“Well, if this happened when we were doing basketball, I would’ve liked to see you girls play like this,” she whistled. “I always wanted to coach the basketball team.”

“Sensei! Can we have a competition against the guys?” Hozuki suggested. The sporty girl was more than a little interested in challenging us with her new height. She was using Aikawa’s shoulder as an armrest. He was a little annoyed but kept silent.

Our teacher chuckled. “I’m happy to see your spirit, but that’d be up to the boys. We’re giving you girls a second measurement today and then a free period.”

“A free period? Sweet!” “Measurements again?” “Right after lunch?” “So we have to get weighed again?”

Those remarks and questions erupted from the group of girls we stood in a group with. I was a little thankful that I wasn’t assigned to this job for the period because that meant I had some time to myself. The fact that we were being given a free period made sense, though. Magnification Week barged into the curriculum a lot more than Reduction Week. As such, Kawamura-sensei had very little she could make us do.

“Touya! We’re back!”

Yae called my attention while I rested after a quick volleyball match with Eguchi, Nakano, and Aikawa. When I turned, I saw her in her gym clothes.

“Yo,” I greeted. “Was the health check alright?”

“I’m 215 cm now,” Yae giggled.

“And your weight?” I added, intending to tease her.

“A-Ah… Can you not ask that question...? You know I can’t lie about it...” Yae resorted to changing the subject to avoid answering. I had a good laugh at that.

I had to look up to look them in the eyes because they were over a head taller than me. The top of my head was beneath her chin. As with Takahashi earlier, she was now at a height where she could put her chin on my head, which she did immediately, pulling me into a hug from behind.

“Now this is perfect,” she smiled.

“Hey now, you’re embarrassing me here,” I chuckled. Though I told her that, I did not fight her.

The fact that I wasn’t resisting made a certain someone a little annoyed, though. “Sheesh. He headbutted me earlier, but with Asano, he’s seriously enjoying it.”

“Kirishima-kun’s soft on her after all,” chuckled the other girl joining in.

Takahashi and Hozuki arrived after Yae together. With them nearing 230 cm since they grew at the same proportion and rate as Yae, I was more or less looking at their chests when I looked straight.

“Ooh boy. You two are together. That’s giving me chills,” I remarked. Though I was friendly with Takahashi, Hozuki, who clicked with her fairly well on occasion, was not exactly someone I enjoyed dealing with. It was probably because she always liked using my seat as a footrest that put me at odds with her. 

“Aww come on, Kirishima-kun, don’t be like that,” Hozuki frowned. “We finally get a free period, and I’m in the mood for a game now. Wanna join me?” Hozuki asked.

“And let you wipe the floor with me? I’ll pass. Even on normal days, I’m not as good as you, Miss-Track-Team-Ace,” I declined. However, the moment I said those words, I noticed Yae’s grip on me tighten. “Huh? Yae?”

“No refusing, Touya,” she spoke into my ear.

My face turned hot the moment her breath hit me. I realized what was going on and glared at Takahashi who was smirking. All three girls were in cahoots with one another. 

“Kirishima, you might as well give up,” the sleepy eyed girl told me. “Hozuki said she wanted to go up against the guys. I suggested challenging you, Natsume, and Yamabuki in a basketball game. It seemed like fun.”

“But Yamabuki hurt himself when a ball hit his face, and Tsujimoto-san went to bother Ryou-kun,” Yae held me tight and informed me. I was aware that the girls got stronger the bigger they got, but it was surprising how tough it was to struggle out of her grip. This wasn’t a simple hug. It was a bearhug.

“So I’m the only one available to pick on? I’m not much of an athlete in the first place, girls,” I directed my words at Hozuki who was the one who wanted to play. She was holding the basketball she had brought up high near her head.

The sporty girl chuckled at my inability to get out of Yae’s grip. “Jeez, the way you put it makes me sound like we’re doing something bad here… Which… Ok, I’ll admit, this is pretty heavy-handed, but grabbing you like that was Asano’s idea. Not mine. I just wanna play a game, Kirishima. It’s not that bad.”

It wasn’t. I was just not in the mood for being humiliated in a game against Hozuki. She was already better than me normally. With several dozen more centimeters in height on her now, there was no way she’d lose.

But the girls had my weakness. She was holding me tightly.

“Please, Touya? I want to play against you too.”

