(54) Day 3 One Scale Distraction (17.0 m < 17.1 m)

Who was Sumire Yashiro?

‘I see. So that is the girl you mentioned once before about some sort of cram school incident.’

Sumire Yashiro was an old friend of mine as well as of Yae’s and Takahashi’s. When it came to her personality, the best was I could describe it was ‘unpredictable’. Back then, she didn’t like getting involved with others and preferred to watch from the sidelines, but after the cram school incident, I realized we never got a proper read on her. Running into Sumire was something I knew was going to happen after Takahashi had met up with her, but I had never expected to meet her in the baths with such a bully of a friend.

‘We will try to keep an eye on her. After hearing her and her friend talk, I have concerns about how they could exploit the size difference and cause harm to others.’

After making it into the girls’ changing room, Senpai and I found out Yae actually had to run after the occult club girls who actually did run out into the halls in their swimsuits. If I had to be honest, I appreciated that a lot. It gave Senpai some time to give me some advice and for me to tell her about Sumire.

‘Simply lay low for some time, Kirishima-kun. I will have the health committee girls handle it, Emi-chan especially. For now, just stay here while I go look for Yae-san.’

I kicked my legs restlessly while dressed in a ryokan yukata and seated on a normal sized bench in a normal sized hallway. Because Senpai had to go find where Yae followed Akagi and Morino off to, Kamiya-senpai left me at the place all of the boys would be staying for the night – the Hotel One-Scale I had spotted before with Narumi-senpai.

“If Kamiya-senpai is sending Yanase-senpai, hopefully things will work out,” I mumbled to myself on a bench on the first floor lobby of the multi-story hotel. Yanase-senpai would know what to do since she was also from the same middle school. “I just hope Sumire hasn’t done anything wrong already…”

My concerns prevented me from taking a good look at the regular sized hotel until some of the guys approached me.

“Kirishima, something going on?” “…?” “Are you alright, Kirishima-kun?”

Three classmates of mine who were walking by stopped moving when they saw me. Fujimoto and Saeki who I had hung out with all day figured something was wrong from my expression while the third, Nakano, was just his usual self.

“Oh, hey. It’s fine – nothing you need to concern yourselves with,” I told them. Getting more people involved would make things more complicated.

“…” Saeki gave me a glare and Fujimoto followed suit.

“That face is worse than the ones you make when Yukimura’s around. If you’ve got a problem, let us know.”

“Thanks guys,” I appreciated their kindness, but I was not going to let them push me into explaining. I searched for a change of subject and smelled something peculiar as I did. “Huh? Nakano… Why do you smell so sweet?”

“Is it still on me?” the guy raised his voice in disbelief. He started sniffing his arms and hands.

“What happened to him?” I asked Saeki and Fujimoto. Well, I mainly asked Fujimoto because Saeki never spoke up.

“Honda spilled some caramel onto him from a snack she had bought and gotten Magnified,” the male class representative explained. “She had Nakano on her leg at the time and he ended up stuck to her skirt.”

“On her leg?” I raised an eyebrow and gave the guy a smirk. “Nakano, did you and Honda actually get together?”

“Y-You’re the one who started it, Kirishima-kun!” Nakano pointed fingers at me.

“And I’ll do it again if I have to.”

“Apparently they’re giving it a shot after all. Our hard work after all these months finally paid off, Kirishima,” Fujimoto faked crying like a proud parent. Behind him, Saeki was wiping his eyes with a handkerchief in mock pride as well.

“You guys!” Nakano was so flustered that his face was cherry tomato red.

Hearing Nakano’s situation was a welcome distraction for me. I followed them and listened to Fujimoto who explained what he had witnessed after I left and to Nakano who I pried about what things he and Honda did around the town.

According to Fujimoto, after Yae and I left, Tokiwa and the gyarus got into a conversation with the Kogei girls about the school. He, Saeki, and even Yoshikawa apparently got uncomfortable when they heard of about Kogei’s dorm system. They took the first opportunity they could to leave.

