by Shouji Gatou
“Hmm. I got tied up by Isuzu-chan, mii... But I wished she’d read up a little bit more on the best knots to use, mii...” Tiramii muttered wistfully.
“I’m sure you overheard our discussion,” Isuzu told them. “We’re going to transform you into human forms and use you in a PV.”
“What the moffu?!”
“In thongs and such,” she continued helpfully.
“No! No way, ron!”
“To please the guests’ mothers,” Isuzu finished.
“Mii? Well, that actually might be pretty hot, mii...” Moffle and Macaron were argumentative, but Tiramii appeared intrigued.
“Try to understand, Moffle-senpai! It’s for the sake of the park!” Kobory said, nostrils flaring.
“Besides, you’re always putting us in skimpy outfits. It’s only fair, right?” Salama said, snapping smartphone pictures of the three bound mascots.
“Ahaha... I just got swept along with the others, I guess... I’m sorry. Um, if you really don’t want to do this, just tell us, okay?” Muse said, attempting to mollify.
“Bow pose!” Sylphie said, striking some bizarre yoga pose that seemed unrelated to the conversation.
“Of course I don’t want to do it! Stop this nonsense and let us go, fumo!”
“Yes, ron! Yes, ron!”
“Actually, what I’d really like right now is for someone to step on me. Preferably barefoot, mii. Right?”
“Don’t you wink at me, ron!”
“Tiramii, you shut your mongrel mouth, fumo!”
“Mii. But it’s a great opportunity! You’re both being stupid, mii!”
“You’re the stupid one, ron!”
While the mascots bickered, Isuzu casually got the torture device known as the Iron Phore ready to activate. (By which we mean “she plugged it in and turned it on,” of course.)
“Muse’s offer is irrelevant—the rest of us are in no mood to compromise,” she informed them. “You need a taste of what the women around you experience.”
“But it’ll be preceded by hellish torture, fumo! I don’t like pain, fumo!”
“I’ve accounted for that. We’ll transform you in ‘Thorough’ mode this time— It will take thirty minutes, but according to the manual, it shouldn’t be screaming agony.”
“It’ll still hurt, fumo! And thirty minutes is a really long time! There’s a mental strain involved, fumo!” Moffle’s eyes were filling with tears.
Isuzu let out a sigh as she looked down at him. “You disappoint me, Lord Moffle. To see the great general of the Maple Land third division reduced to this...”
“Moffu! I’m not a great general, and I don’t like pain!”
“Mii. I heard the way Macaron screamed last time, so I’m even more scared, mii...”
“Yeah. It really hurt a lot, ron...”
“Regardless, it will happen.” There was no mercy in Isuzu today, it seemed. Perhaps she had a lot of pent-up frustration from her daily secretarial duties; she was working with Kanie Seiya, after all.
“Um, um, Isuzu-san. You don’t have to be so pushy...” Muse tried.
“No, the time has come to be firm,” Isuzu stated. “It’s pointless to try to convince them with logic.”
“There’s no logic to this, fumo!”
“Ugh, let’s just do it already,” Salama said.
“G-Give it your best, Moffle-senpai!” Kobory said.
“Help me, then,” Isuzu demanded of the other women.
“Okay!” Isuzu, Salama, and Kobory lifted up Moffle and carried him over to the Iron Phore.
“Moffu! Stop it, fumo! Stop! Mooooffu!”
“Come on, Moffle-senpai...” Kobory said soothingly, “the sooner we start, the sooner it’s over.”
“Yeah, quit being such a poor loser,” Salama jeered.
But Moffle kept raging around, proving harder to carry than expected. “Mooooooffu!”
“Enough, Lord Moffle,” Isuzu said commandingly. “Help us, Muse.”
“What? B-But if he’s this insistent, I don’t know if we should force him...”
“Oh?” Muse was balking, but instead of reprimanding her, Isuzu just turned to Sylphie, who appeared to be meditating in a yoga pose. “Then Sylphie, you help us.”
“Okaaay!” Sylphie leaped to her feet and charged at the Moffle-carrying trio. “Dahhh!” She tackled them, causing the whole group to topple.
“Ah...”
“Moffu...?”
