From the wishes of a kyuubi cutie, but executed by a psycho bitch! It is Venturers of Radiant: The Next Dimension!
Content Warning: TSF Series #017: Cassandra – The Cuddly Demon Empress contains content that some readers might find disturbing, triggering, or uncomfortable. This includes sexually explicit activities, strong language, and extreme violence. Reader discretion is advised.
Foreword
TSF Series #017 was written as a birthday present for my dear friend, Cassandra Wright. She wanted an installment of TSF Series where she, or rather an approximation of her, is sent on an isekai adventure through the world of Venturers of Radiant. A recurring fantasy game series featured in the TSF Series #004 trilogy and TSF Series #016: Darling Lust.
This was originally meant to be a collaborative effort, but because of generally poor communication and inconsistent ideas on what this story would, should, or could be, I wound up making this largely my own creation. Something that is less fixated on the TSF elements, and more fixated on being a wacky fantasy adventure. The end result is… messy.
A story with episodic chapters that structurally fit together, but changes dramatically in content with each chapter. Barreling further and deeper into different genres and being more of a series of adventures than something more deliberate. However, this also captures the jovial relationship I share with Cassie, and the way our interactions run the spectrum from cartoonish silliness to something more somber.
Chapter 0: That Time I Was Murdered by Truck-Kun
Location: Truro, England
Date: September 27, 2024
Time: 17:43
The sky above was the dullest of gray, basking it in a lifeless malaise, while filling all beneath its sky with a concern that it could start raining any minute now.
Despite the weather, people still went about their days, walking along the concrete sidewalks and scooting across the streets in their cars. One such person was a young woman, her curly blonde hair down to her tailbone, bushy brown eyebrows along her porcelain white face, dressed in baggy black clothing that hid her skinny and flat form.
She walked along the streets with a chipper expression plastered onto her face, humming a song with every step. Not because she was happy to be out. Far from it. But because of the dense brown bag she swung with each step. A bag full of £35 of Chinese food, whose rich aromatic scent filled her nostrils. Her tummy audibly grumbled as she caught a whiff of the food, but as the thought of snacking on a piece of shrimp toast crossed her mind, she scolded herself.
Blonde Girl: “No Cassandra! You must savor this feast of yours. Save it for when you are talking with Andreas!”
Cassandra shook her face as she heeded her words and kept walking, her head full of thoughts of spending a night with her German boyfriend, Andreas. Technically, they weren’t meeting in person, but for a 21st century girl like Cassandra, all she needed was a little voice chat to get by. …Assuming your definition of ‘little’ meant at least three hours.
Knowing what lay in store for her, Cassandra merrily made her way down the sidewalk, crossing a street after looking both ways… only to be met with a booming abrasive sound. Turning her head, she saw a truck, zooming forward at 80 kilometers per hour, and showing now sign of slowing down. With her reflexes kicking in, Cassandra ran back to the sidewalk, only to trip on the curb, fumbling onto the concrete and almost spilling her Chinese food all over the ground.
She let out a sad, achy groan as she tried lifting herself up from this most un-comfy fall, and saw that the truck had narrowly missed her, and had crossed the intersection. A sigh of relief escaped her lips as she realized how close she came to death, and she wasted little time getting up and resuming her walk back to her home. …Only to be met with the sound of the same horn.
Turning her head, she saw that the truck she so narrowly avoided had turned around, and was heading right toward her. She had only two real options. Duck down and hide underneath the big wheels of the truck. …Or run. And in a moment of panic, Cassandra did the latter.
She was far from an athletic girl, but adrenaline sent her blazing forward at 20 kilometers an hour. A fairly fast speed to give chase at, but as she ran, she soon found herself locked in between a busy street and concrete wall. A wall that the truck veered toward in its pursuit, shattering its side mirror.
She could practically feel the heat bursting from the front grill of the vehicle, but just as her demise seemed like an inevitability, the concrete wall to her side faded, and revealed a hill. One full of bushes and trees aplenty. Cassandra swerved to her left and began running down this greenery, stomping her feet through the bushes and weeds as she sought salvation.
Once behind the comfort of a thick tree, Cassandra looked through the greenery to see the truck zooming forward and away from her. Relief filled her being. She avoided the threat, and being surrounded by these thick old trees, she had a natural barrier against any further attacks. Her body slunk against the tree, her bottom flopping to the floor, and with a great big sigh, Cassandra dug into her bag of Chinese food, ready for a makeshift picnic as the stress leaked out of her body. She got so far as sitting down and pulling out a piece of shrimp toast. But before she could nom it up… the truck horn rang through the air yet again, and Cassandra saw it was heading right for her. Crashing through the trees like a tank storming through a neighborhood.
Cassandra grabbed her bag as she resumed her run, exiting the protection of the forest and returning to the street. She ran, and ran, and kept on running, not thinking about where she was going or looking back at the truck to see if she was safe. Because there was no time to think, no time to look, there was only time to run. But as she zoomed past her third block, her foot got caught on a gap in the sidewalk, and she went flopping down onto the ground yet again.
The bag of Chinese food flew from her hand, and from the pain that was throbbing across her foot, she could tell she sprained something. She cried and shouted as the pain spread throughout her body, but her sobs were overpowered by that awful sound once again. She turned her head to face it, to allow the despair to sink down past her gullet and slam into her gut. Instead, her head was crushed under the 3 ton weight of the truck as it squashed her body like a common fruit. Bones were broken down to bits, organs flattened like fleshy pancakes, and her face was obliterated, with brain, eye, and gums all splattering together in a vile clump of viscera.
Without a fragment of doubt, Cassandra was dead, and the manic driver behind this truck achieved their malicious objective. Normally, this is when the killer would run, but instead, the driver parked the truck in the middle of the street, hopped out of their seat, and as they saw the corpse before them, they cackled.
The driver was a dark-skinned woman with messy black hair and vibrant pink eyes. Young, a bit chubby, and just over 160 centimeters tall, dressed in a purple tank top that put her chest on full display. She whipped out her phone from her jean shorts as she skipped over to the remains of Cassandra, and wasted little time looking into the front-facing camera, and started a video call.
Truck Driver: “Word up, bitches! It’s yo girl, Maxxie! And I just sent this girl here straight to the Next Dimension! Whatever the fuck her name was, she’s number 9 on my list, and y’all know what that means, right? Just three more murks and I get to kiss this shitbowl bye-bye!”
As Maxxie spoke, someone else began their video feed. A Black woman with a full expression on her face who, according to the user interface, was named Vita.
Vita: “Do you really need to go around streaming after you kill people like that?”
Maxxie: “Vita, for the 10th time, it’s not killing, it’s sending their soul to a better reality with the help of good old truck-kun! So, how’s it going in Germany?”
Vita: “It went fairly well. For a fireman, he wasn’t the most aware person. His body’s already on his way to Michael.”
Maxxie: “For real? Is there that much of a market for skinsuits of White dudes?”
Vita: “I was concerned about that too, but Michael says I’d be surprised by the demographics.”
Maxxie: “Huh, so even trans girls like this have a niche?”
Vita: “Probably. Haul her in Truck-kun and get going. The cops should already be on their way.”
Maxxie: “Of course they are. No matter the country, cops are always not there when it does anybody good, but there when you don’t freaking want ’em.”
Maxxie ended the call and looked at the corpse before her. She schlepped it over her shoulder, getting blood and viscera all over her shoulder and in her hair, before opening up the back of the truck and tossing it. Tossing it into a powerful freezer containing eight other corpses in similar states of disarray, all kept cold and ‘fresh.’ She shut the back of the truck like such a grotesque site was the epitome of banal, and right as she did so, she heard the iconic sirens of the British police.
Maxxie: “Fuck off, fuzz! You ain’t never getting me alive!”
With a hop, Maxxie slid back into her truck and slammed her foot on the pedal, sending her tearing down the street. She moved frantically, using side streets to her advantage, but with all the damn cameras over the place, it was only a matter of time before the cops found her. With five cars tailing her, things weren’t looking good for Maxxie… but that’s when she saw her salvation. A cliff!
With a smirk on her face, Maxxie slammed her fist against a mysterious button on her dashboard, and caused her truck to zoom forward at breakneck speeds. Speeds great enough for her truck to tear through the partition protecting drivers from the stones and water below. It seemed like a suicide attempt, a way to escape the mess she was in, but just as the truck started to lose its speed and dip downward, it vanished into thin air.
With that, Maxxie and Truck-kun were off to their next target. The next subject chosen to escape this flawed world and enter… the Next Dimension!
Chapter 1: That Time I Was Resurrected as a Demon Empress in The Next Dimension
The last thing Cassandra remembered was the sound of the truck. After it struck her, everything went black and, with her final thought, she assumed that she was destined for an endless nothingness. That she would be dead. Unable to think. Unable to feel. Unable to exist.
She was confident that was all that awaited her. …Yet, she found herself opening her eyes. And as she took in her surroundings, she did not see darkness. She did not see an abyss. She did not even see pearly gates. Instead, she saw carefully painted walls, elegant wooden furniture, and a canopy that gave way to an expansive bed. One so massive it could fit an entire family.
Clearly, she was in a bedroom of some manner, one that was expensive, posh, and adopted the aesthetic of a castle. The fine carpets lining the shining hardwood floor, the lush pink curtains, and the massive window that brought in a flood of light from the morning sun. It was something so picturesque that it seemed unreal, like a fantasy beyond fantasy.
She was tempted to get up and explore… but she was currently immersed in a comfort beyond her wildest dreams. The bed she was lying in was the softest she had ever had the privilege of touching, so part of her wanted to do nothing more than snuggle the silky sheets and sleep. However, as she tugged the sheets and turned to her side, she was met with something… unexpected. Something just as soft as the bed… but fluffier. It was… a tail. A fox tail. A bushy blonde yellow and stark white fox tail that was just a bit thicker than her head, laying right next to her.
Cassandra: “Eh? Eh?! EH?!?!”
It was one thing to wake up to such a sight, but as Cassandra spoke, she was taken aback, for she could tell her voice was vastly different than it was before. She would often say she sounded like an 11-year-old kid on Xbox Live— a reference to a cultural trend from 2007 to 2013. Someone high pitched yet not distinctly feminine, and with a voice that was more annoying than anything. A voice in transition to become something greater. Now, just from the way she said… not even a word, but made a sound with her voice, she could tell she sounded like an elegant woman.
Cassandra: “H-Hello? Hello! How… How are you today? Is this… yeah. Yeah! This really is what I sound like now, so… does that all mean… no way, this can’t be!”
With excitement ringing through her voice like a church bell, she cast aside the silky pink blanket covering her body and was revealed with her body. She was expecting it to be in pajamas or… some form of clothing. Instead, she saw a naked body that bore little resemblance to the one she had been locked in for the entirety of her life.
Cassandra’s legs were long and slender, possessing a shapeliness to them that she had never possessed before, and as they brushed together, she was aghast at just how soft they were. The legs gave way to hips that, while not the most wide or pronounced, both looked and felt like there was an extra inch of bone and cushion applied to both sides. Her torso was still slender, but its shape was far less rectangular, instead possessing an hourglass curve that she could only partially see on account of the balloon-like D-cup breasts resting on her chest.
It was all like a dream come true! Except… was that still there? It was hard for her to see it over her large breasts, but as she peered through her cleavage, she could not see a one-eyed turtle saying hello, or either of its wretched friends. Instead, she saw a flat crotch, broken up by a small cleft in the center of her being.
Cassandra looked away from her sex, not ready to confront it along with all other changes, but as she averted her eyes, she was reminded of what caused her to cast her sheets off in the first place. The fluffy fox tail. Reason would dictate that she would find it poking out her tailbone, because it’s a tail, but that was only partially true. While her fox tail did go down to the small of her back… it was not the only tail. Oh no. She had nine.
Nine tails, all two meters in length, all billowing out from her back and onto the bed, forming a fluffy blanket that Cassandra’s entire body laid upon. No wonder this was so comfy!
Cassandra: “I… I’m a kyuubi too? This… This is… THIS IS THE BEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED TO ME!!!”
With her body practically throbbing with bliss, Cassandra leapt out of her bed and onto the floor, where she darted her eyes around the room and found a full-length mirror on the other side. She ran toward it with no hesitation… only to trip over one of her tails, causing her naked body to roll across the elegant carpet beneath her feet.
This did little to deter Cassandra though, who sprang in front of the mirror and participated in an activity she had seen many times… but never thought she would experience for herself. She looked in the mirror, at her face, hoping beyond hope that it would match her preferences… and it did.
