeper and deeper until he arrived at her foot.

The experience was terrifying for all of them, but for none more so than the one at her foot. The poor man screamed as he found himself swung at an incredible speed, only for his ride to end abruptly with the impact of her foot on the floor, which sent him bouncing back and forth between her skin and the boot. Each bounce bruised him painfully, and by the time he stopped bouncing he had a couple broken bones. He cried out in pain, calling for help from his companions, from the princess, from the gods, but his pathetic pleas made it no further than the girl's toes.

A second step came shortly after, and this time when Elise's foot was swinging forward, he was sent rolling back along her boot until he bumped into her sole. When her foot came back down, her weight fell on him, and though her flesh didn't crush him as quickly and painlessly as her boot had crushed his companion, within a second he was just as dead.

Sitting on her bed, Elise reached down and took her boots off, breathing a soft sigh as each of her feet were released. Then she swung her legs up onto the bed, rubbing her tired feet without ever noticing the little red splotch that now adorned her left sole.

The two remaining assassins could only hope their companion survived somewhere in her boot still, and that in time they might be able to help him, but for now they can only help themselves, and they had much further left to go. They walked onward as far as they could, then start climbing when they could walk no further. They gripped the threads of the princess's dress, more like ropes to them, and pulled themselves along towards her face, hand over hand. In time they passed her modest chest, and then their goal was nearly at hand; if they could but reach her ears now, maybe she'd be able to hear their voices.

The pair couldn't help feeling a touch of relief, but it would prove to be short-lived as right afterwards Elise yawned and stretched her arms overhead. The sudden movement caught one of them unprepared, and he fell, tumbling all the way down her dress to land back on her thigh.

As she finished her yawn, Elise felt a little something on her lap, and she looked down curiously to see what it was. “EEK!” the princess gasped as she saw what could only be a little bug crawling on her skin. Her cry must have scared it, because the thing immediately started running, but no matter how fast it ran, it couldn't avoid her hand when she slapped it away, killing it on the spot.

When she pulled her hand away and saw the little red splotch the poor bug had left behind, Elise felt a twinge of guilt. Now that she reflected on it, it hadn't looked like a harmful bug, and she probably could have just blown it away, but she had been so startled to find it on her that she had only thought of killing it.

Ah well; no point in dwelling on such things, she thought, and after licking the tip of her thumb she scrubbed the bug's remains away, unaware of the other “bug” on her chest watching in horror as she wiped away all trace of his deceased companion.

Loneliness weighed on the last of the trio like never before, and so too guilt over the decision made—if only they had listened to their leader and followed him outside, maybe now the others would still be alive. Still with the goal so close now, there was nothing left for him to do except keep moving forward.

So, after Elise lay down, not asleep but just staring at the ceiling, the lone survivor hopped down from her shoulder and went to stand before her ear. Though he was feeling a tad nervous, he put his hands around his mouth to channel his voice and yelled, “Princess! Princess!” Over and over he called to her, hoping she'd be able to hear him through her humming. He kept it up for a while, long enough that his throat started getting sore and he considered stopping for now, but just then her humming came to a stop and he saw his chance. Again he yelled as loud as he could.

“Hmm?” Elise muttered. Was someone calling her, or had she just imagined it? “Is someone there?” she whispered, turning her head to the side and listening closely to see if she heard that sound again. But of course, she wouldn't—not when the man whose voice she'd heard had just been crushed beneath her scalp.

Meanwhile, the leader of the assassins, standing on the floor a couple feet away from the entrance, looked over at her, wondering if his companions were nearing success. Though he could have left the room already if he'd wanted to, he felt guilty leaving the others behind, and chose to stay behind for a bit and see if they could find success, or if they changed their minds and came back. He truly hoped they would, but he couldn't shake the feeling that they were all dead.

The man sighed and shook his head; he was just wasting his time here. He turned around and started heading for the door, when all of a sudden he heard and felt a pair of big THUMPs on the floor, and when he looked over his shoulder he saw Elise had gotten up and was coming closer.

“La, la-la la, la-la la,” the young princess sang, waltzing around the room to her song's rhythm, blissfully unaware of the shrunken man she came so close to crushing underfoot, while the tiny assassin, overwhelmed by her movement and the constant booming of her feet all around him, could only lie down and pray for his survival, at least until her foot smacked down beside him and blew him away. Then he scrambled to his feet and started running as fast as he could go, keeping his eyes looking forward, not daring to look back no matter how close the tremors got.

He had gotten halfway to the door when Elise, casually glancing at the floor, saw him scurrying away and walked over to get a better look. She knelt behind him and, taking him for another bug like the one from earlier, she felt an urge to makeup for killing that one by helping this one out. Putting a hand down in the little bug's path, she stopped the poor thing in its tracks and carefully reached over to pick it up. At that point it started running again, trying to dodge her fingers, but at last she managed to corral it against her other hand. “There, there, it's okay; I'm not going to hurt you. I just want to help you out,” she said. Strangely, it almost seemed like the little bug understood her, since it climbed onto her finger of its own accord when sh moved it closer to it. Then she slowly lifted it up, cupping her other hand under it in case it fell.

There was something curious about the little thing, she thought, though she didn't quite now what it was until she put it down on her desk and sat down with it. Then she noticed that it wasn't a bug at all.

“You're a human?” she said, not sure whether she should believe her eyes. The tiny man hesitated a moment before nodding. “Wow! This is incredible! I never knew something like this could happen. How did you get so small, little guy? And how did you get in here?” The man tried to say something, but even when she leaned in really close she couldn't make out anything he was saying. “Sorry, little guy, I can't hear you. But wait, don't I know you?” Elise asked, leaning in so close that her little find looked plainly uncomfortable. “I do! You're the new servant that started working here a month ago! Is this why I haven't seen you in a few days? Poor thing; I bet it must have been so scary being lost at that size. You probably came here to ask me for help, didn't you? Well, don't worry; as your princess, I promise I'll keep you safe.”

The shrunken assassin didn't know what to say. He supposed he should consider himself lucky that she had so easily settled on her own explanation of what he was doing here. As long as she didn't piece together the real reason for it, he'd probably be safe enough with her. And as long as he was safe, there was still some hope that he might be able to escape and get back to normal some day. He still wasn't entirely comfortable around her, but right here and now, he didn't have a choice but to go along with whatever she wanted.

“Are you okay? You look a tired. Why don't we get you to bed?” She offered her fingers to him again and he climbed on. He expected her to put him in a box or a drawer or something of the sort, but instead she took him over to her own bed and, sitting down, she put him down right in front of her feet. From there he turned to her, and found her looking back at him expectantly.

The assassin didn't understand. Did she want him to fall asleep here? Even if he'd been sleepy, he didn't think he could fall asleep with her so close to him. Just seeing her feet lying nearby had him on edge—he knew just how easily either of them might kill him.

Seeing her servant staring at her feet, Elise wiggled her toes to see how he'd react. She couldn't help but laugh at how scared he got—even if they were so much bigger than him, it was still funny to think she could spook a grown man just by curling her toes a bit.

“What's wrong, little guy? Can't sleep? I guess you weren't so tired after all. Well, in that case, I hope you don't mind if I ask you to do a little something for me. You are still my servant, after all, so it's only right. Don't worry, it's nothing too hard; all I want is a little foot rub. You can handle that much, can't you?” Elise said, turning her feet over to present him with her soles. The man looked at her uncertainly, like he couldn't decide if she was joking or not.  “Come on, don't be shy. Here, let me give you a little push to get you started.” She put a finger down behind him and, scooping him up with her nail, she carried him over to her left foot, dumping him right int he middle of her sole.

She watched intently as the tiny man got up and looked all around, taking in his new surroundings. Her foot must have looked so impressive for a tiny little thing like him; just seeing how little of her sole he actually covered really put into perspective how much bigger and stronger than him she was. It was even more apparent when she scrunched her sole and her little servant ended up caught in a mere wrinkle on her skin.

“You still haven't started working? What a lazy servant you are! Well, I guess that's fine. You're too small to be a good servant anyways; I'll just have to make you my toy instead!” Elise happily announced just as she released the shrunken man. “Com here little guy; let's have some fun together.” Gently gripping her new toy between her fingertips, she carried him up to her face, holding him right in front of her eyes.

He looked so scared now, almost as much as when she first saw him. She should have felt bad for him, seeing him like that, but for some reason, his fear just made him look even more adorable than he already was. “You're so cute I could just eat you right up! And maybe... maybe I will!”

The young princess lowered her toy until he was right before her lips. Even before she opened her mouth she could already feel him squirming in her grip, and his struggles only grew more desperate once her tongue slid out of her mouth, reaching for the tiny thing, until it was hanging right under him. That's when she dropped him right on the tip of her tongue, where her spit quickly fastened him to the broad, pink surface, so that he could just barely manage to crawl along it, and even though he crawled out past the edge, her saliva still held him to her tongue.

The feeling of her little toy struggling to escape her tongue was so delightful! It made Elise feel a warmth spreading from her heart down to her belly. Even more amazing was when she carried him into her mouth and when she closed her lips behind him, shutting off his only chance at escape. Even though she couldn't see him, she could feel the panic in the increasingly scratching of his limbs against her tongue. He wanted so badly to escape~! He might even be begging for her to let him go, however pointless that was; just the thought alone amused her to no end.

And yet, Elise still wasn't satisfied. Her toy's fear was intoxicating; she wanted more of it, wanted him feeling like he was on the verge of death. To that end she started pushing him around her mouth with her tongue. She was careful not to hurt him, but even so she recognized his growing terror as he was made intimate with her cheeks, gums, and teeth.

“Ah, you're so tasty, little guy~! Maybe I was wrong to make you my toy; I think you're better off as a snack!” Elise said, her voice a powerful humming that made the shrunken man's body buzz all over. “Anyway, it's been nice but I think it's time we finished playing. Now let's get you out of there and put you somewhere safe and warm: in my stomach!”

Elise giggled as she felt the tiny man's struggles reach a new level of intensity. Pressing him to the roof of her mouth, she pushed him back towards her throat and finally gave a great, big, GULP!

“Ha ha! That was a lot of fun, don't you think, little guy? ... Little guy? Hello?” Frowning, Elise opened her mouth wide, stuck out her tongue, and poked a finger deep inside. She scratched up the very back of her tongue,and when she pulled her finger out she saw her little spit-drenched toy lying all limp on her fingertip. Poor thing must have passed out in those final moments when she pretended she was going to swallow him. Well, he'd be in for a pleasant surprise when he woke up and saw that he wasn't dead after all.

Until then, there were still a few good hours of daylight left, and Elise meant to enjoy them. But, since she didn't want to leave her new toy behind, she reached over to her foot and smushed him nice and firmly into the gap between her first two toes, giving a nod once she saw that her spit was keeping him nicely in place. With her pet secured, she put her boots on and left her room, wondering who she might show her adorable little find to.

No one knew when it happened. Most of the affected didn't even realize anything was different until well after they had woken up and started going about their day—it wasn't something easily noticed unless one lived on the edge of the city. But soon after breakfast, when the people of Mesagoza left their houses on their way to work or school, they slowly realized that something had indeed changed: somehow, their city had been shrunk down, leaving the whole metropolis, once the biggest in Paldea, stranded in the middle of a great, barren expanse it had left behind with its shrinking.

Even then, they didn't realize just how small they were until a wild fletchling landed near their city. The thing seemed massive—easily as big as a mountain. Their whole city was like a pebble next to it, and until it flew off they all feared it would mistake the city for food and peck it to bits, or rend it with its huge talons.

How had this happened? And why? Was this some freak cosmic phenomenon, or were humans responsible for this? Had Arceus decided to punish them for some unforgivable sin? And more importantly, what were they to do? How in the world could they survive like this?

Panic and despair seized the hearts of the Mesagozans and all of them thought themselves goners for sure. But just when the world seemed darkest, a glimmer of hope appeared on the horizon in the form of a young, pink-and-blue-haired woman. the shrunken people were quick to recognize as Iono, the electric-type gym leader and world-famous streamer. If only they could get her attention, maybe she could save them from this horrible nightmare.

The shrunken people cried out all together to the young woman, jumping up and down, smacking garbage cans, waving flags around, honking their horns, and doing anything and everything they could to get her attention, even getting their pokemon to help out. But though she looked all around at the great barren land left behind by the city's shrinking, wondering what might have happened here Iono never so much as glanced at the ground in front of her, and as she came closer, kicking up little clouds of dirt and making the tiny Mesagozans crane their necks further and further back, their hope again became despair.

Powerful tremors and great, thundering booms accompanied every one of the streamer's steps, both growing stronger by the second, until the tiny people felt she was more likely to be their doom than their salvation. Their attempts to get her attention turned ever more frantic as they realized they might be crushed under her boot if she didn't see them, and when she was only a few steps away many people broke into desperate flight, trying to run away before they were crushed with all the others.

Everyone's shouts rose to a fever pitch as the sole of Iono's boot became visible overhead, its shadow all but consuming the pebble-sized city. There wasn't a soul among them that didn't think the end had come when that gargantuan foot began its descent. Yet when it hit the ground a moment later with a great, deafening BOOM, the city still survived. Oh, some buildings did collapse in the apocalyptic earthquake that followed, but hardly anyone had been indoors when it happened, and though some Mesagozans perished, the great majority still lived, as Iono's foot had so landed that their whole city sat safely in the space between her boot's heel and sole.

Yet it shook them to see how close they had come to being crushed—how close to it they still were. Iono needed only slide her foot an inch forward or back and the city would be razed beneath her boot, turned to dust so fine no one would ever know what had happened to them. Only an inch, and yet this little gap seemed big enough to house even the loftiest peaks in all of Paldea.

Trembling as they stared at the giant arch looming over their city, the shrunken people held their breaths, praying for her to leave them in peace. But when Iono's other foot came down right next to this one with another great BOOM, it became clear that she wouldn't be leaving just yet.

Far above the Mesagozans, still blissfully unaware of the panic caused by her mere presence, Iono pulled out her phone and opened the GPS. Sure enough, it said she was standing right in the very center of Mesagoza. And yet, when she looked around, she saw... nothing. Zilch. Nada. Not a single sign that this place had ever been inhabited. There were a few people around who had shown up after her, but they all looked every bit as lost and confused as she was. Maybe one of her fans would know what was up, she thought, and she opened her social media app to ask them.

“Hey, what gives!? The GPS says I'm in Mesagoza, but there's nothing around! Did someone steal the city before I got here? This is so not cool! #MesaGone” She typed out the message and sent it along with a selfie of herself in this empty land. Then, waiting for the replies (and the sweet, sweet interactions) to come flooding in, Iono started tapping her foot impatiently.

To the people stuck beneath her, this was like a series of earthquakes that threatened to reduce their whole city to rubble, if Iono didn't simply crush it on one of those taps. Each tap of her foot brought about the collapse of more and more buildings which simply  couldn't handle the amazing stresses Iono put them through. And while the people cried out as desperately as they ever had for her to notice them, all their voices combined were as nothing compared to the sound of Iono tapping her foot, rendering all their efforts worthless.

At last, after the most painful minute the city of Mesagoza had ever experienced, Iono ceased her foot-tapping and took a small step back that left the toe of her boot looming over the shrunken city. Finally Mesagoza was out of her shadow, yet the people felt no better than they had a moment ago. If anything, now that they could look up and see all of Iono looming over them, standing so impossibly big that their puny minds struggled to comprehend what they were seeing, the Mesagozans felt smaller than ever before as they were all but forced to contemplate their sheer insignificance. And while a few of them still tried to get her attention, most had fallen silent with a case of despondency as it became clear that a bunch of microbes like them had no chance of being noticed by a living landmass like Iono;the most they could hope for was to make it out of this encounter alive.

Meanwhile, after sifting through dozens of replies to her post, Iono at last saw one with a link to a news report that talked about how the city of Mesagoza had mysteriously disappeared overnight, leaving behind only a big empty crater. The whole thing sounded so bizarre she had to make sure she wasn't reading some weird conspiracy theory site, and even then she probably wouldn't have believed it if she hadn't been standing there right now, surrounded by the empty land where the city had once been.

“And to think I canceled one of my streams for this,” Iono muttered, shaking her head. She'd been supposed to visit the Academy here to host a talk about what it takes to be a successful influencer, but now it seemed the whole trip had been a colossal waste of time.

Then again, Mesagoza's disappearance was likely to be the talk of all of Paldea, if not the whole world, for at least a couple days; if she was the first big streamer to cover it with her own firsthand account, followers and subscriptions would come flowing in like never before! She might even break her old viewership record! Just the thought of it made her excited; maybe this trip wouldn't be a total waste after all. She just had to get home before someone else beat her to the punch.

Closing the social media app, Iono called for a cabbie to come pick her up, then opened the camera to take some pictures and videos for her stream, already thinking about what she would say and how she could spice up her story to engage all her viewers. Then, once she had enough material to work with, and with plenty of time to spare before the cab arrived it occurred to her that she might try calling her contact at the Academy to see if he picked up.

Just as she pressed the call button, down in the tiny Mesagoza, director Clavell's phone rang and, to his surprise, he saw that Iono was calling him. Seeing a chance to save the city, the director was quick to answer. “Iono?” he called into it, his hand and voice alike shaking as he held the phone up to his ear.

“Oh, hey! What's up, director? Are you okay? Tell me what's going on.”

“I'll tell you as much as I know, but first I have to tell you, DO NOT move your foot!”

“My foot?” Iono looked down at her feet, feeling super confused. She lifted her foot up on its heel, shaking it left and right, her sole passing over the tiny city over and over again. “Why not? What's wrong with my foot?”

“Iono, please, stop it! Just take a step back, I implore you! This is a matter of life and death!”

“Okay, okay! Fine! I'm taking a step back now.” Iono did so, finally putting some welcome distance between herself and the tiny city, though it would still only take a single step for her to be back on top of them.

“Oh, thank goodness,” director Clavell sighed. He felt himself about to faint; at his age he couldn't handle much excitement, and simply being near Iono like this was almost more than he could bear. Still, he couldn't allow himself to pass out at a time like this; not when so many people were relying on him.

“Iono, listen; what I'm going to tell you is going to sound like a fantasy, but I assure you, it's all very much real. You can see that Mesagoza is gone, right? Well that's not exactly right. We're all still here—at least, most of us are. No one knows how it happened, but last night our city shrank. We're right here, on the ground, close to where you were just standing.”

“Shrank? Are you pulling my leg, gramps? You really shouldn't kid around with something so serious, you know.”

“I'm not joking, Iono; I wish I were. If you could simply get on your hands and knees, I can guide you so you'll find out city. Please, we're in such danger by ourselves; if you could help us out, we'd be ever so grateful to you.”

“You want me to crawl around on the floor? Are you serious?” Iono scoffed. “I guess I got nothin' better to do right now so I'll humor you, but let me tell ya, if this is some weird joke, I'm making sure all my followers hear about this.”

“That's alright; you'll see soon enough how serious this is.” After Iono went down on her hands and knees, the director guided her towards Mesagoza until their city was right in her sights. At that moment a chorus of cries erupted from all the other shrunken people, who had been following her journey in suspense. “That's it! You're looking right at us!”

“What? You mean this tiny thing here?” Iono moved her hand to point to what at first glance looked like some tiny pebble, holding her finger so close that the Mesagozans feared she would crush them. Her finger hovered over the shrunken city, its surface easily big enough to crush them all with a single poke. Her light skin filled their sky with the spiraling pattern of her fingertip, magnified to such a degree that the people beneath her could make out every last pore and wrinkle.

“Yes! Yes, that's us. Please, be more careful, Iono.

“... Iono?”

“Sorry, gramps; I'll call you back later. Gotta make sure you're tellin' the truth.” Hanging up on the director, Iono leaned in closer to look at that tiny little pebble director Clavell had made such a fuss about. There did seem to be something weird about it—it was weirdly-colored for one, with more green than she'd seen on any pebble before—but that wasn't enough to confirm the director's ridiculous story. No, she needed to take a closer look, so she turned on her camera, trained it on the little green pebble, and zoomed in as far as her camera could go.

Had her phone been almost any other model, even maximum zoom wouldn't have been enough to identify that thing as a city. Fortunately for the Mesagozans, Iono's phone was equipped with the latest and greatest phone camera, able to zoom in even beyond the limits of other phones, and once the camera focused on it, previously unseen details of that tiny “pebble” were revealed to Iono. Even so, it took her a minute to recognize the curious geometric patterns she was seeing as the streets and buildings of a big city, and the faint movement she saw in the center as a crowd of tiny speck-people waving at her.