Moffle hit the floor. Kobory, sent flying by Sylphie, had crashed into Isuzu with Salama. Under the weight of three people against her back, Isuzu was knocked stumbling into the casket—
“!” The force of her impact within caused the device to close with a heavy metal clang.
“I-Isuzu-san!” Muse ran up to the Iron Phore. She tried to open the lid, but it wouldn’t budge. It must have locked.
“Nnnnnnnnnn!” They could hear Isuzu moaning inside the casket, enduring the stinging pricks. “O-Open the lid...”
“J-Just a minute!” Muse panicked. “Getting it open now! ...H-Huh? How do we open it?”
“I don’t know,” Salama said. “Now that I think about it, only Isuzu-chan knows how it works, right?”
“Th-That’s bad...” Kobory trailed off. The four of them stood there, flustered.
Just then, Moffle spoke from where he was tied up on the floor. “Moffu! Untie me, fumo!”
“Moffle-senpai,” Muse acknowledged him.
“I’m the one who put Macaron in there yesterday. I know how it works. It locks automatically. There’s a knack to getting it open, fumo.”
“B-But...”
They had already kidnapped him and ignored his pleas. If they untied him now, who knew how he might take it out on them? The four girls looked at each other anxiously.
“Don’t worry, fumo. I’m not mad. I won’t do anything to you. Just let me handle this, fumo.”
“Yeah, ron! We’re not mad, ron!” the similarly tied-up Macaron agreed.
“......” The girls were silent.
“Hurry! Isuzu-chan is suffering, mii!” Tiramii pressed them, urgently.
“A-All right...” Hesitantly, Muse walked towards Moffle and untied him.
“Moffu. Good.” Moffle stood up and swung his arms around. Then, humming, he untied Macaron and Tiramii.
“Thanks, ron.”
“Thanks a bunch, mii!”
The three of them massaged their aching joints, groomed their fur, and checked their appearances. They didn’t seem to be in any kind of hurry to act.
“Um... Excuse me...” Muse began. “Sh-Shouldn’t you save Isuzu-san?”
“Oh. Yeah, about that, fumo...” Moffle glanced into a mirror and adjusted his hat. Then he said, in a hushed voice, “That thing I said about not being mad? It was a lie, fumo!”
“I knew it!” Salama cried.
“I’m super mad too, ron!”
“Urgh!”
“I-I’m not mad at all, mii! I just want you to rub my tummy, mii!”
“You shut up, (fumo/ron)!”
“Mii...”
Moffle thrust a paw in the girls’ direction. An aura of anger flared around his body.
“Um... um, um!” Muse had heard of this. He was now every bit the image of the “famous general of the third division” that Isuzu had mentioned before. The elemental spirits didn’t come from Maple Land, but the Elementium Republic, its ally—and Muse was completely ignorant about military matters. But the Maple Land Army’s third division often appeared in action movies produced by Merrywood (Maple Land’s movie industry). Cinephile Tricen claimed it was “similar to the U.S. 82nd Airborne Division,” and while Muse didn’t know what that meant, she certainly thought it sounded impressive.
And now, they had earned the wrath of that division’s former leader. They were surely on the verge of some terrible punishment. Maybe they’d be stripped naked and have all kinds of awful things done to them... Like some kind of X-rated doujin!
“Ah, um...�
�� Muse could only tremble, tears in her eyes. She wasn’t quite so self-obsessed as to think that would be the case, but she was still quite afraid.
“Heh heh heh... ready for this, fumo?”
“I... I’m sorry... it... it was all my idea, so... p-please spare... the others...”
“Ah, Senpai.” Suddenly, Salama was standing in front of Muse. “Sorry, but this was all my idea. Muse hasn’t done anything wrong, so leave her out of this, okay?”
“Salama?!” Muse cried.
“You know she’d never do something like that on her own, right?” Salama said. “It’s one of my typical practical jokes.”
While Muse stared in disbelief, Kobory came to stand in front of the other two. “Um, um! It’s not true! It was my idea! I forced them to go along with my fantasies...”
“Kobory...”
“The truth is, I knew... Moffle-senpai, I knew that you were a power top... But I just wanted to find out how you’d do in other positions! So... so...!” she sobbed. Ignoring the use of the term ‘power top’ for now, it was clear that Kobory was trying to protect her friends.
