Nico attempted to crawl out of the massive loafer once more, but now that she was smaller than before, the task seemed even more impossible. If the leathery insides weren't lathered with a day's worth of Maki's sweat, and Nico wasn't already so exhausted, she might have stood a chance.

"Makiiiiiiiii! Down here! I'm in your stupid shoe! Look inside!!" Nico cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted with a raspy, hoarse voice.

Maki's movements outside the shoe seemed to stop, and there was nothing but silence for a moment. The next thing Nico saw was the redhead's giant visage peering down into her prison.

"Yes! It worked! Maki! It's me, Nico! I shrunk and I need your help!"

The giantess didn't seem to react, only continuing to stare into the abyss of her smelly footwear with a slight look of confusion.

"...? I could have sworn I heard something... Wait... what is that...?" her voice whispered.

"She can't even see me!?" Nico looked down and realized she couldn't have been bigger than a millimeter. This was bad, this might be her only chance to be noticed. She had been lucky so far, but her luck may run out if Maki doesn't notice her right now.

"It looks like a little bug in my shoe... I figured there was a pebble or something, but it looks more like a pink speck..." Nico saw Maki's fingers reach in towards her.

"Yes!! She can see me! Thank you!!" Nico cried tears of joy. The fear of Maki's giant approaching finger getting ready to smear her was outweighed by just how happy she felt at that moment.

The redhead's giant index finger made contact with the speck and pressed it into her insole, causing some sweat to seep out and cover her finger. This adhered the speck to her skin. Maki lifted up her strange find to examine it up close.

"What the..."Nico... is that you...? What the heck, am I seeing things...? Are you real?" Maki said in a hushed tone.

"Y-yes! It's really me... It's kind of a long story, but I... I shrunk and ended up in your shoe... Please, help me..." Nico shouted with tears in her eyes after finally being noticed.

"Uhh... y-yeah sure, hold on. You must be so tired... Here, just a sec..." The giant girl slowly walked upstairs to her lavish room with her tiny friend still adhered to her finger.

Maki sat on her luxurious bed and looked at the tiny school idol stuck to her pointer finger.

"Okay, now tell me what's going on. I still can't believe what I'm looking at..."

Nico was overjoyed to finally have someone listen to her. She explained everything that had happened to her so far.

"Wow... I see... Nozomi really got you good, huh?" Maki let out an unsympathetic chuckle.

"Huh!? Didn't you hear what I said!? Nozomi left me to die!"

"Oh come on now, I know they might have smelled a bit, but surely my feet weren't that bad. I'm sure Nozomi just meant to tease you. I mean, just look at you, it is a little funny, you have to admit." Maki couldn't help but let out a full on laugh at her tiny senpai's expense.

"Why isn't anyone taking me seriously!? Your feet were fucking nasty, Maki! I ate your stinking toe jam for crying out loud! Your feet should be classified as chemical weapons and banned from warfare!" Nico spat.

The tsundere's eyebrow twitched.

"Do you ever even wash those things!? Seriously! I have some potentially life-ruining sickness and you two just think I'm a fucking joke! Even when I was bigger, you two always made fun of me!" Nico continued to fling her pent up rage at the giant girl.

Maki's expression changed to one of complete seriousness.

"Nico... Who the hell do you think you are, talking to me like that? You're no bigger than my toenail and you're acting like I did this on purpose. News flash: I barely even registered that you were in my shoe the whole time. That's how small you are." Maki moved her finger with Nico adhered to it all the way back down to her foot. "Now, apologize." Maki ordered, gesturing her finger in a 'talk to the toes' motion.

Nico recoiled in disgust at being assaulted by Maki's foot smell again. "What!? I'm not apologizing to your fucking foot! You literally walked all over me! You should be apologizing to me and helping me!"

Maki scoffed. "Ah, I see your shrinking had no positive effect on your terrible personality in the slightest. Well, that just means I won't have to feel bad about this then."

The annoyed redhead moved her finger closer to her toes, enjoying the exasperated screams from Nico. Maki smeared the tiny girl in the tight space between her second and third toes, making sure Nico was caught on a particularly nasty glob of lint. She could still barely hear Nico's cries for help, but she didn't want to spend any more time thinking about her at the moment, she had piano lessons to attend. Maki would consider what to do with Nico later. For now, she put on her smelly unwashed socks again and headed downstairs to wait for her piano instructor.

Nico was once again thrown back into her worst nightmare. Just being told to wait out this torture like it was no big deal was soul-crushingly humiliating. Thankfully at least Nico wasn't being stepped on constantly, but she had a front row seat to Maki's wiggling toes and festering toe jam. The slime that surrounded her made her gag multiple times. It was a combination of sweat, sock lint, dirt, dust, and whatever other grime Maki had been stepping in. Occasionally Maki would tap on one of the piano's pedals, squishing Nico's face into a glob of toe jam.

Nico had to keep calm and remember that surely Maki would help her. Though Maki wasn't exactly being benevolent to her. Nico had to remember that the more she screamed and struggled, the more she shrank. If she continued to panic, she'd surely shrink small enough to get entirely consumed by this rich girl's toe jam. The tiny school idol thought for a moment and calmed herself down. The only way she was getting out of her was patience. Nico took long, deep breaths, trying to ignore that the only air she was breathing in was Maki's foot stink. It was gonna be okay, she was gonna get out of this.