“Apparently the guys there are Reduced way more often than just during Reduction Week. Those girls were so casual about things like grabbing guys and ordering them around that it felt a bit scary.”

“… That pervert girl was weird enough that I can picture that, but even that camera girl?”

“She said she personally doesn’t but it happens pretty often with her friend who apparently gets one of the guys to give her massages no matter what size he’s at,” Fujimoto pointed at his feet in particular. The image of a small guy a few centimeters tall having to massage the Kogei girls’ legs did not sit well with someone with a foot trauma like me.

After encountering Sumire and her friend, I was becoming more and more conscious of the fact that Kogei was much more worrisome school than I had expected for a place with a prestigious reputation. Fujimoto’s discomfort reinforced my suspicions.

“Kirishima, you’ve got that look again. Come on. Get in the elevator instead of staring out into space.”

“Sorry.”

Nakano’s tales, at the very least, put my mind more at ease. Apparently with him, he and Honda had split off from the others when we first arrived and they decided to actually give dating a try… the only problem, of course, was trying to figure out how to start being a boyfriend and a girlfriend when there was a 10x size difference between them.

“We got away from the city and took a look at the natural sights on the island. There was a waterfall trail we could follow to see a few falls… Honda-san tripped often because she was too big for the foresty path.”

“… Three times she landed on you.” “…” “My money’s on five.” Fujimoto, Saeki, and I guessed three, four, and five times respectfully. Considering how clumsy Honda could be, we knew Nakano hadn’t come out unscathed.

“Well, she fell nine times but she landed on me four times,” was the actual answer Nakano gave us.

“Damn.” “Damnit.” Fujimoto and I pulled out our wallets and each gave Saeki 500 yen.

According to Nakano, Honda was still concerned about holding boys in her hands so he walked around her the entire time. She would either wait patiently for him to get a good distance ahead before walking or walk further ahead of him and then wait for him. Either way, it was a waiting game.

And even so, she still fell over him somehow. The first time, there was a ditch he had to walk around that Honda couldn’t see because her head was literally above some of the trees. She fell forward and onto him, her bust slammed him into the mud. The second time, she was ahead of him because of her longer stride at her scale but got scared when a flock of birds flew towards her. They were likely the size of bugs to her but because she recognized them at birds, she tried to scare them away so they wouldn’t fly into her mouth. She ended up falling backwards and pinning Nakano under her butt.

“I wonder how many trees she ended up destroying trying to go through there,” I couldn’t help but wonder. Honda could certainly bulldoze through multiple thick branches while Magnified. Were the natural sights still around after a Magnified girl made it through there? There were so many Magnified girls on the island so Honda couldn’t have been the only one.

“I think there was a sign on the trail that said it was okay for the trees there to be damaged because the islanders were planning on clearing the area anyways,” Nakano surprisingly had an answer. “But you’re right about that. There were so many giant foot prints on the path I was walking on. I didn’t have to worry about getting lost following them.”

In any case, the other two times Honda ended up tripping on them were apparently when they arrived at a waterfall. The third time happened when Honda stepped into the water; not realizing that it was a lot deeper than just the ‘puddle’ she had thought it was at her size. She stumbled and fell into the lake water. Nakano was actually fine at first, but then Honda’s leg which had shot up when she fell onto her back came down, slamming into him with her thigh and dragging him into the water.

As for the final time, since they were both soaked, Honda suggested they may as well try out waterfall meditation. The waterfall was 20 m tall so it was actually capable of pouring down onto Honda… although it felt much weaker than it did to Nakano.

“Actually, Honda-san’s body scattered a lot of the water. If I wanted to get hit by a waterfall, I had to get under the water that went around her chest…” the guy blushed red remembering it. Fujimoto and I glanced at each other when he said that. We never raised our Nakano to purposefully be a pervert. Thankfully, he proved us right. “I-I didn’t, I swear. Honda-san got embarrassed when I said that out loud that she panicked and fell onto me.”

Through all of that, though, apparently the two had a good laugh in the end and then went back to the city so they could get a change of clothes after being soaked. Nakano was certainly living the life of a lucky pervert with all of the incidents he and Honda went through. It was certainly one of the reasons our class liked to push the ‘Naka x Hon’ pairing.