Yae also wanted to play, wanting to use her height to her advantage because she was typically more unathletic than me. This was why she was assisting them in the first place.

I sighed.

“Fine.” If it was Yae asking, I didn’t want to refuse. “But it’ll be 2 on 2. Takahashi, you’re on my side, alright?”

“Grk,” I heard the girl flinch. The unathletic lazy genius was bad with sports. “I-I was just going to sit this one out and let you go against them 1 on 1. You know I suck at this stuff.”

“You’re an accomplice in this too, considering you admitted you suggested it,” I told her. “You’re not stepping out of this scot-free.”

“Works for me. That sounds fair.” “Yes. Let’s play like that, Aoi-chan.” I got both Hozuki and Yae backing me up because they wanted to play the game. 

“Ah man…,” Just like me, Takahashi couldn’t refuse.

With that said, the half-court basketball game began… and it ended like I expected.

Actually, it was a bit better than I thought it would go.

“10 to 28… Yup. That makes sense to me,” I frowned counting up what was the final score. “At least it wasn’t a crushing defeat.”

It was to be expected that I would lose. Even in a regular match against me and Hozuki, the athletic girl could run circles around me. With almost 60 cm over me, the match became even more uneven. She was more than satisfied because she was able to actually dunk the ball in more than once.

“Alright! We did it Asano-chan!” she and Yae exchanged victory high-fives.

“Yay! I finally got a win on Touya!” my childhood friend cheered.

Takahashi and I were left in the dust. The lazy girl ended up sprawled on the floor of the gymnasium about ten minutes into the game, leaving me to play a two vs one match against two taller girls. Considering her stamina, this was actually a record for how long she lasted.

Still, it was a serious uphill battle for me to even get those 5 shots into the net. Yae alone was able to block a number of shots by putting her hands up. And although I was quick enough to get around her, the same couldn’t be said for Hozuki who never had to keep her eyes on Takahashi. She was fast. There was no way I could catch up to the track star but with her longer legs, it was even more impossible. Whenever she had to ball, she would dash away from me and try to dunk the ball. If I tried to get in her way… well, I ended up knocked down more than once by both her Yae. It felt like being run over by a rolling boulder. I had more than a few scuffs on my knees and arms from the falls I took.

“Yeah… Never again, alright? That was pretty darn one-sided,” I told Takahashi.

“Haah… Haah...” the girl was in a worse state than me. Her breathing was heavy. “No way... Kirishima… I’m totally going to get you back for making me play like this when we get even bigger.”

So she wanted vengeance on me… Well, at the very least, Takahashi’s exhaustion and the few points I had earned proved that at that moment, the girls still hadn’t gotten tall enough to completely overwhelm me. That was the one solace I felt I had. 

At the very least, Hozuki came to extend her hand out to me to help me up. She was satisfied after having sweat so much during the game. “That wasn’t half bad, Kirishima-kun. Your shots were really accurate. Maybe you should join the basketball team instead of being part of the go-home club.”

There were other people out there far better than me, but I appreciated the compliment and took Hozuki’s hand. She didn’t just help me up. She yanked me up. There was enough momentum that I was pulled into her chest. My face felt damp when it hit her sweat stained shirt.

“Whoah.”

“Whoops,” she laughed. I tried to push myself away, but her hand landed behind my head, holding me still against her body. “Heh. What, did you want to cop a feel or something? Aren’t you a pervert, Kirishima-kun.”

I absolutely did not but I could not answer properly with my mouth filled with Hozuki’s sweaty gym shirt and her chest pressing into my face. “Mffffpt!”

“T-Touya! Hozuki-san! Please let him go!”

“Hm…? You jealous, Asano-chan?” Hozuki sounded amused. I felt her hand stop pushing down on my head, but in exchange, both her hands were placed on my shoulders. “Then here!”

“Uwoa!” 

I shouted as Hozuki turned my body around and pushed. I stumbled forward straight into Yae’s chest.

“Mfffpt...” Again, I found myself unable to speak with my voice muffled by someone’s bosom. Much like Hozuki, Yae’s shirt was also stained with sweat, but Yae was bigger than the sporty girl in a few ways that didn’t have to do with height. The impact was cushioned by Yae’s natural airbags.

Much like Hozuki, Yae didn’t let me go. She held me tightly in a defensive hug.

“Hozuki-san, please don’t mess with Touya like that. You’re a girl, so you can’t just shove him against your chest like that.”

