“Touya, it’s time to get going,” Yae walked into the bathroom through the open door as I was getting off the stepstool I had used to get up to the sink.

70 cm was how tall I was. There was a massive difference between Yae and I now, and by that I meant I was beyond half her height. The top of my head was below her waist and the first thing I could see looking forward was the edge of her skirt.

“W-Wow,” I couldn’t stop myself from remarking. A Yae who was over twice my height, whose legs were longer than I was tall, was standing right in front of me, blocking my way out of the bathroom. 

“Uwah… How many centimeters did you lose?” Yae was equally as stunned by the difference.

“Sasakura-Sensei said that the reduction rate would pick up, but even I think 30 centimeters is a bit too much,” I answered, trying to calm my nerves. “Sorry for making you wait. It was a bit hard getting ready today.”

Yae saw that the sink up higher than my height and that I was using a step stool. She nodded. “I can see that. So that’s why the bathroom door was open.”

If I closed it, it’d be a hassle to open it again. I had trouble all morning considering I had to jump up to reach the doorknob of my room and then had to scour my home for the stepstool before I could wash my face and brush my teeth. I didn’t have enough time to shower as a result. At least I had gotten dressed.

“So this is why we had to make those arrangements with Sensei,” Yae realized why Sasakura-sensei wanted us to have proper at home care.

“Yup. And that’s why I said I’ll be relying on you,” I nodded, looking away from Yae’s distracting thighs and fluttering skirt as she swayed left and right while thinking. “I was just finishing up, so can you wait outside for me?”

“Okay,” Yae nodded and stepped out, closing the door with her.

“Hey! Yae! The door!” I shouted. I heard a ruckus outside as Yae stumbled before the door opened back up.

“Sorry. Force of habit.”

I didn’t like to think that a door was becoming an actual barrier for me. After finishing up in the bathroom, I grabbed my sports bag and book bag which were lying out in the hallway. The shrunken belongings had been knocked over by Yae’s heavy footsteps.

I met Yae outside where she held the door open for me and then locked it with her spare key. I tried to keep my gaze away from Yae’s long legs but the pillars in black thigh highs took up most of my view when she was close. This was certainly an optimal height to be flashed as when Yae leaned forward to lock the door, her skirt raised above my head. A sky blue color that wasn’t the sky distracted me.

“All done, Touya,” she told me.

“Great. Let’s get going,” I replied, intent on keeping what I had learned a secret. I power walked ahead so we could get to the main road, and we began our walk to school.

Or rather, run. Though I was power-walking, I found myself quickly overtaken by Yae. Her legs being taller than I was, she accomplished in a single stride double what I could. Though Yae was trying to keep the same pace as me, my pace was slower than hers. When she was distracted and just walking forward, I fell behind her.

“Wait. Slow down, Yae!” I called out, running forward. This was the only way I could catch up. Considering how small I was, Yae was practically a 4 m woman with 2 m legs. I physically couldn’t compare. 

“Eh?” Yae stopped walking when she heard me. She turned to see me run over which still took some time.

“Good. You stopped,” I caught my breath from the dash I had to make.

“Did you get distracted by something, Touya? I was going pretty slowly,” Yae asked.

“I was walking the whole time, but you’re still going... too... fast...,” Facing forward and then looking up at Yae, I frowned. I wasn’t distracted earlier but I was now. The height difference between the two of us was becoming ridiculous. I had lost another 4 cm along our walk, putting my head beneath her skirt. Yae still didn’t seem to realize it yet, at least. 

“I don’t think I can go that much slower without stopping, though, Touya,” frowned Yae. “We’ll be late if I do that.”

“So I’m the slow one,” I turned my head away, trying to avoid trouble from peeking up Yae’s skirt. “Sheesh. I can’t believe I have to run just to keep up with you.”

“I suppose it’s only natural with the way you are now. Maybe you should’ve opted for the Reduction transport Sasakura-sensei talked about.”

“No. I’d still rather walk with you,” I looked up at Yae to tell her that. Her face was certainly far away, as though it were on a second story. 

Instead of feeling flustered or turning red like she usually would, Yae giggled. “Well, if you’re going to try that hard to be with me, maybe I’ll walk normally.”

Walking normally meant her speeding up. “That’s raising the difficulty.”

“Then should we hold hands?” Yae offered, extending her hand to me. She had a gentle smile on her face as she did.

“No…,” I almost accepted but pulled back. “It’ll look like you’re walking with a little kid instead of a classmate.”