“I don’t think it’s much of a relationship yet, guys. It’s kind of hard to talk to Honda-san when she’s so huge. Can you guys give me advice on how to talk to her when she’s back to normal next week?”

“I’m single,” Fujimoto bluntly replied with confidence, earning a laugh from me and Saeki who tried his best to force down his chuckles and nearly choked.

“I’m still not dating Yae, so you’re ahead of all of us, Nakano,” I told him. “You’re better off asking Eguchi or Arai or maybe even Shiina.”

“… I haven’t talked to Arai-kun or Shiina-san much. And I think Eguchi-kun is a real exception so I don’t think his advice would really help, Kirishima-kun.”

“Heh. You have a point.”

I felt a bit better after hearing Nakano’s stories. We ended up heading up elevator to the floor the room the guys in our school were staying at. A tatami-mat room large enough to fit all of class 2B and the health committee guys was on the fifth floor.

“Oh. Not many people are here yet. I guess they’re still wandering around,” I noted. “Is it just Sakuragawa here?”

“Yeah,” answered a new voice that I recognized. “This was how things were arranged on the third and fourth floors too for Kogei and Isuzu.”

“Yagi-san,” I waved at my fellow health committee member. I lowered my head to him, knowing he had a rough day like the other members. “Good work today.”

“Thanks,” he nodded. “It was difficult without you. You’re one of the few guys who can deal with the occult girls and Okazaki.”

“Well, Akagi and Morino ran off somewhere after they got scared a while ago, so Kamiya-Senpai is looking for them. Did Okazaki did something wrong?”

“Is playing kaiju enough of an answer?”

“… Of course she would.” The two of us shared exasperated expressions.

Yagi gave me the rundown of Okazaki’s antics while she was patrolling with him and Asahina. She was more than happy to be play around whenever she could whenever Asahina was looking away, and because she was the size of a skyscraper, Yagi couldn’t really stop her.

“You know those trucks with the flatbeds in the back? She tried using one like a mini-skateboard.”

Nobody was in that truck, thankfully, and whatever was making things more durable on Ookojima made the truck more durable too so it wasn’t turned into scrap metal in an instant. Still, it seemed Okazaki had a literal trip down the road because she crashed, blocking traffic for two blocks with her body taking up the road. The truck, Yagi, mentioned, had been sent flying to the city park where, thankfully, only some Magnified girls from Isuzu were at the time. If there had been any normal sized students or civilians where the truck landed… I shuddered to think of the image.

In the end, Okazaki had to be pulled away by Kamiya-senpai for a long lecture after a strong smack in the back of the head. She was crying in apology after the second hour of sitting in seiza. Actually, she was crying my name apparently.

“… I’ll see if I can spoil her a little tomorrow. We still need her to pull her weight.”

“Don’t do it too much, okay? She’ll bounce back and mess around again if you don’t put your foot down,” Yagi advised. Our underclassman was so needy and needed as much spoiling as she needed scolding.

With our business done, I took a proper look at the huge tatami room. Futons were laid out all around the room. Saeki had claimed his spot next to Fujimoto while Nakano nervously had taken a futon that was one away from them. There was going to be an all guys sleepover tonight, and there was no doubt it was going to get rowdy.

“Aw man… I’m a little sad I signed up for the exemption now,” I was honest with myself.

“Oh, that’s right. You won’t be in this hotel tonight,” Yagi recalled. He put his hand on his chin and gave me a ‘once over’. “Are you sure you’ll be alright in the Magnified building? It felt like I had gotten Reduced when I had to go over there.”

“It’s nothing I’m not used to. Although, I’m more worried about whether or not I can get a ride there when Senpai finds Yae. Does the shuttle still work at this time?”

“… It certainly bothers me that we need to ride a shuttle into that building when we can see its entrance from the window,” Yagi frowned, glancing out to the hallway. There was a balcony area that looked out towards Hotel Ten-Scale. It certainly looked close because it was so big, but it was still a few minutes’ walk to get to the entrance and then many more minutes to get to any rooms inside.