“It’s no problem, is it? It’s Kirishima-kun. It’s not like my body’s much to write home about anyways.”

It was odd for Hozuki to not be confident in her figure - she had more curves than Takahashi and plenty of muscle. She seemed to have some insecurities about that for some reason. Still, that wasn’t the problem. 

“Yeah, but Touya’s mine!” I heard Yae declare. I blinked and glanced over at Takahashi, who was also frozen stiff. To make such a bold remark, Yae must have been envious of Hozuki’s actions. I doubted she realized what she had even said. All I knew was that she was pushing me into her chest with even more force than before. I couldn’t breathe. 

“Uh… Asano, Kirishima-kun’s kind of...” Takahashi started.

Hozuki interrupted by whistling. “Whoo. I know you’re not dating yet, but you sure are something, Asano-chan. Fine. It’s not like I’m making a move on him anyways. Just make sure to invite me to the wedding, okay?”

“Huh? W-Wedding?” Such a reaction flustered Yae in an instant. She released me from her hug, giving me a chance to breathe.

“Haaah. Aaaah.... Phew… Let’s just end it there, girls,” I tried to diffuse the situation, but immediately after I said those words, I noticed a red stain on Yae’s gym shirt. I also felt a wet warmth dripping above my lip. Rubbing my nose, I saw the color red on the sticking to my hand. “Huh?”

“Whoa, I think you got a nosebleed there,” Takahashi realized.

“Oh. Well, that proves it,” Hozuki chuckled. While I was certain it was from being slammed into both girls’ chests, there was a cliche common in manga and anime that people get nosebleeds when they are excited. “You really have nothing to worry about, Asano-chan. Kirishima-kun’s body agrees that he prefers you to me. I’m blood-free here, so he didn’t react at all.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how it works,” I sighed and pinched my nose to deal with the nosebleed. At the very least, this was a good way to get out of the gym class and change the subject. “I’m going to head to the infirmary, okay? Yae, you probably should get changed out of that shirt too.”

Looking down, Yae noticed the blood stain I had left on her shirt. “Uwah. Yikes. Yeah. Sorry, Touya.”

It was nothing to really apologize about. The sensation of being against Yae’s bosom was not something I’d ever complain about having to feel. However, the fact that I could even get a nosebleed from being shoved strongly into them put into perspective that Yae and the other girls were continuing to gain strength as they grew. The girls were going to have to be more careful soon.

The additional green really accented Yae’s fresh appearance in her summer uniform. I watched as she nervously fiddled with her pink hair clip while she waited for me to finish changing out of my indoor slippers at the shoe lockers. She was uncomfortable being stared at because, at 222 cm, she was a head taller than the lockers themselves.

Though there was a bench she could sit on, she stood instead because when she had earlier, she could hear it straining to hold up her weight. She also had to slouch to avoid hitting her head on the low hanging ceiling lights.

“Are you done yet, Touya?” she asked.

“Yup,” I nodded as I closed my shoe locker. “Let’s get going.”

The two of us headed out the entrance of the school together. As we were not in a club, we were practically the first of the 2-D students to leave school. Our only other classmates who were leaving at the same time as us were Watanabe and her boyfriend Arai who we saw at the bike racks.

“Watanabe,” I called the gyaru who was trying to get on her bike. “That’s not going to work. Trust me on this before you break it.”

“See? I was right. Listen to Kirishima, Shino,” Arai seemed to have been persuading her against using it. “I’ll walk you home. Who needs to bike, girl?” 

“Fine, you win, Hiroshi,” Watanabe gave up with a blush. She was more than fine with being walked home by her boyfriend. “Are you two heading home too, Kiri-shii?”

I nodded. “You two have a safe trip. If there’s any trouble, just make sure people see the armband. You’ve got permission from the school to be outside while Magnified.”

“Sweet!” the gyaru was psyched up to hear those words. “Hiroshi, let’s stop by at a cafe later. I totes wanna show off to the girls at West High.”

“Urk!”

I watched as Watanabe pulled Arai into a strong hug. She actually ended up lifting him off his feet to both of our surprises.

“Huh? Uwoa. My bad, Hiroshi.” Watanabe realized she had been too forward to her boyfriend.

Arai was a little shaky when he landed. “Whoa, swept me right off my feet. That’s my girl.”