“That’s what you kind of are now. Come on. Don’t be shy,” Yae was blunt, but more importantly, she snatched my arm and began to walk, pulling me forward.

“H-Hey, Yae!” I was flustered, but Yae didn’t seem to be at all. Was it because she was treating me more like a kid now? I stumbled as I struggled to follow Yae without being literally dragged around. “This isn’t funny. Aren’t you embarrassed?”

“Fufu… I’m just joking,” Yae stopped for my sake and turned around, revealing a pink tint on her cheeks. “And of course I’m embarrassed. It’s just a lot easier for me to do this when you look like this.”

I wasn’t exactly happy to hear that. That Yae. While the reason why we were still just childhood friends mainly fell on me, her own embarrassment was also another factor. Now that it was Reduction Week, it looked like that embarrassment had quickly disappeared.

“Kyaa!”

I spoke too soon. Yae was about to grab my hand again before a strong gust of wind blew past. She reflexively tried to pull her skirt down but was too slow. The navy blue uniform skirt blew up, giving me a full view of the sky blue I had spotted earlier. I was already looking up but because I was in front of Yae, her panties prominently entered my view. Being their height made it easy to see.

Bending her knees, Yae lowered herself, her ears and face red. I noticed she was still over a head taller than me while squatting down. 

“Y-You saw, didn’t you?” she asked.

“Sky blue,” I couldn’t keep it a secret anymore.

Flustered at having her underwear exposed (not that it wasn’t to me before), Yae stood back up and began power walking to school. She was so embarrassed, she was leaving me behind. Not wanting to be left alone while Reduced, I strained my body to sprint after her.

“Hey, Yae, wait! Don’t leave me behind!” 

She wasn’t the only victim of having her underwear looked at. It was unavoidable now for all of us boys because our vision dropped beneath their skirts. Some of the boys made a noise over it, but it was quickly silenced by the intimidating girls towering over us. Rather than talking to each other classmate to classmate, they treated us like brats.

“C’mon, let’s do something about these perverts,” Tokiwa demanded.

“I know how you feel, but they’re going to keep looking up for the next three days. We can’t really fault them for being that short,” the female class representative, Yoshikawa, had to play the middle-man and convince the girls. Yae wasn’t willing to help because she was still sulking from our earlier incident. Unfortunately, the damage had been done. A number of the boys had fallen silent to avoid trouble.

There were a few girls who didn’t mind, actually. Two of Eguchi’s ‘admirers’ were more than willing to show off what they were wearing to him, much to his dismay/delight. I couldn’t tell which he was feeling from his expression. I would have expected Arai’s gyaru girlfriend to be just as open, but following stereotypes was bound to cause me trouble in the long run. I kept silent as I watched Watanabe turn sheepish around Arai, worried he’d see up her skirt. I didn’t know gyarus could be so pure.

The hustle and bustle over underwear being seen was ended quickly, however, when Sasakura-Sensei came into the classroom along with a yawning Takahashi. Takahashi hadn’t been around all morning so it was a surprise to see she had brought the nurse over.

Well, she didn’t. Sasakura-Sensei had already planned to come. When she heard the noise, she shook her head and spoke up.

“Oh, that’s what the ruckus was about? It’s really up to you girls how you want to treat the boys when they’re like this now, but there’ll be trouble if you all don’t calm down. Listen to Yoshikawa. She’s sounded reasonable enough. As for the boys, really, you’re high schoolers. Don’t make such a fuss over seeing panties.”

Sasakura-sensei scolded the girls for getting riled up and the boys for getting excited. She frowned seeing that our homeroom teacher still hadn’t arrived because it should have been her job to fix it instead.

“It’s just a piece of fabric. Get over with. At least none of you are going commando, right? That’d be something to show the boys.”

Sasakura-Sensei made every student turn red and I saw every girl fix their posture and skirts reflexively at her words. She seemed satisfied with her last line, but she still did not leave. After all, that was not why our school’s nurse had come.

To deal with the boys being a third of our size, she had brought large cushions to use as booster seats. As humiliating as it sounds, we actually had to pull ourselves onto the chairs of our desk and if we sat down, it’d be impossible for us to see forward let alone use the desk properly. Though some of us considered standing now, Sasakura-sensei told us to enjoy using it while it lasted.

We relented.

At the very end of it all when she left, Sasakura-Sensei broke the tension enough for the boys and girls to get along again, though I believe it was because the girls were now too busy snickering at the sight of us toddler sized boys on cushions that were much too big for us trying to work at a desk that was now impossible for our shrunken items to fill up.