While she could see a vague impression of her old face, every facet, every contour, every angle of every bone had been reshaped. Her pale skin was a consistent ivory, bereft of any imperfections and, most especially, no poop-colored hairs to be found. Her blonde hair was straight and trailed down past her back before reaching her knees. Her eyebrows were trim and matched the color of the hair on her head. Her eyes were a vibrant purple, and as she stared into them, she saw her pupils were not only shaped like a diamond, but were a bright pink. She was so enraptured by her face she almost forgot to check her head, where she found them. A pair of pointy fluffy fox ears that rested at the top of her head.
Cassandra had always struggled to determine her absolute favorite look, and precisely what she wanted to look like, as it was hard to choose between all the cuties she came across. But as she stared at this sight, before her and rendered it in full 3D, she felt she had an answer to that question. The body before her was… her ideal. It was something that matched something she struggled to articulate, and just looking at it… was enough to turn her face red.
She stammered as she tried to speak to herself. Her breathing grew heavy and fast. And as she stepped back to see the whole of her body, from head to toe and out to her nine tails, she was… overwhelmed. Cassandra flopped to the floor, landing on her tails, and proceeded to hug onto them, pressing them against her naked form as she basked in their warmth and softness. It calmed her mind, slowed her rapidly beating heart, and as she breathed into the thick hair, she felt the concern filter out of her body… only to be replaced with ecstasy.
Cassandra: “Ohmygosh ohmygosh! This is happening, this is real, it’s happening, I’m a kyuubi! I’m a cutie! I don’t know how, but it happened! Yes! Yes! YES!!!”
Cassandra sprang back to her feet, lifting herself up with the nine tails, and basked in her reflection. Mimicking various faces from cuties she had committed to memory, adopting poses of the girls she always envied and admired, and bringing her hands to her newfound body. She touched her hips at every angle, slowly rubbed her tender fluffy ears, and gave her breasts the occasional rub, all while wagging her tails like an excited fox!
Cassandra: “Okay, okay, so… Right! If this is happening, I must have been isekai’d! And based on this room, I must be someone important. Perhaps a princess. I always wanted to be a princess, but… something about these eyes look so… sinister, and as I adopt this smile, and this pose… I sure don’t look like a princess.”
As Cassandra adopted the most villainess pose she could think of, she realized that the wooden cabinet off to her right was probably a wardrobe. She could figure out a lot of her new isekai’d life just by checking the outfit designs, and if she had a wide variety of clothes, now would be the perfect time for a fashion show! She traipsed over to the wardrobe, a smile on her adorable little mug, and opened it… only to be met with the sound of something else opening.
She froze as she heard the sound of a door bang against the wall. Because not only was it loud, it meant someone would see her while she was naked! However, her fear melted away as she heard a familiar voice. A German-accented voice that she could never even hope to forget, even with her flakey memory.
???: “Cassandra, is that you?”
Turning her head, Cassandra looked into the doorway and saw… him. Her boyfriend of the past few years, her true love, and the man who promised to become her husband once they grew older. He looked just as she remembered, from his short brown hair, bushy eyebrows, wide nose, and light complexion. He was still the same handsome young man he was in the other dimension, and still a good 20 centimeters taller than her..
While Cassandra was dressed in… nothing, he was dressed in a plain navy jacket, along with dark pants, which, considering Cassandra confirmed that this was an isekai, just made him look like an uninspired self-insert protagonist. Still, the sight of him was more than enough to send Cassandra’s heart fluttering, and send her body barreling toward the young man before her.
Cassandra: “Andreas!!!”
Cassandra immediately began to press her naked form against Andreas, planting his face into her bare breasts and wrapping him in her slender arms. He did not resist or ask questions. He merely accepted the fact that his girlfriend was now a kyuubi, and wrapped his arms around her accordingly.
Andreas: “Cassandra, I don’t know what happened to us, but so long as I’m with you, it doesn’t matter.”
Cassandra: “D’aw, you’re such a sweetie! And just looking at you is… making me all excited.”
Andreas: “…What? Cassandra, we were just transported to this new world, so shouldn’t we?”
Cassandra: “That was not a request, darling! I am a fox, and this fox… is in heat.”
Without any warning, Cassandra moved her tails with just a thought, sending them around Andreas. The colors of concern painted Andreas’s face, but as he stared into Cassandra’s colorful pink and purple eyes, and down at her voluptuous form, he felt his heart thump against his chest, and his sausage poke against his trousers. He knew this situation was weird… but he wanted it, she wanted it, and with consent shared between both parties, Andreas nodded his head enthusiastically. Cassandra shot him a sly smirk, got on her toes to kiss him on the lips, and proceeded to use her tails to strip him of his clothes, casting every article onto the floor of this immaculate room.
She stared at his form as the stripping came to a close. Andreas’s muscular frame was as primed as she had seen, and seeing his penis poking upwards reminded her of their many spooning adventurers. She was always too ashamed of her body to do anything with his little friend, or even look at it in its rawest form. But as she stared down at it now… it was as if a voice within her head was telling her what to do.
Cassandra moved onto the bed, where she presented her form before Andreas, spreading every limb, putting her ample assets on full display. Without words, her intent was clear, and once Andreas was freed from his fluffy constraints, he joined her. Their bodies quickly grew as close as they could, and Cassandra immersed the two in a ball of fluff. What did they do in this ball of fluff? Well, that was their private time. Time for them to learn more about each other’s bodies, themselves, and forge a memory that they would, and could, never hope to forget…
After fucking like a pair of horny hamsters, Cassandra and Andreas were left resting on their bed, both dressed in nothing. Cassandra sat at the edge of her bed, her flurry of tails all laying down on the mattress, while Andreas rested his head on her cushy lap.
Cassandra: “This really is the best day ever!”
Andreas: “I know, darling. You finally got the body you always wanted. And after all these years, we finally…”
Cassandra: “Yeah! But it’s more than that. We’re no longer on Earth! We’re freeeee from all the sad and suffering!”
Andreas: “Yes, but… I’m not sure if that was all bad. I’ll never see my family again, and while I love you Cassandra, there were certain things that I lost when coming here. My job, my belongings, and everything I planned to do are just—”
Cassandra: “Snuggu!”
Rather than let Andreas voice such sorrow, Cassandra pressed his head into her breasts, wrapped him into a hug, and rolled against the bed, the two cushioned by her fluffy tails.
Andreas: “W-Wait! Cassandra, do you even know where you are or what—”
Cassandra: “Nope! But if you would oh so kindly let me know, my sweet Andreas..”
Andreas: “I know you’ll like it, but please try to stay calm.”
Cassandra: “Heh. I’ll try! But if you are going to say I’m a princess, I already guessed as much!”
Andreas: “Well, you’re not quite a princess. You’re a… demon empress.”
As that term escaped Andreas’s mouth, Cassandra felt something sink in her heart. Not out of sorrow… but out of bliss. Not only was she gorgeous from tip to toe, not only was she a kyuubi, but… she was a demon empress. Once this idea sank into her head, there was only one way she could respond to this.
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! It seems that the goddess has finally recognized my desires and abilities. For this act of generosity, I just might spare them… assuming I can forgive them for two decades of relentless agony! …But what is my dear Andreas? Are you my tiny little king?”
Andreas: “I… I’m actually your right-hand man, my empress.”
Cassandra: “My empress? Empress Cassandra? Oh… Oh my. I like the sound of that… yes.”
The bright and cheery look on Cassandra’s face then became something sinister and foreboding. Whatever she was imagining in her mind, it clearly wasn’t all sunshine, rainbows, and puppy dogs.
Inspired, Cassandra then rose from the bed, and pulled away the curtains covering the massive window in her room. She found herself at the top of a tower, looking down at a castle.It was dark, oppressive, and from the tall walls to the watchtowers, to the moat of green liquid, was arguably befitting a demon empress like herself. She did her signature ojou-sama laugh as she comprehended the power and resources she must have at her disposal, and the gears of her mind turned at a rate faster than they had in years.
Cassandra: “I thought this body was a dream come true… but I am a woman of many dreams, and with every passing hour, it seems that another one is granted. …Andreas, I think it is about time for me to greet my subjects.”
Andreas: “…You probably want to get dressed first.”
Cassandra looked down at her wondrous body, clad in nothing. She was going to explore her wardrobe before Andreas barged in, but for the time being, she just needed something befitting her title of demon empress.
Opening to the doors of her wardrobe, she was almost overwhelmed by the vast array of dresses, the chests of accessories, and the sheer variety of it all. She wanted to cut loose and break out into a fashion show, but she was a busy woman, and found herself drawn to one garment more than any other.
It was a black yukata with a bright blue ‘mana lily’ floral pattern. The moment she touched the silky fabric, she realized she simply had to wear this, and began wrapping it around her body. Even though she lacked the knowledge of how precisely to wrap a kimono around her person, it was as if her body was on auto-pilot as she adjusted the ribbon in the back, perfecting the fit of the robes.
The yukata left her shoulders exposed and presented her plentiful chest on display for all to see. Though a far cry from what one might imagine as a demon empress, Cassandra had the poise and stature of a woman who would and could lead with an iron fist. An aura of power, of dominance, along with her immense beauty. She did her signature laugh as she recognized this, before turning back toward Andreas.
He was clad in the clothes he wore when he barged into the bedroom, and was enraptured by her form, staring her up and down and up again. Cassandra could tell she could have further fun with him… but as she glanced out her window, she was reminded of her… subjects.
Cassandra: “Come, my dear Andreas. I think it is time I introduce myself to my minions, and take my first action as demon empress.”
Andreas: “Yes, Cassandra.”
Cassandra: “Call me… Empress.”
Andreas: “Yes… Empress.”
Cassandra could feel her lips creeping up across her face, but she remained confident as she traipsed out of the room, walking with an elegance and grace befitting of her new body. Andreas trailed behind her, looking deeply at her nine tails, all standing upwards and outwards, not one dragging onto the floor of the elegant stone halls. The tails were long and voluminous enough to almost completely obscure Cassandra’s back, aside from the occasional snippet between the dense wads of fluff. Truthfully, he wanted little more than to embrace their comfort again, but could tell in his heart that he would be chided for such a transgression. Now was simply not the time for snuggles. It was the time for Cassandra to greet her myriad minions… Who were currently hopping around the halls.
Andreas had met these creatures previously during his trek through the castle, but he still could not help but be surprised by their form. Rather than a humanoid minion, they were effectively giant balls of fur with small stubby feet— no legs to speak of— with thin retractable vine-like tentacles instead of arms, and the big shimmering eyes of a baby mammal. These creatures, known as floofballs, stood at an average height of 50 centimeters, came in a rainbow of colors, and traversed the halls of the castle by bouncing or rolling about. Though the creatures were as light as a ball of feathers, they had the proportional strength of an ant, carrying crates carrying over 100 kilograms of equipment with no issue. They even managed to roll around the castle while balancing them on their heads… somehow.
Cassandra: “Oh my… gosh! Look at these cutie patooties!”
As Cassandra said that, she grabbed a green floofball with both hands and rubbed it into her face. The floofball let out a mixture of a cat’s purr and a baby’s laugh as it was snuggled by its empress. A cry that summoned more floofballs, who rolled down the halls before gathering around Empress Cassandra. She looked down at them curiously, losing track of how many were around her after seeing the twentieth, and before she could think of anything to say to them, the floofballs placed themselves around their empress. It was adorable… if foreboding. Cassandra braced herself for an attack, only for the floofballs to form a big pile they gently pushed Cassandra, and Andreas, onto.
Once secured, the pile of floofballs began to roll forward, acting like a carriage as it drove itself through the expansive halls and down the spiraling staircases of the castle. The two passengers took delight in the views of this drive, from the lavish artwork adorning the walls, to the mysterious rooms they just barely caught the name of. Yet every sight paled in comparison to the heart of this castle. The room where a ruler led and asserted their dominance above their subjects. Covered in garments of a regal purple, and with a lavish seat, it was clear that this was the throne room. One that invited in tinted sunlight from its massive windows, yet still carried with it a foreboding atmosphere.
Cassandra: “Heh. It is just as I said. This just keeps getting better and better by the hour! Thank you my floofy friends, but I can take it from here.”
As Cassandra dismissed them, the floofballs dispersed, leaving Cassandra and Andreas standing just a few meters from the throne. Cassandra strutted to the seat and placed herself on it, folding her legs, resting one arm on an armrest, and placing a hand against her smooth face. She stared at the hall leading up to the throne, at the massive pillars of white marble that held up its immaculately high ceilings, and downright gargantuan wooden door. You could fit a gosh darn tyrannosaurus through that thing!