As soon as she confirmed that everything director Clavell had told her was true, Iono sat back in shock, staring mutely at the tiny city. Her eyes passed over the ground near it, over the footprints she had left there, some having come so close to the city it was miracle she hadn't crushed it.

Crushed it? Yes; crushed the city and all the people in it. Strange as it was to think that she could have wiped out thousands of lives in a single step, there was no denying what she saw. And what had the director said? “We're all still here—at least, most of us are.” If only most of them were still there, were some others not there anymore? What had happened to them? Had they... died? Had she caused their deaths without ever knowing about it? It was possible at least. And perhaps it was only her imagination, but she thought director Clavell's tone might have hinted at it.

Iono pondered the question, staring intently at the tiny city. Yet she found that, no matter how much she thought about it, even after coming to the conclusion that the missing Mesagozans were surely dead and that she had killed them, she didn't feel guilty at all. Even telling herself about how how awful it was that those people were dead, she couldn't feel bad about it.

Just look at these people: they were mites. Specks. Germs. She couldn't even have seen them without her phone. A gust of wind might wipe them off the face of the Earth. Feeling bad about killing them made as much sense as feeling bad about all the germs she'd killed by sanitizing her hands. They were lucky to have survived so long like this, really.

But, with that out of the way, what was she supposed to do about these tiny things now? She supposed she should aid them somehow, but she really wanted to have some fun with them first, so she leaned in real close to smile at the shrunken city.

Though they had been working so hard to get her attention, now that they had it the Mesagozans were already regretting it. As scary as it had been to know that she might kill them all unknowingly, with that grin they all feared what this girl might knowingly do to them.

“Well well, looky what we've got here! If it isn't Mesagoza city! Now how'd all you guys go and get so itty-bitty small? I totally didn't see you there before! You really should have said something, ya know; I could'a stepped on you guys by accident! But I guess you were just speechless at havin' such a super-popular streamer standing next to you. Good thing I thought to call your director, huh? Anyways, he told me I should help you all, so I'm thinking, why don't I take you all home with me? You'd be a lot safer sittin' in a little box in my room than you are out here, don'tcha think?”

The people below muttered in careful approval; maybe they had misjudged Iono after all.

“Only problem is, how am I supposed to get you there? Hmm... You think I could just...” Iono stretched a hand towards the little pebble-city, making as if she was going to grab it. Instead she put her thumb and forefinger down on the ground on opposite sides of it, so close that another fraction of an inch would have spelled doom for the Mesagozans. “Nah, that won't work! Just look at you! You're so small I'd probably crush you all just trying to pick you up! You'd all go flat under my finger, just like that!” Iono moved moved her fingers away and flattened a tiny clump of dirt that had been lying close to the city.

Seeing that thing get crushed beneath Iono's fingertip and ground down to nonexistence, the Mesagozans collectively went pale, many nearly fainting on the spot. Director Clavell pulled out his phone and tried calling Iono to beg her to stop, but the call wouldn't go through, even after trying with another phone; it seemed she could call them, but they couldn't call her.

“But then how can I bring all you tiny people back with me? Hmm... Oh well, I'm sure I'll come up with something soon! And until then, I might as well get comfy, don'tcha think?” The Mesagozans sighed in relief as the young streamer moved away from them for a moment, only to panic once more when she sat back and her feet rushed towards their city, stopping just shy of it. But what came next was more bewildering than anything, as Iono took off her boots one at a time and propped her feet up right in front of their city, her massive soles rising into the sky to loom far above their city, her skin faintly glistening with sweat.

“Ah, that's nice! So good to be out of those tight boots! They're super trendy and all, but not too good for being out in the sun, you get me? Of course you do! You guys must be really hot too, isn't that right? Let me give you all some shade. Iono to the rescue!” she announced enthusiastically, giggling as she moved her feet lower over the city.

To the Mesagozans the approach of Iono's feet looked like sky come crashing down. It seemed impossible for something so big, and moving so fast, to simply stop falling, and until her vast soles stopped a mere inch above their city, they felt certain they'd be crushed beneath them. Even once her soles stopped, they still felt as if they might be crushed at any moment, especially as Iono playfully rocked her feet over the shrunken city, bringing tremors with each little motion.

Toes like mountains splayed and curled by turns, causing her soles to scrunch up and leaving the speck-sized people gaping in awe at the hypnotic bulging and stretching of her flesh. Soon something else caught their attention, though—a growing figure hanging from the end of one of her toes—a drop of sweat nearly as big as Mesagoza itself. The monstrous drop grew bigger by the second, hanging lower and lower. Such a volume of water would surely wipe out the whole city on impact if it hit, and it was still getting bigger.

The shrunken people hung on to it in suspense, until at last a particularly energetic curl of Iono's toes flung it down to the earth, to splash down right at the outskirts of the city. In the blink of an eye, a massive wall of water bulldozed through several blocks and dozens of buildings, before vanishing into the earth, leaving behind only scattered remnants of the structures it destroyed and the people it killed. The survivors could only keep staring at Iono's feet, praying that no more drops of sweat would be falling on them.

“Ha ha! You guys look so cute down there! I bet you're all honored to be so close to my feet, isn't that right? I've got tons of fans who'd pay me a fortune to look at them like you're doing right now. I bet I could find enough of them to take all your places.” Just then, Iono had an epiphany as she realized what a huge opportunity had fallen right into her lap. She could picture it already: a super-special stream dedicated to showing off the tiny Mesagozans, where she'd let the viewers decide what she should do with them. It would be the single biggest show of her career. Heck, it might even be the most-viewed stream of all time! She just had to make sure the city got back home safely. But how was she going to do that without wrecking everything?

Actually, maybe she didn't need to bring the whole city. Just the people would be good enough. And if that was so, she didn't even need to pick them up herself.

“Okay! I think I know how to take you all back safe and sound with me! At least, I hope I do.” Iono pulled her feet back just a bit, then lowered her soles all the way, leaving her little toe standing right in front of the city. “All you gotta do is climb up my toe and... find some little place where you won't get crushed once I start movin'! Easy, right? I mean, it's not great, but I don't think anyone could come up with something better on such short notice! So, you coming or not? I guess you could stay here if you want. You might even survive a few more hours! But are you really gonna take your chances out here, all by yourselves?” Iono punctuated her question with a small wiggle of her toes, then held her feet still to let the little specks climb it.

The Mesagozans weren't too keen to hitch a ride on Iono's feet, but they didn't have much choice. It was a miracle they had gotten her attention at all—the odds of them getting help from anyone else were almost nonexistent, as were their odds of survival if they stayed her any longer. Not that their odds were much better with Iono, but at least there was an opportunity there. In the end they all swallowed their pride and came forward to climb up Iono's toe like a swarm of mites, dodging sweat droplets and other such obstacles, all while she recorded their journey on her phone.

It took something like twenty minutes, but at last they had all hidden away under Iono's toenail—all save a few unlucky people who had fallen to their deaths or drowned in the sweat droplets that speckled her skin here and there. Giving a small wiggle of her toes once they were all safely in place, Iono put her boots back on and stood up, taking care not to apply too much pressure on that toe so she wouldn't kill any more of those little people. She them all alive to make this stream the best it could be, after all! At least until the show started; then her viewers would get to decide their fates. And if the people wanted to see the little bugs crushed, well, she'd just have to give them what they wanted.

Anything at all for the sake of a good show.

Standing naked in the middle of Hakurei Shrine at a mere half-inch tall, Reimu kept calling for Yukari's help for several minutes, until at last she was forced to accept that the youkai wasn't listening in on her and she would have to deal with being stuck at this size for now. On the bright side, at least she could fly again, and she rose into the air and flew around to see if there happened to be anyone around who might be able to help her.

Though she didn't notice anything on her first flyby, on her second pass through the kitchen she did hear someone calling to her.

“Reimu? Is that you?” The shrine maiden looked over to the counter to find the inchling princess Shinmyoumaru Sukuna sitting there with a half-eaten grape in her hands. Reimu was so relieved to have finally found someone that she didn't remember her own nakedness until she was already standing on the counter next to Sukuna. She blushed and covered herself with her hands while the inchling put the grape aside and stood.

Even standing just as tall as a person's thumb, Sukuna towered over Reimu, who had to crane her head back a fair bit just to look her in the eyes; the shrine maiden was like a small toddler next to her. Still, she was quite far from the immense size and power that Reimu had seen from Ran, Chen, and Yukari.

“Gosh, you're so tiny!” Sukuna laughed, bending over to pet Reimu on her little head, which only made the shrine maiden even more flustered. “How'd you get that small? Did someone use the Miracle Mallet on you while I was asleep or something?”

“No, no. It doesn't have anything to do with the mallet, actually. It was... Yukari.”

“The gap lady? Huh. I never knew she could do something like that. So she played a trick on you?”

“Y-yeah, something like that,” Reimu said, too embarrassed to admit the reality of what she had been doing with Yukari. “She said she would put me back to normal , but I guess she forgot. Now I'm stuck at this size, way too small to do my job.” She sighed and hung her head.

“You're worrying too much.” Sukuna crouched to speak to Reimu on more even terms, though even like that she was twice as tall as the shrine maiden. “Size isn't that important. If I could cause so much trouble for Gensokyo as an inchling, I'm sure you can handle working as a shrine maiden at your size.”

“But I don't even come up to your knees! What could I even do if a bigger youkai starts causing trouble? There's no way I'd be able to beat them.” Most likely they'd just stomp her flat or flick her away, and that was assuming they even noticed her trying to stop them.

“Before you go and start getting all depressed, why don't we see what you can do at that size? Just a quick fight out to do it!”

“What? You mean... here? Now? Like this?” Reimu looked down at her naked body.

“Sure, why not? I mean, it's not like there's a change of clothes you can use now, is there? And there's plenty of space in the shrine for us to fight at this size. Come on, it'll be fun!” Sukuna slowly levitated, floating off the counter and to the middle of the kitchen. Reluctantly, Reimu followed after her, letting her hands fall at her sides. Once they were in position, she summoned her Yin-Yang Orbs, Sukuna pulled out her Miracle Mallet, and at the count of three they started to fight.

Both women flew around the kitchen, filling the air with great barrages of quick-moving bullets produced from their own energy while dodging and weaving between the other's shots, taking the occasional hit but still continuing their fight.

Reimu quickly noticed that her fighting abilities were nowhere near as degraded as she had thought they would be. Sure, her attacks were smaller and weaker than normal, but relative to her size they were stronger than they had been the last time she'd fought someone. She could sense a new energy burning within her. As it turned out, Yukari and Ran's training hadn't only made her into their obedient servant; the newfound faith she had in her youkai mistresses had also refined her spirit and granted her a higher level of power than she'd ever had before. Her size also turned out to have its advantages, since she was small enough to weave through the tiniest of gaps in Sukuna's attack patterns, and so took far less hits than did the inchling.

As the fight raged on, it was soon made clear that, despite her size advantage, it was Sukuna who was on the back foot, constantly flying away from Reimu, even leaving the kitchen altogether and escaping into various other rooms. The chase went on for several minutes until the fight entered Reimu's room, where a well-placed shot sent Sukuna hurtling to the floor. “Looks like you were right, Sukuna!” Reimu said, gloating over the fallen youkai. “Beating you was a piece of cake! I'm sure most other youkai won't be an issue either, as long as they're all as weak as you.”

“Piece of cake, you say?” Sukuna rose slowly to her feet, readjusting the little bowl she wore a a hat. “Let's see if you still feel that way after I've powered up!” Raising the Miracle Mallet over her head, she called on its power and soon a change came over the little inchling. From just a few inches tall, Sukuna exploded in size to stand a little over four feet—quite short for a human, yet still a colossus to the shrunken Reimu.

Sukuna looked proudly down at the shrunken Reimu, boasting of her far superior size and power. “How's this for weak?” she asked, and held out her hand to attack the tiny shrine maiden floating in front of her knees.

But though she saw the attack coming, Reimu didn't move to dodge it, nor did she ready an attack of her own. The tiny girl was too awed at Sukuna's immense size, gaping up at the towering inchling. Seeing her at that size, she felt the the same same of inferiority and the same urge to submit to the superior “giantess” before her that she had felt when in Ran or Yukari's presence. And so, even though Reimu could have easily dodged Sukuna's attack she simply hovered in place and received the full brunt of it head-on.

The attack hit her with such force that she immediately blacked out, and she remained unconscious until a minute later, when the tiny girl woke up to something big and rounded nudging her—a giant finger, she saw once she opened her eyes.

“Oh good, you're awake,” Sukuna sighed in relief as she watched Reimu slowly pick herself off the floor. Reimu groaned, rubbing the back of her head along with the spot on her lower chest where Sukuna's attack had hit her. “I'm sorry I hit you so hard, but I didn't think you'd just stand there and take it. Should I have given you more of a warning? Or is it something else? Are you feeling okay?”

“I-I'm fine,” Reimu said while the inchling gently stroked various parts of her body. She looked up at Sukuna's face, trying very hard to ignore her urges lest they make her embarrass herself. “I guess I was just too surprised by you growing so big.”

“You think I'm big? I'm barely any taller than a little kid,” Sukuna laughed. “But, I get it. You've only been small for a little while so you're not used to seeing people so much bigger than you. I bet it's really scary for you, isn't it? I mean, even I get scared sometimes and I've been small my whole life. Plus you're even smaller than us inchlings.”

“Y-yeah, it is a bit scary.”

“Now that you're small you're getting a taste of what my people have to put up with every day. Most of us are so weak that we couldn't defend ourselves if someone bigger than us tried to hurt us; all we can do is hide or run away. And if someone caught us we'd be totally at their mercy. Of course it's different for me since I'm stronger than most inchlings, but still.

“When the world is such a dangerous place, you need to be able to resist attacks from people way stronger than you. Maybe that's something I could help you with.”

“Thanks, but I don't think I need it. Yukari's magic protects me from being hurt. I can get stepped on and I still wouldn't die.”

“Really? Wait, how do you know that? Did someone step on you recently?”

“What? N-no, I, uh... um... uhhhh...”

“Oh, it doesn't matter. Anyways, it's good you can live through stuff like that, but I'm not just talking about helping you survive stuff. I can help you so you don't pass out from strong attacks like you did just now when mine hit you. It can even be useful for you once you get back to normal. What do you say? ... Hello? Reimu? Are you listening?”

Sukuna waved at the shrine maiden, but Reimu wasn't looking at her anymore. At rather, not at Sukuna's face. She was staring straight ahead instead, right at the inchling's feet. But was she really looking at them or just staring blindly? And why had she gone quiet all of a sudden? Had something happened to her? Should Sukuna take her to a doctor?

While she tried to decide what to do, Sukuna curled her toes and noticed Reimu's eyes following them. In fact, the girl's gaze Sukuna's followed every movement of her feet, going up, down, left and right together with them, always staring at one or the other. When Sukuna angled one foot back on its heel, showing off her sole to the tiny girl, Reimu shivered but still didn't look away. What's more, Sukuna realized that the expression on her face was one of barely-contained desire, as if she wanted nothing more in the world than to be at the inchling's feet. But that was ridiculous, right? She had to be misreading things; and to prove it to herself, she slowly moved her foot forwards, sliding her sole along the wooden floor towards the shrunken shrine maiden.

The closer her foot got, the further forward Reimu leaned, until she was sitting on her knees and even shuffling ever so slightly forward. Sukuna was in suspense, waiting to see what would happen and yet feeling strangely nervous about the whole thing. She kept moving her foot steadily closer to Reimu until, when it was just a tiny fraction of an inch away, she saw the tiny girl lean over to press her face up to her toe, softly kissing it.

Shocked, Sukuna jerked her foot back, waking Reimu up from the trance she had been in. The tiny girl looked at her with an expression no less flustered than the inchling's. It took Sukuna a few seconds to get ahold of herself again, then her expression hardened into a glare and she stood to reach her full height. “How dare you make a mockery of me!? I-I'll tech you to show me respect!” She raised her foot over the tiny shrine maiden, and while Reimu was busy staring up at it, she SLAMMED her foot down, stomping Reimu flat.

“What were you trying to say kissing my feet like that? That smaller people should worship those bigger than them?” Sukuna ground Reimu down on the floor, twisting her foot this way and that. “I can't believe I ever thought you were worth helping. You're just like everyone else, aren't you? All you humans think you're better than us just because you're bigger... Well, we'll see if you still think that way once I'm through with you!” Sukuna slid her foot off Reimu, then raised her big toe and held it over the tiny girl. “If you like my toes so much, why don't you go ahead and lick this one clean? Go on, get to work! Unless you want me to step on you again.” She tapped Reimu with her toe once, then felt the tiny girl sit up and press her face against the bottom of her toe, her little tongue working furiously to lick away all the dirt and grime on the inchling's foot.

“Not so funny now, is it? I bet you're sorry you ever made a joke of kissing my foot. Well, don't think I'm done with you yet! I'm going to make sure you know what it feels to be at a bigger person's mercy so you never mistreat any inchlings, or fairies, or other small people ever again! Now keep licking! You still have the rest of my foot to clean, you... you bug!”

Sukuna crossed her arms and glared at her foot, where she imagined the tiny Reimu must surely be suffering as she toiled away beneath her toe. After the first one was licked clean, Sukuna raised her other toes, letting Reimu quickly scurry under the next one to start licking it. Seeing how fast she was working, Sukuna thought Reimu must have been really scared of her. Maybe she thought she would get on the inchling's good side by being an obedient little girl. Well, if that was so, she had another thing coming! Sukuna wouldn't let her go until she was satisfied that Reimu had learned her lesson, even if it took weeks.

“How do you like that taste? One of my subjects told me he was once kept trapped and made to  lick his captor's foot every day for a month; by the end his tongue was so numb that he couldn't taste anything. Maybe I should do the same to you. You think a month will be enough for you to learn some empathy? I could always keep you as my slave for even longer if it's not.”

“...”

“What's the matter? Don't you have anything to say? Not even a 'sorry'? Or maybe you're just too scared to speak.” Sukuna curled her toes, pressing Reimu to her sole with them, and grinned smugly at the shrunken girl's pathetic squirming as she was helpless to escape the inchling's grip. “Well, maybe you should be scared. I could do whatever I want with you and you couldn't do anything to fight back,” she said, and released Reimu. “But if you show you can show me respect and obey, I promise not to treat you too bad. Now get back to licking, or else!”

Even before she finished talking, Reimu had already gone back to licking her toes with more enthusiasm than ever before. But, despite what Sukuna thought, the shrunken maiden wasn't doing it because she was scared or anything like that. In fact, she loved how Sukuna was treating her like dirt; it reminded her of how her beloved mistresses had treated her during her time at the Yakumo household, making her toil away for their pleasure so she would know her proper place beneath them.

Even aside from that, she really did enjoy licking the inchling's toes, not least of all because it gave her a reason to press her face right up against that delightfully soft flesh, feeling the warm skin against her own. She didn't even mind the taste or the smell, having gotten used to others like them over the last three days. Most of all, though, she wanted to please Sukuna and maybe earn some praise or headpats by doing the best she could at this job.

Soon Reimu was finishing up with the last of Sukuna's toes, and then the inchling sat and turned her foot sideways on the floor, letting her sole tower over Reimu like a great wall. “Go on then, start climbing; let's see how you like crawling on my foot like a little bug.” Reimu wasted no time in obeying Sukuna and was soon climbing under the inchling's watchful gaze, to lick her sole clean. Maybe she really was learning, Sukuna thought.

Leaning in close to see how Reimu was doing, the inchling was surprised to see that her toes were absolutely spotless, without so much as a speck of dirt on them. The same was true of those parts of her sole that Reimu had already worked on, and as she watched the shrine maiden at work, she saw her working hard to lick every last inch of her foot clean, even working her tongue into the little grooves and wrinkles of her sole. She didn't even look disgusted by it.

Sukuna frowned. Was this job not as bad as she had thought it would be? Her feet weren't all that dirty, after all, so maybe Reimu didn't mind it so much. This won't do, she thought. She needed to be harder on the shrunken girl, or else Reimu would never learn. But how could she make this harder for her?

As Sukuna looked around thoughtfully, trying to come up with some ideas, her eyes happened to fall on a pair of sandals on the floor nearby, and that gave her an idea.