“Changing sizes really warps our grasp on perspective,” I agreed. “But the shuttle sure does beat walking there. I’m all for a long walk at night, but after today, it feels too tiring.”

Ring! Ring!

The tune of my favorite idol’s single interrupted us as my cell phone ringtone called my attention.

“Hello? This is Kirishima,” I answered.

It was Kamiya-senpai who had contacted me. “Kirishima-kun, we have located Yae-san. You may meet up again now. Can you please head outside your hotel? If you are on an upper floor, the balcony is fine.”

“You found her? Okay… The balcony? Not the ground floor.”

Yagi directing to the balcony area earlier helped. I waved him good-bye and headed out to the open area with several seats and tables that had been set up for guests to enjoy the night air. I immediately saw the reason why Senpai said the balcony was fine.

The towering figure of Narumi-senpai, who was taller than the 5-story hotel, was standing outside, checking the big screen of her smart phone. Being on the fifth floor, we were around 12 meters above ground level, so I still had to look up at my 17+ meter high upperclassman in a yukata.

“Naru-chan should be there to take you to us,” Senpai’s told me through the phone call.

‘Narumi-senpai’s being made to do a lot of work today’ was what I thought to myself as Narumi-senpai looked up and spotted me exit the hotel balcony. With her being taller than the building, she had no trouble lowering her hand to me.

“Hi, Kirishima-kun. Your taxi is here,” my upperclassman joked but that was indeed the truth.

Climbing onto her palm, I felt more than a little unnerved looking down. Although I had been in Yae’s hands so often today, I now had a building for reference as to how far below the ground was. I didn’t feel confident in surviving a fall from Senpai’s hands despite this being the same height as when Yae held me inside. It was strange to admit but feeling normal sized felt a lot less safe than feeling Reduced.

“Yae’s okay, right, Senpai?” I asked both Kamiya-senpai who was still on the phone with me.

“Yes. There is no issue at the moment, Kirishima-kun. She is with the other girls in their room. In the meantime, I will go see Emi-chan about looking into your friend.”

That was good to hear. Narumi-senpai slowly moved her palm closer to her body, and I felt the warmth of it as I found myself mere centimeters away from her stomach. I braced myself to be taken inside.

Yae was with the other girls? I guess after seeing the guys’ room, we were getting a good idea of how the school trip was going for the others before we retired to our room.

(55) Day 3 Ten Scale Bedroom (17.1 m < 17.3 m)

“Such a fitting name, isn’t it, Kirishima-kun?”

“You really had to go there, didn’t you, Narumi-senpai?”

The Sakura Room for Sakuragawa was a bit too on-the-nose for the hotel in my opinion, but that was the large room in the inn that Narumi-senpai had brought me to in the ten scale hotel. Apparently, Saegusa-senpai was the one who had taken the liberty of choosing it for us, as expected of Narumi-senpai’s laugh-happy best friend. Senpai set me down at the entrance and smiled at the name of the room on the door as I compared myself to her slippers which were chest high to me.

“So Yae’s inside, Senpai?”

“That’s what I was told. I heard Takahashi-chan in the background when Natsumi-chan called me, so they should be together.”

Takahashi had recovered, huh? That was good to hear. Now that we both had run into Sumire, we could share in our worries.

Before I could do that, though, I had to get to her. I was a bit lucky to have seen the guys’ room arrangement because it was similar to the girls’ room. Futons were spread all around the Japanese style tatami room, and, because it was getting later, more girls had gathered to hang out and claim their spots than there had been guys at the other hotel.

“Ah.”

“… And of course we start with the final boss…,” I realized who was closest to the entrance when I walked in. Yukimura was lying on a futon, staring blankly off into space until she saw me. After she had been pulled away by Kamiya-senpai, I had run into the shoe-hating oddball again. I realized she wasn’t alone either. “This is a surprising pair.”