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! Now, this is the position I always deserved. A power befitting someone like me. Andreas, as my right hand, do me a favor and summon my minions. All of them! I have my first order to declare!”
Andreas: “Cassa— Empress Cassandra, do you think that is the best idea? We do not know what the floofballs are really doing, and calling everyone—”
Cassandra: “I did not ask for your opinion. Summon them all!”
Andreas: “…How? I doubt there is a speaker system or a way to call them. We barely understand how anything works here and—”
Cassandra: “To all my minions… come to me! …NOW!!!”
Cassandra snapped her fingers as she uttered that command. …And the two waited in silence for ten seconds, before Andreas spoke up.
Andreas: “Was that supposed to do something, or…”
Cassandra: “W-Well, it felt like the right thing to do. After all, I am a powerful Demon Empress. So surely I can summon my minions with just a command… right?”
Andreas: “Yeah… I’m not sure about that—”
Just as Andreas was in the middle of doubting his empress, a rumble echoed throughout the castle, and the floofballs arrived. They stormed down the hallways with what started as a trickle of floofballs, but blossomed into a gosh darn wave! Floofballs flooded into the throne room from every side door, every staircase, and then they started coming out of the damn walls via secret compartments. Dozens became hundreds, and just as quickly became thousands, until the entire throne room was filled with floofballs, all a slightly different color, and all looking at Cassandra with their big, adorable eyes.
Cassandra looked at this immense pile with a level of awe and confusion, wondering if she made some grand mistake here. However, as she looked down at her bosom, at the yukata covering her body, she cast aside such weak feelings, and spoke loudly and proudly to her countless minions.
Cassandra: “My minions, I woke up today as a different woman, and whatever plans I had in place, I wish to cast them aside. My new plan… is quite simple. Kon-quest. With the power throbbing through my body, and forces like you, we will kon-quer this world, one kingdom at a time, until everything on this planet is under my domain. Lives will need to be ended by the millions, but it will all be worth it. For what I will bring will not be a world of suffering. It will be a world without aching, without pain. A world where all is right, where all is comfy, and all who try to destroy it… are disposed of.”
Andreas: “E-Empress Cassandra, don’t you think you are going a bit too far? You don’t even know the extent of your powers, and you’re already planning something like this?”
Cassandra: “Shush! I know what I want, and I will get it by any means necessary. No matter how many kings I must slay, no matter how many self-proclaimed heroes I will need to corrupt into becoming my servants. This world shall be mine. For I am Cassandra The Cuddly Demon Empress!”
The floofballs all clamored as they heard her declaration. Not because they understood it— they barely had any brain behind their dense fluff. But because they could feel the emotions of their empress and were ready to do whatever they could to make her happy.
It was damn near deafening, hearing all these floofballs speak at once, and was particularly hard on Cassandra’s sensitive fox ears. Still, she took in the applause like a true leader, waiting for it to die down before making her next move… only for disaster to strike.
A great and mighty kaboom echoed through the hall of floof, and replaced it with a thick smoke that poured onto the throne itself, blinding Cassandra as the sounds of an explosion rang in her ears.
Cassandra: “Owie owie owie! Andreas, my ears are all hurt and achy! What just happened?”
Though she could not see her man in the dense smoke, his accented voice still traveled to her ears.
Andreas: “W-Well, I think the floofballs mentioned something about spies keeping an eye on the castle, saying an attack might happen soon. And with every minion in one place, they must’ve…”
Andreas paused as Cassandra planted a hand on his shoulder. Even in this darkened smokey environment, her violet and pink eyes still shined brightly, and the very sight left him quivering.
Cassandra: “Why didn’t you tell me this! You’re supposed to be the responsible one! BONK!”
With a flick of her hand, Cassandra summoned an elegant purple staff from nothingness and used it to smack the top of Andreas’s head. An impact that not only filled him with the pain of an all-caps bonk, but came with a secondary effect. Andreas’s body was zapped with a burst of violet electricity, causing him to fall down to the floor, his skin and clothes all crispy. It looked like he was cooked, but his body was still groaning and twitching, so he’d be fine in a few minutes. …Probably.
Cassandra: “Hmph! Guess I’ll just need to do things myself. Smoke, begone!”
As Cassandra waved her staff around, the smoke vanished, and the destruction wrought on her castle was made clear to her. Not only was there an explosion, but it destroyed the entire entrance hall of her abode. The walls had crumbled, the ceiling collapsed, the marble pillars had been toppled, and the thousands of floofballs were left laying amongst the rubble. With X’s over their eyes as they laid unconscious and trapped under tons upon tons of stone.
Mere hours after becoming a demon empress, someone had already launched such an attack on her. This very fact filled her with a rage that sent purple sparks flying across her entire body and caused the color of her eyes to morph into a scarlet red.
Cassandra: “Who… who dares to defy me? Show yourself!”
On cue, two figures stood on top of the rubble. The first was a man dressed in white armor, with a head of short blonde hair, and silver blade in hand. His complexion was fair, his eyes were colored a bright amethyst, and from the way he stood, it was clear he at the very least fancied himself a hero. The second was a woman in sapphire armor, her silver hair wrapped in a long ponytail, and her dominant hand wrapped against a lance made of steel and bearing an enigmatic cyan crystal. Her complexion was dark, eyes practically glowed a vibrant green, and she posed like a warrior awaiting to parry her enemy’s next move.
The two looked at Cassandra with stern expressions, staring at her like she was their greatest foe. While Cassandra looked at them and recognized them. But… not as her enemies. Instead, as she looked at them, she smiled. NO, that’s not quite right. Her face was positively beaming as she recognized them, and try as she might, she couldn’t help but squeal at the sight of them!
Cassandra: “Oh my gush! Zyrus! Isadore! What are you doing here?”
The man, Zyrus Radiata, and the woman, Isadore Ivalliance, looked at each other with a bemused expression as the Demon Empress spoke like an excited child. However, they were too focused to let such an abnormality get the better of them, and made their heroic speech.
Isadore: “Cassandra, Empress of Demons! As the king and queen of Radiata, we are here to end your reign of terror, here and now!”
Zyrus: “Your minions have been plaguing and pillaging our lands for far too long. We have been waiting for the right time to strike but…”
Isadore: “You were foolish enough to gather them all in one place, so all it took was one pyro boom to take them all out. I’d ask if evil has corrupted your brain… but I already know it has.”
Zyrus: “Hold your stance, Isadore. No matter what Cassandra has done, she still deserves a chance to surrender.”
Isadore: “Darling, I don’t mean to be rude, but that didn’t work for the Kuronis or the Khalooner.”
Zyrus: “But it did work for the Shadlings. So we need to keep on trying. Every life we save… is another potential ally in arms. So, what do you say Cassandra? Will you cast aside your demonic ways and surrender your empire to Radiata? …Or will you accept death at our hands?”
Cassandra’s infatuation with these two faded as they spoke to her in such harsh tones. She recognized them as dear friends, but as they spoke down to her— figuratively and literally— she started feeling the power in her person swell once again. She should not need to take such disrespect, blaming her for actions she did not do, and threatening to kill her. For she was the demon empress!
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! You clearly do not understand who you are dealing with here. I might not fully comprehend the power that I wield, but just from the way I breath, the way I stand, and from the staff between my fingers, I can tell it is grand. Grand enough to defeat you two in combat… and assert myself as the dominant one. Not only between our lands, but among all who walk on the surface of Gaia!”
Cassandra raised her staff up high, looked up at the clear blue sky with her glowing red eyes… and summoned a sea of dark clouds. Billowing from nothingness and expanding far, obscuring the sun as the castle, and all lands surrounding it, became immersed in darkness. Zyrus and Isadore looked up at this display of power… and ran toward the Demon Empress, their weapons drawn and ready to strike.
As the distance between them halved, Cassandra thrust her staff forward, and the dark clouds roared a thunderous cry. Zyrus and Isadore did not heed this warning, continuing their rush, only for Cassandra’s wrath to strike down from the heavens. It narrowly avoided hitting the heroes themselves, but it painted the rubble-filled floor before the throne with a sea of violet electro mana.
This hazard was great enough for Zyrus and Isadore to cease their movements, for any step forward would send electricity coursing through every inch of their bodies. They thought themselves to be safe in this small ‘island’ of safety… only for the electro mana to spread to their metal weapons. They could feel their weapons sparking in their hands. If they continued to hold them, they would be fried right there… so they made the decision to cast their weapons aside, throwing them into the electric puddles where they became consumed. It did not destroy or harm the metals, but it meant they had to fight this threat with no weapons.
The heroes scowled at Cassandra for such an underhanded tactic, but she only smiled in response. Isadore began to prepare a cryo spell using her hands, preparing to freeze Cassandra where she stood, but Zyrus grabbed her hands before the spell could be cast, shaking his head.
Zyrus: “Heh. You were an intimidating threat before, Cassandra… but you seem to have learned a few new tricks since then. So, what’s your plan for us? Kill us? Use us to claim more land from Radiata?”
Cassandra smiled as the hero admitted defeat. Or rather, ‘defeat.’ She could tell when a hero type like Zyrus was pulling a feint like this, but she did not care. For she had her targets precisely where she wanted her.
Cassandra: “Neither, you fools. Now that I have you right where I want you, there is only one thing I want to do. And that is… snug!”
Cassandra then walked into the electric puddles, her body immune to the electro mana, and once she was sufficiently close, she flared out her tails, and sent all nine out at Zyrus and Isadore. Immediately, they launched a counter-attack. With Isadore’s cryo magic and Zyrus’s pyro magic, the two manifested a spell that would send its target into both extremes of temperatures at the same time. Such a rapid shift was disastrous to the composition of most objects, and had shredded through the bodies of countless monsters. Yet, as it struck Cassandra’s fluffy tails, it failed to do anything more than singe a small portion of the ample demon floof.
Just as the two comprehended the awe-inspiring might of their target, the tails reached their bodies, and wrapped around their limbs. One tail for each arm, with the ninth being used to tie the two together. Despite their robust containment, the two still struggled against their restraints, but the more they resisted, the tighter the fluffy tails became.
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! It seems that I have won this battle, and it merely took me a single minute. I see I’m not only a Demon Empress, but I am an overpowered one to boot.”
Cassandra snapped her fingers to make the puddles of electricity disappear, and brought the heroic duo closer, staring deep into their faces with her scarlet eyes. She snickered at the creeping despair on their faces, but Isadore remained strong even when faced with such adversity, and cut straight to the point.
Isadore: “So, what are you going to do with us? Knowing how much of a sadistic freak you are, I’m sure you plan on torturing us until we talk. Well I’ll have you know that there is nothing you can do to break my resolve, no matter how painful!”
Cassandra: “Who said anything about pain? As the cuddly demon empress, I have other ways to titillate your senses… and these tails of mine are made for many things, but pain is not one of them! Experience… the joys of the floof!
Cassandra’s eyes shifted from scarlet to purple as she spoke, and as those last few words left her mouth, she began to… snuggle them. Her tails loosened and rearranged themselves, wrapping around the entire bodies of Zyrus and Isadore, but most especially their faces. As she rubbed her tails against their exposed skin, she filled them with a sensation so soft, warm, and cozy, that it drained all fury and dread from their bodies. Their scowls became smiles, and as they locked eyes with Cassandra, looking all cute wrapped up in her tails, she tossed her arms around them in a hug.
A hug that became a full-blown snuggle session between the three as they rolled around in the fluff of her tails, laughing and making merry, all while Andreas finally rose from the ground. He looked on at this site with a confused expression, only for Cassandra to free her prisoners from her fluffy embrace.
Cassandra: “So, how did you like that? Have you seen the ways of the floof… or do you require further instruction?”
Zyrus: “That, uh, that certainly was something Cassandra, but… why aren’t you trying to hurt us?”
Isadore: “Yeah, that’s kind of supposed to be your thing, being a demon empress and all.”
Cassandra: “Well, you’re both cuties, and I don’t wanna hurt cuties!”
Isadore: “C-Cuties? But I thought you hated us and—”
Cassandra: “Nope! There’s no way I could hate you guys! …Unless you said no to the floof and fluff! So what do you say? You wanna be friends?”
Zyrus and Isadore looked at each other as Cassandra made this offer, trying to see if there was something obviously… wrong about Cassandra. She did not match the demon empress they had heard about in the past. And the more they looked at her, seeing her smiling while sitting on the floor in her cute little yukata, the more inclined they were to believe that she was being honest. Kyuubi, like her, are known liars and manipulators. Yet, despite having the body and face of a grand villainess… she did not have the spirit of one.
