Archive of Our Own ^beta

The Great 'Snatch the Jellyfish' Operation

Kirara was staring at a piece of paper.

Her room wasn't all that large when taking into consideration that it hosted two people, but she was content with having just a corner to herself. In said corner were four screens, two keyboards, three mouses, a drawer full of different kinds of controllers, a computer, four consoles, two sets of headphones and another drawer, all neatly placed around a padded gaming chair. There was also another screen which only turned on with a password, linked to the hidden hard drive where she stored the most valuables of her digital treasures. All of that was boxed in by two thick plywood walls forming an isolated cubicle. Having those installed had been a little adventure all of its own, but they were soundproof enough.

Not like she actually owned just that corner of the room, no. Utage had gone out of her way to ensure they'd split the space evenly between them, and Kirara did have a couple of consoles and an extra stash of games connected to the tv they shared, but that was her small little kingdom.

She wasn't sitting on her throne at the moment, however. No, she was sprawled out on the sofa, her tentacles softly crawling over her surroundings, her eyes fixed on the single sheet in her hands. She was blushing, but Kirara was from a somewhat peculiar branch of aegir whose cheeks usually turned blue rather than red on such occasions so anyone who might happen to steal a glimpse at her at the moment would probably think she was feeling sick.

But no, she was just embarrassed.

"... can't believe I went and did this... "

The door then swung open all of a sudden, making Kirara jump to her feet and hide the sheet behind her back as she turned to face the other owner of the room.

"Yoh, Rara-chan!" Utage greeted, strolling inside with a few bags under her arm "What are you brooding over this time? Oh!"

"It's noth- no, like, you're back early?" she asked back while trying to inconspicuously get to her private corner of the room.

"Now this won't do, Rara-chan!" Utage almost chirped back, quickly dashing to the bunk bed and putting her bags down before walking up to Kirara, getting to exactly one step from what the aegir considered to be her personal space "You're blushing" she said with a wide, knowing smile, one Kirara was all too familiar with "Did I catch you with your hands in your pants?"

"Wha- I don't do that stuff on the sofa!"

"Where then, the bathroom? Come on, we're buddies, you can tell me"

Kirara's face turned bright blue.

"That's- !"

Then she fished her phone out of her pockets and started typing, her fingers moving much more quickly than her tongue could. The fact that she was doing all that with just one hand, however, could be a dead giveaway to at least three different things.

"You should really work on this habit a bit more, you know?" Utage replied as she grabbed her own phone to read Kirara's message.

"You're not making it any easier... "

"Hey, tell me tell me, did you mod anything for that too?" she pressed the assault, her tail almost poking Kirara's belly, the tip stopping right before making contact.

Kirara, on her part, blushed even more and turned around, typing another message even faster than before.

"Ah!"

" -aaahhh?!"

The aegir fell into a panick upon realizing that she had just done the one thing she absolutely shouldn't have, inadvertently exposing the piece of paper she was trying to hide. Utage simply snatched it out of the aegir's grasp as soon as she saw it.

"Give it back give it back giveitback!"

"Wooo, Rara-chan" Utage commented, a genuine mix of surprise and admiration in her voice "You actually went through with this? That's crazy, I'm impressed"

As for what exactly Utage was looking at right now, that was a rather simple thing.

A pencil portrait, drawn by hand.

Kirara herself was the subject, which was surprising enough in itself already, but the real deal was the situation she had been portrayed in.

She was on her knees, in the middle of a canopy bed. And she was almost completely naked. She was wearing her usual coat, fully unzipped and barely covering her breasts, and her panties, pulled ever so slightly down, not nearly enough to actually reveal anything but still sufficiently so to titillate the viewer. And that was it, in terms of clothing. With that said, Kirara was also chained up in that portrait. Steel rings ran around her chest, her waist, her hips, drawing an intricate and somehow elegant pattern on her skin, underneath the two only garments she was wearing. Another chain looped around her wrists to keep her hands up, binding them to the canopy's frame above her and then coming back down to close around her ankles as well. What possibly stood out the most was the fact that the chain looped around her head and over her eyes a couple of times too, a sort of unconventional blindfold of sort, one Kirara herself had found oddly comfortable to have on, so long as she remained still at least. The portrait itself was remarkably well made, so much so Utage could even see just how hopelessly flushed her friend was as she posed for it.

"Can't believe you went and had this done for real" she said again "I'd heard that minoan's portraits have been getting more and more popular but... "

"I said give that back!" Kirara shouted again, jumping up to reach Utage's hand and snatching it from her, Utage loosening her grasp to avoid accidentally tearing the sheet.

Before Kirara's feet could touch the floor again, however, Utage seized her in an hearthly hug which briefly short circuited the aegir.

"'atta girl! Talk about shock therapy!"

"No no no, you don't get it Utage, do you have the slightest -!" she started to say back, only to grab her phone again and text the rest of her reply.

Utage let out the lovechild of a laugh and a groan at that.

"Alright, maybe the shock therapy did more harm than good. Yeah, of course I know it was embarrassing. I mean, look at this" she continued, her tail pointing to the sheet still in Kirara's grasp "It's really artistic and all but you're basically naked here, and tied up in such a pose too. So" she added, leaning against Kirara and almost rubbing cheeks with her "I bet you wanted to give this to Mizuki and chickened out at the last moment?"

Kirara's face turned even more blue, to the point her cheeks blended in with the underside of her hair -a really pretty sight, if anyone were to ask Utage- as she shrivelled down, collapsing on the floor rather than falling to her knees.

The text Utage received on her phone said pretty much what she had expected to read there, so she helped Kirara to the sofa and sat there with her.

"Alright, it's nice and all that you went and did this but did you at least enjoy it?"

"Well, it was... kinda nice, I think?"

"And weird"

"It was so damn weird you have no idea"

"It took like four hours"

"Pallas asked me if I was really fine at least five times in just the first twenty minutes"

"Which was nice and all seriously but it was also, like, I don't know?"

"I must've looked uncomfortable as hell"

"Why would she have asked me that so many times otherwise"

"... like, four and a half out of five I guess?"

"Woah, slow down there" Utage spoke up to interrupt the onslaught of texts "That's great but maybe don't go for something so bold right off the bat next time ok?"

"I had to! How could I possibly get him back from that woman otherwise?!"

"Listen here, Rara-chan, you can't just go and talk as if you two were dating in the past... "

"WAAAAAAHHHHH!"

"Hey hey, breath! In, out, in, out, like this ok? That's good" Utage sort of managed to make her calm down a little.

"... think I should burn it?" Kirara said -not texted- after a while.

"Woah there, girlie, that'd be a damn shame. I mean, look at this thing, you're gorgeous here. Come on, didn't Mizuki pose for one of these too? I don't see why he would turn this down if you just up and gave it to him. I'm sure he'd take the hint too! I mean, he can't be that dense right?"

"... I touch his tentacles with mine sometimes when we game together in his room but he never said anything... "

"Hey, maybe he just thinks it's on accident? Or perhaps where he's from that doesn't mean anythign. With some people you just gotta up and say it out loud, you know? And if that's what it comes down to, might as well give him a preview of what else you have to offer?" Utage tried to recover the conversation, briefly flapping the portrait around "Besides the absolutely sick setup over there" she added while pointing to Kirara's gaming corner "And your tinkering skill, your collection of manga, your adorable bluish blush, and... "

"Have you seen that woman?!" Utage's phone rang with the next message, a clear sign that things were once again spiraling downward.

"Oh, you mean that- " she started to reply, stopping herself at the last moment to better pick her words "That older lady who sometimes drops by the bar when Mizuki runs it? Yeah, she's... uhm, listen, I don't think they actually do... no, like, I mean... are you even sure they're a thing anyway? I've never heard of them hanging together outside of those times she has dinner there"

"Utage, he"

"He"

"She"

"They did it"

"They ABSOLUTELY DID IT!"

"I KNOW!"

"AND!"

"WHAT AM I EVEN SUPPOSED TO- YOU'VESEENHERYOU'VESEENMEHOWDOIEVENCOMPARESHELIKESHISCOOKINGITRIEDIT ANDIT?SNOTBADBUTIT?SLIKESODOKFSAJDSAJ- "

"Alright, that's enough!" Utage chirped as she snatched the phone out of Kirara's hands before she could keep typing on it like a madwoman "Listen, don't take this the wrong way but I really can't picture Mizuki actually dating someone. Like that" she remembered to add at the last moment.

She couldn't quite picture Mizuki dating anyone in truth, there just was something... off about him. Not really unpleasant, just off. He was a chill and pleasant guy, but something about him just didn't add up. And she had a feeling he was actually just dense. But those were not things Kirara needed to hear at the moment.

"... well, I do spend more time with him than most other people I guess, but... "

"No buts! Mizuki's like a ship anchored in the sea! If you want him you gotta go up and snatch him for yourself before anyone else can beat you to him!"

"... fetch quests can do die in an hole... " Kirara whispered under her breath.

"Say what?"

"Nothing!"

Then someone knocked at the door, prompting Utage to get off the sofa and Kirara to get ready to hide into her gaming corner.

"Expecting visitors?"

"Yeah" Utage replied as she walked to answer "Bena said she- wait, Kirara?" she then asked as she noticed that her roommate had already diven into her little fortress and was about to shut the door "You know her?"

"That child's evil" came the aegir's reply "She's a gaming prodigy but she's evil"

"Ahem... care to elaborate?"

"Just tell her I'm not here. If she asks" she said back, not wanting to recall how her first -and only- meeting with Bena had ended "Especially if Annie's there too"

"Who? Alright, sure" Utage agreed, figuring that she could investigate that later.

And so she opened the door.

But the one waiting in the hallway wasn't the little caprinae.

"Hi" Mizuki greeted, as calm and relaxed as ever "Is Kirara here?"

A smile wide enough to confuse the aegir appeared on Utage's face.

"She sure is! Make yourself comfortable, I'll get her right away"

"Oh, it's just for- " he tried to explain himself, only to get dragged inside and led to the sofa instead.

"Don't worry about the details! Hey, Rara-chan!" she replied first, called out later as she knocked at the plywood door.

"Wha- oh" came out Kirara with her answer, or a little bit of it at least, her words dying somewhere between her lungs and her lips, her tentacles shivering for a moment.

Then she regained control over herself.

"Hi there, Mizuki"

"Good day. Is this a bad time?"

"No, just- wait, I gotta pause it!" she shouted, briefly disappearing back into her walled-off domain before coming right back out and sitting on the sofa as well.

There was a little bit of distance between them. Not too much, not too little. But Utage nearly made it awkward by sitting on a chair rather than on the sofa with them, or so Kirara thought at least. It wasn't that large but it still could've hosted all three of them with no issue after all.

"Are you free next week? Oh, nine days from now actually"

"Next week? Let me think... Depthdivers II's off for maintenance, Elden Soul's expansion won't be out yet, I'll fully clear Death Space III tomorrow, the last Hammer of War was terrible so whatever, then... "

Then Utage kicked Kirara in the shin.

A weak kick by any reasonable metric, that one, but abrupt enough to make Kirara jolt and stare at her, all under the mildly confused gaze of Mizuki. Utage simply gave Kirara an exasperated smile while pointing to her and Mizuki at the same time, and by the way her tentalces suddenly twitched that got the message across.

"Next week yeah! I'm free! Totally"

"The landship's stopping by a town and I have a ride there. Want to tag along? I was thinking of staying a day or so there"

"Ooohhh, the night too?" Utage asked with a mischievious smile.

"Yeah, actually"

Kirara's tentacles crawled back under her coat, shivered, shivered again and then came back out.

"... sure!"

"That's nice" Mizuki casually concluded as she stood up "I'm helping at the kitchens today so I'd better get going now"

"Dinner, yes, right, can't be late" Kirara sort of blabbered as she accompanied him to the door, the slightly erratic motions of her tentacles stopping as soon as she noticed Mizuki taking notice of them "Tell me what hour we leave that day and I'll be ready on time"

"So" he said back, one foot already in the hallway "I think we'll leave in the morning, probably before eight? Ho'olheyak said she has some work to do so she has to get there early"

Kirara froze.