“… Senpai?” my normally energetic kouhai called me in a weak voice after she heard me. She looked up from the pillow she had shoved her face into. “Senpai~! Please comfort me! Kamiya-senpai was so mean! My legs hurt so much!”

“Seiza… pain… Sharp ground… still hurts…” Yukimura agreed. Their ryokan yukatas had rolled up a bit too much with how they were sitting so I could see both of their legs were trembling

“Yukimura, you kind of had it coming. And Okazaki, I heard from Yagi-san about what you did. I do think you had to reflect on your choices after that,” I crossed my arms while slowly side-stepping away from the two chaotic girls. It sounded like Senpai had given them something tougher than a standard seiza punishment - more akin to torture.

“Kirishima-kun… massage…

“That’s not in my job description, Yukimura.”

“Senpai, please!”

Whoosh!

“Whoa, hey! Let go, Okazaki!”

The two of them were already trying to order me around the moment they saw me. I would’ve refused even if I weren’t already reluctant because of who they were, but Okazaki already wrapped her hand around my torso, pulling me towards her. She couldn’t reach all the way back to her legs, but she let me go right on top of her butt.

“Oof! Urgh, hey this is…”

“My legs hurt, Senpai. Can you please rub them?”

Okazaki really knew no restraints. Well, all of us in the health committee knew she was a reckless kid who still needed some discipline. It was why even the other first years like Saeki had to keep an eye on her. I was glad that I didn’t have to deal with her all of this time, but my luck had run out.

Now, I was spread on top of my underclassman’s left butt cheek. Her yukata was thinner than I thought because I could see the faint outline of my underclassman’s panties through the cloth.

“You’re kidding me, right?” I asked in disbelief. It was a distance away, but I had half-a-mind to walk up Okazaki’s back to give her a piece of my mind. I pushed into Okazaki’s butt to pick myself up off the floor and found it firm and with a clear curve to it.

“Kyah!”

“Uwoah!”

Okazaki’s yelp had been accompanied by her entire lower body jumping up a few centimeters for a brief instance. While that movement would normally be seen as small, that was a few centimeters from her perspective which was a few meters to me. I was literally smacked by my underclassman’s butt and knocked into the air. I landed back down in between her butt cheeks, face first into the warm cloth of her yukata.

“Senpai! I’m sensitive right now! A little lower is where I want you to do it.” She sounded like she was half enjoying it and half actually hurting.

I was definitely not going to be following along with the massage Okazaki wanted. I initially planned to just jump off my underclassman’s body and move on, but because I realized Okazaki and Yukimura didn’t have the energy to turn around to look at me, another idea entered my mind.

“Oof… Careful now…”

I climbed around the small hill of Okazaki’s magnified butt and slid down the side slowly so that I was between her and Yukimura. I then then walked over to their exposed thighs which were shoulder high to me. I started with Okazaki, putting my bare hands on her bare leg.

“Senpai?”

“Heh, here we go!”

“Gyaaaah!”

With both hands, I grabbed and twisted Okazaki’s thigh with as much force as I could muster. It was only pinching her from her perspective, but that was enough given how much punishment she’d been given all day. She wailed. I saw her hitting the tatami mat with her hands in the distance, tapping out for mercy.

“… Kirishima-kun?” Yukimura tried to turn her head to see what was going on, but I was already moving on from my giant underclassman to her.

“And once more with feeling!”

“… Nngh! I-It hurts…!”

Yukimura did the same as Okazaki and tapped out for mercy. It felt cathartic to be able to get back at Okazaki for grabbing me and at Yukimura for her shenanigans earlier in the day, especially considering my comparative size.

“Wow. I guess getting a guy to massage you obediently doesn’t work at Sakuragawa, huh? Maybe it’s because they’re still pretty big, but they can bite back. I got to admit, though: seeing those girls hold back tears with their legs exposed is super sexy.”

“Sumika, you’re drooling…”

“M-My bad. Their legs were just so smooth that I… Ehehehe…”

Actually, to my surprise, Sakuragawa students weren’t the only girls present in the room at the moment. Looking down at me from the other side of Okazaki was a girl I had met earlier in the day. She was apparently massaging a girl I hadn’t seen before.