--

After an hour of waiting, and constantly breathing in the toxic air supply of Maki's toes, Nico heard Maki bid farewell to her piano instructor. Hopefully the two school idols were now left alone. Nico's torture wasn't over yet, Maki walked back to her room, stomping on Nico with every dainty step. Did Maki even realize how much just a small movement had an effect on her??

"No, no, calm down Nico... It's almost over..." Nico breathed in some more foot funk, calmed down, and waited for Maki to release her.

Moments later, relief finally came. Nico saw light shining around her, and it felt like her struggles were finally over. Two giant pillars of flesh came and scraped Nico's body off the toe wrinkle she was trapped in. Nico held onto the fingernail that saved her as Maki whisked Nico up into the air and close to her nose. A loud sniffing sound nearly broke Nico's ear drums.

"God you stink. Have you showered, like, at all today? My feet didn't smell that bad, did they?"

Nico was about to blow off some steam at her redheaded captress, but when she looked at Maki's sincere smile shining down on her, she realized it was meant to be a playful jab. Maybe Maki really didn't realize the danger she was putting her through.

"They... yeah, they stunk pretty bad, haha..." Nico squeaked.

A look of surprise came over Maki's face. "Oh? I figured you'd be blowing up at me right now, thought I'd get an earful from you."

Nico was simply too tired to argue. She just wanted to get clean, rest, and potentially grow back to normal. "I don't have the energy to argue..."

In an instant, Maki's surprise turned into guilt. "H-hey, Nico... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to... ya know... I think I went too far... I'll hear you out now, tell me everything."

"I will, but first... Can I get cleaned up? I've been under your feet all evening..."

"Sure~" The first year smiled down to her school idol senpai.

Maki walked to the master washroom, right next to her bedroom. She began to draw a bath and placed Nico's inch tall body on the rim.

"You got some of your height back it looks like."

"Yeah. I shrink when...when I get angry. At least, that's how I think it works. When I calm down and relax, I seem to start growing back." Nico explained.

"Hmm~ I see... I've never heard of a condition like that."

"Me neither, it just happened to the first time when Nozomi was teasing me. She threw me in your shoe."

Despite being the daughter of a doctor, Maki seemed to buy Nico's story. "That explains it... Hey, Nico, I really am sorry, you know that, right? I should have helped you in such a serious situation..." Maki said with a sullen expression.

"It's... okay. I was a bitch too. I've been on everyone's nerves lately, this whole situation is like a cosmic joke at my expense."

"No, you don't deserve this happening to you, and Nozomi shouldn't have made it worse."

The hot water finished filling the bathtub, and the two girls stared silently at each other. Despite their airing of their grievances, there was still a bit of awkwardness in the air.

Just as Maki was about to start stripping for her bath, she could her her phone ringing in the other room.

"Sorry, I got a call, I'll be right back. Don't jump in just yet, wait for me. I don't want you drowning in my bathtub~" Maki morbidly joked.

Walking back into her bedroom, Maki picked up her phone, wondering who could be calling this late at night. It was Nozomi, not someone Maki expected.

"Hello? Nozomi? What's up?"

"Hello Maki-chan... Is Nicocchi with you by any chance?"

"Umm... yeah... she is... Why do you ask?" Maki questioned, feeling suspicious after what Nico had told her.

"I have something to confess... By any chance, is Nicocchi... tiny right now?"

"What is her game here?" Maki wondered. "Yeah, she is... how did you know?"

"Oh dear... Well, I didn't want it to come to this, but I thought you should know... Our little Nicocchi has been deceiving us..."

"What do you mean deceiving? She told me that you made her shrink and put her in my shoe."

"Huh!? She said that? She really is a sneaky little one... Maki-chan, you must believe me, that isn't what happened. I'll tell you the full story..."

Maki peered into the bathroom and saw Nico's tiny shrunken body still sitting on the side of the bathtub, waiting for her to return. Walking into the hallway so their conversation couldn't be heard, Maki replied, "I'm listening."

"You see, a few weeks ago, I found Nicocchi all tiny and shrunken in our club room. She told me she apparently randomly shrank. Only for some reason, I found her struggling to get out of my bra that I left out... I believed her at the time and helped her out. She made me promise to keep it on the down-low between us. But over the next few weeks I'd been following her in secret. Almost every day after our school idol practice, I found her shrunken and sniffing around our clothes. Honoka-chan's panties one day, Elicchi's socks the next. Even Hanayo-chan's pantyhose... Nico doesn't know that I know, but I believe she's been shrinking herself on purpose to perv on us..."

Maki was too stunned to speak for a moment, unable to form a coherent response. "That... doesn't sound like Nico..."

"I know. I had trouble coming to terms with the idea myself. But after hearing you say that she blames this on me... I can't believe she's throwing me under the bus to cover up her perversion!"

"I... I'll talk to you later, Nozomi-chan, thank you for telling me."

"Okay Maki-chan, thank you too. Good night~"

Nozomi and Maki ended the call. Nozomi let out a devilish little giggle, her plan had worked perfectly.

Walking back into the bathroom with a stern look on her face, Maki looked down at her tiny "friend"

"What took you so long, who were you talking to?" Nico whined.

Maki simply stared down at her, wondering what her next move should be.

"So Nico shrunk herself and snuck into my shoe on purpose, huh..."