"Don't worry" he added, completely misunderstanding the reason why her gaze had suddenly turned vacant "You're not bothering her. Actually, she's the one who told me it'd be fine to take someone else along since she was going there anyway"

"... sure... "

"Alright then. Have fun with your game" he concluded, since from what he had gathered Kirara was gaming when he arrived.

Then he left, and Utage had to go and close the door herself because Kirara was still unable to move.

"... it's over... "

"Like heck it's over!" Utage shook her, both figuratively and literally "You heard him right? She's got work to do there, she won't be around much! Maybe not even for the whole day, and you might get to spend the night with him all alone! You've gotta take the chance and secure him! This is basically a date!"

Kirara's face turned bright blue again.

"Leave it to me, Rara-chan" Utage added with a big, big smile on her face "I'll make sure operation 'Snatch the Jellyfish' is a success!"

"... operation what... ?"

Despite Utage's enthusiastic reassurance, Kirara couldn't help but believe that things would not, in fact, end with a success, whatever a success might mean in that context.

As for the portrait, Utage decided to let Kirara forget about it for the time being as that turn of event had convinced her it was better saved for another occasion.

Mizuki came to pick Kirara up at roughly seven in the morning -Utage had woken up even earlier to run off on her own- and the two headed to one of Rhodes Island's gates together. Not the main one, thankfully. That one was always bustling with people and vehicles, Kirara had learned to stand it but she still hated how crowded and noisy of a place that was. No, they went to one of the secondary gates, the fourth one to the precise, where Ho'olheyak was waiting for them. Much to Kirara's dread. The landship wasn't actually docked at the town -maybe they didn't have any ports for mobile facilities that large, which sounded a bit odd in truth, or maybe Rhodes Island simply didn't get permission to dock, which seemed more reasonable because that surely required a lot of bureaucracy and bureaucracy was always slow and messy-, it had simply stopped nearby it. Getting to the town itself from the landship would take almost an hour by car, and a not too small part of Kirara nearly considered walking there instead of having to hitch a ride from Ho'olheyak.

For better or for worse, however, that idea got kicked out of her mind the moment she saw the liberi -pythia? ... what even was that woman again?- bend down just enough to kiss Mizuki's forehead as a greeting. Kirara spotted the tips of his tentacles, poking out from under his cloak, jolt a little bit, which she was absolutely sure meant he had gotten flustered from that.

No, no, she couldn't afford to leave those two alone.

"So, uh, hi!" she jumped between those two -well, more like next to them if anything- with an outstretched hand towards Ho'olheyak "Thanks for the ride!"

The tone of her voice alone was a dead giveaway of how nervous she was feeling already, but even a deaf person would've noticed her state of mind from how stiff she looked.

Ho'olheyak, on her part, simply smiled and -oh lord, how long were those canines?

"I was heading into town anyway" she replied, this time standing straight up, her tail briefly coiling around Kirara's hand to shake is, sending a cold shiver down the aegir's spine -why were even her scales so smooth to the touch?!- "I don't mind taking Mizuki's little friend along. Besides" she added as she leaned forward, and perhaps it was due to how long and thick her tail was or due to the way her head wings -yet another exceptionally freaky trait- had just spread open a fair bit but Kirara just couldn't help but feel like that woman was towering over her despite the height difference between them being of only ten centimeters or so "Someone's gotta keep him warm for me while I'm busy, wouldn't you say?" she whispered into her ears.

"What was that?" Mizuki asked from behind, not having caught Ho'olheyak's words but having noticed how blue Kirara had turned.

"A little, innocent tip" she replied, heading towards the car they'd use to get to the town.

"I-it was nothing, really" Kirara added before heading towards the car too.

Mizuki found that a little odd, if only due to how mechanical Kirara's gait looked like, but he figured she'd tell him if he really needed to know and refrained from bringing the matter up again.

And so they all got into the car, with Ho'olheyak at the wheel.

The ride didn't last that long, in truth. Rather than nearly an hour, in fact, they made it into town in a little under thirty minutes. Kirara had already taken cab rides in the wastelands, back when she first left Higashi to get to Rhodes Island for treatment, so she knew there weren't actually any speed limits out there. What she hadn't considered was just how hard Ho'olheyak would hit the gas pedal, making the car race far too quickly for the aegir to relax. Driving simulators weren't exactly her favorite thing, and even those few she had played still didn't give quite the same feeling of stomach-turning speed as actually being in a car running at over one hundred and eighty kilometers per hour. How were they even going so fast, she screamed out in her mind, that car didn't look like a sports model at all. She heard Mizuki and Ho'olheyak exchange a few words during the ride, but she was too busy holding on to her seat and fearing than any hole or rock or whatever on the ground might send them flying to try and join those brief conversations.

By the time they made it into town, Kirara felt rather spent already. On the bright side, speed limits became a thing as soon as they entered the town's borders and Ho'olheyak decided to respect their existence and slow down. On an even brighter side, the woman parked the car in what felt like the first good spot she could find and got off, together with a slightly shaken Mizuki and a decidedly more worn out Kirara.

"Are we meeting here again for lunch?" he inquired.

"Don't worry about that, pretty boy" she replied, her tail briefly poking the tip of some of Mizuki's tentacles "You do your thing, I'll find you when I'm done with mine"

"... the town's kinda big" Kirara chimed in.

"Trust me" Ho'olheyak answered, her head wings spreading a little bit and her tail standing up behind her, the smile on her face complementing the look of a predator staring down at an entertaining, little, helpless prey "Finding people has never been a weak point of mine. Have fun then" she concluced as she turned around and walked off.

Mizuki waved at her. He had meant to say 'you too', but then he remembered having heard that most people didn't like their work and realized that he had no clue whether that was true for Ho'olheyak or not, and by the time he figured out what else to say the woman had already disappeared.

"You're here a little earlier than planned but that's fine" Utage's voice then rang out from the minuscule earpiece inside Kirara's ear, making her jump from the suddenness of it "Alright, let's start! With breakfast. I know just the place!"

"Wait where are you even- "

"Hey, don't do that! He'll think you're crazy. Oh, but if you think he's into that then keep it up!"

"What's wrong?" Mizuki asked, his neck bent at around forty five degrees as he stared at Kirara, equally intrigued and confused by how she had suddenly started talking to the air.

"No-nothing! No, like, actually, ahem... g-give me a moment. I'm not used to those speed levels"

"Oh, me neither"

Kirara spent the next minute or so taking a hold of her own pulse and recovering from the ride, while Mizuki simply looked around. They were close to a residential neighborhood on a workday, at more or less the right time to see people leaving for work, and the bar at the end of the road seemed especially crowded. That seemed like a good place for breakfast, he figured.

"I, uh, I know a place. For breakfast"

"I didn't know you'd been here before"

"I haven't, I just -no, one of my friends is kinda familiar with this town and she gave me a few pointers"

"That's nice. Sure then, where?"

"It was... " she answered while scanning their surroundings with her pointing finger "... that way" she concluded when Utage told her she was looking in the right direction.

And so they made their way to a small ice-cream shop, open already but almost fully devoid of customers. Picking a seat mostly at random, Kirara stammered her way into ordering a double parfait, trusting that Utage knew what she was doing.

And sort of regretting that when a large but also decidedly singular bowl of parfait got delivered to their table, a serving large enough for two admittedly. Mizuki seemed to find nothing odd about eating from the same bowl like that, simply picking up his spoon and commenting about the pleasant colors of the syrup and custard, but Kirara had to keep her tentacles from coiling around the chair's legs out of nervousness.

Much to noone's surprise, however, nothing really happened. They simply ate the parfait -well, Mizuki ate around four fifths of it, partially because he just had that kind of appetite and partially because Kirara had been warned by Utage to not eat much there-, paid up and left.

"I know another place" she said, once again following Utage's suggestions.

Well, not quite all of them, but she was trying. No way she could've actually tried to spoonfeed him after all.

"Sure" Mizuki agreed, and by the looks of it he actually liked the prospective of hitting another eatery right away.

And so they headed towards a small cafe which had a discount for couples, one Mizuki failed to even notice by the looks of it, or maybe he simply paid it no mind. He was much more interested in the cream-filled brioches, of which Kirara barely had a couple of bites.

Then they went to a valentine-themed bar, where he ate two slices of tart while she only had a couple of biscuits.

After that they got some stuffed flatbread to eat on the go as they walked through a small park.

Then they stopped by another ice-cream store to have some cake and a drink.

And so on and so forth.

Much to Utage's growing frustration, in truth.

"Listen here, Rara-chan, you gotta take the reins a bit. You've been talking about nothing but food the whole time, which isn't bad since he likes food but at least sit next to him, not in front of him. You get me?"

Still wondering where exactly Utage was, since she could clearly see everything the two of them were doing, Kirara took a deep breath. Or maybe she sighed, probably both. Her friend was right, that was a rather pleasant way to spend time but it wouldn't change anything at the end of the day. So, what to do, what to do...

"... hey, there's an arcade there" Mizuki then pointed out, shaking her out of her thoughts "Want to go in?"

"Eh? Ah, yeah! I mean, sure"

She wasn't that much of a fan of arcade games in truth, those were decidedly more of Mizuki's thing, but she did find some of them fun. Although that was sort of secondary at the moment, really.

The inside was even less crowded than the outside, which made sense given the hour and day of the week she guessed.

Nothing special really happened inside there either, in truth, but Utage figured that she could just let them play together for a while. She used that time to make sure the places she had picked for lunch were aviable and decide which one to point them to, then waited for them to come out. Going in would've been a bit too risky.

It was probably a good thing that they ended up spending so long going back and forth between 'House of the Dead VII', 'ManPac III' and 'Space Invaders with a Vengeance', plus a few other games Utage had honestly never heard of before, but she kind of wished they'd hurry it up a bit because she was getting rather hungry herself. At some point, however, she simply accepted that those two would be staying inside there for a very long time and went to get herself something to eat.

In the end they spent around six and a half hours inside there, and once the duo finally emerged from the arcade most places serving lunch had already closed up. But Kirara seemed a lot more relaxed compared to that morning, which was definitively a positive. Utage had planned to lead them to an arcade either way after all, Mizuki bringing it up on his own had shaken up the order of things a bit but nothing else. It did force Utage into picking one of her back-up options for their lunch though: a cafe wasn't the most romantic of spots, but it was already, like, four in the afternoon and Utage had never actually been in that town before, she had just made some researches beforehand. Not much she could do about it. But Kirara had managed to grab a couple of Mizuki's tentacles with her own as they strolled around town, which was like advanced hand-holding so Utage almost felt like popping a bottle of soda to celebrate.

And she might actually have done that, had something else not happened instead.

"Alright Rara-chan, nozzz... wahzhz" she said, the odd nervousness in her voice making Kirara herself suddenly feel anxious "This t-fzzz-g's not quite w-zfhfhd- I think the battery's -sfhfshfs-o die, so... things a-szzwzzzhhh- well, so keep it up. I'll go look for a- zhzzhzhz"

"Wait what? You don't have any- ?!" Kirara whispered back, only for a fizzling sound to briefly go off inside her ear.

"Are you hearing voices?" Mizuki casually inquired, and with a surprisingly innocent expression on his face considering what kind of question he had just asked.

"Eh? Ah, no no no, it's fine! I was just thinking about... stuff... a build... for a game I'm playing... yeah"

"Oh, that makes sense. Do you know any other place around here? The breakfast tour was really nice"

"I... my friend didn't tell me much else, no... "

"How about taking another stroll then? We can just go back to the arcade if we don't find anything"

"Sure!"

Mizuki noticed Kirara's two tentacles grasping his a little bit tighter. She had intertwined just the tips, and their tentacles were long enough for that to not hinder their walk at all so long as they stayed close to each other, but he still found it a little curious. Then again, Kirara did occasionally touch his tentacles with hers while they were sitting on a couch together and playing video games, so he figured she was just more forthcoming or indifferent than others about that sort of physical contact.

She also seemed to be in rather high spirits, which was nice. He liked being around her in general, but she had seemed a bit on edge during the morning and he had no clue why. Seeing her back to her usual self put him in a good mood too, even though they didn't really find anything else of particular interest as they walked through the streets. Some nice sights as they passed by another small park, but nothing more than that. Not like either one of them truly minded, albeith for slightly different reasons.