“Wait.” Sylphie now moved to stand in front of the other three. Her expression was extremely serious. “...Here. This is for you.” Sylphie handed a warabi mochi to Moffle.
“M-Moffu... What’s this?”
“Warabi mochi. For you.”
“Moffu. Th-Thank you?”
“And for both of you. Here.” With a deeply regretful expression, she handed one warabi mochi to both Macaron and Tiramii, . Then, apparently having only the four to give out, Sylphie kept the last warabi mochi and ate it sadly by herself.
“Hey, why are you eating it there, ron?”
“It’s... good.” Tears were forming in her eyes.
“That’s not what he asked, mii.”
But Fairy of Wind Sylphie’s lack of respect for atmosphere remained an unshakable force.
“Moffu. Ah... Um...” The fierce Lord Moffle stood there for a minute, deflated, then cleared his throat. “Well... ah, forget it, fumo. I might try to put a scare into you, but a nice guy like me wouldn’t really hurt a girl, fumo.”
“Same here, ron. I’m not one of those Macaronian roughnecks.”
“Mii too! No matter how annoyed I might be with a woman, I’m still a Tiradaho gentleman.”
Muse couldn’t shake the feeling that the men of Tiradaho were at least as worrisome as the men of Macaronia, but she was too relieved to think about that now. “Th-Thank you!”
“Good.” Moffle folded his arms and nodded wisely. “...Moffu. Now as your cast leader, I must say I’m moved by the power of the bonds that you share. Especially you, Salama.”
“Er?” Salama’s eyes widened as she found herself singled out.
“You’ve made it clear that you care for Muse. You could stand to be a little less ‘tsun-’ and a little more ‘-dere’, fumo.”
“Huh?! Wh-What are you talking about?” Salama demanded. “Shut up!”
“S-Salama?” Muse asked.
“H-He’s wrong! He’s wrong! That’s so stupid! The old man’s imagining things! Seriously...” Salama waved her arms wildly, looking like her face would burst into flame.
“Salama...” Muse was touched.
“He’s wrong, dummy! He’s wrong!”
“Is he really?”
Salama turned her eyes downward with a huff. She then tapped her index fingers together restlessly, sparking lighter-sized flames each time they touched. “Well... not exactly wrong... B-But ugh, you’ve made your point! Just lay off already!”
“Ahaha... sure.” Muse smiled brightly, tears forming in the corners of her eyes. Salama had been a mystery to her before, but now it all fell into place. “Sorry. I’ll lay off.”
“Hmph.” Salama was looking away, while Muse was smiling broadly.
“Mii... What a sappy teen drama. I was hoping for a more tumultuous relationship, mii...”
“Quiet. In any age, friendship is a thing to be appreciated, ron...” Macaron and Tiramii whispered to each other while the two girls ignored them with all their might.
“Moffu. Well, moving on to more pertinent subjects...” Moffle turned his gaze to the Iron Phore. “Isuzu’s still trapped inside there. Let’s see, what to do...”
“......” Isuzu had kept her quiet the whole time, enduring the prick of the needles inside without a single scream.
“Ah... That’s right,” Muse remembered. “Please save her!”
“Moffu. Now, let me think about that...” He tapped the lid of the casket with his squeaky paw, murmuring teasingly. “Hello in there! Isuzu-chan?”
“...Yes?”
“You were awfully rough with us earlier, wouldn’t you say? That was a violation of human rights, wouldn’t you say? It was wrong, wouldn’t you say?”
“......” Isuzu was silent.
“Are you sorry, fumo? Are you sorry, fumo?”
“Sorry?” she asked. “For what?”
“Ohhhh!” Moffle made a dramatic shoulder-shrugging gesture as he turned back to face Macaron and Tiramii.
“Heh heh heh... It’s like she doesn’t realize we hold her life in our hands, ron.”
“Heh heh heh... She’s so stubborn, mii.”
The three shared a sinister grin. “Hah hah hah hah!”
Isuzu was always shooting the three of them with her musket. It wasn’t surprising that, with that threat neutralized for the moment, they would all go mad with power.
“Um, um, Isuzu-san?!” Muse called out. “Maybe you should apologize! You did go a little far with them this time...”