“Geh. It’s the pervert girl,” I reflexively backed away from the Kogei girl, Sumika Izumi.

“Who’s the perv- Oh, you’re that guy from the beach who was with the cutie in the parka,” the bespectacled recognized me. Her remark about Yae made me concerned for Yae’s safety around her. “You sure do get around.”

“I should be telling you that. Isn’t this Sakuragawa’s room?”

“I’m just helping Hazuki here so she can walk. Your Senpai left her and your two friends here since they cramped up after getting punished,” Izumi answered. She paused for a moment, scanning me up and down curiously. “Hm… You look good with that loose yukata. What’s that underneath it though? It’s… kind of hot. I’d love to meet you a normal size.”

“Sumika… Drool again…”

“S-Sorry…”

It was clear to me that Izumi was an easily distracted and tempted girl. At the very least, her friend was apparently restraining her. It certainly concerned me that Izumi wasn’t the one who got punished by Kamiya-senpai but she was instead.

Walking around Okazaki, I got a proper look at Izumi’s friend’s face. The short haired girl was just as expressionless as Yukimura… or rather, she looked bored. “You’re the one who got in trouble?”

“Hazuki covered a bunch of buildings with paint she kept in her pocket,” Izumi explained. “She has a habit of painting immediately when she gets inspiration, so she ended up doing it a bunch of times until your Senpai got pissed.”

“Still, that doesn’t sound too bad compared to what those two did.”

“Some paints are toxic. I forgot…,” the girl named Hazuki frowned, apparently having learned her lesson.

“O-Oh. That IS bad,” I realized what that implied. Because she was Magnified, there would be more of the toxic chemicals. If that was spread across multiple buildings, a lot of people would get exposed.

“Don’t worry about her,” Izumi told me. “I’ll make sure she won’t cause any more problems. We’re always supposed to keep each other out of trouble but getting separated kind of screwed that up today.”

“Hmph, you’re more reasonable to talk to than I thought, for a pervert,” I chuckled.

“You sure have a lot of sass when you’re around a bunch of big girls, shorty,” the bespectacled girl grinned. “Are you alright leaving those girls like that?”

Turning to Yukimura and Okazaki, I saw that their shouts earlier had attracted the attention of Tsujimoto and Saegusa-senpai. Tsujimoto was more than happy to mess with others like the fox she was, and Saegusa-senpai always loved a good laugh at the expense of her underclassmen in the committee. That meant the two of them were more than willing to toy with the two of them and poke their legs and feet, causing them to yip every time their nails touched Yukimura’s and Okazaki’s sensitive legs.

“They’ll be fine,” I dismissed what was happening and ignored it completely.

“Wow, you’re stone cold, shorty,” whistled Izumi. She was impressed.

“Don’t call me shorty when you’re the big one. The name’s Kirishima,” I told her.

“Kirishima?” I heard Izumi’s friend repeat my name, but before anything else could happen, we were interrupted.

“Touya!” Yae had come up from behind me. Turning around, I realized I had taken too long dealing with Yukimura and Okazaki that Narumi-senpai just went inside and told her that she had brought me. My childhood friend had to cross the whole room to come over to me (which, honestly, I was glad for because it was less exercise on my part due to the scale)

She wasn’t the only person either. “I thought I saw something skittering across the floor. So you made it here, Kirishima-kun.”

Joining Yae was our droopy-eyed friend, Takahashi. She still looked tired, but she seemed to at least have recovered enough to be able to walk behind Yae slowly. She took a seat and crossed her legs on the tatami as Yae kneeled down to also sit by me. She didn’t just sit, though.

“Gwoaah!”

Snatching me up with both hands, Yae brought me up to her face. After looking over me, she then rubbed me against her cheek happily.

“Oh thank goodness you’re safe, Touya. Senpai told me what happened!”

“S-She did?” I was worried how much Kamiya-senpai had divulged.