"There you are" a voice then came from behind them, turning Kirara into a chunk of solid ice for a good couple of seconds "Having fun?"

"Ah, hi Ho'olheyak" Mizuki casually greeted as he turned around "Done with your work?"

"I still have a few minor details to deal with. It's a rather bothersome affair, but not a difficult one, a short break won't leave anyone dead. What about you?"

Mizuki felt Kirara's grip on his tentacles grow a little tighter. He figured he'd better ask her what was up, but answering Ho'olheyak's question first was the more polite thing to do. Probably? He could never quite remember how certain social interactions were supposed to go.

"We had a small tour of some eateries. Bars, cafes, places like that. Then we found a really nice arcade"

"That's just like you" she said back, leaning forward almost as if she wanted to kiss him on the cheek, her head wings spreading out and closing off a good portion of his vision for a second or two "Isn't it, pretty boy?" she added with a whisper.

Which, combined with the way her tail had just briefly coiled around his leg, sent a very familiar, very pleasant but still slightly odd shiver up his spine.

"And did your friend have fun too?" she asked, leaning back and turning around.

"Y-yeah, it was plenty fun, really, totally" Kirara answered with a rather mechanical voice, her tentacles retracting all the way back under her coat as soon as Ho'olheyak glanced at her.

"Is something wrong? Do you want to grab another bite?" Mizuki asked.

"Oh, I think I have a better idea" the woman chimed in, her smile causing nearly diametrically opposite feelings to sprout to life within Mizuki and Kirara.

"Sure then"

"Yeah. Why not... "

And so she leaded them into a clothing store. A really large one at that, although there weren't many people around there either. That was because there was a fair going on in another part of town that day, in truth, but neither Mizuki nor Kirara knew about that. Utage did, but she had also concluded that going there would've been counterproductive given the particular task at hand and decided to keep them away from that area.

"I was thinking about grabbing a few things for myself, but maybe you see something to your liking too" Ho'olheyak said as she walked in front of them, almost leaving it ambiguous as to who exactly she was talking to.

"I don't think I need any new clothes. Orchid told me I should add some variety to my wardrobe though, I suppose I might buy something if there's anythin-"

"That one!" Kirara cut him off as she pointed her finger at a certain garment.

Something she did rather reprimand herself for, but she'd been spending the past ten or so minutes constantly yelling inside her head that she had to get more proactive and, having caught a glimpse of what section of the store Ho'olheyak seemed to be leading them to, she figured she just had to do something. Anything.

"What about... that... one... ?" she continued, what determination she had managed to gather shriveling quickly under Mizuki's gaze, downright crumbling as she realized what exactly she had pointed to.

He wasn't weirded out or anything in truth, just a little surprised, mildly intrigued even. In fact, he walked right up to the outfit Kirara had pointed to to check it out.

Well, not the one she had pointed to actually, but rather the one right next to it. A comprehensible mistake, given that the clothes were packed somewhat tightly and that her finger was aimed at a shelf a good six or so meters away.

"If you think so, I might as well try it" he said casually after having checked the size printed on the label, going through a couple of different copies of the outfit before finding one that would fit him.

"... eh?"

"You know" Ho'olheyak said, resting an arm over Kirara's shoulder "You might be a bit more amusing than I had given you credit for"

Between the woman holding her in her grasp -figuratively- and the shock from Mizuki's reaction, Kirara ended up unable to stop him from walking into one of the changing rooms. She had... well, she didn't actually know what she was thinking when she had pointed her finger, but she for sure hadn't meant that Mizuki should've tried putting it on. And the reason for that was very simple.

That was a woman's outfit.

And to make things even worse the one right next to it, the one Mizuki had picked up, was a maid uniform. A somewhat weird take on it too.

"No, I... uh... I-I hadn't... "

"I don't plan to eat you" Ho'olheyak interrupted her, the way her tail was running a large circle around them sort of suggesting otherwise "You really aren't my type, and while I might be rather bored I'm not that desperate" she explained, that last bit admittedly hurting Kirara more than she'd have expected "Far from it. But feel free to catch my interest if you want. This is quite a good start after all"

"... l-listen, are you and Mizuki really... "

The sound of the curtain separating the dressing room from the rest of the store getting pulled open kept her from finishing her question. Or rather, the sight of Mizuki as he walked out did.

Because Mizuki looked good.

Really good.

And... kinda more feminine than Kirara herself, which set off all kinds of conflicting emotions inside her head.

As for what exactly Mizuki was wearing, it was a black dress going from his neck all the way to his ankles, the upper area rather tight around his chest -so much so one couldn't help but wonder whether that was really meant for a woman in the first place- while from the waist down the garment made for a much looser fit, a boon as that ensured his tentacles wouldn't have to tear any cloth to accomodate themselves. The skirt was definitively larger enough to comfortably hide them too. The sleeves were detatched, leaving his shoulders completely bare while covering his arms completely, all the way to the wrists, and he had even put on the white apron, tied with a large ribbon behind his back , and the white tiara, which actually looked more like an hat of sort with how large it was. There were a few frills here and there too, some black, most white, and somehow the way his shoes clashed with that outfit was in itself fitting.

Kirara's cheeks turned blue as she swallowed something.

Ho'olheyak, on her part, joined her fingertips together.

"You know" Mizuki commented as he walked up to them, his previous attire stashed in a small bag "This is really comfortable. There's even an hole in the back hidden by the ribbow, I guess for people with tails? I can slid my tentacles out of it too if I want. ... how do I look?" he then added, because something about the way those two were looking at him didn't quite feel right.

It didn't quite feel wrong either though.

Kirara ended up falling back to a bad habit, her hand typing away at her phone without even taking it out of her pocket. Before she could finish, however, Ho'olheyak had closed the small distance between herself and Mizuki, taken his chin in her hand and pulled his face up a bit.

"Oh, now you're just doing it on purpose, pretty boy" she whispered, taking advantage of how few people were present in the store to brazenly coil her tail around his waist and pull him towards herself "I might just gobble you up right here and now"

Mizuki's own face turned a little red, his hand finding his way to her hips on its own, and it took more than just a couple of seconds for him to remember that such things were not meant to be done in public spaces. Well, that and Kirara was there too, it wouldn't be right to leave her out since they were on that little outing together.

"You look like a trap, 100% certified, like, is this the first time you wear stuff like this? Because you look so... natural... " Kirara stepped in -almost literally- as she tried to break those two apart, her phone briefly forgotten as that surely would've failed at such a task.

"Thanks. But what do you mean with a 'trap'? Do I look dangerous?"

"Ah, no, like... y-you know what, forget about that part... "

"Very well then" Ho'olheyak said as she stepped back from Mizuki "You've already found something to bring home with you, but I'd still like to look for a garment or two for myself too" she said, her head wings spreading just a little bit, her smile almost but not quite showing off her canines.

"Oh, sure" Mizuki agreed as he started following her.

... oh damn! Kirara thought as she forced herself after them.

And, just like she had guessed earlier, the trio reached the lingerie section of the store, an half-wall of sort surrounding it to separate it somewhat from the rest of the establishment, probably in order to provide a certain degree of privacy, one of them looking perfectly at ease, one apparently ever so slightly awkward and one almost shaking from sheer embarrassment.

Truthfully, Kirara had no idea whether she should've been glad that Ho'olheyak simply started browsing the pieces on display on her own or not. Probably yes, since she at least wasn't dragging Mizuki along, so she took the chance to walk up to him.

"So, uhm... h-hey... ?"

"Hi" he returned the greeting, which was a little weird perhaps since they hadn't really parted ways at all that day -bathroom breaks aside- but also somehow normal coming from Mizuki "Are you looking for something too?"

Kirara took a deep, deep breath, a lungful so intense even Mizuki found it rather odd.

"Do you want me to?" she asked, trying to keep herself from blushing and failing spectacularly at it.

Mizuki, on his part, just blinked.

"Why should I?" he asked back, and if nothing else she figured that the genuine curiosity in his voice at least meant he didn't find the idea displeasing.

"W-well, you, I no, like... I-I sort of picked this out for you, right?" she replied while pinching the apron of Mizuki's maid outf -oh lord, just seeing it made her tentacles twitch and stirr, thinking about it too was just too much- "So I think it'd be fair if you picked something out for me too?"

"Oh!" Mizuki exclaimed, hitting his right palm with his left fist as if he had just figured out something "I see, that makes sense. But you talk a lot with Utage and she has a good fashion sense, you're surely much better than me at picking clothes. I don't think I'd be able to figure out whether something would look good on you just by seeing it on display, at least"

That last part sounded like one hell of a bold thing to say, but Kirara knew Mizuki well enough to be almost certain he hadn't meant it like that.

"Then... j-just wait here! I'll go find something then you can tell me what you think of it"

"Sure. Have fun"

'Funny' isn't how I'd describe this situation at all!

And so Mizuki simply sat down in front of a dressing room. There were another two a bit further away in that same section of the store in case one of the few other customers around needed them, but to be honest anyone who would happen to pass by at the moment would most likely mistake Mizuki himself for a girl.

Kirara, on her part, was really trying to find something nice, but most of the garments there made her blush just by looking at them, she had no idea what could possibly look good on her. Someone from the staff noticed her state of confusion mixed with a little bit of panic and offered to help her, but she refused right away out of extreme embarrassment. Only to regret it immediatly, because a professional would've surely known what might look nice on her, but at that point calling the employee back would've been just awkward so she kept rummaging on her own.

And so she ended up picking the first plain thing she could find and headed to the dressing room, walking right past Mizuki who, on his part, seemed remarkably calm.

And cute. Oh gosh, he was so cute in that-

No. No no no, Kirara repeated over and over in her head, that could wait. Later, yes. Right there, right then, she had other things to worry about. Actually getting changed didn't take long at all, but then she got stuck trying to pull the curtain open and stepping out.

That'd be Mizuki's first time seeing her in her underwear. The realization made her heart stop, resume beating, stop again, resume once more, and so on and so forth. Which is just a slightly odd way of saying that it kept beating, in truth, but Kirara herself believed that to be some sort of small miracle in itself.

"Hey, Kirara?" his voice came from the other side of the curtain "You've been in there for a while. Are you ok?"

"Ah, y-yeah, I was just... ehm, I'm coming!" she fumbled her way into answering before pulling the curtain open at last, even if only halfway through "So, uh... h-how... do I... l... oo... k... ?" she tried to ask, her words trailing into less than a whisper towards the end, her face bright blue and her eyes glued to her own feet, her hands holding her own tentacles behind her back to try and keep them from covering her up.

"It's simple" Mizuki answered immediately, his smile soft and relaxed as he innocently stared at the admittedly really plain, matching set of white panties and bra Kirara had picked "You look cute"

She didn't know whether she wanted to jump from joy or dig an hole and hide inside of it forever, because that was both much more than what she'd hoped to hear and not at all what she had wanted to hear at the same time.

"Cute is indeed an apt word for it" Ho'olheyak commented as she passed by, both Mizuki and Kirara turning towards her.

"Have you found something too?" he asked, and maybe that was just Kirara's mind playing a bad trick on her but she could've sworn there was a sort of veiled excitement in his words.

"The assortment here is a bit lacking, but there are quite a few interesting pieces. Why" she added as she leaned over him, just close enough to break into his personal space "Were you hoping to see me disrobed? At this hour of the day?"

Kirara kicked the much too vivid mental image out of her mind.

"I would've liked it" he readily admitted, his cheeks ever so slightly red "... oh, was that a rude thing to say?" he added, because he couldn't quite figure out why Ho'olheyak's smile had grown sharper.

"Honest as always" she commented as she rested her index on his bare shoulder and ran it softly in circles over his skin, sending a faint shiver through his body "But I'm not sure I'm feeling quite that well disposed, considering the reason I need a new set to begin with"

"Ah, about that" he said back as he scratched his head "Yeah, that was totally my fault it got torn. Sorry"

Another mental image, this one even more vivid than the previous one, made its way into Kirara's mind, and this time she failed to push it back out.