“...I don’t need to apologize,” Isuzu said plainly from inside the casket. “As I said from the start: It’s always the women who get paraded around as sex objects. They deserve to get a taste of what we go through. I refuse to compromise on this point.”
“You’re being strangely inflexible about this, Isuzu-san...”
“I’ve been under a lot of stress these last few months. It’s nothing to worry about.”
“Ahh...”
“Of course, I intended to force Kanie-kun to strip as well.”
The four girls suddenly shrieked with excitement. “What?! You should have said that sooner!”
“...Well, I intended to. I hadn’t worked out how to convince him yet.”
“Oh...”
“Anyway, Lord Moffle. I’m afraid to admit it, but I’ve lost. My fate is in your hands,” Isuzu said with resignation.
Moffle closed his eyes in the manner of a samurai being asked to behead a defeated foe. “Moffu. I like your spirit. Then prepare yourself, fumo.”
“Moffle-san!” Muse objected.
“I think I’ll transform her slowly on the ‘thorough’ course, fumo. That should be interesting. And when she comes out, we’ll all have a little photo shoot, fumo!”
Macaron and Tiramii scowled at this.
“Mii! Moffle, I don’t know about this...”
“That pain is nothing to sneeze at,” Macaron told him. “Spare her!”
“Heh heh heh. You’re all so soft,” Moffle said, laughing wickedly. “Isuzu is a member of the Maple Land royal guard. She won’t be brought to tears by this silly little toy, fumo.”
“Moffle!”
“Isuzu-chan, are you ready, fumo?”
“Hm... Yes.” Isuzu said from inside the casket. There was the tiniest of trembles in her voice.
Moffle set his paw on the switch. “All right, fumo! Let’s test the endurance of House Yisuzurch!” He made a sound like a click, and the group gasped.
A few seconds later, Moffle burst into laughter. “Mofufu... I was kidding! It was a joke, just a joke. I didn’t really hit it. Not even I’m that cruel, fumo.”
“M-Moffle-senpai...” The whole group let out a sigh of relief.
“And if you want to undo the lock, you just press here. It’s in the instruction manual, you know? Can’t believe how scatterbrained you people are, fumo...”
Click.
“M-Mii?” Tiramii looked at the switch Moffle had pressed, and this time, he went pale. “M-Moffle! That’s the activation switch, mii!”
“Eh?”
“It’s right next to the release switch, mii! I know because I did it a bunch of times yesterday, mii!”
“M-Moffu?!”
The casket began to tremble. The casket began to roar.
“......! Mmmmmmmmm!” Inside the machine, Isuzu swallowed her screams.
“Hey... stop it! Stop it!”
“We can’t, mii! Once it activates, it can’t be unlocked, mii!”
“Apparently stopping it midway can be dangerous to your health, ron!”
“Um, er, it was just a mistake, fumo. I d-didn’t mean it, fumo! Please believe me, fumo!”
“Just stop it!”
“I told you, we can’t!”
“Isuzu-san! Isuzu-san!”
“Unplug it!”
“No! That’s dangerous!”
“It’s like turning off your PC during an OS update, mii!”
“Ah, this is so bad!”
“Isuzu-san! Hang in there! Isuzu-san?!”
The three mascots and four spirits crowded around the casket. After about three minutes of grabbing the instruction manual from each other and shouting...
...They concluded that they had no choice but to wait for the ding.
The casket was set to “Thorough” mode. According to the instructions, it should hurt about one tenth as much as “Express” mode. But despite the supposed lesser pain, Isuzu still let out an occasional moan of suffering.
“Isuzu-san... are you all right? Isuzu-san!”
“...I’m sorry... but I’m fine.” Isuzu managed between feeble breaths. “It’s endurable, but... I realize now that I was wrong to try to inflict this on you. Forgive me, Lord Moffle.”
“Moffu. It was an unfortunate accident, fumo. I’m sorry, fumo.” Moffle was abashed.
“Don’t worry about it,” Isuzu told him. “I’m not angry, so please wait for me there.”
“Moffu...”
“I’m really not angry...”
“Okay. I’ll stay, fumo.”
And so, thirty minutes passed. The Iron Phore dinged, and the transformed Isuzu emerged from its billows of steam. The others were struck dumb by the sight. Only Sylphie looked at her, eyes shining, and shouted, “Cute!”