“Ugh! Could you work any slower?” she said, feigning annoyance. “I'm not going to sit around all day to let you finish, you know. I think I'll go for a walk while you keep working down there.” Grabbing the sandals, Sukuna put the tiny girl on one of them and then put the sandals on, smothering Reimu between sole and insole. “Better keep licking down there! I expect you to be finished by the time my walk is over.” After taking a moment to enjoy the feeling of Reimu fidgeting under her foot, Sukuna left the room and went for a walk around the shrine grounds, making sure take the longest route.

By then it was almost noon, and the day was steadily growing warmer under the sun's bright rays. Out in the light it was warm enough that Sukuna started sweating a bit, and she was pleased to notice that her feet were no exception. Her soles were soon covered in sweat, helping Reimu stick to them while she walked. She had no doubt the shrine maiden would be beyond disgusted at being soaked in her sweat, and also by the intensifying smell of her feet—assuming she hadn't already passed out.

It wasn't until an hour later that she sat down on the shrine entrance to check in on Reimu. “So, did you make any progress on cleaning my foot?” she asked as she kicked off the sandals and turned her foot around to look at the poor girl stuck to her sole.

Reimu was barely moving at all, apparently trying and failing to get herself unstuck from the warm, sweaty sole that stretched all around her; this punishment had definitely taken its toll on her Sukuna almost felt sorry, but it was no less than she deserved for her blatant mockery.

“Look at you; you're so pathetic, like a worthless ant. Even the weakest inchling would be taking this better than you. Still think you're any better than us just because you're a human?”

Gradually, though, Sukuna's smugness gave way to confusion as she came to realize that Reimu wasn't trying to get up. Rather, it looked more like she was snuggling against her foot, caressing it, and even... was that another kiss!? The inchling quickly turned her foot over, throwing Reimu to the ground. “You're still mocking me!? Give me one good reason why I shouldn't crush you here and now.! She held her foot over Reimu, ready to stomp on her again.

“W-wait, please, Sukuna! I can explain. I... EEP!” Reimu yelled as Sukuna stomped down, only for the inchling's foot to land next to her. Then Sukuna leaned over and picked her up, holding her by the waist to dangle here before her face.

“Go on, then; explain, if you can.”

Reimu gulped. “I swear I wasn't trying to mock you or anything. I just... when I saw you grow so big, when I saw your feet right in front of me, I... I just couldn't help myself.”

“Are you trying to say that you actually like being at my feet?” Sukuna squeezed Reimu until the tiny girl squeaked. “I don't believe it. Come up with a better explanation or I'm through with you.”

“I swear I'm telling the truth! It's all because of what Yukari did to me.” Despite her embarrassment, Reimu told the inchling about everything that had happened during her time in the Yakumo household—as much of it as she could bear to reveal, anyways.

“I didn't think anyone else would make me feel the same way as they did, but when I saw you so big and powerful, I just wanted to throw myself at your feet and worship you. That's why I kissed your foot, not to mock you or anything like that.”

“I don't buy it. If that was all true you wouldn't want to worship me; you'd be too scared of me for that.”

“I am scared, but my instinct to serve you is even stronger. Now do you see why it's so important I get back to my normal size? The way I am now, if any youkai bigger than an inchling starts causing trouble I could never stand up to them; I'd just fall on my knees and become their pet.”

“That's what you want? To be my pet?” Sukuna could hardly believe what she was hearing. She still wasn't sure how much she believed, but Reimu sounded sincere enough.

“Yes? A part of me does, at least, and I can't resist it.”

“I'm sorry but that's not okay! You need to be able to stand up for yourself even when you're so small. Especially when you're this small. Looks like I'm going to have to train you to have some self-respect.”

“Train me?” Reimu said. The poor girl had had enough training for a lifetime already and she wasn't too keen on dealing with any more.

“That's right.” Sukuna put Reimu down on the stone walkway that led up to the shrine, then put her bare feet down in front of the tiny girl. “Stand up and look at my feet, but don't move no matter what I do, okay? Fight against whatever urge you get and stand firm.” The inchling then moved her foot steadily forward, little by little closing in on the tiny girl. Reimu, meanwhile, stared intently at the giant foot, admiring its power and its supple curves, watching its skin faintly glistening with tiny sweat droplets, standing entranced by the subtle bulging and stretching of its flesh as it moved. Its rounded toes looked so lovely, so soft, so welcoming, and yet so mighty and strong. She could think of nothing she wanted more than to be buried under their supple flesh once more.

“No! You have to resist. That's what Sukuna ordered you to do.” So she said to herself, and stood stiff as a board to keep herself from acting on her base urges.  But it was so hard for her, especially once Sukuna's foot got close enough that she could feel its warmth against her naked body. It was so close now; close enough that she could just reach over and...

Moving with a mind of its own, Reimu's arm stretched out to touch Sukuna's toe, and as soon as she felt the inchling's warm skin against her hand, all of Reimu's resistance melted away and she stepped forward to press her body up to the mammoth toe, surrendering herself to the inchling.

“Looks like this is going to take a while.” Sukuna bent over and pried Reimu off her toe, dragging her back an inch or so while moving her foot back into place. “Okay, let's try this again.”

Progress in Reimu's training was slow in coming. The first several tries ended with her moving to hug Sukuna's toe as soon as it touched her if not before. Finally, though, she was able to resist the temptation and stand still even while the toe bumped against her. She felt a stirring in her heart, and a strong desire to serve at Sukuna's foot, but she held herself in check and strove to obey the inchling's orders instead.

“Good! Keep fighting now, and remember your dignity!” Sukuna said as she raised both her feet back on her heels and let them tower over the tiny Reimu, wiggling her toes and scrunching her soles. Reimu's will almost faltered when she saw such a powerfully dominant gesture, but though she trembled with barely-contained desire, she still didn't react when Sukuna's sole gently tapped her on the face.

Yet, when the inchling's toes descended on her, holding her down while rubbing her back and forth over the ground, it proved to be more than she could resist. Once the initial shock wore off, Reimu spread out her arms to welcome the domineering digits and started kissing them passionately.

With a sigh, Sukuna took her foot off of Reimu and restarted the training, determined to succeed no matter how many tries it took. Over and over she repeated the same motions, first moving her foot closer to Reimu and then pinning her down underfoot, trying to tease some reaction out of her.

 It took many more attempts before Reimu could finally go through it all without reacting to what Sukuna was doing. “Very good,” the inchling said, setting her feet down in front of Reimu. “Now for the next part of your training: come over here and kiss my toe.”

Reimu didn't understand how this was supposed to contribute to her training, but she went up to Sukuna's toe and started eagerly kissing it.

“No, no, no! You're not supposed to do what I tell you! Show some self respect! Do you understand?” Reimu meekly nodded once Sukuna had moved her foot away again. “Good. Now start worshipping my foot or else I'll crush you like the little bug you are,” she said, slamming her foot commandingly in front of Reimu.

The tiny shrine maiden trembled, unsure of what to do. “Didn't you hear me? Get on your knee and start worshipping, unless you'd rather do it from beneath my sole.” Sukuna held her other foot over Reimu, threatening to stomp her flat under her heel.

“I-I'm sorry, mistress; I didn't mean to disobey. Let me make up for it by rubbing your feet,” Reimu said, scurrying up to Sukuna's foot and beginning to massage her toes until the inchling flicked her away in annoyance.

“Why are you just submitting to me? Attack me! Fly away! You could even just stand still if you want, but whatever you do, don't do what I say. okay?”

Reimu nodded, but internally she was conflicted. Her instinct was to obey, but her orders were to disobey; it didn't make any sense to her. For a while, whenever Sukuna ordered her to do something Reimu was as likely as not to obey. It might as well have come down to a coin flip, though the harder Sukuna pushed, the more likely Reimu was to submit to her orders.

But, little by little, Reimu did come to some sort of understanding. While Sukuna was bigger and stronger than her, and very much deserving of the shrine maiden's respect, at the end of the day it was Yukari who she served and owed her allegiance to, and that meant the only person she had to obey was Yukari—and also Ran and Chen as Yukari's messengers. Sukuna, on the other hand, she didn't need to obey at all, but she could still do it as long as it didn't interfere with her job.

Once Reimu came to that conclusion, the next time Sukuna ordered her to worship her feet, Reimu simply made herself turn around and fly away, to hover just out of the inchling's reach.

“Where do you think you're going? Get back here; I'm not finished with you yet. Come and kneel under my feet, right where a little bug like you belongs.” Sukuna pointed at the ground, but though Reimu was tempted, she shook her head and kept her distance. “Oh yeah?” The inchling stood up and stepped right up to Reimu. “If you're not going to obey, then... It looks like you finally passed the test. Congrats!”

The sudden shift in tone caught Reimu by surprise, but when Sukuna offered up her hands to her, Reimu didn't hesitate to land on them. “Took you long enough! I almost didn't think you'd ever get this far. Hope I didn't push you too hard or anything, but I'm glad it worked out in the end.”

“So that's really it? There's nothing more left? I really passed?” Reimu was so relieved when Sukuna confirmed that it was over. It really did feel like she had dropped some heavy burden; finally she could be around the inchling without worrying about offending her or embarrassing herself. “Thank you so much! I can't even say how glad I am that I could pass your test. I really owe you for all your help.”

“Don't sweat it! You deserve it for being so nice to me, even when I was smaller than you, and even after all that trouble I caused you back when we first me. In fact, I think you deserve something more. Now sit still while I reward you for putting up with all that.”

Reimu tensed up for a moment, wondering if this “reward” was to be another test for her. But when Sukuna started stroking her back, her worry melted away and she happily let the giant inchling pamper and care for her. Sukuna kneaded the tiny shrine maiden under her fingertips, massaging her until she was as calm and relaxed as she had ever been. Then when she was done with Reimu's back she gently rolled her over to massage her front and limbs, enjoying it almost as much as Reimu did.

The shrine maiden was so cute at this size, so small and dainty; Sukuna found she loved feeling Reimu's delicate figure beneath her fingers, and it made her so happy to see how the tiny little thing trusted her to be gentle. She wanted nothing more than to protect and care for the tiny girl, yet at the same time she sensed somewhere in the back of her mind an urge to mess with Reimu—to exercise her superior power by dominating the shrine maiden. Was this how human-sized people felt towards her and the other inchlings? It would explain so much if it was. Not that it excused them from mistreating her kind, of course.

“So, how do you like it? Are you happy with your massage?”

“M-hm,” Reimu muttered. “But, could I ask you for something else?”

“Like what?”

“Um, I just wanted to ask if you could maybe.... smother me between your feet. I-if you're okay with it, I mean.”

“Eh? Do you really still want to be at my feet? I thought I taught you how to control those urges already.”

“I-I swear I can control it way better now! It's just... I still really like it, and you said you would reward me, so I thought...”

“Okay, okay. I guess it can't hurt to indulge that stuff for a little bit.” Sukuna moved her feet closer, holding them so their soles were only an inch apart, then she gently lowered Reimu towards them, dangling the shrunken miko by the legs. Once Reimu was right between her soles, she slowly moved her feet together. Her flesh engulfed the miko, perfectly smothering her. She tried to be gentle and not put too much pressure on Reimu, but she couldn't help but worry that she was hurting the tiny girl, especially when she felt Reimu start fidgeting.

“Are you doing okay? I'm not hurting you, am I?” she asked, moving her feet apart just enough to let Reimu answer back.

“No, I'm fine. In fact... m-maybe you could be a little rougher with me. Like you were before, when you were training me.”

“You mean like this?” Sukuna pressed her feet together and rubbed them against each other, rolling Reimu between them as if the miko were a mere piece of lint.

“That's perfect!” Reimu said breathlessly when the inchling again moved her feet a little bit apart. “Please, keep going!”

Sukuna felt awkward about it, but she did as Reimu asked and kept rubbing her soles back and forth.  To her surprise, once she had been doing it for a while, she found that she was starting to enjoy it a bit. Reimu felt so nice being pressed against her soles, and unconsciously she started pressing her soles a bit harder together to better feel every detail of that minuscule body. Not too hard, of course, but before long she realized that she wanted to be even tougher on Reimu than that.

The inchling loved being the bigger and stronger of the two for once in her life. And while she didn't want to hurt Reimu, she did want to make sure the miko knew she was the one in charge now—that she could do whatever she pleased and Reimu couldn't do anything to stop her.

It was funny; before today she would have been indignant if anyone had ever confessed to feeling that way, but now it was all she could think of. She supposed it would be fine as long as Reimu was okay with it, though—it was only a bad thing if it involved mistreating someone.

After turning the matter over in her head for a bit, Sukuna finally decided to go ahead with it and moved her feet apart, letting Reimu fall to the ground. The tiny miko was confused, and she looked to Sukuna with worry in her eyes. “Is something wrong? We can stop if you don't like doing this.”

“Shush, you little bug. The only one who gets to decide when we stop this is me. Now come over here and give my toes some proper worship.”

Reimu was confused; this was such a sudden change from Sukuna. The way the inchling was talking reminded her of the test she had just passed, and she had to wonder if maybe this was another test that she was supposed to pass by refusing to obey her commands.

“What's wrong? Aren't you going to show my toes some love? Then just sit tight while they show you theirs instead.” With her toes raised, Sukuna slid her feet forward until her digits were hanging over Reimu. The tiny girl sat in suspense beneath them, taking in their scent, their warmth, their lovely curves and incredible power. She watched them splay apart, then looked past them at the inchling's smiling face.

It was only when she saw Sukuna's genuine expression that Reimu could feel certain this wasn't a trick, and when the inchling's toes came down to either side of her she eagerly crawled over to them and, kneeling, started to kiss them.

Sukuna's toes curled ever so slightly at the feeling of the tiny girl's lips against her skin, giving Reimu a hug that she kept up while the tiny girl had her fun. It was so heartwarming to feel that frail little thing showing her such love, and Sukuna showed some back to her by gently wiggling her toes around her, sliding Reimu up and down until the shrunken shrine maiden.

After a little while she tilted her foot back and splayed her toes, letting go of Reimu, but even then she still clung lovingly to Sukuna's toe, nuzzling against it, until another wiggle brushed her off. Then Sukuna lowered her foot, pinning Reimu down under her big toe and kneading her against the ground. Reimu received that toe like a long-awaited lover, spreading her arms to hug its soft surface and gladly surrendering herself to its whims, letting the inchling toy with her as she pleased.

Sukuna loved feeling that minuscule little body being pressed into her skin, and the little movements of her arms and legs beneath her toe. She simply couldn't get enough of Reimu, so after a little whole she slid her foot forward to pin Reimu down under her sole and then she started applying ever more pressure to the tiny girl, driving her deeper into her flesh, until Reimu couldn't even breathe. At that point Reimu's instincts took over and she started trying to escape Sukuna's foot, but by then there was hardly anything she could do; all her pitiful fidgeting did was amuse Sukuna, who smiled and twisted her foot. Reimu's awareness started dimming then, and before long she passed out, waking up some time later in Sukuna's hands.

“Hey, are you okay?” the inchling asked, gently stroking Reimu. “Sorry about that; guess I got a little carried away. Hope I didn't hurt you too bad.”

“It's okay. Like I told you, Yukari's magic protects me at this size.”

“Right. Anyway, I was thinking about your size. The Miracle Mallet is still recharging since I just used it to grow myself, but by tomorrow I should be able to grow you back with it. Only problem is that since you're a human it won't work as well or you as it does for me. It'll wear off after some time, or if you get hit by a powerful attack.”

“It's alright. I don't need it to last forever, only until I can get Yukari to fix me. And if I shrink again before then you can always grow me back, right?”

“Sure; as long as you don't mind me playing with you a bit while you're still tiny.”

“I don't mind at all.” Reimu blushed.

“Then it's a deal. I'll stay with you today, and tomorrow morning we can fix you up. Now...” Sukuna leaned closer and gave Reimu a sniff. “Why don't we get you a bath so you can stop smelling like my feet.” Reimu agreed, and so Sukuna carried the tiny girl off to the bathroom—still a bit messy from when Yukari had snatched her up in here. There she began filling up the bathtub, and after setting Reimu down on the rim of the tub, the inchling undressed, neatly folding her clothes and putting them away in the corner before returning to Reimu.

Once the tub was full, Sukuna climbed inside and brought Reimu in after her, lowering her in the water right in front of her chest. Reimu looked all around, at the huge lake of bath water she floated in, at Sukuna's hand floating just beneath the surface, ready to save her if need be, and at the inchling's kind expression. Once she felt more comfortable in the tub she started swimming around, with Sukuna's hand always following beneath her to keep her safe, and when she got tired she swam up to Sukuna's chest, climbing just high enough along her skin to get out of the water and then lying down to relax while Sukuna stroked her back.

After soaking in the tub for a bit, Sukuna started feeling more playful, and she plucked Reimu off her chest, holding her in her open palm. Then, bringing her other hand closer, she started inspecting Reimu's body, poking and prodding her all over and even spreading out her delicate limbs to get to see her from every angle. Reimu spent the whole time blushing in embarrassment, but she didn't complain—she loved being manhandled and treated like a doll by the much-bigger inchling.

Sukuna's fingers were so strong, so insistent, so domineering. Reimu couldn't help but get ever more aroused at their touch, especially when the inchling started playing with her tiny little breasts, kneading them under her thumb. Reimu's flustered moan only encouraged her to mess with the tiny girl even more, rubbing not only her chest but also between her legs, getting her all riled up until she was actively spreading her legs to invite the inchling's touch.

Seeing how worked up Reimu was getting amused Sukuna to no end, and she kept teasing the tiny girl's crotch until she was all but begging for it, only to move her finger away afterwards to listen to her pitiful little whimpers. Finally, she pulled Reimu closer, pressing the shrine maiden up to her lips in a tender kiss. And, after Reimu returned the gesture, she stuck out her tongue and started licking at Reimu's crotch, working to please her until at last the shrunken girl let out an adorably squeaky cry and lay limp on Sukuna's hand.

After washing Reimu down, the inchling was just about ready to get out of the bath, so she pulled the plug and grabbed a towel, using it first on Reimu and then on herself. After getting dressed again, she went with Reimu back to the shrine maiden's bedroom, where she sat in Reimu's bed with her legs crossed and set Reimu down on her lap, letting the tiny girl clamber down to play at her feet.

After their bath, Reimu was newly in love with the inchling's feet. Her soles were so clean, so soft, so smooth; even simply rubbing them felt wonderful, and she spent a long time doing just that, enjoying their warmth and the clean smell of Sukuna's skin while the inchling softly wiggled her toes to stroke Reimu's body, the both of them enjoying each other's company until it grew dark and they went to sleep with Reimu cradled under the inchling's toes.

Led by Destroyer's dummy, close to a thousand Sangvis Ferri troops had successfully infiltrated the territory held by Griffin and Kryuger, positioning themselves under cover of a small forest in preparation for a strike. Their target, a small town of just ten thousand inhabitants, was also a crucial nexus in G&K's supply lines, the disruption of which would enable SF to attack in key points along the front line.

Though there were some T-Dolls guarding the town, they were merely a token force, not nearly enough to withstand an attack by Destroyer's forces—clearly they hadn't been expecting an attack from anything near the number of troops she commanded. It was almost too easy, the only caveat being that they had to move quick so as to strike the town before they were detected and enemy reinforcements sent.

Throwing caution to the wind in favor of speed as Dreamer had instructed, Destroyer forewent the use of any scouting forces during her advance, trusting that they would meet no meaningful resistance during their march. At a mere dozen or so miles from the town, they still hadn't encountered any enemy forces, and Destroyer was starting to think the whole operation would go off without a hitch. Already she was looking forward to the destruction of those enemy Dolls as something all but assured, when little by little she became aware of a ripple of alarm spreading through her forces.

Starting with those at the head of the battalion, all the units came to a halt as they detected a repeated shaking of the ground with a faint booming noise and the sound of crunching bark following each tremor. Soon Destroyer sensed it too, and she racked her mind trying to think of what it might be. It didn't quite sound like explosions, nor like artillery fire, and anyway it didn't have the right rhythm to be either of those things. She could think of nothing else, though, and with the sounds getting ever closer, she had to figure this out quick, so she directed a few SF scout units to hover above the treeline and find the source.

A few seconds later, she got her answer in the form of an image captured by the scouts' cameras, and immediately regretted her decision.