"I'll take another look around" Ho'olheyak then said as she turned to leave "Maybe your friend will find something a little more interesting too, in the meanwhile"

"I think she looks cute though"

"Oh, my sweet pretty boy" she said back, the tip of her tail briefly coiling around his chin "You're hurting her with those words, you know? Oh, but by all means, do keep it up" she concluded before walking away again.

"... am I?" he asked Kirara for clarifications, genuine confusion and concern in both his voice and his expression.

"... j-just wait here!" she effectively avoided the question as she pulled the curtain close, got changed and dashed back out, looking for something else to wear.

She barely had the time to move out of Mizuki's direct line of sight, however, when her earpiece sprung back to life.

"Rara-chan, you ok? Still alive?" came Utage's voice.

"That's what- " she began to answer, crouching down and covering her mouth with an hand as she pulled the neck of her coat up, enough to only need to whisper into the microphone temporarily hidden inside there "That's what I should be asking you, what happened?"

"I don't know, my transmitter stopped working then I had to make a run for it to not stumble into that woman, changing the batteries didn't work and I had to buy a new one. Where are you now?"

"I'm... w-well, actually... U-utage, what kind of... do you think there's some lingerie that might look good on me... ?"

"... Rara-chan. Your position. Now. And then tell me everything while I get there"

"It's... "

...

...

...

Not even five minutes later, somewhat to Kirara's surprise, Utage had made her way to them already. She was panting and more than a little sweaty in truth, which caused a little argument with someone from the staff, but she managed to convince them that she was there only to give advice and not to try anything on herself.

"Hey, Utage? You ok?"

In response, Utage vigorously grabbed her friend's shoulder.

"Listen here, Rara-chan. Don't take this badly but if you're putting yourself up against that woman then going for something sultry would be akin to committing suicide. You've gotta aim for a different kind of appeal, you get me?"

"That... makes sense, but... "

"Which brings us to -not this, not this, not this one either, that's bad, that's not your style, this color doesn't match your hair at all... " Utage cut her off as she started dragging her along while inspecting the store's wares "This! Go with this!" she concluded as she handed her her find "And try to act... cute! Frankly speaking, if he ends up comparing you to Ho'olheyak in terms of raw sex appeal you're done for"

"... mnh. Alright. Sure. Thanks a bunch, really"

"Go get him, girl" she waved her off as Kirara made her way to the dressing room again.

Utage, on her part, froze like an animal playing dead the moment she felt a tail coiling around her ankle and an hand resting on her shoulder.

"Now look at that" Ho'olheyak commented with a soft mix of amusement and annoyance "The peeping tom decided a broken radio wasn't enough of a warning, isn't it?"

"... g-good evening, ma'am. May I help you look for something to your liking? I've got quite the eye for fashion" she said back, managing to regain her cool -if only apparently- after the second word.

"I suppose I could use your help to kill some time, yes" she replied as she leaned down, her head wings spreading in a slightly menacing way "Go out and wait for me at the second streetlight on the left, would you? I'm sure you're not one to stand people up"

"Oh, of course not, those folks suck. Can't stand them" Utage shot back with a soft laugh which sounded almost entirely natural.

"Good girl" Ho'olheyak concluded as she walked away, leaving Utage to wonder which option between running away and showing up to that meeting would cause the least amount of damage to her.

As for Kirara, she had just finished getting changed again and was in the middle of gathering enough resolve to pull the curtain open again. Rather than taking a deep breath, she tried to keep herself from breathing too quickly. Then she made sure her tentacles were standing still -still enough at least- behind her, and finally she reminded herself that it was Utage who had picked that garment for her, and Utage knew what she was doing when it came to fashion.

... did that even count as fashion though?

To prevent herself from getting even more lost in such thoughts, Kirara simply pulled the curtain open all at once to find out what Mizuki thought about it.

She also froze the moment she did so though, because Ho'olheyak was standing there too, right next to him. Because of that, she failed to notice the way his tentacles twitched a tiny little bit at the sight.

As for what exactly Kirara was wearing, it was a leotard of a very, very pale shade of pink which matched her hair. The mirror behind her revealed that her back and a bit of her sides were left bare, which made perfect sense considering that she had to accomodate for more appendages than most other people, while the front reached all the way to her neck, a small clasp hidden behind it to keep the whole thing up. It was a rather tight fit but it also covered quite a lot of skin, relatively speaking, fully embracing her chest and belly. There were a few, blue details sewed here and there on it too, but what really caught the eye were the frills, died a soft shade of purple and running along almost every hem of the undergarment.

"You look cute" Mizuki said, Utage's words from a short while ago making that statement sound much better than it had the first time around "... pretty" he corrected himself as he recalled what Ho'olheyak had told him "You really look pretty. It's very good on you" he concluded, as spontaneous as ever.

"Juvenile" Ho'olheyak commented "Fitting, I suppose"

Kirara, however, was too focused on what Mizuki had just told her to notice.

"Alright, stay here you two" Ho'olheyak added "I'll fetch a clerk and pay. It looks like it will rain soon and I'd rather not get my feathers wet"

Kirara... couldn't quite recall what exactly happened after that, in truth. She was still too focused on what Mizuki had told her and on the smile he had on his face as he did so. Utage might've commented about Kirara being hopeless, had she been around, but she... well, wasn't. Not exactly, at least. The trio left the store together -neither aegir got back into the stuff they were wearing upon walking in, keeping it in two bags instead- then Ho'olheyak said something about having to deal with a little matter and finishing up her work before going off on her own, but only after having given them an address for an hotel where she had already rented a room for the night. With her gone, Kirara managed to get back to her senses as she and Mizuki ate dinner in a perfectly ordinary restaurant, although the realization that she was still wearing that lingerie underneath her clothes did keep her from fully relaxing. Whether Mizuki failed to notice or simply decided to not bring it up, however, one could only guess.

Then they bought a couple of umbrellas in the first store they could find -Kirara silently shouted at herself for not having insisted on getting a single one- to avoid getting drenched by the rain which was starting to fall. Most aegir liked the water, in truth, but only when it was a large body. Rain didn't cut it for them, it felt a little... lacking, in a way. Proper downpours could actually work for some, admittedly, but the rain that evening wasn't that intense. Plus, they could still end up getting a cold if the temperature was too low. There were exceptions, naturally, but as it so happened they both would rather keep themselves dry than get soaked in the cold rain. And so they just made their way to the address Ho'olheyak had left them. Mizuki was the one to suggest doing that, in truth, and Kirara figured they could just play some games in the hotel room. She did have two handhelds with her after all, and since she hadn't even used them all day they were also still fully charged.

Then they got to that address, however, and that's when Kirara's mind blanked out. Again.

The hotel in itself looked rather... well, not quite normal, it seemed a little bit fancy if anything. Not downright luxurious, but still not a place Kirara herself could really afford on her own. It was also rather big, but nothing really made her worry up to that point. Then they walked in, however, and right there in the hall she spotted something which made her heart stop for a couple of seconds. Mizuki noticed that and followed her gaze, but the blackboard with a list of hourly rates and room prices -themed rooms at that- didn't strike him as all that odd. A bit weird maybe, but he hadn't really been to that many hotels in his life so he figured that's just how some worked.

Kirara, however, knew. She had seen those in a couple of videos and -mostly- in a fair bit of videogames, so she knew exactly what the hourly rate and themed rooms meant. Well, that was assuming the stuff she had seen was accurate, admittedly, but she was too agitated to think about that detail.

"Let's see the room, ok?" Mizuki said as he casually grabbed her hand and tugged her along as if it was the most natural thing in the world, Kirara's face died a deep blue, her vocal cords failing to produce any intelligible sound.

The receptionist, a middle-aged lung woman, gave them an ever so slightly suspicious look and asked them for any document. Kirara didn't know whether she should've been happy or mad that she just so happened to always have hed id with her. Content enough with what they showed her, the woman then asked them how long they'd be staying and what preferences they had, at which point Mizuki replied by saying that a woman named Ho'olheyak should've already made a reservation for three. A very brief check on the registry later, the two got handed a key and directed to the third floor, with Kirara insisting on taking the stairs to give herself some more time to mentally prepare. Mizuki didn't mind that, the atmosphere was nice inside there after all.

There weren't many rooms per floor, as it turned out, or at the very least there weren't many on the third one. Just four in fact, which meant finding theirs took no time at all.

The room itself was, for starters, large, and not themed after anything in particular, thanks the heavens. Very large though, with the outer facing wall consisting almost entirely of sliding windows and equipped with enough curtains to obscure the sight completely. It was also very well soundproofed, as they could see the rain hitting on the glass but they could barely hear it. The bed was bigger than even a king-sized one, comically so even as six people could probably sleep comfortably on it at the same time. The tv was larger than the triple screen Kirara had in her room back at Rhodes Island, not to mention that it had a gaming console connected to it already and that suggested there were a few games stored in the cabinet underneath it as well. There were lamps here and there to provide extra lighting in case one didn't want to turn the chandelier on, plus a fridge, a coffee machine and even a water boiler for tea. A couple of wardrobes and drawers were also present, but Kirara dared not open any of them for fear they might not be empty.

"Do you want to take a shower?" Mizuki asked while pointing to the only other door present, which he figured had to lead to the bathroom "We've been out and about the whole day"

"... you mean, like... to-together... ?"

He bent his head a little to the side.

"No, in truth" he replied, more surprised than anything "But... "

"Nonono it's fine I'mgoingthanks!" Kirara cut him off as she dashed into the bathroom.

"Alright then"

Left alone, Mizuki took a look around. The furniture inside there looked a bit expensive, but not to the point of being lavish. A style he wasn't used to, and not one he would try to replicate for his own room, but it wasn't unpleasant either. He tried opening the wardrobes to both kill some time and satiate his curiosity, finding both empty. Then he went for the fridge, and a small glass bottle inside there stood out to him. For starter, it didn't have the same design as the other ones, and the slightly pink fluid within seemed a little viscous. The most glaring detail, however, was the sticky note attached to it. He wasn't too familiar with handwriting or lip marks recognition, but the 'For you, pretty boy' writing on it and the lipstick mark right next to those words somehow made him absolutely certain that Ho'olheyak had left that drink there for him. He took it off to see if maybe there was anything else written on the other side, only to find nothing.

So he took the bottle itself out of the fridge.

He wasn't quite sure about what to do with it though. His instincts were telling him entirely conflicting things, after all. Some were warning him that swallowing suspicious fluids he knew nothing about could be dangerous even for him, doubly so when they'd been left by that woman. Others were telling him that it'd been precisely a weird drink -well, a bunch of wine and alcohol to be more accurate, not really a weird drink but still- to first get him and Ho'olheyak together on the same bed. Not like they only ever had sex while drunk, that had only happened twice actually, but there were precedents for accepting a drink from her and having a really good time afterwards. Even then, Ho'olheyak wasn't there at the moment and there was a chance drinking that might make his mess up while playing with Kirara, because he was fairly sure they'd boot up a game and play together. Then again, whatever was inside there was unlikely to affect him right away, and that was assuming it was something that would actually affect him in some way to begin with.

So he pulled the lid off and drank the content. He had meant to just have around half of it or so but the beverage, which turned out to be much smoother than he had expected, was pleasantly sweet, with a faintly bitter aftertaste to it. And so, telling himself that in hindsight not finishing it would've been rude towards Ho'olheyak -not an excuse, he genuinely believed that-, he gulped the rest down as well, leaving the now empty bottle on the countertop next to the coffee machine.

... he felt a bit warm.

And slightly fuzzy.

There was a mild tingle on his palms too, and he could feel a few other things moving and working inside his body. No, that was probably his mind. Telling the difference between the two was a little tricky at times.

It was a nice feeling, honestly. Better than that he had gotten from the wine for sure, as he wasn't having any mild pulsations going off inside his head this time around.

Then he kept exploring the room, and thus Kirara nearly suffered from a cardiac arrest when she finally came out of the bathroom, fully dressed and still with the lingerie on underneath her clothes.

As for the sight which had almost made her heart stop again, that was a somewhat simple thing in truth.

Mizuki was sitting on the floor, staring at a cordless electric massager. And there were quite a few other things lined up in front of him too, things he had found inside the drawers and taken out to kill some time without starting up a game he would've most likely had to stop right away anyway. Placed on top of a towel on the floor were toys of a kind Kirara was technically familiar with but never personally owned, the fear of having someone accidentally finding one in her possession always kept her from purchasing anything in that field. Hiding files on her computer was much, much easier.