“He’ll be okay.” Considering he was able to joke around, he was fine. I waved the two farewell. “See you two tomorrow.”

“Good-bye, Watanabe-san, Arai-kun!” Yae bowed and left with me.

The two of them were going to have to walk their bikes home because the leggy gyaru was too tall to properly sit on it anymore even if she adjusted the seat. This made me wonder what other concerns there would be regarding getting home for the girls. The thought of taking the cramped trains seemed like it would be an issue. I believed there was a particular train line that had a Reduction and Magnification platform, but I had never been on it before to confirm.

Yae could see my pensive expression as we walked home together. “Is something wrong, Touya?” she asked.

I noticed that Yae was walking ahead of me slightly. She was going at her usual pace, but her longer legs had improved her stride. She usually liked walking slightly behind me, but I was going too slow for her now. 

“Touya?” Yae called my attention again.

“Ah. Sorry. I was just thinking about how the other girls would get home,” I answered her.

It made me happy to know Yae understood my thinking process. “Oh. I know what you mean. It’d be a real problem to get in a train or a car, right? When we get too tall, I don’t think we’d fit.”

“Yeah. If it’s tough enough for Watanabe to bike home, I think all of the girls will have to end up walking to school tomorrow.”

Yae giggled. “Then it’s a good thing that I already do that with you everyday.”

It was convenient for us definitely. We lived close enough to the school that it only took a few intersections before we arrived at our neighborhood and then another couple of minutes afterwards to get to our homes.

Yae was a little embarrassed as she walked by other people however. I could see her shift about and slow down whenever that happened. She was trying to hide behind me which, considering I was over 40 cm shorter than her, wasn’t exactly possible. “It’s a bit embarrassing that people are staring.”

“You’ll have to deal with it. You’re only going to get bigger all week, Yae,” I told her. “We can drop by a public area like the cafe Watanabe was talking about to get you used to it.”

“No thank you,” Yae rejected my proposal. “Stylish places like that aren’t exactly for someone like me.”

That was something I refused to believe. “I think you’re plenty stylish enough for it. Maybe we really should take a detour. I’d love to see you show that off.”

To follow up on my suggestion, I turned and started walking back to the main road, unfortunately I was stopped and pulled back when a hand was put on my shoulder.

“Or maybe I should just pick you up and take you straight home,” Yae countered with a cheshire cat-like smile. Just like I was using what we had seen with Watanabe and Arai earlier, Yae was doing the same.

To follow up on her suggestion, Yae swung her arm under my arms and pulled me close. She then started to lift me up.

“W-Whoa,” I found myself unable to keep my feet on the ground. Yae did it so easily, how much stronger had she gotten?

“W-wow. This is surreal. You’re so light, Touya. It feels like you’re lighter than Yuri is normally.”

It certainly was surreal to me as well. I was around 70 kg, but for me to seem lighter than an 8 year old primary schooler to Yae meant her strength had increased a lot with her height. The fact that she was so easily lifting me off my feet and even walking made that clear to me.

“Alright. Alright. I won’t force you to go, so can you put me down now? This is a little embarrassing here.”

“Hm… I don’t know, Touya,” Yae giggled. “It’s not as drastic as when you were puny during Reduction Week, but I like being able to be in charge of you like this.”

She sure was having fun joking like that. I had to admit - an aggressive Yae was appealing. The fact that she was messing with me like this told me Yae was readjusting well to her newfound height.

“How about this - let me go and I’ll make you lunch for tomorrow. You still have to eat non-Magnified food until Wednesday, so I can at least whip up a good meal for you,” I decided I had to bribe Yae to get her to put me down.

Drool.

It worked very easily. Yae released me almost immediately.

“A bento lunch from you, Touya? There’s no way I can say no to that,” my childhood friend had to wipe the drool dripping from her mouth.

Considering her drooling, I couldn’t tell whether it was because Yae liked the taste of my food or the fact that I was cooking for her that made Yae cave in so easily. She could cook as well, and I honestly felt her cooking was better, though that was my bias as someone who was admittedly head-over-heels for her.

In the end, though, we had made a deal. Now that I was free to put my feet flat on the ground again, I was going to have to make her lunch.

“Sheesh,” I chuckled. “Even when you get bigger, you’re still you, Yae.”

Though I knew there were going to be tough times for me in the future, I was looking forward to the rest of the week with Yae.