Just as the two were contemplating their answers, Andreas approached the two, and stood next to Cassandra. The two heroes looked at him with confusion. With his handsome yet common visage and plain clothing, he seemed like someone you’d sooner see on a farm or running a shop in the city than at a demon empress’s castle.
Andreas: “The demon empress you heard about is… not Cassandra. She replaced them, and while she might have a bit of a temper, she is not a malicious person, and does not want to cause suffering. I know that might seem unusual, but sometimes things are just like that. Not everything always follows such a rigid dichotomy.”
Cassandra: “Yeah! What Andreas said. So, what do ya cuties say? Will you be my friends?”
Zyrus: “S-Sure, I guess we can be friends. But are you sure you’re willing to forget everything that happened and forgive us for attacking your castle and destroying so—”
Cassandra: “It’s fiiiiine! Now, don’t think! Just snuggle.”
Cassandra then wrapped herself, Andreas, and her newfound friends in a giant ball of fluff. They bounced, bobbed, and cuddled to their heart’s content, but as they did so, Zyrus and Isadore couldn’t help but think about how their lives were going to change dramatically in the next few days.
Chapter 2: That Time I Befriended a King and Queen With the Power of Snuggles
One week after meeting Zyrus and Isadore, Cassandra and Andreas were invited over to Radiata Castle for lunch. The hosts, Zyrus and Isadore, made it a point to ask Cassandra what she wanted to have for lunch, as they were unsure if a kyuubi like her had any diet restrictions. However, even after clearing and approving the recipe, they were still looking at the final product of this so-called ‘pizza’ with perplexed expressions. It was a flat circular piece of bread with crushed tomato, cheese, and cured meats. Many plates of this dish were prepared, guaranteeing that none of the four would be left with an empty stomach. However, this did not help Zyrus or Isadore when it came to… actually eating it.
As such, the two were looking intently at Cassandra and Andreas at the other side of the table, observing how the demonfolk ate this food Rather than using a fork and knife, they used a knife to slice the circular flatbread into eight triangular slices by making a series of four equidistant cuts along the diameter of the ‘pizza.’
It was something the two hosts observed while simultaneously maneuvering around Cassandra’s… curious questions about the world they shared.
Cassandra: “So, you two really don’t know anything about Lunadrella the dragon queen?”
Isadore: “No, that name doesn’t seem to ring a bell. Dragons were wiped out by Zyrus’s ancestors 10,000 years ago.”
Cassandra: “What about the Black Syndicate?”
Zyrus: “They went into hiding a decade ago, but that was before my time. From what I have heard, the group has splintered off into nothingness due to infighting. Though, it is hard to get accurate information about sects so secretive.”
Cassandra: “Hmm… If that’s the case, then I guess this isn’t Venturers of Radiant Extreme… maybe this is Venturers of Radiant the 3rd? Maybe I’m in a prequel!”
Isadore: “…Look, it is hard enough for us to accept that you came from another dimension, but trying to say you learned about us from a book is just… weird. …And you’re already weird enough.”
Cassandra: “Gee, thanks Isa!”
Isadore: “I am a queen, and you will treat my name with respect. I might be willing to dine with you, but don’t act as if you can be familiar enough to give me a nickname!”
Cassandra: “Kay!”
Andreas: “Cassandra, please try to be a bit more formal. You are an empress after all and—”
Cassandra: “If I’m an empress, that means I can do whatever I want, because I’m in charge!”
Zyrus: “Hehehe. That is definitely one way to view the idea of being a ruler. But even though you are a demon empress, you do treat your citizens with respect… right?”
Cassandra: “Hmm? Andreas, do we have… citizens? I only ever saw the floofballs.”
Andreas: “Uh, we do actually. They are mostly exiles who had no place to go. They are a simple folk, mostly consisting of farmers, craftsfolk, and other laborers, all leading honest lives after casting their past behind them. The population has been growing over the past few years, but it is nothing next to Radiata.”
As Andreas explained things to Cassandra, she plucked a slice of pizza and began to eat it with her hands— like a civilized person— drawing the attention of the king and queen on the other side of the table.
Isadore: “There is no way that’s how you eat this ‘pizza.’ You just use your hands and shove it in your mouth like a common sandwich?”
Cassandra: “Mhm! Ish good!“
Andreas: “It is not… the most refined form of food, but that is how you are supposed to eat it. You may use a fork and knife if you want but—”
Cassandra: “Nope! If it’s pizza, you gotta use your hands. That’s the law!”
Zyrus grabbed a slice of pizza after Cassandra spoke and gently brought it to his mouth, pausing after taking a bite. The flavors mingled against his tongue, congealed as he slowly chewed, and once he swallowed, a great big smile appeared on his face!
Zyrus: “Delicious!”
Isadore: “R-Really? It seems so simple and basic that—”
Zyrus: “Think about everything that goes into this dish, Isa. The rich flavor of tomato, a deluge of cheese, the crisp fresh bread, and the salty cured meats. It is an explosion of flavors in your mouth!”
Isadore stared at her husband as he made a sales pitch for pizza and, with a sigh, she relented and took a slice for her own. She bit into it, chewed, and within two seconds, you could tell she admitted defeat.
Isadore: “Damn it. You’re right, Zyrus… Cassandra, thank you for introducing us to this dish. I’ll have to ask our chef to add this to our regular menu.”
Cassandra: “You should! If I could, I would have pizza once a week, same with Chinese!”
Andreas: “Before you ask, China is a country in our world, and Cassandra is fond of many dishes common to that nation. Sadly, teaching your staff to make things to her preferences would be… challenging.”
Cassandra: “I might know how to make pizza, but sweet and sour pork balls are a mystery for me… I don’t even know if you have pigs here!”
Isadore: “…Please tell me that when you say ‘balls’ you just mean something shaped like a ball…”
Cassandra: “Yeah, what else would I mean?”
Rather than reply, Isadore just continued to chomp her pizza, hoping she wouldn’t need to explain herself.
Zyrus: “Well, I’m sure you have a lot of knowledge you can offer us about the other dimension. Such as the… I believe you called it a Phone.”
Andreas: “Yes, I still had mine, but it’s out of power, and for as much as I love Cassandra, I don’t want her to try charging it.”
Cassandra: “How can you call me an empress when you would deny me of your possessions? Need I remind you that you, Andreas, belong to me?”
Andreas froze and shivered as Cassandra chided him, unable to come up with a response.
Isadore: “About that, are you two… married?”
Cassandra: “In our hearts! I was dating Andreas for years over the internet before we arrived here, and he was the first person I met.”
Zyrus: “The Internet?”
Andreas: “I knew there would be much to explain, but we may as well start from the top…”
From there, the four continued to converse for two hours, steadily chipping away at the three pizzas before them, before finally leaving the dinner behind, all of them positively stuffed. They could have stayed there and chatted for hours, but per Isadore’s instance the quartet moseyed out to the courtyard of Castle Radiata. A scenic locale with lush greenery and flowers, a man-made stream, and at the center of it all, a small dirt arena for knights to train their skills in mock battles.
Cassandra: “Isssaaaa! Why are we here? I just want to find a couch and… flop.”
Andreas: “Cassandra, you only have yourself to blame for eating all that pizza. You’re still the same height as you were before, even if you weigh more—”
Cassandra: “I suggest you stop talking sweetie, unless you want to feel the wrath of a kyuubi scorned!“
Andreas: “…Your tails are very nice and fluffy.”
Cassandra: “D’aw, thank you!”
Zyrus: “A-Anyway, thank you for the insights surrounding your world. I will be sure to have my inventors look into this ‘combustion engine’ because while horse-drawn carriages are efficient, the idea of a ‘steam-powered rail-based locomotive’ or ‘autonomous mobile carriage’ could revolutionize our world.”
Isadore: “If it even works, dear. Steam can be rejuvenating for people, but I’m not sure how it could power something as large as a boat.”
Cassandra: “Oh? Is it time for some boat facts? Because I know all about boats. Especially warships!”
Isadore: “Says the leader of a landlocked nation…”
Zyrus: “Isadore, please, don’t provoke the girl.”
Cassandra: “Yeah! You were way nicer in the other stories!”
Isadore: “Ugh! Can we simply demonstrate our powers and move on?”
Zyrus: “That would be for the best. Cassandra, Andreas, pay close attention.”
Zyrus walked over to the dirt field in the center of the courtyard, standing tall and casing his hands high, where they began to glow a vibrant red. A second later, an orb of flame floated between his two hands and, with every second, it grew. Larger, larger, and larger until it was larger than his whole body.
Zyrus: “This is the power of pyro mana. The power to make flames from nothingness… and shape them however you please.”
Upon saying that, the large fireball in his hand split into a dozen smaller fire balls, all of which floated in the sky, burning a bright orange even without any kindling. They spun, they sputtered, they danced across the air without even a fragment of a care, before all flying upwards where they exploded into an array of sparks— red, orange, and yellow, that all faded away to smoke before any could reach the ground.
Zyrus: “Pyro mana is in many ways one of the most versatile mana, as fire brings warmth, light, and turns the inedible into something edible. But on top of all that… it’s beautiful. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Isadore: “Zyrus, are you really going to do this spiel… again?”
Zyrus: “Alright, Isa. Show them the power of your cryo mana.”
Isadore stepped up to the dirt field and, much like Zyrus, began channeling mana through her hands. They glowed a light, pale blue, but rather than raising them above, Isadore faced the ground, took aim and… unleashed her power!
Immediately, a pulse reverberated throughout the courtyard and the ground beneath her feet began to shake, quivering, before shattering.
A massive mound of ice, almost big enough to be considered an iceberg, penetrated the dirt, toppling the dirt field, and rose beneath Isadore’s feet, propelling her higher and higher on a platform of jagged ice, all until reaching its apex of 10 meters in height.
Isadore: “Now this is making the most of your power! This is the power of mana.”
Zyrus: “Well, you can see that someone wanted to boast.”
Isadore: “Oh please. You’re the one who tried to dazzle them with such an adept level demonstration. You’re a master, and you know you could do so much more.”
Zyrus: “…Isa, you do realize we’re in the courtyard… right?”
As that incredibly obvious fact was pointed out to her, Isadore went quiet and slowly slid down the iceberg she summoned.
Zyrus: “Andreas, would you like to try your mana abilities?”
Andreas: “Oh? W-Well, I know I have control over hydro mana, and can move water, but it is nothing next to—”
Cassandra: “C’mon Andreas! I know you can do it! You’re a fireman, and if there’s anything a fireman knows, it’s how to use water!”
Isadore: “That… what? Why would a fireman know anything about water? If their job is to make fires and light fires—”
Andreas: “Firemen put out fires. …But I do know how to start a good fire too.”
Zyrus: “Regardless of your skill level, let’s see what you can do. Your element may be different, but the fundamentals are the same throughout every one.”
With a deep breath, Andreas started moving his hands around, where the tips of his fingers began to glow a deep indigo. His mind narrowed, focused on the steam of water around him, and pictured it moving upwards with his mind, causing roughly two liters to fly through the sky, and around him. He stared at the water with glee as he moved it about before shooting it forward like it was shooting from a hose. The water collided with the iceberg before him… where it dripped down to the grass below.
Andreas: “Hmm… I suppose I lack the same skills as you all.”
Zyrus: “Your form is good, but you need to accumulate more experience, to train this stat more. I know someone you should talk to regarding a more regimented training program. But… don’t be insulted if you need to learn alongside children.”
Andreas: “Hmm… So long as they are well behaved, I don’t mind.”
Cassandra: “My turn, my turn! And for my first trick, I shall shatter this iceberg to smithereens with a single strike!”
Isadore: “Heh. Good luck with that! While hydro might be weak to electro, cryo resists it!”
Cassandra: “Exactly. So, you cuties should sit back, relax, and… get a load of this!”
Without the aid of her staff, with only the violet electro mana coursing through her hands, Cassandra focused on the iceberg before her, imagined the power of lighting tearing it to shreds and, with a powerful swing of her hands, lightning shot from the tips of her fingers and palms, forming twin beams of electrical energy that shredded through the ice before her, bursting it open and leaving behind a wall of steam that obscured her target. Cassandra waited for the steam to fade, and was met with the sight of a small pile of ice coating the training grounds. No chunk of ice taller than a meter remained, and as Isadore looked on at this sight… she had a feeling that, if Cassandra tried a little bit harder, nothing would have remained.
Isadore: “…Where in Hell did you get that power?”
Cassandra: “Dunno. I just woke up, and I could do stoof like this!”
Zyrus: “…N-Needless to say, I’m glad that Cassandra is on our side now.”
Cassandra: “Yeah, being someone’s enemy is too much work anyway. It’s easier just to be friends with people… or dispose of them at the soonest possible opportunity.”