"... M-Mi... zu... ki... ?!"

"Say, Kirara" he asked, seemingly as calm and relaxed as ever as he lifted a dildo covered in little bumps and shaped like a spiral "Don't you think some of this stuff just looks weird?"

In response, she retreated back into the bathroom slamming the door behind herself in an attempt at calming down.

That was wrong, completely wrong, things were not supposed to progress that way, it was all out of order. Not... not that she really minded, no, but... there was only so much her heart could take. Maybe she could ask Utage for...

... hold on.

Hold on, where had Utage gone off to now? She hadn't heard from her since the clothing store. She tried putting the earpiece back on, since it was supposedly waterproof but she had decided to not keep it on while showering for good measure, and she also called her out a couple of times through the microphone, but no answer came her way. Did the battery die a second time? That seemed odd, but...

... she had a much more pressing matter to deal with though.

What was she supposed to do? Under normal circumstances she'd have probably tried to steer the conversation into a more traditional direction, she was pretty sure he wouldn't mind doing some quests together in the latest Hunters of Monsters, but... but then again... she was kind of skipping a lot of steps there, but she figured that's what she had to do if she wanted to catch up to Ho'olheyak. She even had that lingerie Utage had picked for her, and they were already in a place meant for that, so... yeah, she was going to do it.

She just needed another couple of minutes to really convince herself.

Mizuki was still sitting on the floor when she came back out again. He was about to ask her if she hadn't digested dinner well, but stopped and simply blinked instead.

He had seen Kirara in that leotard not even three hours ago, but for some reason the sight felt a fair bit more captivating now. Perhaps it was due to how her tentacles were spread out a little behind her instead of trying to hide. Either way, she walked up to him with slightly mechanical steps and sat down right next to him. It took her more effort than she had expected to actually drag her own gaze away from his maid outfit and stare him in the eyes though.

"... Mizuki!" she shouted, the suddenness of it startling him "This is... w-well, this is one of those places where people... do... that thing, so... "

"I suspected that" he replied "Normal hotels don't really have all this stuff, right?" he added, his tentacles grabbing a few things mostly at random from the display next to them to drive home his point.

"... please put those down... i-it's really, really embarrassing... "

"Oh. Sorry" he complied.

"So, I was saying... w... would you... want to do it with me... ?"

Now, even in that situation there was a good chance Kirara wouldn't have been quite that direct about it. However, Mizuki could emit electrical signals and release pheromones to tamper with other people's perceptions, disturb their senses and induce altered states of mind. He couldn't get anyone to see or perceive of think the things he wanted them to, since those were just biological reactions he was causing and not some kind of Arts which would allow the caster to pick and choose the target's visions, but the effects could nonetheless be quite potent, and very few people aboard Rhodes Island knew about this ability of his. And, as it turned out, the drink Ho'olheyak had prepared for him was -be it by design or by unintended side effect- making Mizuki unconsciously release a small amount of a certain sort of pheromone, one he never used and possibly didn't even consciously know he could produce, but which was nonetheless having an effect on Kirara. In fact, he probably wouldn't have let out as much if not for Kirara having walked out of the bathroom with just her undergarment on.

And that was in addition to the effect the drink itself was having on Mizuki too.

"If you're fine with me, sure"

"It's not about being fine!" she shouted back as she sprung to her feet "It's... it's that I... specifically... want... you... " she then said, her voice fading into a whisper so feeble Mizuki didn't really catch the last words.

"So" he added as he got up too "... do you want to do something specific?" he asked, because while that was not his first time, he had little idea of what to do to get things started himself.

"... so, uh... c-can we kiss, for starter?"

"Sure"

And so he gently grabbed her, almost but not quite unconsciously making use of the little things Ho'olheyak had taught him during their private meetings, locking his gaze on her eyes and softly caressing her hips as he pulled her closer, smiling at how cute the intense blue tint of her cheeks was, at how frantically her tentacles were moving around when his coiled slowly around hers, around her legs, the touch making her tremble with anxiety and anticipation and nervousness and, fortunately, excitement too.

Kirara's mind stopped working for a moment or two when their lips met, Mizuki's surprisingly warm tongue poking the entrance to her mouth as if asking for permission, waiting all the time it took her to fully process what was happening and welcoming it inside. Mizuki himself was not quite used to kissing, in truth, that was arguably one of the few things he and Ho'olheyak hardly ever did, and even when it happened she was always the one leading. It felt a little odd, even, not having a long, forked tongue coiling around his and exploring his mouth. But Kirara felt nice to the touch too, and he had a vague feeling of having been told that comparing people was more often than not a bad thing to do, so he kept himself from continuing along that line of thoughts.

He considered moving his hands down, but he could feel her trembling and he wasn't sure that was right so he pulled his lips back, gulping down what little of Kirara's saliva had ended up in his mouth -the taste was rather forgettable, but something about the act itself pleased him- before speaking.

"Are you ok?"

"Y-yeah" she replied, only then noticing how tightly he was holding on to him "I, uhm... w-what came after this again... ?" she wondered out loud rather than asking, her thoughts having tied themselves into too messy of a knot for her to recall how those scenes played out in the dating sims and eroges she had played.

Which was arguably a good thing.

Mizuki, on his part, briefly recalled how things usually went between him and Ho'olheyak, but he wasn't all that sure following that would've been a good idea. Kirara looked a little bit too agitated, so... maybe getting right to it was a good idea? Perhaps she was nervous because she had never done stuff like that before, after all, in which case he believed having her experience it immediatly would help her decide whether she wanted to stop or try other stuff too. So he -wait, Ho'olheyak was usually the one lying him down on the bed but he was probably supposed to be in charge of that at the moment. So he gently accompanied Kirara down on the frankly too large bed, the soft sheets welcoming her, her limbs -all of them- trembling when she saw one of Mizuki's tentacles fetching a bottle of lube from the assortment on the floor.

"This really looks cute on you" he commented, his face a bit red, his arguably excessive sincerity making Kirara blush even harder "The frills suit you, and there's not so much cloth that I can't feel your skin. Can you keep it on? Or do you want to take it off?"

"I... I'll keep this on if you... keep this on too" she replied, grasping the hem of his maid costume and wondering whether she'd be seeing that in her dreams from that day onward or not.

"Gladly"

The skirt made things a little bit awkward, admittedly, but one of the many perks of having tentacles was that he could just pull it up and hold it out of the way while still having more than just his two hands free, so he did just that. Kirara's own hands shot up to her face, nearly slapping her as she almost covered her own eyes, her gaze nonetheless fixed on Mizuki's boxers as he pulled them down just enough to reveal his stiff member, a bit of transparent fluid already dripping from the tip. Under normal circumstances Kirara would've definitively wondered why exactly it looked like that, in truth, the shape was kinda odd after all, but there and then she could only think of it as... oddly cute.

Her tentacles coiled around whatever each one could find, be that the frame of the bed, the sheets, Mizuki or even Kirara herself as he poured what he guessed to be a sufficient amount of lube on himself and another serving on her, the cold lotion making her shiver, a yelp escaping her when he pushed a finger past her folds to spread some of it on her insides too.

"You ok?"

"Yeah! I mean- yeah. It's just, uhm... I'm not used to... to having someone else's fingers... down there... "

"Mine are about as thin as yours, don't worry" he tried to reassure her with a soft smile.

That was not at all the point, honestly, but Mizuki being like that was one of the reasons why she liked him after all so all his words managed to do was make her blush even further.

"I think this is enough? ... tell me if anything feels weird"

"Can I" she spoke up immediatly, stopping him in his tracks "Can you hold my hand... ?" she asked, around half of her mind fixated on how stupidly good that weird, slightly form-fitting maid uniform looked on him.

"Certainly"

Her palm was hot, and she was sweating. Mizuki's gaze fell on her hair, a bit disheveled already, on her lips, left a bit wet from their previous kiss, on her chest, the fabric of her leotard almost too thin to hide the stiffness of her nipples. Cute wasn't quite the word he'd have used to describe her anymore, no. He felt a certain instinct whispering into his mind again, which reminded him of something.

"... do they have contraceptives here?" he asked.

Kirara's face turned pale, and for a second Mizuki would've sworn her tentacles had shrivelled down to a dry husk.

"I -oh god right we need those!"

He never used condoms with Ho'olheyak, to be honest, but that was an entirely different matter.

"Alright, give me a moment" Mizuki said as he fixed up his clothes and walked to one of the two nightstands, pulling it open and checking the contents.

There were a few pills inside there which he... wasn't entirely sure whether should be taken before of after, honestly. But there were also condoms, quite a lot of them when taking all the different sizes into consideration, and he guessed going with that would've been the safest choice. He had to try a couple of different sizes before finding the right one admittedly, since he had no clue which one he should've picked, and the fact that some models were made specifically for certain races didn't help. He had never even thought about different races needing different ones, in truth. Universal condoms were a thing, in truth, but they were a bit more expensive than average, and besides that wasn't really relevant at the moment.

Once he managed to put it on, silently thinking to himself that it didn't feel all that comfortable, he walked back to Kirara, who had taken the chance to try and calm down a bit. With questionable results admittedly, her tentacles shivering again when Mizuki realigned himself with her, one of his own tentacles sliding underneath her leotard and pulling it to the side a bit, just enough to bare her privates. Taking his hand in hers a second time and grasping the sheets underneath her with the other, Kirara's body grew stiff.

Then Mizuki entered her.

Slowly, with just the tip, because for as lubricated as Kirara seemed to be and for all the lube he had used he still wasn't sure how well she might take it. She let out a sound in equal part a moan and a groan when he moved a little bit further in, her hand and tentacles closing around him tighter. He felt her insides contracting around him, a sense of fullness wholly different from that her fingers could provide taking over her, the physical contact allowing Mizuki to unconsciously transmit weak electric signals to her, his more instinctive actions influenced by the suspicious beverage he had drunk earlier. As a result of that, however, Kirara seemed to relax a little bit, her expression easying up, a surprisingly intense warmth filling her as Mizuki fully pushed himself inside of her.

"Are you ok?" he asked, running his free hand through her hair and feeling both her skin and her sweat.

"I'm... p-please don't ask that... just... you can mo-move"

"Hey, relax" he tried to make her feel more at ease "This is nothing particularly special. ... Kirara? Did I do something wrong?" he then inquired, because while he couldn't figure out what her change in expression meant he could still tell that something had just happened.

"No, nonono I mean, this is... already more than -aaahhh, please don't make me say it out loud... " she said back, covering her blushing face with her arm and a free tentacle.

"... sure" he agreed, though he had a strong hunch there was something going on he wasn't aware of.

But he guessed that could wait, so he slowly pulled himself back, almost sliding completely out of Kirara before pushing in again, her body trembling as shivers ran through it, warm pleasure building up within her, aided arguably more by the fact itself that she was having sex with Mizuki rather than by his pheromones and electric signals.

Mizuki, on his part, was enjoying himself as well. Kirara felt pleasant around him, and having someone else's tentacles coil around him was a rather new experience for him. Her skin felt smooth, and her petite breasts were endearing to look at even through her leotard. A bit of a shame that the soap she had used in the shower had that strong of a scent to it, since it covered her natural aroma, but he wasn't about to bring that up.

He... kind of wanted to move faster, in truth, because at the moment their pace was really too slow, but Kirara's heavy breaths suggested she was still adjusting to the feeling so he discarded the idea.

And brought his hand to her chest instead, making her yelp in surprise.

"Shouldn't I?"

"Eh?! Ah! N-no, you can! B... be gentle though... "

"You can touch me too" he made sure to remind her, his smile appearing a little less innocent than usual due to his slightly flushed cheeks.

And she tried to, but... honestly, he was so cute in that costume that she almost feared putting her free hand on him might ruin the perfect sight in front of her. Which arguably made no sense, but that's just how Kirara's mind was rolling at the moment, for better or for worse.

The combination of Mizuki pushing in again and his palm cupping her small breast through the leotard distracted her from such thoughts, making her bite her lips.

"Doesn't that hurt?"