“That girl that scared Fumika-san and Akagi-san off was really dangerous, right? I should’ve taken you with me! I’m sorry!” Yae’s concern and worry had gotten the best of her. I appreciated how much she cared about me, but the friction of her cheek rubbing against my chest was causing my yukata to loosen.

“Y-Yae, hold on, my clothes!” I pushed against Yae’s cheek to try to get my body off of her, but, of course, for all intents and purposes, my actions were cancelled out and overwhelmed by Yae’s until she realized.

“Huh?” Yae pulled me away to see that my yukata had almost entirely been pulled off by her love and concern. She turned red upon seeing my disheveled state in her palms. “Kyah! S-sorry, Touya!”

“As expected of Asano. Her love sure can be overbearing, can’t it, Kirishima-kun?” Takahashi mumbled, watching from a safe distance.

It took me a moment to get my yukata back on properly, but when I did, I told her. “You don’t know the half of it, Takahashi.”

“What’s that supposed to mean, Touya?”

“Do you really want me to remind you about what happened with sensory enhancement, Yae?” I raised an eyebrow.

My childhood friend turned red, recalling fully the incident I was referring to. “N-No. I’m good.”

I chuckled and climbed up Yae’s knee and onto her lap. I grabbed onto her yukata to not get knocked off as she adjusted her seating position to face Takahashi. “You two seem okay. First of all, though. Are Akagi and Morino, alright, Yae? I thought they’d be with you.”

Yae nodded. “They got pulled away by the staff who didn’t want them running around in their wet swimsuits. Some of the water dripped off of them and into one of the open tunnels you and the other boys would use. It made it hard for the tram system, so they were told to get some cleaning supplies and mop it up.”

“And you didn’t have to do that?”

“… I was a bit slow changing before chasing after them.”

That would explain it. With my concern there alleviated, I turned to Takahashi. “You feeling better, Takahashi?”

“Eventually,” the girl gave the best answer she could muster. “Maybe tonight I’ll be able to have some proper sleep since it looks like we can it in here unlike back at home, Kirishima-kun.”

“Oh right, you had a lot of trouble the past two nights because of the Magnification,” I recalled Takahashi’s troubles with getting enough sleep from both the size change and from the sensitivity raiser spray. “… Well, try to get some sleep early tonight?”

“After today, you can be certain that I’ll be trying,” sighed the girl. “Today was way too rough…”

“I know what you mean, Aoi-chan,” Yae sighed in agreement. While she certainly could relate, Takahashi and I were likely more mentally exhausted than her. I certainly wanted to talk to Takahashi about Sumire, but because Yae was literally on top of me as well as below me, I hesitated to mention the topic.

That didn’t stop Takahashi, though. It seemed she wanted to talk about it as well, so she pointed to the opposite end of the room. “Asano, do you mind getting the snacks Senpai gave us? I feel like my blood sugar’s getting too low.”

“Was it still too soon for you to get up, Aoi-chan?” Yae’s concern for her friend made her overlook the fact that Takahashi was faking it. I felt the ground beneath me shift as Yae started to stand.

“Grk!”

Before I could slide off, with two fingers, Takahashi reached forward and grabbed me using the back of my yukata. I was yanked up by her hand like a stuffed doll in a crane game and brought over to her as Yae walked off. Takahashi had cleverly directed Yae away so she could speak to me more privately.

“… She was in the bath, wasn’t she?” she whispered to keep the conversation a secret, but I heard her like she was shouting at me through a loudspeaker. Takahashi dangled me in front of her mouth which could fit my head inside with room to spare. I got a good look at her moist pink lips as her hot breath battered my face with moist air that smelled vaguely of some kind of sweet potato.

“Yeah,” I confirmed. “I can see why you were so drained after meeting her now. I’d say she hasn’t changed a bit, but it looked like she’s gotten worse.”

“Message me about it later whenever you’re free. We should trade notes to figure out what we should do to keep her and Asano away from each other, Kirishima-kun.”

“That sounds like a plan.”

It wouldn’t be long before Yae got back, so Takahashi put me down afterwards to look conspicuous. Because she was seated cross legged, though, she plopped me on her right thigh. I realized I had an easier time straddling her leg than Yae’s because Takahashi’s slimness applied to her whole body.