Andreas: “She speaks the truth. It may be terrifying, but it’s the truth.”
Cassandra: “So, do we have anything else planned?”
Zyrus looked up to the sky as he pontificated an answer, asking and questioning himself before, finally, remembering a suggestion.
Zyrus: “You two have never seen our kingdom before, is that right?”
Andreas: “Aside from the carriage ride and castle, no.”
Isadore: “Wait… Are you inviting them to the summer festival?”
Zyrus: “Of course I am! They would love it there. Especially the green radiance!”
Cassandra: “GREEN?!?! Radiance?!”
Cassandra’s excitement was at its apex upon hearing that term, and even though Zyrus could not fathom why, he was not one to let a good opportunity pass him by.
Zyrus: “…See?”
Isadore: “…Fine. But we are going incognito. There’s no sense in detracting the entire festival just because the king and queen wanted to attend. We’ll wear masks and yukata and nobody will know it’s us.”
Zyrus: “Hah. One step ahead of me as always!”
After Andreas, Zyrus, and Isadore all dressed in yukata, the four found themselves walking up the mountain this festival would be held at. The trail was long and winding, but it made up for it by being so… scenic. The trees and shrubbery formed natural walls of green that surrounded them on both sides. The pathway was old, but well maintained, making for easy walking even in the less-than-ergonomic shoes they were wearing. And after every few minutes of walking, there was a clearing with a few benches, allowing those walking the trail to rest and bask in the majesty before them.
Even in the next dimension, a forest was still a forest, but there was something… different about it all the same. The sky seemed bluer, the trees seemed to be a brighter green, the air was clearer and cleaner than Cassandra and Andreas had ever known, and the radiant orange setting sun seemed all the more majestic. Yet the most insidious difference was the sounds of the woodland critters chirping around. What previously sounded like random white noise was… almost sounded melodic. As if the animals were singing while going about their carefree lives in this beautifully maintained slice of nature. It kept them motivated, calm, and if this was just the hike up to the festival, Cassandra couldn’t help but imagine how picturesque the festival would be.
The fact that all four of them were wearing a yukata made her positive that this would be a traditional Japanese summer festival. And her ample experience with anime and manga had given her high expectations that reality could never hope to live up to. But seeing as how this was not the reality once knew— it didn’t even smell like it— she could not help but let her hopes rise with each step she took up this mountain. By the time she passed through the torii at the top of this mountain, she felt her expectations were so high they simply could not be met… but they were.
Stalls, all accompanied by bright eye-catching lights, coated the stone walkway, offering every manner of snack or attraction one could desire. People walked calmly yet enthusiastically as they ventured across the sights, half dressed in traditional clothing, and half in their everyday clothes. While there were enough people to evoke the idea of a crowd, there was also ample room to breathe, for people to get away and shuffle off to the side to talk. The sound of beating drums echoed throughout the environment, but it was soft enough that it acted as merely another layer of the forest’s ambiance. And the smells— the rich scent of fried food and sweets— filled Cassandra’s nostrils, making her tails stand up on end as she imagined what every scent belonged to.
However, there was also a particularly magical bent to everything she saw. Paper lanterns not only burned with every color of the rainbow, but they floated, bobbing up and down while moving slowly, as if they were caught in the slight breeze brushing along the top of the mountain. Rather than just being home to humans, there were all manner of demihuman creatures littered about. Humans with animal features, tall elves with vibrant hair colors, thicker and hardier humanoid creatures, and tiny people who scurried about at a pace surprising considering their size. …Or maybe those were just children. Who’s to say?
It felt like something she felt she could never experience… However, it was happening, right before her eyes.
Cassandra: “Whoa! I’ve never been the biggest fan of festivals, but this is just… beautiful!”
As Cassandra admired the sights, Isadore approached her, her identity as the queen blocked by a rabbit mask.
Isadore: “In Radiata, we try to do everything we can to enrich the lives of those living within our borders. Come, you’re probably hungry after all that walking. Let’s grab a snack and see the sights.”
Andreas: “Eh? Cassandra, you just ate an entire pizza so maybe you should—”
Before Andreas could finish his warning about overeating, Cassandra already scurried off to the nearest takoyaki stand, dragging Isadore behind her. Andreas let out a sigh at this display, only for Zyrus to plant a hand on his forehead and look at him. Or look at him as well as he could while wearing a wolf mask.
Zyrus: “Don’t worry. With how she uses mana, Cassandra needs all the food she can stomach.”
Andreas: “Really? Hmm… I suppose that makes sense…”
Zyrus: “So, do you want to win a prize for her?”
Andreas: “Prize? …Right, I guess that is part of Japanese festivals.”
Zyrus: “Japanese?”
Andreas: “Nothing, nothing, just… what kind of games do they have?”
Zyrus: “A lot, and I’m sure we’ll find one you’re great at.”
As the boys went to participate in games, the girls busied themselves around the food stalls before settling on a candied apple for Isadore and a little tray of takoyaki for Cassandra. Isadore slowly chomped away at the apple, appreciating the simple yet rich flavors on display as she turned away from the festival goers to maintain anonymity. While Cassandra eagerly blew on each takoyaki ball, trying to cool them off as quickly as possible, before plopping another into her mouth. The flavor was rich, and the octopus inside was a delectable treat that catered to her inner carnivore.
Cassandra: “Yummy yummers! I don’t know why, but I keep forgetting how much better things taste with my new mouth!”
Isadore: “I still find it hard to believe that you were never a kyuubi. …Or at least a fox demihuman.”
Cassandra: “It was merely a physical defect, and has now been corrected! Now I am not only a fox in my heart and mind, but I’m one in my body as well!”
Cassandra wiggled her nine fluffy tails and ears to assert her foxiness to Isadore, who snickered in response.
Isadore: “Heh. Anyway, is there anything you want to do here?”
Cassandra: “Just being with you guys and Andreas is enough for me… but I guess I should play some games. What kind do you guys have?”
Isadore: “Well, there’s fish catching game, a shoot—”
Cassandra: “Fish? That’s right, I lost my aquarium! Let’s go do that! I gotta get some fishies!”
Before Isadore could say anything, Cassandra went running, looking for a stall where she could catch some fish. She wisely decided to just look at the ample signage, and as she saw a bright pink fish, she knew she had the right place. She ran as quick as a kyuubi could, cutting in front of some kids, and barely paid any mind to the man running the stall as she looked down at an assortment of colorful fishes of all sizes. She swiftly grabbed one of the paper nets and bowls at the edge of the stall and stared deeply into the pool before her.
Her purple and pink eyes tracked the movements of the fishes, her inner predator helping her see the patterns in their movement and then, when she saw a cluster of fish before her, she plopped a large cluster of six fish with her paper net, and swung them a foot into the air, where she caught them in her bowl. She peered into it, to make sure the fish were still okay, and while clearly panicking, they were swimming about as well as a fish in a bowl could.
Cassandra: “Hooray~! I got ’em!”
Isadore: “You really are just a big kid, you know…”
Cassandra smiled as Isadore made that snide remark, and presented her bowl to her, like the proudest 8-year-old.
Cassandra: “Now all I need is a tank for them…”
Isadore: “Tank? Cassandra, you know—”
Cassandra: “Hey, do you have a fishbowl I can buy, Mr. Vendor Person?”
The old man running the stall simply handed her a glass bowl, already filled with water. He murmured something in a heavy accent that Cassandra could not quite understand, but as she glared at Isadore, the masked queen signed and produced a few coins from her yukata.
Isadore: “They charge twice as much for these things at these festivals. …But I can’t blame you for not knowing…”
Andreas peered over the wooden grip of his rifle at his target. At the fox tauntingly staring back at him with its cyan eyes. He had six rounds to fell this beast, and with a mere five meters between them, this was child’s play… right? Well, while he was trained with firearms and hunted to help maintain wild animal populations, he… was not using bullets.
This gun was loaded with pellets that barely packed any force behind them, and he could not hope to do much more than push this knitted plush fox off of its platform. Still, he focused on the weakest areas in the structure, analyzed the force he would be dealing with, and fired. One, two, three, he was making progress, and could see the plush inch closer to the ledge. Now he just needed to finish things with pellet number four, five, and finally si—
???: “Are ya having fuuuun, Andreas?”
Right as Andreas was about to fire off the final pellet, he felt someone wrap their arms around him. He fired his shot without properly aiming, and immediately turned away to look at who dared to disturb him… only to see Cassandra’s adorable face.
Andreas: “Yes, but Cassandra, you could clearly tell that I was in the middle of something. I love your hugs, but please don’t do it while I’m—”
Andreas’s spiel was cut short by the sound of the stall vendor grabbing the rifle, and placing the knitted fox plush doll in its place. Cassandra’s eyes sparkled as she saw the cute little orange doll, and immediately grabbed it, rubbing it into her cheeks.
Cassandra: “D’aw, you’re sho kyute! Andreas, can I keep it?”
Andreas: “Of course Cassadra, but you need to listen to me when I—”
Cassandra: “Oh, pretty lights!”
Without even registering that her boyfriend was talking, Cassandra started running away to the next attraction that caught her attention. Andreas sighed at this display, hoping for more… while getting about what he expected.
The vendor of the ring toss booth stared at the masked man before him. Not out of fear, not out of hatred, but out of sheer shock. The vendor had carefully arranged the most valuable prizes to be the hardest to get, blocking them with cheaper items that would be replaced between rounds, but instead, this masked man managed to get his six most valuable items… with six rings. How, why, and, most of all, who was this person… and why were they flaunting such skills at a goldarn festival?
Zyrus: “I believe you owe me some prizes, good sir!”
The vendor scowled, and proceeded to give Zyrus the most valuable items. Well, valuable is something of a misnomer. They were all cheap tchotchkes that only cost a small amount… but that still meant he was seeing a 60% loss on this one transaction, and these stall fees weren’t cheap, darn it!.
The vendor placed the items before the masked man, who looked them over. Whatever expression he had was hidden behind his wolf mask, but after examining these goods, he simply left, muttering how the vendor could ‘keep them.’
Baffled, all they could do was… place the items back where they were originally, and hope that the masked man didn’t change his mind later on.
While most of these attractions were simple, if not trite, there was one exception off to the side in a dirt clearing. One that featured a tower of six wooden wheel-shaped blocks, each painted a vibrant color, and a wooden hammer for the player to wield. The objective was simple. Knock down the blocks while preventing the top block from tumbling onto the ground. It was a notoriously hard game given its scale, with each block larger than carriage wheel. But after two wooden blocks were cast away, a small group of onlookers arrived to see how far this challenger would get.
The challenger was a woman wearing a rabbit mask, and she paid no mind to the crowd as she smacked away the third block. They cheered, but she did not wait for them to finish before knocking away the fourth, sending it rolling into a fence made from a net. While it seemed like the simplest to knock away, the distribution of force made it the hardest. She had to balance strength and precision to cause the top block to land onto the base below. She took a deep breath, audible even through her mask and, with a focused strike, sent the final block flying into another fallen block.
The silence of anticipation blossomed into uproarious applause as she achieved this goal, and among them were this woman’s friends!
Cassandra: “Whoa! You go, girl! You showed those blocks who’s boss!”
Andreas: “I didn’t even think that was possible.”
Zyrus: “Oh please. You guys have no idea what she’s capable of.”
The masked challenger simply bowed at the applause, and when the vendor came to give her a prize, she politely shook her head and walked away, rejoining her friends as they headed to yet another attraction.
The four found themselves away from the festival grounds proper, from the hustle and bustle that developed over the evening, and at one of the clearings they passed earlier. All four of them snuggly sat together on the same bench, wrapped up in Cassandra’s tails, keeping them warm even as the slightly chilly evening wind brushed across their faces.
Cassandra: “When’s it going to happen?”
Isadore: “Any minute, my canine friend.”
Cassandra: “H-Hey! I’m not a canine! I’m a fox! Not a dog!”
Zyrus: “Technically, they are from the same family, but you know that Cass—”
Isadore: “I’m just kidding around with her. She’s more fun if you act like a kid while treating her like a kid.”
Cassandra: “I will have you know I am more than capable of doing anything any adult can do, queenie! In fact, how about we—”
Andreas: “Ah! Cassandra! It’s starting!”
With her boyfriend bringing her back to reality, Cassandra turned her head at the forest before her, illuminated by the shimming stars overhead and the vibrant full moon. The stars were more plentiful than she had ever seen in her life, and the moon looked bigger than it ever had on Earth. The sight alone was well worth admiring, for its beauty was undeniable, so intense that it silenced the quartet. They felt like they could stare at this for hours… only for the image to change, to evolve into something greater, after just a few short seconds.