"Eh?"

Making the admittedly completely mistaken assumption that Kirara just wanted to feel something on her mouth, Mizuki leaned down and kissed her, which did help her keep her voice down but at the cost of increasing her heartrate yet again. Then his palm moved down along her side, to her lower back and past it, sneaking between her body and the sheets to cup a gentle feel of her petite bottom, which sent a decidedly weird but even more assuredly pleasant spark through her.

Then his tentacles crawled underneath her leotard, circling around her chest and softly pinching her nipples.

Something loud and extremely embarrassing escaped her, an unprecedented spark shooting through her entire system and making every single muscle in her body grow stiff, a sudden warmth tipping over and spreading from her chest all the way to the tip of her every finger and tentacle, her insides contracting around Mizuki as the sudden orgasm left her breathless, confused and, regrettably, somewhat ashamed too.

"Did you... " he was about to ask, stopping halfway through his question because she didn't seem to be having a good time "Hey, what's wrong?"

"I-I just... you haven't even yet -and I- "

Mizuki giggled, which earned him a rather dumbfounded stare from Kirara.

"I don't see anything to fret over about" he said, mostly calm but also a little amused "Do you want to stop?"

"No! I mean, no... o-of course not... "

"That's good to hear, I'd like to continue too"

Kirara blushed yet again, at which point Mizuki wondered whether hugging her wouldn't have been better. So he gave that a try, making sure to not rest his weight on Kirara as he closed his arms around her, slowly resuming to move back and forth inside of her in the meanwhile.

And, perhaps because she couldn't see what exactly was happening at all like that, perhaps because she was still sensitive from her orgasm, perhaps because she could feel Mizuki's warmth all over her, most likely due to all three... and probably due to his pheromones still being released without anyone in the room realizing in truth, the pleasure seemed to build up more quickly, each slow pull and thrust making her shiver and moan, her voice only partially contained as she felt his tentacles tenderly exploring her body, softly coiling around her thighs, her arms, her chest, running over her breasts, her neck, her belly, some intertwining with her own tentacles as they hesitantly made their way to this body in turn.

Then his tentacles pushed down on her nipples again, and for the second time Mizuki felt her contract around him, her tentacles turning rigid as she accidentally let out a moan much too loud for her own comfort. He stopped moving, giving her a bit of time to ride out her orgasm, and then pushed himself up a bit, just enough to look her in the eyes.

"You're really sensitive here"

"This... this is weird, it's never happened before... "

"I'll stop touching you there if it's too much"

"... if it's not a bother, then just... just be... gentle there too, please... "

"Sure"

He leaned down again, their lips meeting as he resumed moving inside of her for the third time, being careful to not touch her nipples because it really didn't seem like she could take that much more stimulation. But two orgasms in such quick succession, paired with the situation in itself, Mizuki's pheromones and, perhaps her inexperience as well, had made her too sensitive, even that slow motions being a bit too intense for her at that point. Mizuki was making sure to not touch her nipples directly, just fondling her chest instead while caressing her all over, so feeling and hearing her coming for the third time in the span of what had probably been just five minutes left him equally amused and startled.

"I-I don't think this is normal... " she barely whispered.

"Well, maybe? I... don't know what really goes for normal, honestly. Do you want a break?"

"I... do you mind if I... rest a bit? Maybe I just... need to calm down" she answered between one ragged breath and the other.

"No, sure. I think there are some snacks in the fridge, and I'm pretty sure there's room service too. Hey, how about some cake?"

"... oh yeah, please"

And so Mizuki pulled out, briefly wondering whether he should've taken the condom off and settling for leaving it there for the time being while Kirara pulled the sheets to hide underneath them. He didn't look troubled at all, but what if he was just putting up an act to not hurt her? She felt like she had completely blown her chance. Oh heavens, what if he didn't want to continue after that?

And to be completely honest, Mizuki was a little bummed by that turn of events. Nowhere near enough to harbour any sort of negative feeling towards her though, that much was certain. If anything, he was wondering whether that was his fault. He looked at the small pamplet next to the phone and searched for something to eat to think about something else. There were beverages of all sorts in the fridge already, so they could do without ordering those.

"You like strawberry cheesecake, right?"

Keeping herself from freaking out over the fact that he remembered that -and not quite succeeding at it, to be honest- she replied that she did, so he picked up the phone and placed the order, which apparently would arrive within five minutes. Either they had some already prepared or there was a bakery nearby. What followed was an almost awkward not-quite-silence, with Mizuki making some small talk to ease the mood and, secretly, distract himself from the fact that he really, really wanted to continue. It was kinda odd, in truth. That wasn't exactly an instinctive pulse, or if it was it felt a bit different from usual. Not just because it was stronger, but rather because it seemed a little... not spontaneous? Well, he was fairly sure he knew why that was the case, but so far he had yet to find a reason to be really bothered about it.

Someone eventually knocked at the door. Kirara, realizing once again in what state she was in at the moment, pulled the sheets up to cover herself while Mizuki simply adjusted his clothes and went to open the door, getting a tray from the attendant and seeing them off. Mizuki's pheromones had escaped into the hallway a little bit during that brief exchange in truth, which probably meant he would be on that person's mind that night before sleep. As for the cheesecake, that looked tasty, and it wasn't a small one either.

"Oohh, that looks nice" Kirara commented as she poked her head out from under the sheets, hers being half an attempt at distracting herself.

"Yeah. So- oh, wait" Mizuki's reply got cut off by another knock at the door.

Thinking that maybe the attendant had forgotten something, he went to answer again.

And his body turned stiff upon seeing Ho'olheyak standing in the hallway. His tentacles then twitched, just like his fingers.

"I see that you've gotten started already" she commented with a low, alluring voice as she peeked past him, Kirara feeling a sudden need to crawl under the bed and hide "You don't plan on leaving me out, don't you?" she added, her tail sneaking underneath his skirt and poking his still stiff member, her lips curling into a sharp smile.

"Not at all"

Something inside Kirara would've probably shattered there, had she not known from the very start that she just couldn't match that woman in that particular field.

As for Ho'olheyak, she had noticed that something was a little off the moment Mizuki had opened the door, and realized what that was about as soon as she had stepped in. He wasn't really a normal aegir after all, she had figured that out pretty soon after having first met him. The details were a surprisingly well kept secret on Rhodes Island, but she had still managed to get her hands on some bits and pieces. Her eyes briefly fell on the empty bottle on the counter, at which point she figured that might have caused some unintended reactions with his body. He had never done things like that before, so she doubted he had just suddenly decided to try that sort of stuff. That might've been worth looking into in more details, admittedly.

... later though. Because she was feeling rather bothered, in a very specific sense. Now, that was actually rather normal when it came to Mizuki. Physically speaking, the aegir was exactly her type, just like he had found out that she was exactly his, but he seemed especially attractive that day, more than the maid costume could justify.

Oh, she was going to enjoy that evening.

"Where you in the middle of something?" she asked, a slight hint of mockery in her voice as her gaze moved from the cake on the countertop to the display on the floor before settling back on Mizuki.

"Of a break" he answered right away, because he saw no reason not to.

Kirara, in the meanwhile, really wanted to dive under the sheets and pretend to be somewhere else, but she had a feeling she'd end up swallowed the moment she tried that. As for what "swallowed" meant exactly in that context, that's something Kirara herself wasn't sure about.

"I don't mind if your friend takes a breather. But" she added, her tail coiling around him and pulling him towards herself "I've had some really busy days lately, truly, and I even had to deal with a little peeping tom twice today. You surely get what I'm saying, sweetie?" she said more than asked, grabbing his chin and pulling his face up while smiling, her canines visible behind her teeth, his waist pushed up against her enough for her to feel his stiffness through their clothes.

"... do you mind?" he managed to bring himself to ask Kirara "While you rest a bit. Oh, but leave a slice for me, I want to try it"

"... sure... " Kirara replied "... hold on. A peeping tom? What?"

"Oh, you've got nothing to worry about" Ho'olheyak replied as she casually tossed a small transmitter to Kirara, whose face had turned from blue to white "Your friend's taking a long nap in a decidedly more conventional hotel, that's all"

"Did I miss something?"

"Nothing worth worrying about" Ho'olheyak dismissed the topic as she took a couple of steps back, just enough to have the necessary room to take off her long dress, putting it on her tail and using it to leave the garment on a chair far enough from the bed.

Mizuki gulped, his gaze captivated by the sight in front of him.

Ho'olheyak was wearing a black negligee, the almost sheer gown reaching further than her hips but not quite to her knees. The part covering her breasts wasn't see-through though, which only made what lied beneath that much more alluring. The panties were coordinated, both those and the negligee having dark green lace trims decorating them. To complement the look was a garter strap, and linked to it were thighhighs which fully covered her legs with the only exception being her toes and heels he found out as she stepped out of her shoes.

Mizuki swallowed again, and Ho'olheyak's smile grew sharper still. His gaze ran a bit everywhere on her, lingering more or less equally on her thighs, on the almost lustrous scales of her tail as it slithered in place behind her, on her lips, on her breasts, on the half-spreaded open wings on her head and on the way her feathers quivered a little bit as if to lure his attention.

Kirara, on her part, grabbed the plate with the cake and started eating in an attempt at dissociating herself from the reality of her current situation, because at that point she felt utterly defeated on the whole line.

The only one who had ever seen that as a competition was her to begin with, in truth, but whether that was a good thing or not was still up in the air.

"Now then" she said as she pushed him down on the bed, almost but not quite on the opposite end from where Kirara was pretending to be a misplaced piece of furniture "Let's get started, shall we?"

"Right away?" he asked back, cheeks red as she pulled his skirt up and straddled him.

"Oh, we'll have plenty of time for games and the like" she replied, dragging her panties down just enough to get them out of the way, more wetness than she herself was aware of on the cloths as she adjusted her position over him, her hand holding his member in place while his hands gravitated almost naturally to her plump thighs "But I really need this right now, sweetie"

He opened his mouth to speak, but something told him that saying he needed that too would've been a bad idea. He wasn't sure why, but that seemed to be coming from his instincts, from those not directly related to survival at least, and he had a feeling he should follow the suggestion.

Then Ho'olheyak dropped herself on him, his entire length getting buried within her in a single motion, and the only thing left in his thoughts was her.

She let out a soft moan, a mostly intentional one, as she seated herself on Mizuki. That felt a fair bit more intense than usual, most likely an effect of whatever was going on him with due to her drink. Deciding to think about that later, she simply adjusted herself on him and began moving up and down, heat building up within her with every motion of her hips as she felt some of his tentacles coiling around her legs.

"Daring today, aren't we?" she commented, making no attempt at hiding her amusement when his hands moved to grab her rear and knead it, her head wings quivering a little bit. His palms felt oddly warm that day.

"Well, uh... can't I?" he managed to ask back.

Ho'olheyak gyrated her hips a bit, getting a sudden moan out of him which made her shiver with delight.

"I suppose I don't mind" she replied, running an hand through her hair and brushing one of her wings at the same time, a simple gesture which completely captivated his gaze for the brief moment it lasted "You're putting on quite the show today, after all" she added, her other hand moving to his belly and tapping its way up along his chest, appreciating the fabric of the apron stitched to his costume and the way the cloth underneath it stuck to his body.

"Tha- ah!" he tried to say, only for his words to get cut off again.

He felt like her insides had just grabbed his member and wrung it, moving the opposite way of her hips around him to send a further wave of pleasure through his body.

"My, my, pretty boy" she commented as she pulled her hips up enough to separate herself from him, almost giggling at the way his tentacles put up a soft resistance "This isn't quite like you" she almost mocked, reaching for his member with one hand and pulling the filled out condom away.

"Ah, well... it feels better than usual today but, uh, sorry" he answered, a little bit embarrassed but mostly worried that she might be disappointed.

"Or maybe you were left hanging?" she said, her words sharper and colder than a knife as her gaze trailed to Kirara, who answered by shrinking further into the den of sheets she was slowly making for herself.

"Hey, that's not a nice thing to say" he kind or reprimanded Ho'olheyak, a simple sentence which nonetheless did wonders for Kirara's sinking mood.