Dead center in the picture, out in the middle of a lush dark-green carpet, about a mile away, stood a dark figure rising starkly above the horizon—a giant for whom even the tallest trees, whose figure dominated the landscape, and whose angry purple eyes were looking right into the camera.

It was a giant Griffin Doll, and not just any of them, but the giant among giants herself, P7.  And as she felt the tremors drawing closer, Destroyer knew her odds of success had gone down to nearly zero.

“It's no fair! Why do I have to be the one to take care of all these missions?” P7 complained not for the first time that morning.

“You already know why,” Kar98k patiently said from her perch atop P7's shoulder, where she clung unperturbed to the threads of the 500-foot Doll's odd nun-like outfit, keeping herself stable against the constant jostling from P7's stride. “You're Griffin's most valuable asset—the Commander's most useful Doll. It's only natural you'd be put to work so often. You knew this would happen when you accepted the transfer to this new body.”

“But I just got back from another mission! Couldn't they have sent someone else instead? It's not like I'm the only giant Doll at the base. At this rate I might not be back at base tomorrow.” It was the 31st of March, which meant that tomorrow was April Fools' day; P7's favorite holiday, a day when she could run wild with her pranks, secure in the knowledge that for once she wouldn't get in trouble for it. She'd been all set to make the most of it this year, with a ton of prank ideas she'd been brainstorming, but with how busy she'd been recently it was already too late to make preparations for most of her ideas. She'd have to settle for something simple this year—assuming she was able to celebrate it at all.

P7 glanced wistfully at the town a couple miles to her left. “Say, if SF is after this town, can't I just go over there and wait for them to show up? I mean, why chase after them if we can wait for them to come to us.”

“Because once they see you there they'll just go cause trouble somewhere else. We need to eliminate them here and now. Besides, we both know that's not the reason why you want to visit the town. Now hush; the SF forces are supposed to be in the forest up ahead. Obviously you can't be perfectly quiet but the less noise you make, the closer we can get before they hear us coming.”

P7 sighed, but kept quiet otherwise as she started into the forest, scanning what she could see of the ground through the foliage. At first she tried to step softly and avoid damaging the trees any more than was necessary, but the forest grew thicker the deeper she went, and soon she could no longer avoid some destruction, cracking branches and even some tree trunks with her every step. Worse, she could see increasingly little of what went on beneath the thickening canopy, forcing her to crouch and hold open holes in the foliage to see if there were any SF dolls below.

Her frustrations kept mounting until at last she'd had enough. The final straw came when she raised a foot to take a step, only to find she couldn't put it down anywhere else without knocking down a tree or two. Well so be it! she thought and stomped her foot down, taking her frustration out on the innocent pine by sending its trunk crashing down beneath her slim white boot. More and more trees followed the fate of the first as she walked further on, ignoring Kar98k's admonishments to keep the noise down, until something in the distance caught their eyes—a trio of dark, reflective objects rising briefly above the forest canopy only to descend again a second later.

“Did you see that?” asked Kar98k. P7 nodded—those had definitely been SF scouts. “Looks like we found our target. Let's move in and take them down.”

“I'm way ahead of you.” P7 strode purposefully forward, crunching branches and tree trunks alike with every swing of her legs, her eyes searching intently for any SF units.

All of a sudden, when P7 was just a few short strides away from where the scouts had appeared, a barrage of bullets surged out from beneath the foliage, the fire of at least a hundred weapons rushing up to meet her. P7 paused and pulled Kar98k off her shoulder, cupping her in one hand while using the other to shield her from any incoming fire before proceeding. Save for a few of the larger rounds, which produced a mild stinging, none of the enemy's attacks did damage to the giant doll, at most giving her a buzzing feeling where the bullets bounced harmlessly off her skin.

On the other hand, the intense fire tore to shreds much of the foliage that had obscured the SF forces from view, letting P7 march confidently to destroy them.

This was bad. Even with all of Destroyer's massed forces firing together at the giant Doll, there was hardly so much as a scratch on her, and even those scratches were all from the manticores, of which she had only ten. How was she supposed to bring down that monster with such limited resources? She should have just dispersed her forces and tried to escape with as many as possible the moment she saw the Doll—better than having informed Dreamer about the giant only to be ordered to fight her to the death.

Maybe one of the others could have figured out some plan to take this monster down with the forces she had at her disposal—though Destroyed doubted it—but all she could think to do was to have everyone keep shooting at the giant P7, even as she came ever closer. By then the surrounding leaves rustled at P7's every step; the trees shook down to their roots, and the cracking and crunching of those she stepped on was almost louder than the roaring gunfire of all her forces combined.

Destroyer sent the scouts to attack the Doll's face, hoping their short-range fire might be enough to blind her, but the swarm of drones, which next to P7 looked like more like flies, was quickly swatted out of the air, and those that survived the swing of the giant hand either went on to crash into the Doll's head and shoulders, or else were simply left behind as she kept going without missing a beat.

“Stupid bugs,” said the giant. “It's all your fault I'm missing out on my April Fools' preparations. Now I'm going to make you pay for that.”

As she approached the brutes at the head of the formation, the black sole of her boot appeared in the sky above the melee units and quickly descended, crashing through sixty-foot pines to flatten over a dozen of them in an earth-shaking stomp. The survivors hurried to climb the white boot like ants, digging their knives into the smooth surface to help them climb, but they hadn't even made it past P7's heel when her foot rose once more and they were either thrown off with its sheer speed or else brushed off by the branches the giant foot blasted right through.

Her next step brought her right to the middle of the rippers and vespids, and when her foot fell on a couple squadrons she took a moment to grind them under her boot, reducing them all to an unsalvageable mess of mechanical parts and synthetic outer shells, all half-buried in the dirt. And then she was only a single step away from Destroyer and the line of manticores.

The SF ringleader couldn't remember ever being more scared in her life. The giant's expression was fierce; in it, she could see the intent to exterminate every last one of her forces, and as was becoming clearer by the second, there was nothing any of them could do to stop her.

Once P7 was in range, Destroyer joined her troops in shooting at the giant Doll, lobbing grenade after grenade from her launchers. But though she managed to hit the skin of P7's thighs, as far up as her shots would go, it seemed all she accomplished was leaving a small black soot mark on the spot of each explosion, more bug bites than bruises. Still she kept shooting, until she saw that massive black sole appear above the trees, swinging past her on the way to one of the manticores—the giant hadn't even noticed her!

Destroyer watched as that foot came down on the manticore, the great war machine fitting neatly under the end of P7's boot. The unit looked like no more than a mouse beneath the giant Doll, and as her foot slowly pressed down on it, the whirring of its gears as it strained to move under the immense pressure sounded almost like the whine of a wounded animal to Destroyer's ears, a sad and pitiful noise. But the Doll showed it no mercy, and slowly the manticore's armor cracked under her weight, until with just a bit more pressure the war machine was flattened in a quick succession of crunching noises as each separate bit of armor gave way and was destroyed.

A dreadful sense of helplessness came over Destroyer as she watched the giant grind the manticore's remains down all the way before turning her attention to the next one, putting it to the same slow death she had given the first.

Though most of Destroyer's force still remained, she already knew the battle was lost. The manticores were too big and slow to have any hope of escaping the giant Doll; she would grind them all down one after the other, then turn her attention on Destroyer and the remaining troops. Whatever Dreamer had said, there was no point in wasting her forces on a losing battle, and while P7 was occupied dealing with the manticores, she ordered everyone else to disperse, and took one last look at the monster before running away.

After finishing with the manticores, P7 lifted Kar98k back to her shoulder, and with the smaller Doll's help she tracked down the rest of the SF forces as they tried to flee under cover of the forest. Every so often an enemy squadron would stop to attack her, and she would lumber over to the offending forces to stomp them flat, crushing them as mercilessly as if she were dealing with ants. All the same, there was no real urgency to finish them all off, knowing that none of their remaining units could damage her. It was just a matter of some simple pest control now, and she freely took her time in dealing with the comparatively bug-sized troops, enjoying the catharsis of decimating these units which had once caused her so much grief.

“Is this really all that Sangvis Ferri managed to send?” she mused while crushing another couple squadrons of rippers beneath her boots. “What a waste of my time. A few squads of regular T-Dolls could have probably cleaned this bunch up while I stayed at the base and prepared for tomorrow. I think I'll need to have a word with the Commander not to waste my time with such easy missions.” Another squadron revealed itself to her right and she slowly walked towards it, smiling at the faint tickling she could feel from their bullets. 

“I'll walk up to him when he's out in the open so he can't avoid me, then pick him up between my fingers and bring him up to my level so we can talk face to face, just like so.” P7 demonstrated her intentions with one of the rippers that had been shooting at her, crouching to snatch up the enemy fighter and then dangling it by the legs as she brought it up to her eyes. The tiny thing tried to aim its guns at her, but P7 quickly tore them from its hands, almost tearing its arms off as well, and flicked them aside.

“Then I'll very slowly and patiently explain my request so he understands how important it is not to squander me on little stuff like this.” As she said this, P7 slowly squeezed the ripper's legs harder and harder; though it tried to wrest itself free, all its efforts could barely even dimple her skin. “And once he sees my point, I'll very gently put him back down.” The moment she let go, the ripper hurtled three hundred feet to the ground, slipping right through a gap in the trees' branches to crash down on the forest floor, its damaged body giving no signs of life save for some jittery twitches as its CPU tried to assert control over the body. P7 then raised her foot to step on it and the other rippers still busy shooting at her, ending them all with a satisfying crunch. “What do you think? Will the Commander listen to reason?”

“M-hm,” Kar98k muttered absentmindedly, her thoughts focused on the movement of the troops they'd been following. “P7, have you noticed anything strange about how our enemies are behaving?”

“Strange?” P7 turned her head, straining her eyes to get a good look at her companion. “Not really. Have you?”

“It's these squadrons that keep stopping to shoot at you. If the enemy wanted to improve their odds of survival they could just disperse into the forest and it would be almost impossible for us to find all of them from up here; at least a few of them would be able to hide or get away from us. Instead they keep opening fire on us and drawing our attention. It all seems very deliberate; I think they're trying to distract us with disposable troops to protect a more elite unit.”

“An elite unit? Like a ringleader?”

“It's likely. Keep walking the way you were headed before this last group distracted you. If I'm right, they'll try to make more distractions for you; ignore them and keep going straight. We can deal with any stragglers later with help from some other Dolls if need be, but we shouldn't let the ringleader get away.”

“I'm not sure if we'll be able to see them from up here, though.”

“Then put me on your boot. I'll keep an eye out below and tell you if I see anything.”

“Eh!? Are you sure about that? Won't it be dangerous for you down there? I mean, you could fall off and...”

“It's fine. The mission comes first. Besides, I trust you to keep me safe.”

“Really? Well, if you trust me, I'll just have to trust myself too.” Moved by Kar98k's dedication, P7 raised a hand to her shoulder, letting Kar98k hop on to be lowered onto her boot. Once she got the go-ahead, P7 carefully set out to where Kar98k had directed her. Sure enough, another squadron of vespids started shooting at her from behind after she'd taken just a few steps, but P7 ignored it and kept walking. More and more groups started shooting at the further she went, from every direction except straight ahead, all but confirming Kar98k's suspicions. Whatever was there, they definitely didn't want her finding it. Well, she'd find it all the same, and if it did turn out to be the ringleader responsible for these forces, P7 would be sure to make them pay.

“Crap! Why isn't she turning back?” Destroyer ran through the forest as quickly as her legs could carry her, yet even so she could feel the giant Doll getting ever closer, completely ignoring the several squadrons of SF troops shooting at her from behind.

As Destroyer looked over her shoulder, she saw the giant P7's white boot come crashing down behind her, with a normal-sized Doll on top of it. Was that one of her troops? The question flashed in the back of her mind and was quickly forgotten as she swerved to the right to try to get out of the monster's path, but as she ran, she dimly heard someone's voice shouting, “She's over there!”

Destroyer heard the voice again, from much closer behind her, after the P7 took another couple steps, and looking back again she saw the Doll on P7's foot pointing right at her, guiding the giant this way. “Crap!” she muttered again.

She tried to obscure her position by running through where the trees were thickest, and when the foot that held the other Doll went back up, she ducked behind the biggest trunk she could find. But in her haste to find a hiding spot, Destroyer had miscalculated where P7's foot would land next, and she jumped in surprise when the great white boot slammed down right at her side, sending a shower of leaves and broken branches falling from above. The ringleader couldn't hold back a cry, and the noise turned the boot-riding Doll's head towards her.

“She's right by your foot!” Kar98k shouted, sliding off of P7's boot just as Destroyer aimed her grenades launchers at her. Just in time; a pair of grenades soared through the air where she had been just a second ago, going on to explode many yards away. By then P7 was already looking down at the scene playing out beneath her, and she ducked to reach for the shrunken ringleader.

Seeing the giant hand descending towards her, Destroyer shot another few rounds of grenades at it, but though P7 hissed at the slight stinging she felt, her hand still kept coming and soon Destroyer was left with no choice but to turn and flee. Yet she'd barely taken two steps when P7 caught her and brought her, struggling, up to eye level.

“AAAH! L-let go of me, you... you monster!”

“Whatever you say,” P7 laughed All of a sudden Destroyer found herself falling from a few hundred feet in the air as those monstrous fingers released her. She screamed as she fell towards a clearing left by P7's steps, and held out her arms preemptively to try and grab some branch in her way, only to be caught by P7 before she even reached the Doll's knees

P7's tree-sized fingers curled over destroyer, leaving her encased in the giant Doll's synthetic skin. She railed against her captor, doing everything she could to escape her grasp, yet however hard she tried she could not so much as budge any of those fingers. When P7 let go of her a few seconds later, she found herself back under the giant's gaze, with Kar98k also looking at her from P7's shoulder.

“What's the matter? Can't you handle a little prank?” P7 asked, grinning at the little ringleader.

“J-just who do you think you are!?” Destroyer shouted, quickly getting to her feet. “Do you have any idea who you're dealing with? I'm Destroyer of Sangvis Ferri; I've killed hundreds of worthless Dolls like you, and you just made yourself the next one on my list. Now die for disrespecting me!” She raised her weapons, but just before she could fire them, one of P7's fingers curled to pin her down.

“Cute toys you've got there. But aren't these too dangerous for a girl like you? Why don't I put these away somewhere safe.” P7 snatched the grenade launchers from Destroyer's hands, handing them over to Kar98k for safekeeping.

“Ah! What do you think you're doing? Give those back to me right now! Do you hear me? Give them back! Give them back!” Destroyer beat her hands angrily against P7's hand, taking out her frustration in the only way left to her. There was no way this was happening; it was impossible. Had she really been defeated by a pair of lousy Griffin Dolls? What would Dreamer say when she heard about this?

“Aww, does the little girl want her toys back? Sorry, but those are a bit dangerous for a kid like you to be handling.”

“I'm not a kid! I'm a fearsome ringleader of Sangvis Ferri!”

“Really? Because you look just like a kid to me. A bad little kid who's been causing so much trouble and needs to be punished. The fun I get out of that should almost make up for having to come all the way out here to chase after you and your troops.”

“You... you... You bastards! You'll be sorry you ever messed with me! I'll be back some day, with  a bigger army and bigger, stronger weapons, and I'll make you pay for all this! Do you hear? ... Hey!!! Pay attention to me!!!”

“P7,”  said Kar98k, ignoring the ringleader's tantrum, “remember we still have more SF units to deal with. Finding them takes priority over you 'punishing' Destroyer.”

“Aww, but that'll take all day! Can't I just have a little fun with her first?”

“The mission, and peoples' safety, comes first. Deal with her quickly so we can finish up here; if we get them all today, maybe we could be back at base tomorrow.

“Fine, fine,” P7 sighed, dropping the struggling Destroyer on the ground.

Destroyer tried to stand, but the fall had damaged her legs and she could only roll onto her back to look up at P7 rising back to her full height. P7 raised a foot high in the air, holding it smugly over the damaged ringleader, who recalled the last images she had received from all her troops who had been crushed under the giant Doll's boots. Unwilling to take such humiliation, she triggered the self-destruct function she'd built into her dummy, destroying it before it could be crushed, and swearing, one day, to get her revenge.

“Alright, you little germ,” Soi Fon playfully said to the near-microscopic Yushiro standing in the shadow of her toes, gawking up at them like they were the world's biggest mountain range, “I figure I'd better head home now, so go ahead and climb on my toes or you'll get left behind. Better hurry, or I'll lose my patience with you and pick you up myself.”

At Soi Fon's command, Yushiro scurried fearfully along the floor towards her nearest toe, climbing it as soon as he reached it. He got there much quicker than he had expected—apparently at his current puny size he was so weightless that he could advance by leaps and bounds, much faster proportional to his size than he had ever run at his normal size. His climbing went by quickly too, and in less than a minute he had already made it under Soi Fon's toenail, crawling as deep beneath it to make sure he wouldn't fall off.

Soon after the tiny boy had disappeared beneath her toenail, Soi Fon stood up, and the increased pressure on her feet made the upper flesh of her toes bulge out ever so slightly, causing Yushiro to be firmly smothered between her skin and toenail. Then, after putting her sandals back on, wiggling her toes to tease the tiny boy, she strode out of Yoruichi's home and towards her own.

Her walk was even more intense for Yushiro than it had been the last time he had been stuck to her feet, back when he had still been as big as a grain of sand, not a hundred times smaller than one. And that wasn't the only thing that was more intense, either; the smell of her foot was more intense too, only bearable because of how used to it he already was, and so was the pressure bearing down on him every time he was squished under her toenail, which nearly knocked him out cold. 

If only he had paid more attention to his sister when she was teaching him that spell to grow himself back. But }instead he had rushed through it and only ended up shrinking himself more.  Now all he could do was hope that he could survive Soi Fon long enough for his sister to come back and help him.

Finally arriving at her home after several minutes, Soi Fon went directly to her bathroom, where she took off hr sandals and put up  her foot so that her toes were resting on the edge of the bathtub. Then she ordered Yushiro to get out, and after the speck-sized boy climbed out of the wad of dirt that he had gotten half-buried in and hopped down from her toe to the tub's porcelain rim, she put her foot back down and opened the water faucet, allowing the tub to slowly fill up. The great torrent of water hitting the tub rattled the whole thing ever so slightly, making Yushiro feel as though there were a powerful and unceasing earthquake going on. Finally, Soi Fon started undressing, taking all her clothes off one by one and neatly folding them before putting them all away.

Despite his bewilderment at seeing Soi Fon undressing right before him, Yushiro couldn't tear his eyes away from her, and he kept watching until she was bare naked, even as he was blushing red the whole time.

Once she had finished, Soi Fon went and sat on the tub. She dipped her feet in the water to test the temperature, then looked to her side, down at the tiny Yushiro who had come just a couple inches from being sat on. The boy gawked up at her naked body—Soi Fon was as beautiful at this size as she was terrifying, and he couldn't help but admire both her figure and her amazing power.

While she was looking at Yushiro, the shinigami used a spell to enhance her senses so she could see, hear, and feel him, allowing her to witness his gaping expression. “Like what you see?” she asked teasingly, turning her body just far enough to the side that he could see her breasts. The gesture made Yushiro blush and finally turn away, which amused her to no end. “You know, it's adorable how shy you are. Hmm... maybe I should give you a little push.”

As a shadow fell over him, Yushiro looked up to see Soi Fon's hand reaching towards him with a single outstretched finger as wide as a mountain was tall. Even knowing that it wouldn't crush him, he still grew scared at its approach, and stood petrified as it descended onto him. Soon he was smothered under her finger, flattened between her warm flesh and the cool porcelain, before being swiped up and carried away. A short while later he was safely deposited onto a rugged pink surface with rose up to a vast wall on one side and tapered off to a precipice on the other three.

It looked unlike any place he had ever seen before, and so he didn't realize where he was until he looked up and saw Soi Fon's face hanging over him from just beyond the great curved wall he was faced with—then he finally recognized that wall as her breast, and this pink protrusion as her nipple. Immediately he blushed and tried to look away, only to realize that no matter where he turned he'd still be looking at the shinigami's nipple, not to mention touching it. He apologized profusely for it, but Soi Fon only laughed, her breast wobbling softly at her chuckles—to him a powerful earthquake that made him fall on his knees.