From the dense forest below, Cassandra saw a bright glow. A green bioluminescent shimmer appeared on the single leaf of a single tree. That alone was a remarkable feat that made this world seem so much different from the one she knew, but from the corner of her vision, she saw another… and another… and another twelve! They multiplied at a rapid rate, until every leaf in the forest, those in front of her, behind her, and off to the sides, were all emitting a brilliant and radiant green.
The glow was soft, natural, and came with it a subtle aroma that danced across her nose, one smelling like a sweet flower, but with a dash of bitterness. It was truly unlike anything Cassandra had ever seen, and all she could do when faced with this sight was gawk, her jaw open and eyes practically shimmering as she took in this sight… but then she looked up at the sky.
The stars and moon were just as gorgeous as ever… yet they were filtered behind something. Behind an array of green light, floating in the sky, and shifting ever so slightly with each passing second. Cassandra had to tell herself it wasn’t the northern lights— aurora borealis— but it was so similar, so comparable in its majesty, that it did not matter to her.
In this single image, three dreams came true. Her dream of seeing the night’s sky as it was always meant to be, undisrupted by pollution carelessly pumped out by the dastards who ran her world. Her dream of seeing a natural wonder in person, when she always lacked the economic means to take such a ‘frivolous’ trip. And a dream… she did not even know she had. The dream of seeing nature in a whole new light, in seeing it innovate and find a way to achieve a level of beauty she never thought possible.
Cassandra was in bliss as she took this sight in, and just as she thought things couldn’t get better, her boyfriend leaned in, and kissed her on the lips. She wrapped her arms around him, as they made out, and from the sounds she heard behind her, Zyrus and Isadore were doing the same.
They all stopped tracking time as this wonderful moment played its course, but once they were content, they broke away from the lover’s embrace, and returned to staring at this dazzling array of green.
Cassandra: “Everything I ever wanted. Everything I could ever want. I have it. Loving friends. A lovely boyfriend. And a world that is capable of beauty that I never thought possible. To whoever did this, to whatever allowed me to live like this and see such things… Thank you.”
Chapter 3: That Time I Dug a Hole to Hell
Three months after venturing to the world of Gaia, Cassandra achieved a lot. She befriended the king and queen of Radiata, merged her nation with theirs, and went on a world tour, visiting every nation and… making them comply to her authority. The entire world of Gaia was now flying under the banner of Radiata. While it would take years, if not generations, for all the kinks to get worked out, Cassandra could already tell this world was in infinitely better shape than the one she hailed from.
Cassandra had done it all, and she celebrated this achievement by… taking a nap in one of the many sitting rooms of Castle Radiata, using Andreas’s head as a lap pillow while he read a history book, stroking Cassandra’s hair every few minutes.
She remained in this state until early afternoon, when the sun started creeping onto her face, and she celebrated awakening by snuggling up to her husband. Just as she was about to wrap him up in a ball of floof for some afternoon delight, they heard the familiar footsteps of Isadore, who promptly sat in one of the armchairs and muttered a sigh.
Isadore: “Well, after that rebellion scare, things are finally settled in Albion, so I think we can safely say that… we’re done! The nation of Radiata is now the leader of every nation on Gaia. I thought it would never happen but… thanks to you, Cassandra, we did it. We rule the world, and can bring an end to every nasty thing that has been plaguing other nations. We can foster a society without need for war, without need for conflict, one where knowledge and resources are shared, and all are treated as equals. I did not trust you at first, but now… I think finding you was the second best thing that ever happened to me. …After meeting Zyrus, of course. So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you Cass— You fell asleep during my speech again, didn’t you?”
Isadore was correct. Cassandra had dozed off and was sleeping on Andreas’s lap yet again.
Andreas: “She has… been low energy ever since we left Hinomoto. I guess it’s a lack of motivation, as there are no more worlds to conquer. Hmm… Cassandra slept, for there were no more worlds to conquer. It has a nice ring to it…”
Zyrus: “Well, I wouldn’t say that there are no more worlds to conquer.”
Zyrus casually entered the room and sat next to Isadore, gently holding her hand as they sat in different chairs.
Zyrus: “Gaia is an expansive world, but the surface is only half of it. The unseen heart of Gaia is everything below. The realm of Hell.”
Andreas: “Ah. I thought they were being poetic in the books I’ve been reading. So, Hell is a real place in this world? With the usual fire, brimstone, lost souls, and so forth?”
Isadore: “It is. We actually had an… altercation with Satan two years ago. He was summoned by a group of cultists to bring death upon the world, and had set one of the largest cities in Radiata ablaze. We tried to reason with him, but… he gave us little choice but to kill him. Since then, we have not had any communications with Hell, and we fear they are preparing for war. So, in a sense, and alliance would be the best way to achieve peace between all nations in this world.”
Cassandra: “Could you guys be quiet? I’m trying to sleeeeep!”
Zyrus: “Cassandra… what do you say about joining us on an expedition to Hell?”
Cassandra: “Sounds hard. Can’t I just lay on Andreas, snuggle, and eat Chinese?”
Isadore: “If you want to waste your life, sure.”
Cassandra: “What do you mean waste? I’ll have you know this is the highest and best use of what I want to do in my life! I eat, I snug, I sleep.”
Zyrus: “As a demon queen, I imagined you would want to have some authority over Hell, but perhaps I was mistaken. Maybe you don’t want to become the Empress of all Demons.”
Cassandra: “Hmm… well, when you put it like that… Yeah, that sounds pretty nice. …Can we do it tomorrow though?”
Isadore: “Sure… but no Chinese or pizza tonight. We really need to expand your palate.”
Cassandra: “Geeze, it’s almost like you don’t want my help.”
Andreas: “Darling, play nice and I can make you my schnitzel.”
Cassandra: “Oh, tempting me with food, are ya? And I thought I was supposed to be the sly one!”
As morning came the following day, Cassandra and her companions ventured off to a vast field located twenty kilometers away from Castle Radiata. Though it was just common grassland, it still carried with it the same level of beauty emblematic to this world. With tall tufts of grass and flowers drifting gently in the wind, alongside small rodents, rabbits, and insects scurrying around, making this place their home.
Truly, it was the perfect place to open a hole to Hell!
Isadore: “Cassandra, I know you’re strong but… are you serious about this? We could just take a look at that cave the akumajinn abandoned two years ago.”
Zyrus: “I’m sure the entrance has long-since been blocked, Cassandra. But with your electro mana I’m sure you could make quick work of it.”
Cassandra: “Yeah, but I can also make quick work of this! All I need to do is summon some lighting and bam, big hole to Hell!”
Andreas: “Cassandra, I don’t want to doubt you, but even with all your strength, are you—”
Cassandra: “It’ll be fiiiine! I am a level 9999 demon empress, meaning there’s nothing I can’t do! So, you level 500— and 80— noobs can sit back and watch how a master works! It’s time for Cassandra to show 100% of her power with her grand debut!”
With a noggin full of anime, and a body full of floof, it was finally time for Cassandra to do something she never thought she would have the poise, skill, body, or voice to do. It was time for her to not only channel her power, but channel it in the way that all great demons did. With the power of… SONG AND DANCE!
With her mind flashing back to the lessons of grace and style she learned from her pink idol, Cassandra held out her hand and summoned her staff. A catalyst for her immense power, but here, it was a mere accessory. A way to express herself in a louder more pronounced way as she moved every bit of her body. Her arms, her legs, but most obviously, the nine tails popping out from her lower back, each one acting with the dexterity and possibility of an arm. Making her performance hectic as heck, but at the same time, mesmerizing in its complexity and fluidity.
Author’s Note: These lyrics are a ‘transformative parody’ of Idol (アイドル English Ver.) by YOASOBI.
Even now, this body fills me with hysteria
So cute and sexy, making all the men delirious
Face, chest, hair, ears, legs, and most especially these tails
Comfy and pretty, nothing about me is a lie
I’m the greatest cutie, unmatched
I’m your empress, I’m the cutest girl
With every movement, her tails grew more erratic, and with every praiseful word, her expression grew more twisted, rapidly shifting from cute and welcoming to ecstatic. It was disturbing to an extent, but at the same time, carried with it a beauty too grand for anyone to justify turning their heads away.
I can do it all
Snuggu, cuddu, lab
Every single day, memories getting hazier
And with every single touch
No more stress, no more ache
To the goddess who did this to me, I thank you oh so very much
As Cassandra referred to the ‘goddess’ she looked up into the sky, which was in the midst of a transformation. With the clear blue and sunny day replaced by something darker and more sinister. With clouds zooming and clashing through the sky, before blocking out the sun..
I’ve got no kon-cerns! I am not kon-fused
This life I live is about as rich as my sweetie’s blackout cake
But I want more, more, more, I wanna kon-quer all
As a demon empress, I know this for true
It’s my destiny
As the third verse came to its end, the skies were rendered a pure sheet of black, one that cast all land in the vicinity in a darkness that was even greater than the blackest of nights. Terror spread at a rapid pace, and all who were out on this one beautiful day fled to safety. However, their fear would only deprive them of a feat no one on Gaia had ever witnessed.
Oh blessed manafont, you will grant me all of your strength
I rule you, I rule all, so heed my call
Strike the earth, with the force, of the heavens
As the goddess of all electro mana, you surely know of
All the ways I could punish you
With the fourth verse, the black clouds overhead began to cackle with the sound of thunder, as terawatts of electricity accumulated. Violet sparks escaped from these tufts of darkness, and from their size alone, it was hard for fear to not strike the hearts of Isadore and Zyrus. Andreas though? He was all smiles.
Skies of black, skies of dark, let the thunder roar
I’m the coolest cutie kyuubi demon empress
Ultimate, level nine-nine nine-nine
Brightest face, darkest heart, a power supreme
Oh, I know you love my dance
I know you love my voice
Everyone, everything, I guess I’m irresistible
I’m stylish, I’m refined
I even learned to cook
I guess you could say I’m the perfect kyuubi
Cassandra continued to channel her inner idol with her exaggerated and showy movements, each of which was punctuated with a flash of violet light from the dark clouds above. It was almost as if one was watching a staged performance or music video. But the tempest of winds that accompanied these clouds, along with the veracity of the lights, made it clear that this was not staged. This was all Cassandra’s bidding.
So, so, you know that I’m precious, yes
In the next dimension, I became the very best
Power to control the world, and I know that includes Hell too
So strike the ground, into pieces of a million
It feels so right
So divine
With power like this, who needs any dysphoria
It’s in my heart, in my veins
It can make me feel like I’m insane
Marvelous bliss
Knowing I can do it all
Always right, never a flaw
For now, forever, guarantee, I will be the strongest of all
With the winds reaching the point where they were tearing small pig-like creatures from the ground, there was no doubt as to Cassandra’s strength, and it was getting downright scary. The thunder was louder, flashes were brighter, and as a wave of uncertainty struck her audience. Even Isadore wrapped her arms around Zyrus and Andreas, her brown face painted with fear.
With such power, all should pray and worship me
A goddess
So strong, I’m the ultimate kyuubi
Not a thing could ever defeat me
And yes, of course, that includes even you
Well, okay, I guess I still do trip and nap
Trippu nappu
But those things are what makes me so darn loveable
I’m one and only, no one else can match Cassandra
So feel my love and do the fookin’ thang
On cue, the burgeoning power of the clouds overhead was unleashed, and a stream of blindingly bright lighting struck the earth below. A stream with a diameter of no less than 50 meters that shredded into the grass and dirt below. The already foreboding tempest grew even stronger, flames spread across the nearby grasslands. And Cassandra’s once graceful demeanor had shattered as she comprehended the sheer power she was wielding. Her eyes shifted from purple to a bloody scarlet once more. And established ‘oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho’ blossomed into a cackle of the most deliciously devilish villainess one could imagine.
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! OHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHO!!! KYAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!”
In all the trials Zyrus and Isadore had faced, they had never been so terrified.
The stream of electricity continued without relent, tearing deeper and deeper into the ground below. This sent a magnitude coursing beneath their feet, growing so strong that the three found themselves unable to so much as stand. They fell on their rears and found their eyes cast upwards. At the dark clouds stretching over to the horizon, with veins of lighting coursing through them, funneling in more and more power into what looked like a deadly cannon. It… looked like the world was coming to an end.
Zyrus and Isadore looked at themselves, nodded, and decided they had to stop Cassandra before she destroys Gaia. They steeled their bodies, drew their weapons, and looked at the manic fox demon before them. She was in her own little world, so they made sure that this attack would count. With mana rich in the air, they channeled their elemental powers into their weapons, rushed toward her, and prepared to launch their attacks… only for them to be stopped in mid-air by Cassandra’s glare. Her scarlet eyes, bereft of any sense of reason, carried with them a power so immense that it shot them away, flying back a hundred meters, where their bodies crashed into the ground below.