"Alright then" she replied as she twirled the used condom in her hand "I'll leave your little friend to her cake. As for you" she added, taking a brief pause to push her forked tongue into the rubber and lap up some of its content, something about that sight making his member twitch -much to her unspoken but nonetheless expressed pleasure- "I have no doubt that you can keep going"

Mizuki was about to answer, but...

... his instincts had always been rather strong. He had learned not to mindlessly listen to them a long time ago, he wouldn't be able to live in any sort of modern society otherwise, but Ho'olheyak managed to stirr a certain, primordial need from deep within him by merely existing within his perception range. And with the condom -which worked exactly against that specific need- gone, he found that whisper inside his head growing louder, harder to ignore.

And since prior experiences told him he didn't really have any reason to ignore it either when it came to her, he simply took it up on its advice.

"Oh" she commented as his tentacles coiled around her waist again, his hands getting an ample feel of her rear and of the base of her tail as he aligned himself with her dripping entrance "Aren't we eager today?"

Half a whimper escaped her when he pulled himself up, reaching as deep within her as he could go with a single motion, the shock making his body tremble and her wings quiver.

"I know I said I needed this" she declared as she lowered herself, pushing him back onto the mattress before beginning to move her hips at a more relaxed pace "But I did not mean that as a signal for you to rush things, you know?"

"Oh. Sorry"

"But do feel free to indulge" she added as she leaned forward, the brief spreading of her wings distracting him for a moment "You're so cute when you do that"

It took him a bit of willpower to not focus completely on the warm pleasure washing over him every time her hips moved up and down along his member, especially due to the way her insides moved around him to further stimulate both him and Ho'olheyak herself, but he managed to. Partially as a way to last a bit longer, maybe. Either way, he moved his hands up to her breasts, feeling their firmness underneath his palms and fingers as he fondled them, poking her stiff nipples through her undergarment. And when he did so she felt something run through her chest, a sharp tingle which coursed to her brain, a sudden jolt of pleasure accompanied by what her brand of Arts allowed her to recognize as an impulse aimed directly at her brain, one which stimulated a very specific part of it.

Had she not been sure he wasn't doing that on purpose, she might have strangled him a little bit for that cheekiness. But she was feeling rather generous, and somewhat needy as well in truth, so she decided to simply enjoy that for the time being, his tentacles running over her butt in the meanwhile, moving as if to knead her rear while a couple more wrapped themselves around her tail. Ho'olheyak allowed herself to let out a soft, sultry moan in response to his touch, and an especially delighted one when another tentacle slithered between her legs to tease her clit, a bit of sweat beginning to run down her skin as the pleasure built up in her nethers.

Somewhat to her surprise, she felt him twitch and tremble inside of her again, warm seed beginning to fill her up. She pushed down, almost slamming herself onto him, the sound of flesh hitting flesh filling the room together with another groan from his lips as she gyrated her hips on him to scratch that sweet spot on her insides, contracting and relaxing her muscles as needed to get that bit more of stimulation, her hands coming to rest on his shoulder, her nails digging a little bit into his skin as she reached her own climax, her wings spreading a little bit as her tail coiled around one of his legs and then around the other too, the further contractions of her insides making Mizuki release a bit more of his warm seed within her, the heat making her pleasure linger a bit longer.

"This was a good start, pretty boy" she commented, her breathing a little bit more ragged than usual as she pulled herself up and adjusted her underwear as if to keep his seed from leaking out of her -something within him pulsed at that sight- before getting off him completely.

"Yeah, that was... really good... " he concurred, his own breaths decidedly heavier than hers as he relished in the lingering pleasure for a little longer.

"Now then" Ho'olheyak said as she turned around and got to the edge of the bed while on all fours, casting her gaze at the display Mizuki had -sort of inadvertently, in a way- prepared earlier.

She didn't usually use toys like that, but she had nothing against them either and, since they had them at the ready, she figured she might as well give one a try. With that said, nothing was truly catching her eye, perhaps because resorting to those while Mizuki was perfectly aviable seemed like a waste.

Then she felt a decidedly familiar pair of hands on her waist though.

"Oh, youthful as ever I see" she commented.

"I keep myself in shape" he replied, because he had kind of gotten the wrong message from that admittedly.

Briefly wondering whether she was really just that pent-up or if the ever so faint scent she could smell from Mizuki that day was having a stronger effect than she was realizing, Ho'olheyak decided to indulge in her own needs, taking their peculiar intensity on that day as just a small perk of the situation. So she spread her legs a bit to lower her hips, getting them at just the right height while resting her face down on the sheets, between her folded arms, putting her half-naked back on full display, the sheer layer of fabric covering it only making her that much more alluring.

"Since you're so eager I assume you'll show the courtesy of doing the work yourself this time around"

"It wouldn't be fair otherwise, right?"

"Oh, it sure wouldn't"

Meanwhile, Kirara was staring. She had accidentally eaten up all the cheesecake, but she hadn't noticed that at all. In fact, her hand was still stabbing at the nonexistant dessert to bring it to her lips, and her jaws were still moving to chew on the missing mouthfuls.

She had calmed down, in a certain sense, but mainly because her anxiety and excitement had gotten replaced for the most part by an intense sense of disillusion and disappointment in herself. She didn't want to think about Ho'olheyak, partially because she hated how attractive she looked as she had her way with Mizuki, because she was clearly the one leading there. She hated how she led him along, how well she handled the stimulations, the situation itself, how... in control she was. And she kind of hated that Mizuki was clearly enjoying himself too, decidedly more than he had with her. The rational part of her mind was telling her that, by most reasonable metric, that was perfectly normal. Ho'olheyak was definitively more experienced with her in that field, and she even had prior experience with Mizuki himself, they had to know what the other liked already. But since that was about Mizuki, the more emotional side of her was making its distress be heard loud and clear, especially when the two parted again, some of his seed trailing out of her before she readjusted her panties again. She kind of wanted to go away, but at the same time she sort of really wanted to see more of that side of Mizuki, even if it was with someone else.

It took her a while to realize that he was shaking her by the shoulder and calling out her name, and when she finally noticed she quite literally jumped in place, his tentacles catching the empty plate and the fork before they could hit the ground.

"Woah, careful there"

"M-miz-what-she-uh?!"

"You look really spaced out. Do you need a drink?"

"Oh, you silly little thing" Ho'olheyak chimed in, poking out from behind him and grabbing his member, making him -and Kirara- jolt "With the way she's staring, she clearly wants you" she said, her words turning Kirara's face fully blue with embarrassment, and with something else too admittedly.

"That's fine for me, but you looked a bit overwhelmed earlyer?" he sort of stated, sort of asked.

"I... th-that's... "

"Come here, you stuttering mess" Ho'olheyak cut her off, coiling the tip of her tail around her and pulling her towards herself.

"Wait wha- hold on pause! Pause stop! What?!"

"I'll make sure she doesn't get too excited this time around" Ho'olheyak said as she strattled her, effectively pinning Kirara down with her legs hanging off the edge of the bed "Be a dear and give her some care too, would you?" she said.

Not because she actually cared about Kirara in the slightest, unless we want to describe the mild amusement she got from her reactions as a form of care, but rather because she knew Mizuki well enough to be sure he'd end up getting distracted if that girl simply stood around like a depressed lamppost the whole night.

"Are you sure?" he asked Kirara, although a good half of his mind was busy resisting the hurge to grab Ho'olheyak again.

"This might be your last chance, you know" Ho'olheyak whispered into her ear as she leaned down "But feel free to throw it away, that works just fine for me as well. In that case, however, I'll just have you grab the blankets and sleep in the bathroom"

Mostly out of desperation, Kirara found herself swept away by the flow, unable to form any coherent thought, much less put up any sort of resistance.

"... just... " she managed to say as she lifted her tentacles "... c-could you... hold me while we... t-try again?"

"Certainly. But tell me if it's too much, ok?"

"Oh, don't worry about that" Ho'olheyak reassured him as he got off the bed and up on his feet to have a more comfortable angle.

"... ah, wait. I need another condom" he remembered, leaving Kirara waiting for one of the longest, most awkward minutes of her life, one made all the more unnerving by having that woman right on top of her and pinning her down "Alright, I'm here"

The feeling of his tentacles coiling around hers helped her calm down a little bit, but the way Ho'olheyak was staring at her worked in the exact opposite direction. Not to mention that having her body pressed down against her like that only made her sense of inferiority stronger, as she felt beaten in pretty much every metric she could think of: the liberi -... pythia... what was she again, exactly?- was taller, more curvaceous in every place where it mattered and her smile was a killer one, in at least four different ways. A small part of Kirara did believe she had prettier hair at least, but that point felt moot when taking into consideration just how peculiar and charming the wings on Ho'olheyak's head were. The scales on her tail also seemed much, much more pleasant to both the eye and the touch than the aegir's tentacles, though to be completely honest Kirara's own judgement on such things was much too clouded by her emotions to be considered accurate.

Then two things acted to drag her mind away from such considerations.

One was Mizuki, who had fetched a bit more lube for good measure due to their earlier experience and was now applying some to both himself and her -he had forgotten to check whether that was compatible with condoms, in truth, but thankfully it was- to make the penetration smoother. The other was Ho'olheyak, who had leaned further down against her while arching her back, the feeling of oddly long canines resting against her neck keeping her from getting too flustered by the breasts pressing down on her or by the thighs squishing her sides.

"Mnh? Are you ok?" Mizuki asked, having felt her trembling but not really seeing what exactly Ho'olheyak was doing due to the way they were positioned.

"Never had fun with another woman?" she asked before Kirara could answer, a relatively subtle way of telling her to play along, her fangs still much too close to her carotid for comfort.

"A... about that... well, a... a couple of times, maybe... ?"

"Was it Akafuyu?" he asked

"Ho-how did you even think of her?!" she shouted back, flabberstagged by that incredibly wild guess.

Though the fact that he had gotten it completely wrong sort of soothed her in a way.

"Now, now" Ho'olheyak interrupted her, her tail coiling around Mizuki's hips and pulling him forward all at once, the sudden penetration pushing all air out of Kirara's lungs despite the plenty abundant lubrication "Let's not get too distracted, alright?"

"Ehm, tell me when I can move" he added, because the way her tentacles were gripping his told him the warm shiver he had felt upon entering her had been a fair bit less intense than what she had experienced herself.

"Oh, she looks fine" Ho'olheyak said as she forced his hips to move with her tail, albeith at a rather tranquil pace "I can tell, I assure you"

Kirara was about to speak up, but her gaze told her she'd better stay quiet for her own good.

And that... worked in her favor, in truth. At least from a certain point of view.

Mizuki's slow thrusts felt even more intense than before somehow, each back and forth of his member making her entire body tremble with pleasure both physical and not, and as much as she hated to admit it having someone as good-looking as Ho'olheyak pushing her down onto the sheets did make her even feel even more hot and bothered. But at the same time the sense of danger, that instinctual need to get up and run away she was getting from the fangs occasionally resting on her neck, from her long, forked tongue on her skin, from the tender and yet threatening way her fingers were tapping her sides, it all distracted her from the pleasure, not enough to keep her from enjoying it but still enough to prevent her from having another orgasm too soon.

Mizuki, on his part, found himself a little torn. On one hand, he supposed he should've focused on Kirara given the current situation. On the other, however, he felt like simply leaving Ho'olheyak to her own devices wasn't fair, since she never said anything about taking a breather herself. With the alluring sight in front of him taking him to a quick decision on that matter, Mizuki moved an hand up to Ho'olheyak's rear, gently fondling it while searching for something on the floor behind him with a free tentacle.

She said nothing when she felt him pulling her panties aside yet again, some of his seed trailing down with nothing to hold it inside.

"Do you mind?"

"I quite appreciate the courtesy, rather"

"That's reassuring to hear"

She simply let out a measured whimper when a toy entered her, the neither too intense nor too weak vibrations stirring up her insides, warmth building up within her, her hips bucking a little bit when a nub reached her clit, vibrating against it as well. She quickly readjusted her underwear with the tip of her tail, both to make sure the toy wouldn't fall off and to leave Mizuki's hand free to caress her, his eager yet delicate touch sending pleasant shivers through her skin, almost enough to make her feathers quiver, and the sight of the toy poking out a bit from underneath her drenched panties made him all the more excited in turn.