“Fu fu~ Are you really so eager to be off my breast? Maybe I should put you back on my feet instead. But not before you do a little something for me. Just hang on for now,” she said, and turned off the faucet before slipping into the half-filled tub, easing herself down until she was lying in the water. The gently lapping waves reached up to her nipple then and captured the tiny Yushiro, pulling him off to float in the great roiling sea that was Soi Fon's bathtub, until she scooped him up and put him back on her nipple. “There. Now be a dear and give me a little massage, will you?”

Though he got flustered over her request, Yushiro still got down and started rubbing her skin as she'd asked, sinking his hands into the supple flesh. Instantly a rumbling moan escaped the shinigami's throat, and he had to hang on to her so it wouldn't knock him down. “Keep going, Yushiro. Don't stop until I tell you. You don't want to end up under my sweaty foot, do you?”

Yushiro jumped back into action as soon as she stopped talking, crawling all over her nipple to rub her skin like mad. He did slow down after a while, though—just as soon as he could be sure she was satisfied—and came to enjoy his work, marveling at all the awesome signs of Soi Fon's power around him, from the warmth of her body blanketing him and all his little world, or the constant throbbing of her skin in time to the beating of her heart.

After soaking in the water and enjoying Yushiro's massage for almost half an hour, Soi Fon decided to get out of the tub, and she pulled the plug before standing up to grab a towel. While she was drying herself, Yushiro was swiped up by the towel, having gotten his leg caught in some of the threads' individual fibers. He didn't even get an opportunity to free himself before he was already being rubbed all over her skin, being used to dry every last inch of her body along with the towel. And though he tried to yell to let her know what was happening, his shouts all came out muffled as his face was constantly pressed against her skin, right up until she finished drying herself and wrapped the towel around her body and left the bathroom.

He remained fastened to her skin for minutes before she finally took off the towel and let it fall on the floor. Then its impact finally dislodged him from its fibers and sent him flying away in a puff of wind, together with countless little specks of dust, before at last he settled down on the floor, dizzy but otherwise unharmed. Slowly he picked himself back up, ready to call to Soi Fon, but before he could, her massive foot slammed down on the tiny speck of a boy, instantly flattening him.

While her vast foot remained on him, Yushiro started trying with all his might to break free, and Soi Fon just barely felt his fidgeting down under her sole. The shinigami lifted her foot to check what it was, and when she saw that it was only Yushiro, who had once more gotten plastered to her sole by the pressure and remaining moisture, she smiled and scrunched her sole, causing him to be briefly swallowed up in the microscopic folds of her skin.

“You really must love my feet to have ended up under them already!” she chuckled, sending him moving up and down her sole by a mere wiggle of her toes. “Well, if you like them so much, why don't you go ahead and spend some quality time with them while I get ready?” With that she put her foot back down, reveling in the feeling of tiny Yushiro stuck beneath her.

There the boy would remain, to his chagrin and her amusement, each new step she took driving him to be stuck ever more firmly to her expansive sole. Then, once she had finished getting dressed, Soi Fon left for her kitchen, to cook herself a simple meal of some rice and beef. Before she started eating, though, Soi Fon dropped a single grain of rice on the floor and squished it so it ended up stuck to her foot right alongside Yushiro. Then when she sat down to eat she put that foot up on her lap and gently peeled Yushiro off her sole with a fingertip. Hurry up and eat; your food's getting cold,” she said as she dropped him onto the squished rice grain, then she teasingly wiggled her toes and made him fall face-first on the bland paste.

Soi Fon calmly ate her own dinner while watching Yushiro eat his, every so often teasing him with some minor movement of her foot that rocked his world. Small as he was, he didn't even come close to finishing the grain of rice, as a mountain of the stuff still remained, and Soi Fon had to throw the rest away once he was full. Then, lying down on the floor to calmly digest her meal, the shinigami turned her foot around on her knee so she could watch the shrunken Yushiro clinging to her sole.

“So, did you enjoy your meal?” she asked him.

“I-it was alright,” Yushiro said. “Thank you. But, um... could you maybe give me some water too?”

“You want water? Well, I'm sure you'll find plenty of it right between my toes,” she replied, wiggling them playfully.

“You mean your sweat?”

“Sweat is mostly water. You can take it or leave it, but you're not getting anything else. So? What will it be?”

Yushiro grimaced as he contemplated his options, none of which appealed much to him. In the end, though, he decided to accept her offer and started climbing her foot by leaps and bounds, occasionally stopping to hold on to the shinigami's skin while she moved her foot, and soon made it up between her toes. Though she had just washed less than an hour ago, already the air between those immense digits was starting to smell again, being notably mustier than elsewhere.

It didn't take him long to find a droplet of sweat resting on one of her pores, to him a huge lake filled with more water than he could ever need. Still more impressive was the way the droplet bulged upwards in a dome shape, the clear liquid being held in place by its surface tension. Yushiro walked up to it and, putting his lips against the crystalline surface, sucked in a mouthful of Soi Fon's foot sweat. Despite the saltiness, it wasn't as bad as he had expected, and he was able to drink his fill without issue. Just when he had finished, though, an errant twitch of Soi Fon's toes threw him right into the dome of sweat.

After he slipped inside, he tried to get out, but the surface tension was too great for him, and when he pushed against it, the droplet's surface stretched out like a great plastic wall. He tried to call for help, but his words only came out as a burbled mess. He started to drown, and was only freed when Soi Fon casually curled her toes together, spreading the sweat contained in the droplet all over her skin in a thin layer that soon evaporated and left him free. Then Yushiro was left coughing out a mouthful of sweat onto her skin until she curled her toes again and trapped him deep in a wrinkle.

Forgetting about Yushiro again as she relaxed and her sense-enhancing spell wore off, Soi Fon wiggled her toes together, not even feeling the little speck as he was rolled up and down or miles along her sweaty skin, getting soaked in her sweat until he was utterly sick of it and even long after that. It wasn't until she sat back up that she remembered him and, casting the spell again, peered down at her toes to see if he was still there.

She couldn't help but laugh when she found him floating in a swamp of her own sweat, and after watching him for a bit she rescued him from the deadly waters, scooping him up onto the very rip of her fingernail. “What a pathetic little thing you are; it seems I have to keep rescuing you at least once an hour. I wonder if you'll even survive until your sister returns.”

Yushiro wondered the same thing, but Soi Fon didn't sound too concerned about the possibility of his death. After a moment she tipped her finger over and sent him falling off her nail, floating down the air along with a myriad other specks of dust, many of them so much bigger than him that they looked almost like floating islands, down along her body until he settled right on top of her toenail. “Let's see if you can survive down there for now,” she said, and left to go wash her dishes.

Yushiro clung with all his might to Soi Fon's toenail while she went on to deal with a few other minor chores as she got ready for bed. Finally she stepped back into her bedroom, and there she sat down on her bed to see how he was doing now. “Still there? Good. Now it's almost time I went to bed, so let's figure out where you should sleep, shall we?” As her hand drew closer, Yushiro thought she was going to pick him up, but instead he was flicked right of her toenail to land on the bed sheets, in front of her foot. “So then, which do you prefer? The left foot? Or the right one?” she asked, holding his options over him and blanketing him in the shadow of her feet while she playfully scrunched her soles.

“C-can't I sleep somewhere else? Anywhere at all?” Yushiro meekly asked.

“Why? Is there something wrong with my feet, perhaps? Something you dislike about them?” Soi Fon asked, slamming her feet down on the bed with such force that the ripples it sent through the mattress bounced him hundreds of feet up. “After all I've done for you today, washing and feeding and even saving you, are you going to be an ungrateful little germ and start making demands of me? Maybe I should make you sleep in my mouth instead and see if you don't drown in my spit or get swallowed while I sleep. And if you do, well I'll just have to tell your sister that you ran off and got lost. Would you prefer that?”

“N-no! No, I... I'm sorry, Soi Fon, I didn't meant to be rude or anything.”

The shinigami chuckled. “Of course you didn't. I'm only messing with you, of course. So, what will it be? Left foot, right foot, or mouth? Better choose quick or I'll make the choice for you.”

“Uh... Your left foot, I guess.”

“ You guess? It sounds like you're not too sure. Maybe I should let you try all three so you can make an informed decision.” She raised her big toe over him, threatening to squish him underneath.

“I'm sure, I'm sure! Definitely the left one!”

“Whatever you say, speck.” Soi Fon giggled, moving her left foot so he was flanked by two of her toes, then she pressed her toes together to pinch him between them, squeezing him until he was plastered to her skin once more. “Comfy down there?” she asked, wiggling her toes as she admired how pathetically small he was next to them.

“Y-yeah. Thank you,” Yushiro just barely managed to say.

“Well then, I guess that's good night. Sweet dreams, little germ.” The shinigami blew him a kiss, then turned off the lights before climbing into bed, lying face-down on her mattress. For a while she idly wiggled her toes together, having fun rolling Yushiro between them, but at last she fell asleep. Then the shrunken Yushiro climbed up until he was standing on her sole and searched for a good place to sleep, finally choosing a cozy little wrinkle of her skin. He crawled in and curled up, and with her body warmth blanketing him he soon fell into a restless sleep plagued by nightmares of Soi Fon and Yoruichi alike dominating him with their godly feet for the rest of his life.

“Hi! You must be Ryan, right? Welcome to the X-Mansion! I'm Jubilee, and I'm here to help you learn how to control your powers. Mind if I come in?”

“Uh, sure, that's fine,” Ryan said to the young woman standing outside his room. She was strangely-dressed, with blue shorts and boots, yellow jacket and gloves, a red shirt, and on her forehead a pair of red visor sunglasses as wide as her face. Still, he thought she looked pretty despite the strange appearance, and if nothing else her clothes definitely made an impression.

“Great! So, what exactly are your powers?” Jubilee asked, walking inside and taking a seat on Ryan's bed.

“It's... shrinking.”

“Shrinking? Neat! So you make stuff smaller?”Jubilee casually took off her boots and kicked her bare feet out over the floor, splaying her toes to let the fresh air blow through them. “Ahhh! So nice...”

“Um, not exactly. I can't shrink other things, or at least I don't think so; I only shrink myself, and it's never on purpose. It kinda just happens at random.”

“Oh. Well, that's still pretty neat! But you say you can't control it at all? I bet that's gotta be really annoying. How small do you usually get?”

“Smaller than an inch.”

“Really? Wow, that's so tiny! You'd be just like an itty-bitty little bug! Hmm... Can you think of anything that there was in common between all those different times your powers activated? Anything that might have triggered it?”

“N-no, nothing ,” Ryan said. The truth was, he actually did have a pretty good idea of what caused him to shrink, but he didn't want to say that it was caused by attraction; it was too embarrassing.

“Try thinking harder. I'm sure there must be something you're missing; these things are never completely random. If you learn what it is then you'll find the key to controlling your powers, and then you'll be able to shrink and grow back to normal whenever you want. And I'll get to see how cute you look when you're all tiny!”

As soon as Jubilee said that, Ryan knew he was in for another shrinking episode. Sure enough, only a few seconds had passed when he felt that familiar tingling sensation that he had come to dread so much spreading out from his chest to envelop his whole body. Then he could only watch as the world started to grow around him. In no time at all his head reached no further up than the bed, and when his shrinking finished after just half a minute, he was standing on the floor at a mere quarter of an inch tall, while jubilee looked at him wide-eyed from above.

“Wow!” she uttered, standing up and walking up to him, the floor shaking with her every step. When she stopped, her feet were resting on the floor right in front of him, filling the air he breathed with a strong cheesy smell that made his eyes water. “You really are tiny! Looks like my wish came true. Did you shrink for me, little guy?”

“No, it happened on its own; I couldn't do anything to stop it.”

“Then, did you notice anything in particular that might have triggered it this time?” Ryan shook his head. “Looks like it's gonna take more time for us to figure this out, then. But, it's a good start! Unfortunately, I don't think we'll be able to work on it much until the next time it triggers. Say, how long are you usually stuck at that size?”

“Usually I'm back to normal when I wake up the next morning.”

“So you're gonna be tiny all day? Sounds rough. Don't worry, though, I'll keep you safe with me until you're back to your normal size!”

“Y-you don't have to do that, really. I'm fine on my own.”

“Nonsense! I'm responsible for your safety, and I'm not letting anything happen to you. You're coming with me, little guy!” Jubilee leaned over to pick him up, her huge gloved fingers seizing his tiny body and easily lifting him up to her face, where her massive eyes peered down at him. “But where should I keep you? It's gotta be somewhere you won't fall off from, and where you won't get hurt. Maybe... Oh, I know!”

Jubilee walked back to the bed and, crouching, she lowered Ryan to the opening of what looked to him like a huge vertical tunnel, which he recognized as one of her boots once the smell reached him. Before he could object, Jubilee's fingers let go of him and he fell right down the shaft of her boot to land on the soft, humid insole. While he was picking himself up, the boot suddenly moved, causing him to roll onto his back, and as he looked up through the opening he saw Jubilee's grinning face.

“Hope you're comfy! I'm gonna be busy for a while so you're gonna have to stay down there for now, but I'll check up on you when I get the chance. Anyway, see ya later!” With that her face disappeared and was soon replaced with a massive bare foot, house-sized toes wiggling to make way as it slid into the boot. Ryan got up and tried to run away from Jubilee's foot, but it was much faster than him and soon the sweaty flesh was barreling over him, sliding him along the boots insole even as it smothered him under countless tons of warm, sweaty flesh.

Jubilee's toes wiggled as her foot settled into the boot. Focusing on her sole, she could just barely feel Ryan down there, fidgeting underneath her like a tiny little bug. She took a while to enjoy that feeling before putting her other boot on and leaving his room.

Ryan would go on to spend the next several hours inside Jubilee's boot, flattened under her immense weight, his tiny body buried between her soft foot and the insole, all the while his surroundings kept getting hotter and more humid. Sweat seeped off her foot and onto him and his clothes nonstop, soaking him entirely and even threatening to drown him as it filled the tight space.

After some time, when Jubilee was sitting down, he was able to get himself unstuck from her sweaty sole and crawl out from under her foot. Just as he did, though, Jubilee got up again, and when she started walking he was thrown all around inside her boot, her every step bouncing him between her foot and the walls, until eventually he landed between her toes.

As the tiny mutant wriggled around, trying to free himself from her toes, Jubilee felt something moving down there and curled her toes reflexively, smothering him between them, never once suspecting that it was him she gripped between her toes. Really, she was too focused on other stuff to even remember that she had left him in her boot, so she assumed it was just some piece of lint that she felt, and she started unconsciously toying with him, wiggling her toes to roll him between them, or pinning him under them to amuse herself by sliding him around her insole. Ryan tried to resist, but her toes were much too strong for him; even her little toe was twice his height, and if it weren't for his powers protecting him it could have easily crushed him like a bug all by itself.

Ryan was overwhelmed. Even though he'd shrunk down many times before, he had always hidden away so that no one would find him while he was small, and he'd never been this close to another person while shrunken down. He felt so weak, so defenseless, unable to fight back against anything Jubilee did. It scared him, but at the same time a small part of him thought it was exciting in a strange way; it almost wanted for him to stay this small and to have her keep toying with him all day long.

At last, after a long day of helping out the younger students at the X-Mansion, Jubilee arrived at her room, tired but satisfied at having done a good job today. She took off her boots and aired out her feet, and as she splayed her toes, Ryan fell off and landed on the floor, right in front of her massive, towering soles. The tiny teen couldn't help but gawk at them, taking in their immense size and power. He felt so small standing in their shadow, especially with Jubilee not even knowing he was there. He really was just an insignificant little bug to her now, completely beneath her notice.

After resting on her bed for a while, Jubilee got back up and almost stepped on Ryan again. The tiny boy had ended up right between her toes, shaking from the scare but thankfully safe from her foot. Then Jubilee went over to her closet and started changing into her nightwear, first taking off all her clothes and putting them away.

Ryan turned his back to her as she was changing, not so much out of respect for her privacy but because he feared that if he saw her with her clothes off he would shrink again. He'd never shrunk down more than once in a single day before, but it was better to be safe about that stuff, considering this was already almost the smallest he'd ever been.

He only turned back when he heard her walking towards him, and he looked at her just in time to see her immense foot swinging towards him, filling him with fear. Ryan turned to ran as fast as he could go, trying to get away before she could step on him, but he was much too slow and her giant foot slammed down on him just a fraction of a second later, instantly flattening him. And though her foot went up shortly after, Ryan remained stuck to her sole, fastened to it by a thin layer of sweat and dust. The tiny mutant went up together with her foot, and was swung forward at incredible speeds before being slammed back onto the floor beneath her foot.

The same thing would happen a couple more times before Jubilee finally climbed onto her bed and sat with her back against the headboard. Crossing her legs, she grabbed a book she'd been reading and flipped through its pages before stopping on the latest chapter. Meanwhile, Ryan was now caught between both her feet, which rubbed softly against each other while she immersed herself in her book, unaware of his plight as she rolled him up and down her sole.

Eventually, though, Ryan was left near her toes, and after taking a moment to recover his strengths, he climbed up to reach the towering digits, giving a sign of relief once he pulled himself up between her second and third toes. From there he looked out at the rest of her body, seeing it stretch before him like some colossal monument, almost a landscape in its own right.

She looked super cute now that she was out of that bulky yellow jacket she'd been wearing earlier, and he couldn't help but stare at her trim and fit body in her blue shorts and tank top, dwelling especially on her chest and midriff, but when he realized what he was doing he quickly shook his head to clear those thoughts away before they made him shrink. Still, he figured he'd be at constant risk of shrinking as long as he was around someone so pretty, so he hurried to try and get her attention by shouting and waving at her, and when that didn't work, he started rubbing her toes so she would feel him. She did eventually notice some annoying sensation down on her toes, and to deal with it she squeezed them tight and rubbed them together, smothering Ryan in her flesh. While trapped between them, Ryan fought to free himself, which only made the annoying sensation she felt persist so she would keep wiggling her toes.

Eventually, though, when the feeling wouldn't go away, she decided to look at what was causing it. “Ryan? Oh, man, I'm so sorry! I totally forgot about you!” she said, plucking him out from between her toes. “Are you okay? How long were you trying to get my attention just now?”

“Only a little while,” he said, looking up at her face. Goodness, she really was pretty, with her frizzy black hair, brown eyes, and especially her plush red lips. He couldn't help but wonder what it might feel like if she kissed him at this size. “And I'm fine, thanks for asking.”

“Oh, that's good. I see you're still the same size as before. I guess that means you haven't figured out how to grow back yet, right?” Ryan nodded. “That's what I thought. Well, I can't say I'm sorry, since at least this way I get to have you all cute and tiny. You don't mind keeping me company a bit longer, do you?”

“Uh, n-no, I think that's f-fine. I... I...” Ryan strained with the effort of keeping his feelings under control, but it was no use; from the moment she called him “cute” he had already felt another bout of shrinking coming on; it started just a couple seconds later, and soon it had left him at half of his previous size, smaller even than most ants.

Jubilee watched him in amazement at first, but then she smiled and got all excited. “No way! You got even smaller! This is so cool! You're so tiny I can barely even make out your face. Man, I must seem huge to you; I bet I look as big as a mountain!” She leaned in close, so close that Ryan could see his reflection in her eyeball as she stared at him. “I wonder what made you shrink. Do you have any idea?” Ryan shook his head. “I wonder if it has anything to do with my feet. I remember I you shrank the first time only a little while after I took off my boots. But you didn't shrink while you were in my boots so maybe that's not it? Let's try it and see to make sure!”

Jubilee moved Ryan closer to her feet, which were now resting sideways on the bed with their soles held against each other. She held him up over them, and when she let go, he fell slipped down her soles until he was firmly wedged between them, barely able to move. Before he could try to get out, she pressed her soles firmly together and started sliding them back and forth against each other, rolling him around between them as easily as if he had been a tiny pebble.

Knowing by now that there was nothing he could do about it, Ryan surrendered himself to the might of Jubilee's feet, letting her toy with him as she pleased.

After rolling him between her soles for a bit, she then moved her feet apart and looked to see if he had shrunk any smaller, but when she saw that he was still the same size, she pressed down on him with her finger, pushing him deep into her foot flesh. Under that massive finger he was slid all over her sole, from her heel to her toes, and even between them. She basically used him as a tool to clean her foot, gathering up all her sweat and dirt and even a bit of toe jam on his tiny body until he was totally caked in the stuff. He groaned in disgust at the smell and at the feeling of it on his body, but even so there was some part of him that was getting all excited about it and for a while he feared that it would make him shrink even smaller. Thankfully, he was still the same size when she moved her finger away and left him to pick himself up on her sole and turn to look at her immense looming figure.