Andreas saw this sight… and ran forward immediately. He knew Cassandra was powerful, but this was something else. More than worrying about the world, more than worrying about himself, he was worried about his wife! He ran toward her, shouting her name, and even as she stared at him with the eyes of one who succumbed to insanity, he did not falter, not even for a fraction of a second. He rushed forward… and embraced her in a hug.
What followed was… a flash. A blinding violet array that covered kilometers. To all who saw it, it seemed like the world was indeed at its end. …But a moment later, it faded. The light vanished, leaving all it touched unharmed, and dispatching the dark clouds overhead. The radiant sun, the bright blue skies, had returned.
At the epicenter of this all, Cassandra and Andreas stood there, wrapped in a simple yet tight embrace, their heads on each other’s shoulders, and their eyes shut. A moment later, they looked at each other. Cassandra’s eyes had returned to their natural state, and a broad smile painted Andreas’s handsome face.
Andreas: “Are you feeling better, Cassandra?”
Cassandra: “Yeah! I got a teensy bit carried away there, but this kyuubi is hunky dory! Especially now that she’s with her hunky hunk.”
Cassandra and Andreas then proceeded to make out, kissing each other profusely as they ramped up to something more physical. …Only for someone to tap Cassandra’s exposed shoulder. She turned around to see Isadore, her face scuffed and hair frizzy.
Isadore: “Going forward, you are not allowed to do something like that ever again!”
Cassandra: “Eeeeh? I can’t dance?”
Zyrus: “You attacked us with just a glare, Cassandra. You were in a trance and it was… painful.”
As Zyrus came into earshot, Cassandra could see that he was scuffed, with scratches in his armor, a cut on his face, and his blonde hair all messy.
Cassandra: “Geez. I’m sorry, guys.”
Isadore: “It’s alright. We’re just recovering from the terrifying power you just displayed. However, it seems to have worked.”
Isadore looked past Cassandra as she said that and peered closer to the giant 100 meter wide hole before her. It was deep. So deep that she could not see the bottom even as she neared closer. It was, without question, terrifying seeing something so large, vast, and deep. …But was it deep enough to reach Hell?
Andreas: “Hm… it looked like Cassandra was successful. This hole looked to go on for several kilometers at the least. In fact, let me try something.
Ruffling his hands through a pouch in his jacket, Andreas produced a small shiny stone, one that glimmered in the sunlight. He threw it lightly into the hole before him, and watched as the glimmer faded further and further with each passing second. Until… nothing. No sight, no sound.
Not satisfied by this, Zyrus then shot a ball of flame down the hole. A sphere that burned a bright light as it descended… only for it to fade into a flicker.
Zyrus: “Hm… it seems that we cannot know if this hole reached Hell or not, unless we… go down for ourselves.”
Isadore: “…Well, we do have the Homeshard, so we should be able to teleport back to Castle Radiata, regardless of the realm we are in. However, the descent would require…”
Cassandra: “I’ve got an idea!”
Rather than explain this idea, Cassandra decided to show it by stretching out her nine tails and wrapping them around the three before her, locking all four of them into a giant ball of kyuubi tails. The ball, perfectly sealed and protected from any threat that a level 9999 kyuubi could withstand, then bounced around, as if adjusting to its new weight, before deliberately rolling into the big hole before it.
Screams followed as all four found themselves spinning around and around in this ball of fluff, unable to see anything, and all holding onto one another for dear life. …For the first minute or two. Afterwards, they were just scream-talking to each other as they waited for this ride to end. …Then five minutes passed… then ten… and after that, they just fell asleep. Only to be abruptly awoken by the sensation of slamming into something with the terminal velocity of 300 kilograms.
All: “OOF!!”
The impact was too much even for the fluffy tails of Cassandra, causing the four to fall out of each other’s embrace, where they cast their eyes onto their surroundings. Part of them feared they would just find darkness at the end of this hole, but instead, things were… red. Very red.
The sky was replaced with a ceiling of stone that hung what looked to be 500 meters above the ground. The stone itself was brown, but it carried strong hints of red that grew more intense as their eyes cast downward to the myriad pillars and walls that made up this place. A place so vast and expansive that it seemed wrong to call it a mere cave… and was far too populated for that anyway.
Rather than just landing on the outskirts somewhere, they found themselves smack dab in the middle of a city. A city with tall rectangular buildings, all lined up along a clear grid. A city with streets full not only of humanoids, but creatures of all shapes and sizes. From giant insects dressed in clothing, to living creatures of metal, to hybrids of different species that were only spoken of in myth. All of which was before they looked closer at the area above the street, where they saw flying creatures aplenty, coming in all shapes, sizes, and species. With gargoyles, pegasi, birds the size of a dragon, and beetles the size of a carriage.
Andreas: “Well, this certainly looks like Hell to me…”
Zyrus: “Everything matches… except the architecture. It looks… beyond modern. Assuming such a thing is even possible.”
Cassandra: “Eeeewwww! Why does everything look so weird? When I’m in charge, there are going to be some major changes here!”
Isadore: “Maybe you should consider that… when we’re not on a bunch of rubble… surrounded by demons with manashooters.”
Cassandra and Andreas then looked at their more immediate surroundings and realized what Isadore was saying. They landed in a city… and on what clearly was a destroyed building. As they looked overhead, they saw the big hole they fell from, so that explained that much.
Looking along the circumference of this impact site revealed a number of demons. They came in all colors and sizes, but each carried a gun-like object in their hands, and wore a slick dark uniform.
After much shuffling around, the four interlopers from Radiata found themselves in an elevator, taking them to the top of the tallest skyscraper in this Hell-based city. Their weapons were confiscated and hands were bound by shackles of obsidian, but while a sense of worry was on the faces of Andreas, Zyrus, and Isadore, Cassandra was just peachy, smiling as she listened to a poppy little diddy she found deep within her subconsciousness.
As the elevator ride ended, the four found themselves shoved through the hallway and to a set of double doors. One of the demons escorting them opened it, while another quickly shoved them into this room.
Much like every bit of architecture in Hell, this room was disappointingly normal. With its massive window overlooking the city, filled bookshelves lining the walls, conference table in the center, and general air of elegance, it looked like an executive’s private office. Complete with a lavishly crafted mahogany desk, which obscured a chair that looked more like a throne.
In that chair sat a man. A demon with tall brown horns poking out of his head, purple skin, red eyes, and slick pink hair. He was dressed in a sharp blue suit, and looked at the four who entered his office with utter fury.
Demon Man: “So, you’re the motherfuckers who destroyed my city? …Sit your asses down in front of me. You have five minutes to explain why I shouldn’t strip you of your souls and shove them in some cum-sipping beetle for time immemorial? Go on, I’m waiting.”
Zyrus: “I… I believe there has been a grave misunderstanding, sir. I am Zyrus, king of Radiata. I understand that I have done much harm to your city, and by extension the entire realm of Hell.”
Demon Man: “Wait… Radiata… Oh… Oh, I see how it is. You weren’t satisfied with just killing Satan. You decided to bring the fight to us. Heh. I won’t say that I wasn’t planning the same, but I’m impressed at your audacity… and disappointed by how ill-advised your methodology is. What did you expect would happen when you dropped a giant bolt of fucking death lightning onto my city, only to send in four soldiers?”
Zyrus: “I… it’s true that the Venturers and I killed Satan, but that was not out of any malice toward your people, mister…”
Demon Man: “The name’s Max Flare, Controlling Emperor Overlord of Hell. And I thought that was the case… until you rained fucking death lightning onto my city! So, humor me, what reason could you possibly have for this other than war?”
Isadore: “We simply wished to resume relationships with Hell, but since all pathways to the surface realm and Hell have been severed, we had to… improvise with what we had.”
Max: “You must really think I’m dumber than a sack of rocks. You carved a hole through Gaia, shredded through 66.6 kilometers of stone! How could you do that… unless you had a super weapon at your disposal? By Lucifer, I loathe to imagine what you did to the surface to accomplish something like that. You humans have always been a destructive sort. It’s why your world is so… woefully primitive.”
Cassandra: “Hmm. Normally I’m the one talking about how much humanity sucks.”
Max: “…You. You’re a demon, but… there’s something different about you.”
Cassandra: “Oh, so you noticed? My name is Cassandra Katie Wrought! I am a demon empress, and I came here to take my place as the empress of Hell!”
Max: “Heh. That would be funny if it weren’t so stupid.”
Cassandra: “Do you question my power? Oh, you foolish man, you. I’ll have you know that I’m the one who created that hole. I summoned the lightning from the skies above, and channeled its power. All it took was a little song, dance, and determination.”
Max: “…I’ll refer to my prior statement.”
Cassandra: “Oh, then perhaps a demonstration is in order? Very well!”
With a devious smile upon her face, Cassandra raised one hand, placed her middle and ring finger against her thumb, creating a fox hand gesture. Cassandra looked through the opening in her fingers, staring at Max as he sat back in his chair. With her target locked on, she smiled.
Cassandra: “Kon.”
An explosive burst of electricity erupted from Max’s body, creating an explosion so great and powerful that it shattered his desk and chair into a million pieces. Every window in the room suffered the same fate, sending a rain of glass down to the unexpected denizens below, and by the time the explosion subsided, Max laid on his floor. His body naked, and resting in a crater. Through audible pain, he rose from this unflattering position, his body covered in ash, and his expression aghast.
Max: “…Okay! I guess you weren’t bullshitting me! …What the fuck are you?”
Cassandra: “I’m a kyuubi, dontcha see? A lotta floof, a lotta cute, but on the whole I’d say… I’m like a goddess! So, tell me, do you surrender, or do I need to take your land for myself? Because I will show no mercy, even if you are my own kind.”
Max looked at Cassandra, surrounded by terrified humans, and let out a cackle.
Max: “Bahahahaha! I don’t know where you came from, but if you wish to take control of Hell, know that we are above the process of vying for dominance. Such bestial practices has been frowned upon for decades at this point.”
Cassandra: “Oh? So how do I become empress of Hell?”
Max: “Hell is a land of demons— of sin! We only allow one of our own to lead, and to lead, they must be in tune with their inner demon, and be able to exercise both their power, and their capacity for the seven sins. Lust, envy, gluttony, sloth, wrath, pride, and greed.”
Cassandra: “Hmm? But wouldn’t being sinful be a bad sign for a leader, as you don’t want—”
Max: “Lady, it’s a test to be a politician.”
Cassandra: “Oooooohhh! Now that makes sense!”
Before continuing, Max walked to Cassandra and planted a hand on her exposed shoulder, smiling as he looked into her abnormal eyes.
Max: “Now you’re getting the hang of it. I’ll make some calls and we’ll begin things… right after this break!”
Cassandra: “This wha—”
Chapter 4: That Time I Won A Game Show In Hell
As Max made his declaration, Cassandra and her companions found themselves cast away from this office, and into another realm. A realm where glitz, glamor, and garishness reigned supreme, while a positively Hellish aesthetic was maintained. A realm where her every movement was captured by large glass orbs that stared into her very soul. And where an audience of 666 onlookers looked upon her with rapt attention. It was a land not of reality, but of surreality. And if Cassandra ever wanted to escape this world, she would need to…
Audience: “SIN TO WIN!!!”
As the audience screamed, Cassandra found herself shaking. Darting her eyes all over the place as she tried to comprehend what was going on and deal with the relentless noise. She quickly snuggled up to Andreas, holding onto him as he similarly looked around this game show set in confusion. While Zyrus and Isadore… they didn’t even know what a game show was, so just try to imagine how baffled they were by the sight of rotating colored spotlights hanging overhead.
They needed something familiar… and in return, they got Max Flare, dressed in a gaudy orange and yellow suit. He strutted onto stage with them, waved to the audience, before speaking into his microphone— a demon microphone with bat wings and everything— and began his spiel.
Max: “Yes indeedy dandy, our heroine— the so-called ‘demon empress’— Cassandra has found herself locked into a game show. And if she ever wants to escape, she will need to prove herself to be a Grade-A sinner. You all know the rules, but every show is somebody’s first time, so I’ll give you the DL. Our contestant needs to strut her sinful ways with all seven sins in order to become the new CEO of Hell. If she wins, we’ll be calling her empress from now on, and if she loses, we’re stealing her body and giving it to a real demon instead. As for what we’ll do with her soul? Well, that’s a surprise for a good reason. Now, before we begin, do you have any questions, Cassandra?”