Kirara had noticed that something was going on but she was too caught up with her own circumstances to pay all that much attention to it, Ho'olheyak's tongue still occasionally running over her neck, her nails tapping over her body and sliding underneath her leotard every now and then, the garment made sticky by all her sweat. She brought an hand to her mouth to keep herself from moaning too loudy, the sounds she'd otherwise let out being far too embarrassing for her to bear as Mizuki tried picking up the pace a bit, his tentacles holding hers a bit more tightly, his hand massaging her thigh as if to reassure her that everything was fine, his pants and soft moans echoing in her head like a most pleasant, most awkward soundtrack, every contact of their skins sending an unperceptible electric signal to her brain, making her more relaxed and more excited at the same time, the pheromone saturating the air to add even more to her still increasing sensitivity, barely kept in check by the perhaps not entirel unfounded fear of having her neck pierced by a pair of much to long canines.

Then, just as her hips began to buck on their own, Ho'olheyak grabbed both her wrists and pinned them down with one hand as she placed her lips on hers, silencing Kirara, the odd feeling of a much too long, forked tongue wrapping around hers combining with the spontaneous stiffening of her muscles to completely freeze her, her insides almost pulsating against Mizuki as Ho'olheyak's tail coiled around his waist ensured he kept going. To make sure the aegir beneath her would get well and truly overstimulated, she slid her free hand between herself and Kirara to pinch her nipples while pushing her hips down against the aegir's, the tip of her tail sliding up and reaching for Kirara's clit to stimulate her there too.

"Kirara?" Mizuki asked as he felt her grasp on him grow especially tight, her body tensing up and trembling, muffled moans escaping her as she fruitlessly tried to wrestle her lips free to ask for reprieve as the pleasure kept piling up, hotter, more intense, washing over her and reverberating all the way to her bones as her nerves approached overloaded, her mind eventually blanking out as a second orgasm crashed into her while she was still going through the first one, a third one following much too soon as Ho'olheyak ensured not a single source of pleasure gave her a break.

"Oh dear" she eventually said as she got back up "I fear that might've been a bit much for your friend"

"... Kirara?" he asked again as Ho'olheyak moved aside, a certain amount of concern in his voice "You ok? Kirara?" he repeated as she gently shook her, getting no answer as she simply lied there, panting heavily but also apparently asleep.

"Now don't do that" Ho'olheyak playfully stopped him with her tail "She just needs some rest. Something to drink when she comes to would help her as well"

"Is that so... ?"

"You don't trust me? That hurts my heart, you know?"

"That's not it, just... maybe I should've- "

"Oh, you" she interrupted him "It'd be quite the real bother for me if something serious were to happen to her or to any Rhodes Islander as we are out together, you know? Let her sleep a bit. Besides" she added as she pulled the negligee off herself a bit, just enough to reveal her breasts "You don't quite look satisfied yet, and neither am I"

His gaze and focus caught once more, Mizuki swallowed a lump of saliva as he stared at her, the soft buzzing still coming from between her legs giving rise to something he failed to identify as a weird sort of jealousy deep inside of him.

"Now come here, sweetie" she said as she sat on her legs and tapped her lap "Let me pamper you a bit"

"Sure. No, wait, it's 'thanks', right?"

"You're welcome" she softly chuckled back, her wings spreading a little bit and closing again as Mizuki lied down on the sheets with his head on her thighs, her breasts blocking out his vision to a... certain degree.

"... can I?" he asked as he lifted an hand to her chest.

She smiled. A wide, sharp, somewhat threatening smile. Then she pushed the vibrator still buzzing inside of her a bit deeper with her heel while pulling him up against herself and leaning forward a little bit at the same time.

Taking that as a yes, Mizuki tried something new and, rather than just fondling her breasts, he closed his mouth over her stiff nipple, his teeth grazing it.

She felt another electric signal reach her brain, almost making her shiver as a decidedly odd but undoubtedly charming pleasure filled her, a peculiar kind of warmth welling up in her chest. Making a mental note to keep a bit of that drink around for whenever their next meeting would be, she fetched another bottle of lube with her tail while pulling the condom off him a second time, properly moving his skirt out of the way once more. She felt him whimper into her chest when the tip of her tail, wet with lotion, coiled around his member, covered by both his seed and her fluids from earlier.

"I thought you didn't like getting your tail dirty" he said, though it was written all over his face that he liked that. He was making no attempt at hiding it, after all.

"I sure don't" she replied as she moved her tail up and down, her muscles contracting and relaxing around his length while her tip occasionally poked his "But you're so endearing I might just make an exception for you"

Then, to make sure he wouldn't waste time with a reply, she pulled his head back up. Taking the signal, Mizuki resumed licking and sucking on her breast, one hand fondling her chest while the other moved to her lower back, now groping now her butt now caressing the base of her tail.

Ho'olheyak, on her part, was amused by how unusually pleasant that felt. The toy buried between her legs was definitively doing its job, vibrating in just the right way to tease her sweet spots on the inside while the nub against her clit ensured she got some external stimulation as well, but the pleasure shooting through her whenever Mizuki touched her breasts and, especially, her nipples was decidedly more intense. That stirred her curiosity, there clearly were yet more things she could learn about his biology if he was capable of such peculiar things, but for the time being she simply enjoyed it, her tails spreading wide open and her tail coiling a bit more tightly around him as she reached her climax sooner than she herself had expected, savoring the sensation as it spread from her chest through the rest of her body, picking up in intensity as it reached her nethers and then moving to the tip of her tail, making her tremble ever so slightly around his member.

But she still wasn't satisfied and so she let Mizuki continue, giggling a little at the way his hips were occasionally bucking in response to her ministrations. She ran an hand through his soft hair, wondering how cute he'd look with a ponytail, then placed her other one on the tip of his member, the sudden touch making him whimper, the following ministrations as she used her palm and fingertips to further stimulate him while her tail kept rubbing him off causing his tentacles to wrap around her and himself too, as if to lock them together, her heel pushing the toy a little bit further still within herself. A not entirely controlled moan escaped her when Mizuki bit down on her nipple, a sudden spark setting her thoughts ablaze for a brief, intense moment as she nearly came again, her fingers grasping his head a little bit tighter for half a second.

Having noticed that and guessing that he should continue with it, Mizuki began to gently bite down on her, nibbling her nipple while tenderly pinching the other one, every electric signal he unconsciously sent to her brain making her twitch with growing ecstasy, the pheromone he was still releasing making her desire him even more than she usually did, a fact which showed in the way she held on to him and which in turn made him that much more attracted as well.

Then she heard her whimper and something about the sultriness of that sound got him over the edge as well, her palm closing over the head of his member to keep his seed at least somewhat contained, the warm, sticky fluid pouring from between her fingers and dirtying her hand and tail.

"Now then, pretty boy" she said, her breaths a bit heavier than he was used to hearing them be "Let's continue, shall we?" she declared rather than asked as she coiled her long tongue over her own hand, licking his seed off her and savoring its most peculiar, sweet taste.

For the first time that evening -but, in truth, not the first time since he had met her- Mizuki felt his instinct to reproduce giving way to the one telling him that he was a little out of his league.

But, once again, he decided to ignore that one.

Kirara woke up to a most intense, odd scent. Not a foul one by any means, but she wouldn't quite have called it pleasant either. It was a mixture of the smell of sex, which she wasn't exactly familiar with, and the lingering aroma left by Mizuki's pheromone as its component broke down naturally after a certain time leaving an innocuous fragrance in the air, one Kirara was even less aquaintained with.

She rubbed her eyes, then jumped up as the events of the previous evening played back in her mind.

"Oh... ohgodohgodohgod what... "

"Hey, you're awake"

"Aaaaahhhhh?!"

Her scream startling Mizuki almost as much as it startled Kirara herself, she turned around to see him sitting on a chair and eating breakfast, his maid costume still as pretty as ever on him even if terribly disheveled. If the number of plates on the countertop were of any indication, he was already at the fifth course too.

"Mizuki, we... you... " she tried to say, her words dying in her throat as she noticed that he looked a little pale. And slightly... wasted? As if he had lost a bit of weight. And there were bags under his eyes, the kind Kirara got after an eighteen-hours gaming marathon "... are you ok?"

"Oh, absolutely. Just a little tired. What about you?"

"... "

Before she could answer, Ho'olheyak walked out of the bathroom fully dressed, her skin looking especially smooth, her scales almost glistening, even her feathers seemed prettier than the previous day. She wasn't wearing the same dress as the previous day though.

"Get yourselves clean and changed quickly, I want to get back to the landship before lunch" she casually said as she headed to the door.

"Wait, ehr... how much... do I owe for the... the room... ?" Kirara asked.

The smile Ho'olheyak threw at her was so sharp the aegir almost feared one of her tentacles would get cleanly cut off.

"I woulnd't expect you to have any meaningful contribution to make to this tab, girl" she declared before walking out, leaving Kirara with yet another sense of defeat hanging on her shoulders.

The hotel wasn't actually as expensive as Ho'olheyak made it sound, in truth, and Kirara would've been able to foot at least a part of the bill since she did receive a sort of paycheck from Rhodes Island and even won some money now and then from gaming tournaments, but Ho'olheyak just wanted to see her mood drop again for no particular reason and succeeded at that.

"... sorry" she said as she turned back to Mizuki "I... I just got in the way of your night out with your girlfriend... "

He bent his head to the side.

"What girlfriend?"

"... Ho'olheyak?" she asked back, his clear confusion leaving her even more puzzled in turn.

"I'm not sure what it means to be someone's boyfriend or girlfriend to be honest, but I don't think that's what we are" he tried to explain while finishing up his cup of milk and cereals.

"Well, I mean... a girlfriend's someone you go out with, someone you spend time with, someone you like being around, someone who shares some interests with you, someone you... you ha... have s-sex with, I guess... and who likes you too... "

"Wouldn't that make us boyfriend and girlfriend too?"

"... eh... uh?!"

Her face turning as blue as the sea, Kirara found her thoughts stumbling into each other and turning her mind into a jumbled mess from which she couldn't pull a single coherent sentence to speak, random half-words and meaningless sounds leaving her lips instead as she tried to gesticulate with her hands, leaving Mizuki even more confused as he tried to figure out what she was trying to communicate.

"I mean" he continued "If those are the metrics I think you're probably the closest thing to a girlfriend I have? Oh, does that mean I'd be your boyfriend too then? ... is how much you like each single paramenter important when deciding which person is your girlfriend and who is just a friend? Wait, I think that liking someone can also mean multiple things, so that might be relevant too. Or maybe how much time you actually spend together? Mmnnh, this is really complicated... oh, do you want to use the shower? ... I'll go ahead then" he concluded once she went two full minutes without answering, silently thankful that the clothes he had on when leaving Rhodes were still clean.

Left alone, Kirara found herself in a state of complete confusion, shaken only when the earpiece she had left in the pocket of her coat suddenly sprung to life. When exactly her clothes got moved to the backrest of a chair there from the bathroom where she had left them the previous evening she had no idea, but the voice which came from the transmitter was decidedly familiar.

"Rara-chan, you ok? Still alive? Answer me, pal"

"Ah, Utage! Drop the volume, you'd have broken my eardrum had I still had this thing on!" she almost shouted back into the microphone still hidden in the neck of her coat "What happened?"

"Uh, I don't even want to talk about it, Rara-chan... I don't think I'll be able to walk straight for a week, that woman is a monster... "

"Utage, listen here Utage!"

"Hey, what happened? Sounds like you're on cloud nine!"

"Mizuki said I might be the closest thing to a girlfriend he has!"

"... that's... I'm happy for you... ?" Utage said back, not really sure what she was supposed to answer to that sort of declaration. Especially because Kirara sounded genuinely ecstatic about it.

"Yesterday was awesome! Thanks for the help, Utage, I owe you a big one! No, make it even two!"

"Ahah, that's just what buddies do, don't they?"

Honestly, Utage wasn't sure Mizuki even really knew what a girlfriend was, and knowing him there was a strong chance he and Kirara weren't even talking about the same thing during whatever conversation they might've had.

But since Kirara sounded so happy, she figured she could deal with all of that later.