“Still nothing. I guess it doesn't have anything to do with my feet, then. Hmm...” Jubilee stared at the tiny boy intently, trying to figure out what else there had been in common between the two times he'd shrunk. As she tried to think of an answer, she idly scrunched her foot and wiggled her toes, amusing herself by watching how those minor movements transformed the surface of her sole, causing Ryan to be swallowed up in the folds of her skin, or forcing him to cling helplessly to her skin so he wouldn't be thrown off.

“He's just so adorable,” she thought as she looked at him. “Wait, that's it! I remember both times you shrank it was right after I called you cute! So then, if I call you cute again, you'll probably shrink. Or that's the theory, anyway. How about we try it out. Come on, won't you shrink for me, you little cutie?”

Even knowing what was coming and steeling himself for it, Jubilee calling him a “cutie”, especially in that tone, still left Ryan so flustered that he couldn't stop himself from shrinking and he ended up losing half of his remaining height again.

“Oh, my! You're so tiny I can barely even tell you're a person now. Now my foot by itself must look like a mountain compared to little-old-you. And my toes...” she carefully picked up the flea-sized boy between her fingernails and dropped him on her second toe. “My toes look like giants next to you!”

Jubilee laughed as a slight wiggle of her toes made Ryan cling fearfully to her skin, trying not to be flung off by her mighty toes. It amused her to no end seeing how scared he was of just her toes, and yet how desperately he sought their protection. After a while she curled her toes and engulfed him in her skin, leaving him trapped in a tiny wrinkle under the crook of her toe. Even focusing all she could on that part of her foot, she could just barely feel him fidgeting around—any smaller and she wouldn't be able to feel him at all. Then he'd be like a tiny little germ living on her body. 

That idea got her so excited; she just had to make him even smaller! “Won't you shrink again for me now, cutie?” she said, and was disappointed when he remained the same size, even after calling him cute again. “What's the matter? Is that the smallest you can get? Or are you trying not to shrink? Or maybe I was wrong. Maybe it's not just calling you cute that makes you shrink. Maybe the thing that makes you shrink is how warm and fuzzy you felt when I called you cute all those times. Isn't that right, little cutie?” Jubilee smiled warmly at the tiny boy. “Well, Ryan, how about this; if you shrink smaller for me, I promise you'll by my very special little boy forever. What do you say? Will you be my little cutie?”

Jubilee's smile so beguiled Ryan that he didn't offer up the least bit of resistance when he felt the next bout of shrinking coming on. He surrendered himself to it, and quickly started shrinking at an incredible rate, shrinking until the sole around him was transformed into a whole landscape of vast mountain ranges and giant lakes of sweat, extending as far as his eyes could see. In the sky, Jubilee's face loomed a large as the moon, her eyes twinkling in delight as they looked at the spot where he had shrunk out of visibility.

“Thanks, Ryan! You really made my day!” She said, her voice blasting over him like the shockwave of a powerful explosion. As she scrunched her sole, Ryan watched in fear and awe as the whole landscape was transformed by the simple gesture, and his puny mind almost broke trying to comprehend her amazing power. “And now, a very special reward for my very special boy.” Jubilee moved her foot closer and Ryan watched her face growing larger and larger in the sky, her lips in particular rushing straight towards him. Then her lower lip fell on him, and as he was smothered between her sole and her lip, he felt an incredible warmth come over him and started shrinking yet again.

“Mwah! Good night now, Ryan. Maybe I'll see you tomorrow,” she said, unaware that the tiny boy was now rapidly shrinking down to nothingness. Already her toes alone were the size of planets compared to him, and they were still getting larger by the second. Soon, he knew, they would be as big as suns, and the thought alone excited him so much that it pushed him to shrink ever smaller, hoping that at some point this foot would become his whole universe. He might never stop shrinking and he was totally fine with that; just as long as he could spend the rest of his insignificant life on the infinite Goddess that was Jubilee.

It happened the moment Nightwing—Dick Grayson—set foot in Power Girl's apartment. Unseen sensors detected Dick's entrance and triggered the security measures that Kara had set up, shooting a beam at him that knocked him out cold. Hours later, when Dick finally awoke, groaning under what was almost the worst headache he'd ever had, the young hero  looked around and found himself in a vast empty plain, or so it looked to him in this darkness and with his vision still a bit blurry.

Just then he felt a faint tremor and heard something like a distant explosion. By the time he had turned towards the noise, another tremor and another boom had already reached him. Many more followed, getting more intense over time, making the young hero tense up in preparation for whatever was coming. But despite all his years of training and experience facing some of the most unbelievable situations any man had ever encountered, Dick was not prepared for what he saw next.

All of a sudden the darkness parted and he saw the backlit silhouette of a giant person standing in an equally giant doorway. This person took a step forward, and, as they reached a hand to the side, all of a sudden the world was flooded with light. That was when Dick realized exactly where he was and what had happened.

He wasn't in some barren wasteland or great empty chamber as he had believed at first, but rather inside Kara's apartment, exactly where he had been before passing out. The reason for the confusion was simple: he had been shrunk, and at his much-reduced size, the familiar environs of the apartment were transformed into an entirely new world, unlike any he had ever seen before. The sight of that world alone would have been enough to leave him awed, but right then there was something still more impressive that left him gawking stupidly: Kara herself.

Having just returned home after an evening out on the town, enjoying the civilian life without a care in the world, Kara Zor-L, alias Karen Starr, now stood before Dick like a living, breathing mountain. No, not a mountain—her boots alone were enough to put mountains to shame. She was so immense, and moved with such incredible speed and power, that Dick's puny mind couldn't make sense of what he was seeing. His thoughts ceased and his jaw dropped as he saw her turn to close the door behind her, the earth shaking with each minor shuffle of her feet. He only snapped out of his trance when she turned back towards him and he saw her enormous foot rise up and begin swinging towards him, threatening to flatten him under the sole of her boot.

“Kara!” the speck-sized hero cried out, hoping that the Kryptonian's superior hearing would let him be heard. He was so relieved when her foot stopped mid-swing and fell back on the floor far, far away from him while Kara looked down, looking his way. “Kara! Over here!” he called again, waving desperately at the heroine, until her eyebrows rose in surprise.

A sigh escaped Nghtwing's lips, and a great relief filled him... at least until he saw Kara's look of surprise transform into a much-amused grin. “Well, well, would you look at that? Who ever thought you of all people would be the first to fall for my new security system?” she said in a tone that told Dick she had been drinking recently, her voice booming over him with all the might of a hundred thunderclaps. “So what's a guy like you doing breaking into an innocent young woman's apartment at night? You weren't up to anything naughty, were you?”

“I just... heard you were moving in and I thought I'd pay you a visit,” Dick explained.

“And you didn't think to wait until I came back instead of breaking in? That's against the law, you know. And as a hero, it's my duty to make sure that people like you get punished for your crimes. Now, what am I going to do with little old you?” Kara stepped forward, setting her feet down to either side of Dick, each impact of her giant boots sending a shockwave that sent him bouncing and rolling along the floor for what to him were dozens of yards. When he finally came to a stop and looked up, he saw Kara crouching down over him and felt as if the whole sky were falling down to crush him.

After crouching, Kara let herself fall back, her ass crashing onto the floor like a world-ending meteor, causing the biggest earthquake Dick had felt in his life. Then she giggled and reached to tug on her shoestrings. “You mind if I get comfortable? No? Oh, good,” she said, and took off her boots and socks before letting her bare feet thump down next to Dick. With her heels on the floor and her soles in the air, the powerful smell of her feet was quick to reach the speck-sized hero, assaulting his nostrils with a sharp cheesy scent that hit like a truck. Just as bad was the heat and humidity that came with the smell, making him feel like he'd jumped right into a steaming hot sauna.

He watched in horror as water droplets, small as a grain of sand to her but bigger than a two story house for him, condensed on the cool tiled floor all around him, one of them nearly overtaking his body. At the same time, the world kept shaking as Kara moved her feet teasingly overhead, scrunching her soles and wiggling her toes, bringing them so low that he feared she was going to crush him.

From this close up Dick could see very last detail of her colossal soles, from the bulging and stretching of her skin with each errant movement down, to the pulse of her Kryptonian blood rushing through her veins, to the tiniest wrinkles and sweat pores, all of which bore a tiny little droplet on their surface.

And while he was fearing from his life beneath Kara's soles, gawking at her feet and hoping she wasn't so drunk as to crush him by accident, Kara simply smiled, enjoying the power she held over the little germ at her feet. “Mmm, it feels so good to finally be out of those boots,” she said, splaying her toes wide apart to peer down at Dick through them. “Stinks, doesn't it? That's what happens when you spend all day walking and never take your shoes off. I'd say I'm sorry, but this is what you deserve for the crime of breaking in. In fact, now that I think about it, being under my feet is the perfect place for a speck of dust like you. It would be so fitting to crush you like the little bug you are so you can never break the law again. All I would have to do is put down my foot. Just. Like. This.”

Dick watched in horror as Kara demonstrated for him, slowly lowering her foot towards him, her sole coming to fill more and more of his field of view until it was pretty much all he could see when he looked up, and still it kept coming lower. “Kara!” he yelled. “Quit messing around! You're seriously going to crush me! Kara? Kara! Stop!” But her foot still came closer, millimeter by millimeter, until it was so close that its shadow had turned his world pitch black. At that point it finally, hovering directly over him.

Dick held his breath, and not only because the smell had gotten still stronger. Then, after what felt like several minutes, Kara's foot fell on to him so quickly that he barely even had time to shut his eyes before it hit the floor. By reflex he raised his arms to defend himself, only to realize after the fact that he hadn't been crushed. And yet, the foot had definitely hit the ground; he had heard it happen. How had he survived? And why was he still standing? Curious, he turned on his mask's night vision and quickly discovered how he had survived: by being so small that he fit very neatly in one of the grooves of Kara's footprint.

Her skin stretched around him like the walls and ceiling of a tunnel at least a hundred paces wide, in what was the starkest sign of his own insignificance he'd yet encountered. The sight left him trembling in fear as he realized just how close he'd come to being crushed under her foot—how close to it he still was, considering she could simply slide her foot a fraction of an inch and either of those huge walls of skin would come barreling over his puny self, reducing him to a smear on the floor.

He was still deeply shaken when Kara raised her foot again and moved it aside to look at him. “See how easy that was? You're lucky I didn't actually try to crush you or you would've been toast.” Kara smiled and wiggled her toes, enjoying the look on his face.

“K-Kara, you need to stop this right now. You're not in a good state of mind to be messing around like this. You could seriously hurt me!”

“Oh, relax~! Nothin' bad's gonna happen to you. You'd be fine even if I did step on you. Or at least you wouldn't be crushed; with how small you are, you might drown in a little drop of my sweat!” Kara laughed and wiggled her toes together with enough force to send tiny sweat droplets splashing onto the floor.

As soon as the deluge began, Dick started running this way and that, trying to dodge the great liquid spheres falling towards him, only to be caught in one tiny droplet hardly any bigger than a grain of sand. He was pulled into the sphere and tried to swim out, but just as his head was about to exit, the droplet's surface stretched upwards along with his face, and at the same time he felt it pulling him back in. He tried with all his might to force his way through, but he simply couldn't manage; the surface tension was too much for the puny hero.

Still, with his lungs now aching for air, he couldn't afford to give up, especially with Kara seeming so content to just sit back and watch him slowly suffocate, laughing at his struggles and wiggling her toes in delight, her actions causing microscopic ripples on the droplet's surface.

“What's the matter?” she said, leaning in so close that her face just about filled Dick's field of view. “Didn't you ever learn how to swim? Come on, you just have a little bit further to go; not even a single millimeter. Are you really going to make me rescue you after you went and broke into my home? What a little nuisance you are. But I guess breaking and entering isn't a serious enough crime to warrant the death penalty, so... alright, I'll help you out. Just stay veeery still for me.”

Fighting now not to escape but to keep himself from passing out before Kara decided to help him, Dick watched helplessly as she straightened back up and brought her foot closer to him until her toes were hanging over him. Kara lowered her foot so that the droplet was right between her first two toes, then closed her toes together so that he and the droplet were both swept up by her big toe, barreled over by the mountain of flesh and flattened under Kara's warm and sweaty skin.

Even though it was just a single toe, the pressure bearing down on Dick was immense. He wasn't sure how he survived, though he vaguely remembered hearing something about the shrinking process giving bodies increased resistance. Only problem was, he still couldn't breathe under all that pressure, with his whole body being smothered under Kara's toe. It wasn't until Kara lifted her foot a bit that he could finally lift his face out of the thin layer of sweat that covered her skin and get a breath of air—air tainted with the smell of her foot, but still the sweetest breath he ever had.

Once he'd taken a few good breaths, Dick looked around and saw what looked like an series of hills and valleys stretching all around him, much of it covered with a clear liquid that seeped out of giant pools to flow over every nook and cranny—the alien landscape of Kara's toe, he realized, and shivered as he heard her giggling again. Slowly the shrunken hero looked up, and sure enough there was Kara's face, or more specifically, her eye. Her inky black pupil, laser focused on the tiny hero, seemed about ready to swallow him up, and Dick trembled under its gaze, feeling as if he were staring up at the judging eye of some all-powerful deity.

“What a tiny little thing you are. If I didn't have super vision, I wouldn't be able to tell you apart from a germ. How does it feel to be so small you're invisible to most people?” Following Kara's question, the whole world seemed to shake as she wiggled her toe, almost launching Dick off her foot if not for the swamp of her sweat holding him fast to her skin. Then Kara's second toe, which had been hanging in the sky all this time, closed in on Dick, until he found himself smothered between both of her toes.

As those toes wiggled together, Dick was slid miles and miles along Kara's skin, as helpless to resist as the specks or germs she had compared him to. He was completely at her mercy, and Kara had no qualms in taking advantage of it, amusing herself by showing him just how puny and pathetic he was compared to her now.

By the time she finished, Dick lay as limp as a rag doll on a tiny mound of toe jam at the base of her toes, nearly unconscious after the beating he'd just taken. It took him another couple of minutes to fully wake up and crawl out of Kara's toe jam, only to collapse on her skin the second he was out, rolling onto his back to see her godly smirking face beaming down at him. “Please... no more... I beg you,” he managed to say.

All covered in her sweat and toe jam, Kara had to admit the shrunken hero was a truly pitiful sight. At any other time she would have done anything to help him out. But right then she was positively intoxicated with the power she held over him, a power which felt somehow different from the one granted her by this world's yellow sun, and which she couldn't resist lording over him. “Are you really that desperate to get away from my little old foot? Tell you what: I'll grow you back just as soon as you finish cleaning my entire foot, from heel to toes. And if you don't like that? Well I guess you'll just have to spend the rest of your life living as a germ between my toes. Don't worry though; I'll make sure you'll have plenty of toe jam to eat and sweat to drink if you want to live on me, and I'll play with you every day so you don't get bored. I'm sure you'll be very happy as my little pet germ!”

After teasing him by wiggling her toes again, Kara gave a yawn and stretched before standing back up. Secure in the knowledge that her sweat would keep Dick held fast to her foot, she went to the kitchen for a quick snack and some water. While she ate she kept curling her toes together every so often to enjoy the feeling of her little friend squirming as he was trapped within the folds of her skin. After finishing her meal she brushed her teeth and then went to her room, where she crawled onto her bed without even bothering to take off her clothes.

Almost as soon as she lay down she started snoring softly, the sound of her breathing reaching Dick where he lay between her toes. Slowly the shrunken man crawled up until he could stand up, then looked out at the vast landscape of Kara's sole—miles and miles of dirty, sweaty skin shaken by tremors whenever the Kryptonian's foot twitched in her sleep—stretching ahead of him and rising up to peak at her heel. It would take him at least a day to traverse it all, let alone to clean it like she'd asked him to.

Had she been serious about that, or was it just a joke? Would she still want him to clean her foot when she woke up sober tomorrow, or would she feel sorry for what she'd done and apologize to him? He hoped for the latter, but he had the sense it would be the former; she'd been way too into all this for it to be just the alcohol making her act like that. And she had been developing a bit of a domineering streak recently.

“Guess I'd better get started, then,” he sighed, and got down on his hands and knees to start cleaning up her foot, gathering any bits of dirt or grime he could casually carry at this size and tossing them off her foot. He worked diligently, pushing himself through his exhaustion, until all of a sudden an errant twitch of Kara's foot sent him falling back down to her toes, where a slight curl was enough to keep him trapped in a little wrinkle on her skin. He tried for several minutes to free himself, but seeing that it was no use, he sighed and gave up, snuggling up in Kara's warm flesh to get some rest for the long day of work ahead of him.

Trinh had just finished making breakfast when her mother Phuong entered the kitchen, bidding her good morning.

“Good morning, mom. Did you sleep well?” Trinh served Phuong a cup of tea and a small plate of food, which the fit middle-aged woman graciously took and started eating.

“Thank you, Trinh. And yes, I did. I feel great this morning!”

“That's good to hear, “Trinh said, sitting down with her own tea and breakfast. “Do you have any work today?” she asked, curious to hear about what city her mother would be visiting today. For a couple weeks now Phuong had been working from home, opening portals to other worlds where she grew to giant size and rampaged through their cities, all while being paid for it. Trinh didn't understand what Lorraine, her mother's boss, got out of it, but as long as Phuong was being paid she didn't think it mattered.

“No, not today; this is my day off. But tomorrow definitely! It's going to be a big city, maybe the biggest one I've ever been to. It's so big, I think I might need two days to finish destroying it; I'll probably be gone all day tomorrow, and most of the day after.”

“All day? Are you sure that's really necessary? I mean, you can take a break, can't you? You shouldn't push yourself too hard, mother.”

“Relax! I know how to cake care of myself, daughter. Besides, rampaging through these cities is almost as good as a break for me; I don't think I'll ever get tired of it! But, if you're really worried, why don't you come along and join me?”

“Join you? You mean grow giant and go on a rampage with you? Would that even be possible?”

“I don't see why not. Lorraine has many of those bracelets; I'm sure I could convince her to let you borrow one. What do you say? Want to help your dear mother out? You could think of it as our mother-daughter bonding time.”

“I...”

“What are you talking about?”

Trinh's head whipped around to face the kitchen entrance, where she saw her son and daughter, Van and Hoa. Hoa looked confused, and a bit curious, but Van's face was lit up with excitement. “Are you going on another trip, grandma? Can I come with you again? Pleeeeease? You told me I could if I behaved. I've been good since then, haven't I?”

Trinh was taken aback by her son's insistence, and she opened her mouth to chastise him for not being respectful enough, but before she could say anything Hoa jumped in. “Oh, are you talking about grandma's new job?” she said. “Van told me all about how he got to see you grow huge and smash up a whole city! Is that true, grandma? Are you going to go smash up another one? Please tell me I can come along; it's not fair if you let Van see you like that but not me!”

While Trinh gaped at her children in disbelief, Phuong simply burst out laughing. “Easy, kids! You haven't even told your mother and me good morning yet; don't be in such a rush to talk about other things.” The kids apologized and meekly greeted their mom and grandma, taking a seat at the table with them. “That's better. Now, will I take you with me to work? Normally I would, but this time I'm going to be very busy all day long, and I won't have the time to spare on taking care of you two. But, if your mom agrees to come and help me out, then I'm sure it would be no trouble to bring you along.”

“Please, mom, please!” Van and Hoa said immediately, turning to their mom. “Let's go with grandma together! Then we can see both of you smashing everything up!”

“Well, what do you say, Trinh? Will you listen to your children?” Phuong asked her with a grin.

Trinh frowned at her mother—the nerve of her, using Trinh's own children to help convince her! Still, she couldn't stay mad for long. “Do you promise they'll be safe if they come with us?” she asked her mother.

“Of course! I can get something from Lorraine that will keep them perfectly safe, and to bring them back home if they get separated from us.”

“And do you kids promise to behave, and to listen to everything your grandmother and I say?”

“We promise!”

“Then I guess it should be fine if we all go with her.”

“Thank you mom! You're the best!” The kids say, running to hug their mother, and after a second, Trinh hugged them back.