Before Yae, could get back though, someone had been waiting for our conversation to end to speak to us.

“Hazuki, what’s wrong?” the bespectacled Izumi asked. Takahashi and I could hear shuffling and turned to see that her friend had recovered enough to stand up. She was also, however, searching pockets for something. She didn’t have pockets considering she was wearing the inn yukata but she found what she was looking for in her bra.

“Found it.”

“Found what?” Izumi asked the question I was also curious about.

To my surprise, the Hazuki girl turned to me instead of her friend. “… Kirishima. You said your name is Kirishima?”

“Yes?” I didn’t know the girl, but it seemed after hearing my name earlier, she knew something about me.

The light haired girl handed me a scrap of paper that she had to pinch between her fingers.

“What is that, Hazuki?” Izumi asked as I opened the paper up to read it. Because it was my size, none of the girls knew what it said.

The Hazuki girl only said one simple word before walking away. “Oyasumi…”

“Oyasumi (Good night)? Sweet dreams, Hazuki” Izumi blinked as she saw her friend starting to walk out of the room. “Wait, are you heading to Kogei’s floor now? You just started feeling better and you’re leaving already? Wait for me! At least answer my question!”

The two Kogei girls were out the door before Takahashi could figure out what had happened. She was as confused as I was.

“What’d she give you, Kirishima-san? Did you meet her today like you met the rest of us?”

“I didn’t. She was just passing on a message,” I slipped the note in my yukata, trying to ignore the feminine scent it was coated in“… She’s been looking for me, huh?”

“She? … Oh boy…” I was glad that Takahashi was a genius. She caught on to what I was saying just as Yae returned with the snacks.

“I got them, Aoi-chan. Wow, there are a lot of Okinawan sweets here. I’ve never had these before,” my childhood friend approached Takahashi from behind and plopped the building sized paper bag to her right next to me. “Oh? Did those two girls from Kogei just leave?”

“Yeah. After that Hazuki girl felt better, she just walked off,” I told her.

Yae frowned, “I wanted to ask about that scary girl Senpai talked about.”

Even without knowing Sumire was around, Yae was just as concerned about the Kogei girls as Takahashi and I were. We both did not want to get her involved too deeply, so Takahashi interjected by taking out a snack, unwrapping it, and biting down into it above me, causing rock-sized crumbs to tumble down onto me.

“Ow! Hey, Takahashi!”

“Mwaff… Fawwy, ‘iri-‘hima-‘un. ‘id ‘ou wah’ sah’… ma’ Chi…ko…?”

“A-Aoi-chan?” Yae hoped she heard wrong. Takahashi’s mouth filled with the cookie made it hard to understand her but I was sure that my childhood friend had thought she had said ‘chinko (penis)’.

“It’s chinsuko, Yae,” I corrected her, knowing both the snack and the joke that was even shown on the packaging. “You sure are a closet pervert, Yae-san…”

“Asano-san sure is dirty-minded,” Takahashi laughed after swallowing her food. “Oh, there’s sata andagi in here too. Senpai sure gave us a lot.”

“’San?’ Hey, why are you two distancing yourselves from me?!” Yae was embarrassed at being called out for her mistake.

“Oh, the bag says it’s a variety pack of chinsuko flavors. I actually want to give it a try, Takahashi. Give me a piece.”

“Sure thing, if you nibble on it like a hamster for me.”

“Takahashi…” I actually didn’t reject her as she handed me a cookie the size of my torso. It looked like a novelty prop for advertisements but the smell was certainly real. I wondered if I could make a big enough bite to leave a mark on the Magnified snack.

“Hey, Touya, don’t ignore me! Aoi-chan, you too!”

We shared a laugh at flustering Yae. I was happy to see that she was alright after running off later, and just seeing the part of the Sakuragawa girls’ room as calm as can be did help put my mind at ease. It wasn’t going to be much longer until it was our curfew, so it was good to feel a proper school trip experience while we could…

… especially because Yae and I were going to be separating from them for the night.