“Okay now, sit down so you can have breakfast. Mom, since it's your day off, would you mind taking care of the kids for a bit? I need to do some things to get ready for our trip tomorrow.”

“Of course I don't mind taking care of my grandchildren! But how exactly are you going to get ready?”

“Well, maybe it's silly, but... if I'm going to be rampaging in these peoples' city, crushing the people and wrecking all their buildings, I think for their sake I should try to look my best while doing it, so I'm going to the beauty salon to get my hair and skin taken care of, and maybe get a pedicure while I'm at it.”

“That sounds like a great idea! You go right ahead and don't worry about a thing; I'll be here taking care of the kids for as long as you need.”

“Thanks, mom,” Trinh said and went to serve her kids breakfast, feeling all excited over the coming day.

On the following morning, Trinh and her family all gathered together in Phuong's room after breakfast for their trip to this other world. Trinh sported a simple but elegant áo bà ba—a white shirt with a pair of dark blue pants, close-fitting to emphasize her figure while still providing a sense of modesty—together with a bamboo nón lá hat and her best pair of sandals. She had thought about wearing one of her traditional Vietnamese dresses to look even better for the people they were going to crush, but decided against it since she didn't want to get it dirty; these clothes were more appropriate while still making her look good.

Her long black hair hung almost perfectly straight down to her shoulders, and her dark skin, soft and smooth as velvet after her visit to the beauty parlor, had a healthy sheen to it. Her toenails had been trimmed and lacquered in the same hue as her pants, and her soles had been cured of all blemishes or calluses.

She looked beautiful, as her mother and children had remarked after seeing her yesterday, yet she still worried about how she'd be seen in the world they were visiting today. Would the people there think her pretty too? She feared that they wouldn't. At the same time, looking at her mother, she couldn't imagine that anyone in this world or any other would think Phuong was anything less than beautiful.

Not that she had done anything special to look good for this trip—she was wearing very casual clothes exactly like she usually wore around the house, just a plain white sweater and a pair of black knee-length pants, going completely barefoot—that was just how she usually looked. Trinh had always been a bit insecure about her looks compared to her mother's. Though Phuong, her children, and indeed everyone else, often told her how pretty she was, she never quite believed them, thinking herself simply average and getting awfully shy whenever anyone insisted otherwise.

As for Van and Hoa, they were also dressed in casual clothing, though, after seeing how her mom looked, Hoa wished she would have dressed up nicely too. Then again, she wasn't going to be the one going on a rampage, so it didn't matter as much.

“Okay, is everyone ready?” Phuong asked. All the others nodded. “Good. Then let's get going, shall we?” She held up her left arm, which had a fancy high-tech bracelet wrapped around its wrist—Trinh wore an identical one, while Van and Hoa wore simpler designs which lacked the full functionality of the others—and, after making sure that it showed the right destination, she pressed a button and opened up a portal with a view to a big, sprawling city right in the middle of the room. “Okay, let's go!” She went through to the other side, after which Hoa and Van and finally Trinh all stepped in after her, all of them emerging on a small field of dried grass on the outskirts of the city, near a highway filled with hundreds of furiously honking cars, all sitting still on the road though with their engines rumbling and smoke coming out of their tailpipes.

“Ugh! It stinks so bad here!” Hoa said, covering up her nose to try to mask the stench of exhaust fumes that filled the air, not only down there but also above, dimming the light of this world's red sun.

“It really does, doesn't it?” Phuong said. “Don't worry, kids, your mom and I will take care of all those polluting cars in a jiffy. Are you ready, Trinh?” Her daughter nodded. “Alright! Now, just press the buttons like I told you and... boop! You'll be growing just like me!” Demonstrating the process for Trinh, Phuong pressed the growth button and sent her height surging massively.

As Phuong expanded up to a hundred times her normal size, Trinh and the children watched her in awe, their hearts racing in excitement to see the middle-aged woman towering over them like a skyscraper, growing so large that her mere toes dwarfed them all. “Ohh, that feels sooo good!” Phuong said, stretching her body to enjoy her incredible power, while down on the ground her family felt the earth tremble beneath them at the slightest shift of her body mass. Then she looked down, smiling at her tiny family and wiggling her toes before them, each impact of the house-sized digits against the ground sending a new tremor to rock their world. “Well? How do I look?” she asked, lifting a foot up on its toes and showing off her beautiful sole to her family.

“Wow, grandma. You look amazing!” the children said, echoing Trinh's thoughts as they eagerly ran forward to jump on their grandma's toes, clambering all over Phuong's foot as if it were a playground.

“Kids! Get down from there! You'll get hurt!” Trinh said. Their mother nearly had a heart attack when Phuong laughed and wiggled her toes again, almost throwing the kids off her foot.

“Relax, Trinh; I told you their bracelets will protect them from just about anything. They'll be fine even if they fall...” Phuong turned her foot over, sending Hoa and Van tumbling off. “... or if I step on them.” She raised her foot over the kids while they still lay on the ground, and both of them gawked silently at their grandma's massive sole as it slowly descended onto them, to finally leave them smothered underneath.

Trinh watched it all in horror, terrified for the lives of her children, while at the same time feeling a twinge of jealousy, wishing she were the one being stepped on by the giant Phuong. She was greatly relieved when her mother's foot went up again, releasing Van and Hoa, both unharmed but looking utterly awestruck. “Kids! Are you okay?” she asked, running over to them while her mother still kept her sole hanging over them.

“Yeah, we're fine, mom,” they said quietly. “That was so amazing! You have to feel what it's like!”

“Some other time, maybe. Now stand up and get yourselves cleaned up, Trinh said, brushing the dirt and grass off Van and Hoa's clothes while leading them out from under their grandma's foot and trying not to stare at the giant sole.

“Why don't you join me now, daughter? I'm sure the kids want to see you as a giantess too,” Phuong said, crouching down to dote on her tiny family.

“Yeah, do it, mom! We want to see you grow huge!”

“Okay, okay. Stand back kids,” Trinh said, holding her finger over the bracelet's growth button. She waited until her children were standing next to Phuong's feet, then took a deep breath and pressed the button.

Immediately she was flooded with a potent energy that made her feel tingly all over as her body rapidly expanded. Her eyes grew wide at the sight of the whole world shrinking around her and the amazing sensation of her own growth, and was deeply disappointed when it all came to a stop, leaving her just short of six hundred feet tall—a little bit taller than Phuong. She looked at her mom's smiling face in disbelief, then down at her feet when she heard a pair of squeaky voices coming from below.

“Mom! You're so big!” Van and Hoa said, rushing to their mom's feet to climb on her sandals and crawl under her toes. Their tiny bodies tickled Trinh's foot, making her toes wiggle reflexively before she forced them to sit still.

“Van, Hoa, get out of there right now!” she said, deathly worried for her children while at the same time being filled with wonder to see them the size of mere bugs at her toes. “Kids, I'm serious! How can I trust you to stay safe on this journey is you won't even listen to what I say?”

“Oh, you don't have to worry about that,” Phuong said. “I brought a little something so we can make sure they don't get lost or get in the way when we're working. Here, put this on.” She handed Trinh a little red string tied in a loop with the ends hanging loose.

“How is this supposed to help?” Trinh asked, taking the string from her mother. Phuong didn't answer, instead crouching next to Trinh.

“Van, come out for a second, will you, dear?” Phuong said while slipping the string over her foot, using it as an anklet. When Van crawled out from under his mom's toes, she picked the boy up and brought him over to her own foot, tying him up with the loose ends of string to leave him dangling from her anklet like a cute little figurine. “Now you do the same with Hoa.”

Trinh followed her mother's lead, teasing her daughter out from under her foot and tying her up with the rest string to dangle by her ankle. Then she moved her foot a bit to make sure that Hoa wouldn't fall off, listening to her “tiny” daughter giggling as she was swung back and forth.

“So, are you ready to get to work?” Phuong asked her daughter; Trinh nodded. “Alright! You can start by following my lead. When you're more comfortable you can go work by yourself, or we can rampage together; either way is fine!” With that she led Trinh over to the road leading up to the city, where the thousands of people stuck in traffic had long since stopped what they were doing to stare in awe at the two giant women who had appeared out of nowhere.

The local people were stunned by Phuong and Trinh's beauty, gaping in awe at them both as they approached, even as the tremors caused by their steps grew stronger and stronger, rattling their cars which next to the two looked like little plastic toys. They only started to get worried when Phuong's shadow came over them, and they realized how close these giant women were to crushing them. Even then, they thought they would still be fine since neither of the giantesses looked cruel or malicious. So they were all very shocked when Phuong raised her foot over a bunch of cars and, still smiling placidly at them, brought it down, slowly crushing dozens of vehicles under her cinnamon-skinned sole, ignoring the pained screams of her victims as they were all crushed alive, until at last they were all flattened and her foot settled down with a wiggle of her toes.

The people could hardly believe what they were seeing. They remained in stunned silence, their faces pale and bloodless, until Phuong's other foot came to swing over more of them. Then the spell was broken and they all started screaming and trying to flee, some getting out of their cars to escape while others drove off the road and over the dried fields, their cars rattling as they sped over the uneven ground. Soon all that remained on the road were just empty vehicles leading all the way up to the city.

Phuong watched it all in great amusement, reveling in the awe and terror of the locals while she continued along the road, crushing their vehicles into crumpled metal sheets, with little Van on her anklet amazed at the power of his grandma's foot crushing all those cars.

Trinh was a bit less thrilled about the peoples' reaction, but she did find it exciting to see how scared they were of her and her mom. Still, she hoped they weren't so scared that they wouldn't appreciate how she had dressed up for them.

At first Trinh walked next to the road, alongside her mother, not feeling confident enough to crush any people yet, but when she saw that all the cars were empty, she let her curiosity lead her feet onto the road so she could see what it felt like to crush them underfoot. Even through her sandals, the sensation of all those tiny little cars and trucks going crunch beneath her was incredible, and she walked the rest of the way trying to step on as many of them as she could.

“It's fun, isn't it?” Phuong said, looking over her shoulder at her daughter. “Just wait until you feel what it's like to step on a group of people; then you'll wish you had this job too!”

As they approached the city, the giantesses saw that nothing moved on the blocks nearest to them, but deeper into the city the streets were jam-packed full of cars and people alike, with everyone yelling as they tried to get away from Trinh and her mother. In their rush to get away, they had caused a really massive traffic jam over much of the city, and now that they saw the giantesses had almost caught up to them, their screams intensified and those who had been honking their horns furiously as though it would help clear up the jam now left their cars and tried to run away.

Trinh followed Phuong as her mother strode confidently past buildings that reached no higher than her hips on her way to the group of people. The road cracked under their feet, and the buildings buckled wherever their bodies happened to graze the structures; it really was an impressive sight for the children tied to the two women's ankles.

“Hello, little ones!” Phuong greeted the tiny people once she had caught up to them, standing behind them all with Trinh looking down at them over her shoulder. Some of the locals stopped running for a moment to look back at them, but most of them kept trying to push past each other. “My name is Phuong and this is my daughter Trinh. I hope you don't mind but we're going to be having some fun in your city. I can tell you're scared but don't worry, everything will turn out fine.”

Trinh was surprised to see that some people had ceased their yelling and now looked at her and Phuong uncertainly. She had always known her mother had a way with people, but she still hadn't expected she'd be able to calm these people down. There was just something in the way she talked and carried herself that seemed to inspire confidence, even as a towering “monster”.

“There you go; that's much better. Now, stand very still for me so I can feel you getting crushed under my sole.” The crowds erupted in fear again as Phuong raised her foot over them, playfully scrunching her sole, and again they started trying to get away. But there were too many cars in the road obstructing their path, and only a handful of them managed to get ahead of her foot when it came down, slowly pressing down on cars and people alike until she could feel all the little people struggling against her sole, silencing all their screams with a sharp crunch and wiggling her toes over their remains.

After Phuong dragged her foot back along the ground, leaving behind many little red streaks amidst the mangled vehicles, Trinh realized she had been holding her breath and exhaled, feeling lightheaded after that spectacle. It took her another few seconds to notice her mother was talking to her.

“Uh... sorry, what did you say?”

Standing at an intersection, Phuong pointed down the street to the left. “There's another group of people this way if you want to take care of them. I'm going straight ahead for now if you'd rather follow me.”

“I think I'll go off on my own now. See you later, mom; good luck with your work.”

“You too, honey!” Phuong said, then turned and strode after the fleeing masses. Trinh watched her for a bit, then walked down the way her mom had directed her, following after the crowd of people. With how big she was it didn't take her long to catch up, but even then she simply followed them silently for many minutes, slowly working up the nerve to talk to them, while admiring how teeny-tiny they were compared to her.

The people weren't sure what to make of her silence. They thought she must be toying with them, letting them stew in their fear before she crushed them mercilessly, and intensified their attempts to escape, though of course they couldn't have gotten far even without for all the vehicles in the way.

Finally, though, Trinh introduced herself to the locals. “Hello, tiny people,” she said, blushing a bit when she remembered they weren't actually tiny, it was just she who was giant. “Um... My name is Trinh. It's nice to meet you. I hope we can be on friendly terms.” The crowd was even more confused about her now, but some of them did slow down a bit when they heard her acting so nice. “I know it's probably really scary for you, but don't worry, even if you die or get hurt my mom will put you all back to how you were once we're finished here. So it'll be fine if I step on you, right?

“A-anyway, I'm going to do that now, okay? Here goes...” She raised her foot over the people furthest back, those who had slowed down after hearing her talk. As they saw the sole of her sandal appear above them, most of them stopped and stared in awe at its size. They didn't even try to run when it started coming closer, and quietly allowed themselves to be pressed to the ground beneath the giant woman's weight.

At first Trinh left her foot resting gently on the crowd people, thrilled to feel their tiny bodies moving beneath her sandal, but then she slowly pressed down on them until one body after another went crunch, shivering as the last of those tiny people were extinguished, with Hoa listening in awe from her ankle. When she raised her foot afterwards, she saw the people were all little more than bloody stains on the ground. Then she went to chase after the rest of the crowd.

Trinh spent all day chasing and crushing the little people, enjoying the feeling of their tiny bodies going crunch under her feet. Each time she caught up to some people she tried to calm them down so they wouldn't be as scared of her, and to her surprise it often worked. The people as a whole grew less scared of her over time, and stopped running as hard to get away from her. Eventually, some of them came up to her as a group, waving and calling to her. Trinh greeted them and asked if they wanted to tell her something. They said that they had come because they wanted to be crushed under her pretty sandals and lovely pedicured feet.

Their compliments made Trinh blush—she hadn't expected this reaction at all—but she smiled and agreed to give them what they wanted. She told the people to stand in two groups and then stepped on them both, crushing some fifty people under each foot. All of that made her way more confident and she started having fun crushing even more people, and even wrecking some buildings along the way. She was having so much fun that she didn't realize how late it was getting until she heard Phuong calling her name from a nearby street; then she saw that the sun had nearly set, and she looked at her bracelet to find that it was after 6 PM.

“I'm over here, mom!” Trinh called to her mother, and after a few seconds Phuong rounded a skyscraper roughly twice their size to find Trinh in the middle of the street.

“There you are! Looks like you had a lot of fun as a giantess,” Phuong said, looking around at Trinh's handiwork. “Good work today! I really appreciate the help.”

“You're welcome, mom. But, really, I didn't do that much. I wasn't even confident enough to start smashing the buildings until a few hours into it. I guess that means you're going to have to come back tomorrow to take care of the rest of the city, huh?”

“Oh, don't worry about that. I was thinking a bit and I decided I'll just grow bigger before I leave and crush it all in one big step; it's no fun coming back to a city I've already destroyed, so I might as well deal with it all at once.”

“Really?” Trinh's heart skipped a beat at the thought of her mother growing big enough to crush an entire city under her foot. “Well, I guess we'd better get the kids back home so you can do that without worrying about them. Come on, Hoa; come on, Van.” Trinh crouched down to free her daughter from her anklet, while Phuong did the same with Van, setting them both on the ground. Then Trinh shrank back down to normal size and opened up a portal back home to send the kids through. Of course they complained about it, wanting to see their grandma grow even more giant, but Trinh wouldn't hear a word of it. “Don't you both have homework to do? Go on, get home so you can start working on it. I'll be back in a bit; I'm staying with grandma until she's done here, just in case anything comes up.”

Despite their complaints, Van and Hoa eventually did as she said and went through the portal, leaving Trinh alone with her giant mom.

“You know, you can go home with them too; I've done this a million times before so I don't think I'll need any help.”

“I know. I only sent the kids back because... well, it's really embarrassing, but... I wanted to ask if you could step on me before we leave. You already stepped on them earlier, and I've been thinking all day about how it would feel.”

“Is that so?” Phuong laughed. “Well, as a good mom, of course I'll give my daughter what she wants. You just stand right there, dear; I'll grow bigger and then I'll step on you along with the whole city, okay?”

Trinh nodded, already trembling with excitement at of what was to come.

Standing with her daughter between her feet, Phuong adjusted the settings on her bracelet for a bit before finally pressing the growth button again. Instantly her body started growing at an incredible rate, smashing through everything in its path. Soon her feet were the size of the city's skyscrapers, bulldozing hundreds of them a second as she kept expanding, and not long after that even her little toes put the city's tallest building to shame, making it look like a pebble in comparison. Simply by growing her feet razed countless city blocks flat, until she was so big that the city fit neatly between her feet. By the time she stopped growing at over a hundred miles tall, her toes alone were like huge mountains and their slightest wiggle caused earthquakes that collapsed more of the city's remaining buildings.

Trinh was speechless. This was even better than she'd ever dreamed it could be. Her mom was so incredibly giant this whole city was like a tiny patch of moss at her feet, and Trinh was nothing but a microscopic little germ, much too small for her to even see. She was so thrilled!

“Hope you're ready, dear,” Phuong said, shaking the world with her voice, and with a smile that Trinh knew was meant for her, she raised her foot over the city, holding it so low that it spanned nearly the entire sky, her playfully scrunching sole filling everyone's view. And as that celestial foot began its descent, Trinh lifted her arms and smiled, ready to receive her mother's divine sole and take her place along with the rest of the city exactly where they all belonged: as a speck of dust under Phuong's foot!

Life had been anything but easy for the tiny people since their city was bought by the human girl Shigure. It wasn't just that thousands of lives been lost as their entire city was transferred piece by piece to the Minaduki estate, to be kept in a large sandbox in an otherwise-empty room; those losses were to be expected for people like themselves—people thousand of times smaller than normal humans, so fragile that even a sneeze could spell the end of them—and they would have been more than worth it had their city ended up in the hands of a kind owner who would care for them like beloved pets, letting them live out their short lives in peace and prosperity.

But that's not what they had been bought for. They weren't bought as pets, but as toys for Shigure's pets, a sextet of catgirls who had terrorized their city for fun every day since their arrival, raining indiscriminate death and destruction on them. They had survived so far thanks to the sheer rate of their reproduction and the speed of their life-cycles compared to a human or even a cat-person, but they still had to wonder how much longer they'd survive at the hands of these walking catastrophes.

It wouldn't even have been so bad if not for one catgirl in particular, who alone visited them as much as the other five combined. It was she who was the first to visit them this morning, as she was on most mornings. The tinies knew it was her long before she came in, recognizing her by the distinctive clacking of her Mary-Jane shoes on the wooden floor. Thousands of them woke up with a start at that omen of ill fortune, and hurriedly sought refuge from the new round of destruction to be visited upon them, for whatever good it might do them.

Not that there was much in the way of refuge left; most of their constructions had long since met their end at the hands of the catgirls, and those that remained were largely abandoned as they were more deathtraps than real shelters in here. Reconstruction was pointless since anything they built would be wrecked within days, so most tinies were reduced to living out in the open and hoping blindly they'd survive each new encounter.

A million sets of eyes looked in dread to the door as the footsteps stopped just outside. Slowly the handle turned, and when it opened, there stood that monster, Azuki, in her white-and-blue sailor fuku, her brown, striped tail flicking playfully behind her. After gently closing the door, the catgirl turned to the tinies' habitat and her slitted pupils widened to take in her prey. She walked towards them with a slight wiggle in her step that spoke of barely-contained playful energy.

The tinies remained paralyzed even as each thundering step brought her closer and closer to them, sending tremors throughout the land, until her mile-long foot appeared on the wall of their habitat, her heel landing on it with a soul-crushing THUMP. With arms crossed under her modest, but to the tinies still mountainous, chest, her lips curled in a smirk and her eyes swept over them with a predatory gleam that left no doubt to her intentions.

“There's less of you again today, aren't there?” Though soft and childlike, her voice rattled the tinies, booming in their sensitive ears like the shockwave of an explosion. “At this rate you'll all be gone in a months. All good things come to an end, I guess. Oh well, I'll just have to make the most of you while you're still around!”

Suddenly crouching low over the edge of the tinies' enclosure, Azuki leaned forward, and the tinies panicked as they saw her gargantuan body falling towards them. To all those who stood in her shadow it seemed as if they would all end up crushed beneath her, whether by her milky white thighs, flat belly, petite breasts, or her rounded face. Instead it was only her hands which fell on the earth, crushing a mere thousand of the tiny things, for whom the intricate wavy patterns on her palms and fingers were to be the last thing they ever saw before they were crushed into formless paste on the catgirl's unblemished skin.

Those who avoided that fate by a centimeter or less were blown away by the impact and their bodies dashed against the boulder-sized grains of sand when they landed relative hundreds of feet away, while powerful tremors shook everyone else, even at the furthest reaches of their sandbox home.

A similar scene played out where Azuki's knees fell, and again and again as the catgirl slowly stalked her way to the center of their habitat. Slowly for her, at least enough to allow a few more people to escape death at her hands and knees and feet. Not that she was concerned for them; if she ever took it slow it was only so she could better savor the death and destruction going on beneath her.

Soon Azuki had made it to the center of the sandbox, where the greater concentration of tinies was to be found. Her colossal body, held aloft by celestial pillars, now hung over most of them, swaying playfully in a way that gave a sense of vertigo to those who looked on her too long as it seemed like the whole world was swaying with her—and not just because every shift of her weight brought a new tremor.

For a while she seemed content to survey the chaotic movements of the frightened specks beneath her, humming a lighthearted tune while her ears turned this way and that to pick up the faint sounds of their screams. Then her left hand rose up and hovered towards a group of swarming tinies trying to flee from their destroyer. Her fingers pierced the earth to their left, and with slight wriggles burrowed deeper inside before curving to tunnel under the fleeing masses. The earth bucked violently all around while Azuki's fingers dug their tunnels less than an inch beneath the surface, giving rise to short-lived hills and divots in the landscape that sent sand grains and tinies alike tumbling violently, often mixing together so that over a hundred souls ended up buried in the dirt.

A moment later the catgirl's dirt-covered fingertips emerged from the earth on the opposite end of the group of tinies, and with a violent upheaval they and the land they stood on were lifted into the air. Great masses of sand, and some tinies too, spilled down the sides of her palm as she raised them higher and higher, but even when they came to a top a few inches under the catgirl's face, several hundred of them still remained, trembling under her gaze.

Baring her gleaming white fangs in a grin, Azuki started gently shaking her hand back and forth, letting the bottom-most grains of sand slip through her fingers and pelt the tinies on the ground as a rain of boulders until only a thin layer of dirt remained along with the tinies standing on it. Then the frightened souls she held saw her other hand appear, with an outstretched finger drawing nearer and nearer, until it hung so low overhead that those in its shadow could plainly see the minutest pores and wrinkles on the fleshy ceiling.

As Azuki waggled her finger playfully over her prey, the mere threat of being crushed under it was enough to make everyone scatter, scurrying over the gentle hills and slopes of her palmscape until they were faced with the sheer precipice at the edges of her palm, and a multi-mile fall to the sandbox. While a few were so bold, or so desperate, as to take the jump in the hope that some errant gust of wind might cushion their fall and save them, the bulk remained standing on the edge, daring neither to go forward nor back.

“Where do you buggies think you're going? Don't you know it's dangerous for you over there,” Azuki chuckled. “Let's get you all back to safety now.” With a finger she brushed them back to the center of her palm, crushing a few and leaving many others mangled in the process, bruises and broken limbs abounding. The faint cries that went up with each sweep of her digit were music to her ears, and she held them closer so she could hear all their moaning and wailing.

When she saw some of the tinies get up and run for the edge again, clearly determined to jump off this time, she shook her head and tutted in feigned disappointment. “Well, if you're that set on dying, at least let me be the one to kill you; it's better to die at the hands of a cute catgirl than by falling to your death, don't you think?”

The fleeing tinies ran with all their might, their feet thumping away against the ground, yet they hadn't even made it halfway to their destination when Azuki's finger came down on a group of them, instantly obliterating dozens. The terrible digit swept mercilessly around the edges of her palm, barreling over one tiny after the next, leaving only a few disturbing traces of them behind. When she had cleared them all away, the catgirl pressed her finger against her thumb, balling their remains up into wads of blood and dirt she nonchalantly flicked away into another group of tinies below, before fixing her gaze on those who remained—who wouldn't, or couldn't, run away from her.

Azuki half-curled her fingers, letting them hover threateningly over the tinies to hear them cry out in sweet, sweet fear. Was there any sound better than this? Anything that better conveyed the power she held over these little specks? If there was she hadn't found it, so this was what she kept coming back to listen to, over and over again. Here, where for once in her life she could be the biggest person in the room. None of these tinies would ever call her “short” or “munchkin”—never pat her on the head like a child or look down on her. Instead they trembled in her shadow, never doubting her absolute superiority. The feeling was divine; it was pure ecstasy; it was...

“Azuki!”

“Wah!” Azuki jumped with a most undignified cry, reflexively curling her fingers further and crushing all the tinies in her hand before flicking them angrily away and looking over her shoulder at the young catgirl standing at the entrance: the tall, tan-skinned, and very... “well-developed”... Coconut. “W-what are you doing here?” she asked a tad defensively, standing and turning to face her younger sister.

“That's what I should be asking you. Didn't master send you here to feed the tinies, not to play with them?”

“I was just... getting to that part.”

“Oh, so you thought you'd have some fun crawling around in the dirt first?” Coconut asked with an infuriating grin, walking to the edge of the enclosure while Azuki stomped up to her, taking her embarrassment out on whatever tinies happened to be in her path.

Even standing on an extra layer of dirt above the wooden floor, Azuki was still nearly a head shorter than the younger catgirl; her gaze was closer to being level with Coconut's chest than with her heterochromic blue and amber eyes—a chest so unfairly bigger than Azuki's. Why had she wandered in now of all times, just when she was really getting in the mood?

“Is that all you came here to say? Because if it is you can leave now; I'll feed them just as soon as you're gone.”

“Hmm... actually, I think I'd better stick around, just in case you come up short. You don't have that much to feed them with, after all; maybe you'll need me to help you out,” Coconut said, arms crossed immodestly to emphasize her well-rounded breasts, practically shoving them in Azuki's face. The shorter catgirl hissed and made a swipe at Coconut, but her sister stepped just out of reach. “Besides,” she continued unfazed, “someone has to stick around to make sure you leave some tinies for the rest of us. If I leave you'll probably crush them all. Honestly, you're so greedy about them. Would it kill you to go one day without coming in here?”

“I don't come here that often,” Azuki grumbled.

“Are you going to feed them or not? Maybe I'll just do it myself and get it over with; if I leave it to you you'll just let them starve and they'll die out even faster.”

“No, no, I'm going to do it! I'm way better at it than you.”

“Really? How about we both do it, then, so we can see who's better.”

“Fine!”

After Coconut stepped into the sandbox beside Azuki, both catgirls removed their shirts and bras, exposing their breasts for the million tiny souls gawking at them. They all watched as the catgirls dropped their clothes outside their enclosure, then turned to face all those who were still alive and dropped to their knees, sending massive earthquakes through the land. At once their hands went up to their chests, fingers seizing on nipples and beginning to tweak them.

Azuki, with her brow furrowed in concentration, looked like she was dead set on beating her sister to the punch, but it was the confident Coconut who first managed a flow of milk, drop after drop of the rich white substance spilling from her perky breasts and falling to the ground in squirts or drops, splashing spectacularly on the earth and sending small explosions of milky droplets over much of the landscape. Splash, splash, splash went her milk, pooling together in a pair of puddles near her thighs, her ceaseless discharge flooding over more than a thousand tinies.

Swept up by the powerful currents, the tinies swam for their lives, trying to keep their heads above the surface, but despite their efforts many of them ended up drowning in the warm, motherly ambrosia, Coconut's milk filling their lungs with sweet death.

“Come here, little buggies!” Coconut giggled childishly over the scenes of mass destruction. “Drink up so you can grow big and strong, and make lots of new babies so we can keep having fun with you!”

Despite their overwhelming fear towards the two catgirls, hunger drew all the tinies towards the shimmering pools of milk once Coconut had finished supplying her milk to them, releasing her well-rounded breasts to let them hang gently overhead. The catgirl then sat back, resting her hands on her knees, to watch vast swarms of tinies setting out for her milk from all parts of their habitat, and purred proudly once the first of them arrived at the sticky shores and started drinking.

But a frustrated groan turned her head aside, and she saw that her sister, despite all her frantic twisting of her nipples, had yet to produce a single drop of milk for the tinies. “What's wrong? Are you all out or something?” she asked.

“No! I know I have some milk, but... it just... won't come out!” Azuki said, squeezing her breasts in frustration.

“You're too tense. You need to be more relaxed so it'll come out. Don't try to force it, you'll just hurt yourself.”

“Oh, whatever! You already fed them; it's not like they need any more right now.”

“Come on, don't be like that, Azuki. Let me help you; rest your head on my lap and we'll see if we can't tease that milk out of you!” Coconut said, slapping her thighs.

Azuki frowned. Letting her younger sister help would be so embarrassing, but if she wasn't able to produce milk after playing with her nipples for so long, it would keep bothering her all morning. “Fine,” she said at last and eased herself down to lie in the sandbox, resting her head on Coconut's soft thighs. “This had better work, you hear me?”

“It will if you just stop worrying so much about it. Relax and let me do my thing, okay?”

Azuki grunted and shut her eyes, letting Coconut pet her head with one hand while rubbing her belly with the other, all the while a million tinies watched this most incongruous spectacle put on by their tormentors.

Coconut purred as she stroked her sister, hoping the sound would help put her at ease, but though her touch was soothing, as was her purring, Azuki just felt more awkward than anything, and when Coconut tried playing with her nipples for a bit to see if it had worked, even pressing her lips to one and sucking on it for a minute, nothing at all came out. “Huh. You must be way more tense than I thought.”

“I knew it wouldn't work,” Azuki sighed. “Well, whatever. I guess I'll get going now.”

“Wait, don't leave yet!” Coconut said, pulling back on her sister as Azuki started to sit up. “I have one more idea! This one will work for sure!”

“Hmph. Fine. Just... make it quick.” Azuki crossed her arms and looked away.

Looking at the ground, Coconut spotted a particularly big group of tinies and reached down, setting her fingers down right in front of them. “Climb on if you don't want me to crush you,” she told them. The tinies, looking uncertainly from the towering set of fingers to the colossal tan catgirl and exchanging glances among themselves, eventually decided they were better off obeying her despite their reservations. The tinies walked forward and climbed on Coconut's fingernails, crawling deep into the space between the nail and her flesh, until Coconut judged she had enough and lifted them up, gently curling her fingers so their tips pointed upwards to minimize the risk of her little passengers falling.

Fretting over their unknown fate, the tinies held on tight to Coconut's skin as they were lifted high up, with only the barest notion of where they were headed courtesy of the narrow glimpses they caught of the outside world, until the catgirl lowered two of her fingers onto a large, pink surface with a big bumpy hill rising up before them. “Get off now,” she said, and a couple hundred tinies walked off her fingers and onto Azuki's breast, right on the edge of her areola. There they turned to watch as Coconut carried the other half of their number over to the neighboring teat, and once all of them were off her hand, they looked all around in awe, particularly at the towering pink nipples, at Coconut's massive breasts hanging nearby, and at Azuki's face frowning curiously at them.

“Now,” Coconut announced, her eyes flicking from one nipple to the other as she addressed the tinies, “please be good little buggies and help my sister feel good!”

The tinies obeyed—what choice did they have?—and, swallowing their trepidation, they walked forward to the base of Azuki's nipples. Now that she realized what her sister's idea was, the older catgirl felt her heart beating rapidly in her chest, and the flesh of her breasts started pulsing noticeably for the little specks along with the blood rushing under her skin. Her nipples, which had grown soft after Coconut stopped playing with them, now grew erect again even before any of the tinies reached them, unnerving and striking awe into the heart of the puny creatures as they swelled higher and higher.

All of Azuki's attention was focused on the tiny pilgrims making their way to her nipples, watching them closely, trying to see if she could feel their tiny feet treading on her skin. When they finally reached their destination she held her breath, and gasped when she felt their tiny little hands pressing into the firm flesh of her erect nipples, their touch pushing those pink peaks to their fullest size.

As they began trying to stimulate the catgirl into lactating, the tinies felt a deep sense of awe come over them. The scent of her hanging heavy in the air, the rhythmic sound of her heartbeat and the pulsing of her flesh in time to it, the all-enveloping body warmth and the sight of those mountainous nipples—it all affected their puny minds, triggering deep-seated instincts. Their fear all but disappeared and they were called on to climb.

All together, as if in a trance, without any notion of why they were doing it, they pushed their hands up along the catgirl's firm leathery skin, seizing whatever footholds they could find and pulling themselves up by them, to climb up to the peaks of these holy mountains.

“You don't have to climb any higher, guys. You were fine doing what you were doing just now,” Coconut said as she saw them start going up. “Hello? Did you hear me? Hmm, that's weird. I wonder where they're all going. You think we should get rid of them, Azuki? ... Azuki?” The catgirl looked at her sister's face, finding Azuki's gaze transfixed on the tiny climbers. “This is weird,” she muttered. Clearly something was going on that she didn't understand. She thought of asking Azuki about it, but she got the sense that anything else she said would break the spell had gotten ahold of everyone; better to keep watching and see where it would end.

It took the little specks a minute to reach the top of the nipples, pulling themselves onto the sprawling pink mesas and looking around once more. Then, without so much as a word among them, they all started for the center of Azuki's nipples, guided by that same ancient instinct that had sent them climbing all the way up here. They spread out a bit, searching the land before them, until at last they happened upon what they now realized they had been looking for all along: the entrance to the catgirl's milk ducts.

On each nipple everyone gathered around those fleshy tunnels, and after a silence, one adventurous soul stepped up to crawl inside. Once they had disappeared into the tunnel, another followed, and another, and another, until all of them were in her flesh, spelunking to the depths of the catgirls teats.

From the moment the first tinies had crawled inside, Azuki's nipples had started tingling in pleasure, and the feeling only grew as more of them went inside, until it felt like a thousand tiny feathers were tickling her from inside her flesh, sending wave after wave of bliss radiating out from her breasts. She gasped at first, then she started breathing deeply, watching her chest rise and fall with each breath, and by the time they were all inside she had come to hold her own breasts gently. “Keep... keep going,” she cooed to those specks lost inside her, her voice vibrating through her flesh to reach their ears. “It feels... so good.”

The tinies hardly needed her encouragement to keep following their instincts, but still her voice did prod them onwards, to crawl still deeper through her flesh and bringing her greater pleasure. Moaning, Azuki twisted back and forth in her sister's lap, groping her breasts ever harder, until at last a trickle of milk burst forth from them, each mountain erupting with a small stream of pure white milk speckled with the bodies of hundreds of tinies, followed by a gentler stream that began dripping down her body to the sand below, carrying a portion of the little specks along with it.

“Ah! That's good, Azuki!Now sit up so you can feed the tinies,” Coconut said, smiling at her sister.

“Coconut... come... come here.” Milk still spilling from her breasts, Azuki stretched her arms up. Gently she held Coconut's head by the sides and pulled her closer, leading the younger catgirl's mouth right to her nipple. “Have a drink, little sis. It's all for you, if you want it.”

Coconut was shocked at first, but the taste of delicious milk spilling into her mouth soon convinced her and she started suckling, joining her purrs to her sister's while licking around her nipple, lapping up all those tinies who still remained on it. The tinies were swished around her mouth in a growing sea of milk, their fragile bodies dashed against every surface or crushed by a simple flick of her tongue, savored thoroughly by the monstrous catgirl, and finally flushed down her throat indiscriminately, to provide sustenance for her body.

Coconut drank until she was satisfied, but still drops of milk spilled from her sister's breasts, running down her body. Sitting up, Azuki leaned forward, putting a hand on the ground to hold her torso above the masses of tinies she rained drops of milk upon. Cupping a hand to her breast, she squeezed one, then the other, and moaned, her limbs wobbling for a second as the flow of milk from her teats was reawakened. Powerful streams of milk spilled from her breasts, flooding the masses gathered below.

The flow of milk seemed unstoppable. Any time it looked to be dying down, another squeeze of her breast or nipple was enough to revive it, adding to the growing oceans of milk. When after some minutes she finally finished, the twin pools of her milk nearly matched her sister's; with the milk Coconut had drank, they would have surpassed hers.

“Wow! You had way more milk than I thought,” Coconut said. “I guess I was wrong; you could have easily fed them all yourself.”

Azuki was still breathing deeply as she sat back again. “That... that was amazing. Coconut, you have to try that. I've never felt better in my life.”

“You mean right now? Even though I just milked myself?” Azuki nodded. “Well, okay.” Coconut eased herself down onto her side along the side of the sandbox, crushing thousands under her shapely form, hundreds under just her breast as the heavy orb settled into the dirt with the edge of her nipple resting on the ground. “Alright, tinies, climb in!” she said, motioning to her nipple.

At first the tinies around her breast all backed away in alarm from the great heaving mountain, but after a while a few of them felt themselves drawn to it and reversed course, hiking en masse towards her nipple. As the approached, Coconut scooped up some of them and gave them a lift to her other nipple, letting them all climb it. Soon the tinies were crawling over both of her nipples.

When they finally found and entered her milk ducts, Coconut gasped and shivered in delight. Sh reached for her breasts, groping them gently, and after a couple minutes, milk sprang anew from her breasts, spilling down to pool in front of the gathered tinies, while her legs stretched and curled in pleasure, taking countless lives as they tore through the land. Then after she had finished, producing only half as much milk as she had before, she lay there watching as the remaining tinies drank from this new lake of milk she had given them.

“You were right, Azuki, that was amazing!” Coconut giggled. “We have to tell the other girls about this. They're going to love it!”

“Yeah, I guess we should, huh,” Azuki said, also looking at the tinies drinking from her milk. Why did seeing that make her feel so warm inside, she wondered? Terrorizing all these specks had been amazing, but letting them crawl into her breasts and feeding them with her milk was even better. And even though she still had the urge to scare these tinies and feel them getting crushed against her body, she also had the urge to care for them and see their civilization grow big and healthy. It was weird having both these desires at once, and she still didn't know how to feel about it.

“Well, we should probably get going now. Need to get ready for work,” she said, stepping out of the sandbox and putting her clothes back on.

“You go ahead; I'll catch up with you in a bit,” Coconut said. After Azuki left, the younger catgirl looked back at the tinies gathered at her chest, her tail flicking playfully. Once the tinies had finished drinking her milk, they pulled back and stared at her, feeling the ground vibrating with her purrs, and wondered what she meant to do with them now.

After a while she lowered her hand to them, silently offering them her fingers with a smile. The tinies hesitated at first, but then a number of them came forward to take her up on her offer, climbing onto her fingers, until Coconut, deciding she had enough now, lifted them up and cupped her other hand underneath them to carry them safely. She pushed herself up, then hopped out of the sandbox on her way to her clothes, where she knelt and sprinkled the tinies onto her crop top, letting them get caught in the fine pink threads. Once that was done, she put her clothes back on carefully so as to not crush or throw off too many of the tinies.

Now fully dressed, Coconut looked down at herself, searching her top for all the little tinies clinging fearfully to its fabric, clambering all over her body as they desperately tried to find some safety on this living, breathing mountain of a catgirl. With a smile, she gave a little twirl, laughing happily over all her little passengers. “So glad you little buggies decided to come and give me company while I'm working! Try to stay alive down there, at least until work is over, okay? It'll be so much more boring after you're all gone. Say good-bye to everyone now! Good-bye, buggies!” she said, waving to the tinies still in the sandbox, then exited with the tinies on her top fighting not to be thrown off by the violent shaking brought on by her every step.