Cassandra had many questions, but in her current mindset, she could only ask one.
Cassandra: “AAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!”
Scratch that. Screaming is not a question according to Hell law.
Max: “Ah, looks like we’ve got a nervous one. Well, nothing treats the nerves like a good hardy all Hell-style FUCK. So this time we’re kicking things off with… Lust!
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Lust
The world around her morphed and twisted in the span of a scene transition. The garrish Hell-flavored gameshow garnishments were torn out and replaced with that of a love hotel, and not only did Cassandra find herself on a bed, she found her yukata stripped away from her. Instead, she was dressed in.. to call it clothing would be a stretch, because while it had the necessary outlines of a bra and panty, it didn’t cover shit. Foxy perky nipples were on full blast, and her labia was about as exposed as her face.
Normally, being in a position like this would have made Cassandra bug out, lose every ounce of her shit, and send her soul out of her foxy body and back to the next dimension! Instead, as Cassandra looked down at her body, dressed in clothes designed only to titillate… she smiled. She laughed. She started drooling. And that not being enough, she started playing with her hot-as-fuck kyuubi body, shakin’ her D-cups, gyrating her hips, and letting her pink pupils get real, real big-like.
Max: “Now, Cassandra here is a bit of a docile little thing, so we gave her a nice little injection, kicking off her heat cycle with a bang. Some might call this cheating… but I call it entertainment!”
As the disembodied voice of Max— who was just off-stage, getting a little quirky from a demon harlot trying to make it in the entertainment biz— the pheromones ravaged Cassandra’s gentle little mind. The restraint and control she once prided herself on faded away, and the only thing that she could focus on for more than a scant few seconds was… SEX.
She had more than enough time to get intimate with her body these past months, so she wasted little time taking her hands to her breasts, and sinking her fingers between her legs. However, this only served to amplify her desire, rather than satiate it. She needed a partner, she needed a mate, and as her mind became increasingly fogged by this hunger, three people suddenly popped onto her California king sized bed, all naked as the day they were born.
They were Zyrus, Isadore, but most importantly, her husband, Andreas. All looking positively terrified They turned to Cassandra, hoping she could offer some explanation to what was going on. But once they stared into her scarlet eyes, they realized that… she was a threat. Immediately, they ran off the bed, trying to escape out a prop door on this set, only for Cassandra to send her nine tails after them, wrapping their legs in fluffy bindings, and dragging them back to the bed. They clung to the shag carpet, desperate for escape but no one could resist the power of a level 9999 kyuubi in heat.
…And even if they could, once Cassandra brought them back to the bed, they didn’t want to.
Within a sweltering mound of flesh and fluff, the four embraced each other in the most intimate of ways. Cassandra’s tails ventured across every inch of her friend’s bodies, brushing against nipples, genitalia, and the most tender, or mayhaps ticklish, areas of their bodies. Rubbing vigorously against Isadore’s labia, with such force and softness that it brought her to climax. Wrapping them around Zyrus’s member as he became lost in a pleasure so grand it was as if he could see into another dimension, before finally reaching the oh so distant heaven. And, of course, locking her and Andreas together as their bodies became mingled and lost, every naughty bit hidden amongst the sea of fluff.
Seconds stretched onto hours, and the bliss caused minutes to fade into seconds as the four found themselves locked within this sexual time warp. Their every action driven by the relentless waves of euphoria that gushed across their being, coursing through their loins, and being released into and onto one another.
Some may view such things as obscene, but throughout each of their minds, even discounting their utter lack of inhibition, laid something pure. Something sweet. Even as they pressed themselves onto and into each other, planting heads into one another’s sex and forming a circle of coitus, there was something greater than just lust driving them. It was… love. The affection they had accumulated over months manifested itself into a physical form as they joined their bodies, and in doing so, they felt their minds expanded. Every facet of their friends that had been cast in shadow was suddenly illuminated, and when confronted with this radiance… this love only grew stronger.
Yet, it was not enough to last forever, and once the sexually transmitted aphrodisiac faded, the four were left with fatigue. Their bodies were sore, tired, and dripping with juices. But through this erotic musk, they only felt joy. Joy for taking their iron-clad social links… and achieving a stage higher than they ever thought possible.
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Envy
Within the blink of an eye, Cassandra found herself stripped away from a den of sex and fluff. Instead, she was fully dressed in her black and blue yukata, sitting in a chair located in a brightly lit room with light colored walls. Another set, but one with virtually no furnishings to speak of… beyond three chairs before her. She initially would have assumed it to be Zyrus, Isadore, and Andreas. But instead, she saw three of the most important women from her first life. Women who made her the woman she is today.
A young blonde woman with brilliant blue eyes, cast in a light turquoise dress that showed off her plentiful chest. A purple-eyed woman with a giant indigo ponytail kept in place with a yellow bow, so long that it almost reached her knees, dressed in school uniform. And a pink haired woman with elven ears who shared Cassandra’s purple and pink eyes, dressed in a white short sleeve jacket, a white midriff revealing top, and baggy pink shorts.
As the cameras focused on these three women, floating boxes appeared beneath them, acting as glorified name tags for the audience. Cathy Wrought, Nia Matsume, and Alysie the Auspex of Origin, respectively.
These three legally distinct individuals all smiled at Cassandra as she stared at them, her eyes wide and her mouth agape. She completely forgot about every ounce of power she wielded, and mentally became a timid kid meeting their top three greatest idols… at the same time. She stammered, muttered, and sputtered as she contemplated what was going on… before the mack daddy of mac daddies, Max Flare, came narrating to the rescue!
Max: “Oh, that’s a lotta shaz-a-botta! Our contestant has come in contact with her greatest envy! Now, the question to end all questions is pretty simple. Will this kyuubi cutie sink or swim, and does she still envy them like she did back before she was a demon empress? Let’s find out!”
Cassandra: “W-What? I… I can’t talk to them, that’s… waaaaay too embarrassing.”
Alysie: “Ara ara. For someone who just had sex in front of millions of people, you’re awfully modest.”
Nia: “What my pink friend here is trying to say is… if we were as important to you as we were told, if we shaped your very identity, then… why do you look like that? I mean, I can kinda see an impression of myself in you, but—”
Catherine: “I have the most right to be insulted out of all of you. This woman stole my very name, and considered our identities one in the same. But when she has the opportunity to remake herself in another world, she combines me with a… mutated animal? Somehow, I feel dirty and insulted…”
Cassandra: “I… I love kyuubis okay, and when I woke up, I was just… sort of like this. I… I love all of you. I’d have been thrilled if I became any of you after I got iskeai’d, but this just… sort of happened!”
Alysie: “Oh? So, does that mean you still envy us? Do you want to embody us, flaunt our personae as if they were your own? Because just from the way I see your eyes and ears move when I talk to you, I can tell what you want. You don’t want to be with me… you just want to be me.”
Cassandra felt as if a dagger had just been slammed through her heart… but as a demon empress, that wasn’t even a flesh wound. She steeled her conviction, found the strength within, and answered her idol’s question.
Cassandra: “Yes! I want to be you! I want to be all of you! I want to be a rich ojou-sama, going on adventures with my beloved husband! I want to be a cute girl going to school with my adorable friends, fighting evil, and getting into all sorts of crazy stoofs! And I want to be a cheery dominant elf queen with the cuuuutest voice! I want to be all of you!”
Nia: “Well, do you want to be us… more than yourself?”
When faced with that question, Cassandra looked at her hands, her chest, and most especially the fluffy tails overflowing from her chair. This body of hers combined many of the traits she loved so dearly about these three, with a few extra things she adored. This was her dream body… so why did she want to still become them.
Catherine: “Look at her, gawking at herself like this. Please, you thief, you. Answer. The. Question.”
Cassandra: “…No. I want to be me… and I want to be all of you too. And… if I can take your bodies for myself, shifting between them as I desire… I will!”
The audience applauded as Cassandra attempted to sound cool, only subsiding when Max spoke up again.
Max: “Hot damn! Would you look at that envy! Tell us Cassandra, how do you expect to take their bodies? Will you turn them into trinkets, skinsuits, or—”
Cassandra: “I will… kon-sume!”
Max: “…What?”
Cassandra: “With the power of vore… My dreams can come true!”
Cassandra rose from her chair, her eyes shifted to a piercing red, and cast her tails upon the trio of cuties before her, grabbing them tightly, raising them high above her head, and looking at them with a positively twisted expression.
Cassandra: “As a demon empress, I can do anything… right?”
Rather than wait for an answer, Cassandra dropped Nia close to her face, and when there was no more than a few inches between them… Cassandra’s mouth opened wider than any human mouth ever should, her head grew ten times as large, and she gobbled up Nia in a single bite.
Cassandra’s head returned to her usual size half a second later, and she set her dilated scarlet eyes on the other two women before her. Fear struck their hearts, and before they could do anything, Cassandra made use of her newfound powers, keeping her tails, but becoming the busty indigo-haired woman she just devoured. Her form shifted with the elegance of rippling water, and the first expression she made with her new face… only made them more horrified.
From there, it only took a matter of seconds before Cassandra’s consumption was complete. She now wore the form of Catherine, and the first thing she did… was utter a hardy ojou-sama laugh.
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! After all these years, I am finally complete! I am the kyuubi queen of all cuties, and now… nothing can stop me! I shall assume all forms, become all, and everything that makes them great, that makes them pure, shall be mine to wield! OH-HO-HO-HO-HO-HO!!!”
Max: “…Yeah, I think that counts for envy. But speaking of eating, let’s see if this girl still has room in her belly for more. Because it’s time for—”
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Gluttony
Cassandra found herself back to normal… again, but this time in a dining room, wearing a bib, and with all manner of food before her. Towers of pizza, an entire menu of Chinese food, a multi-layered blackout cake, a mountain of meat from every animal worth cooking, the fanciest bucket containing nothing but frosted corn flakes. And that’s before getting into the fountain of juice before her!
Cassandra’s purple eyes cartoonishly grew to the size of dinner plates as she saw this… before shrinking down to their normal size a second later.
Cassandra: “Wh-What was that? How did my eyes—”
Max: “Next, let’s see if this girl’s got a big enough belly to lead demonkind! Buffets are the only course here in Hell, but this skinny little bitch doesn’t look like she could eat a plate, let alone an entire table’s worth.”
Cassandra: “H-Hey! I am a fox, not a dog! And as a fox, I have been known to eat entire pizzas in one sitting!”
Max: “Ah, but can you eat 12?”
Cassandra: “I… I don’t think anyone can—”
As Cassandra attempted to skirt around this challenge, she felt something crumble in her stomach, as if it grew at least three sizes within a single second. She was hungry before, as sex burns a lotta calories when you make it a foxy orgy, and even though she ate three cuties, those things are only 130 calories per serving. Just like Clif Kid ZBar Organic Chocolate Brownie Snack Bars, available at your local VitaCost! But now… she wanted to do nothing more than kon-sume. So… she did.
Plate after plate, serving after serving, all poured into her mouth, with Cassandra barely taking a full second to chew before pushing whatever was in her cheeks down and into her gullet. Cartoon physics were 100% in effect, and as to be expected, Cassandra’s body morphed in real time. Growing from a skinny, pretty anime woman into something thicker, then a full-on chubster, before becoming a creature with more structural similarities to a beach ball than a textbook human being.
By the time she was in the shape of an orb, she had kon-sumed every speck of food and left behind only the plates. As a ball of tub, she sure looked like a victor of any gluttony test… But even after tripling her weight within a matter of minutes, the hunger still raged on.
Cassandra: “Kon-sume, kon-sume, kon-sume!”
As Cassandra chanted… the world around her changed. The plates before her became thick plate-like crackers. The table became a ginormous chocolate bar. And as she looked at the walls around her, hearing them crinkle, she was met with a familiar scent. One she often smelled during Christmas… Which could only mean one thing!
Cassandra: “Ooooh! The walls are full of Christmas cake?”
…In her defense, her sinuses were clogged after becoming a fattie. But obviously, the house she was in became a gingerbread house and, as is tradition, all of the furniture became sweets as well. Her chair gained candy cane legs, the rug beneath her feet became a massive strip of fruit leather. Doors were replaced with almond bark. And the fridge became a giant rectangle of ice cream covered by a layer of crispy dessert rice.
Everything around her was begging to be eaten… So Cassandra followed her impulse, and whenever she felt like she was getting full, her stomach got bigger, and bigger, until she was so big that she burst from the roof, gobbling it up and shoveling it into her mouth!
Despite her size, she was still a cutie patootie, with soft skin, a round shape, and was completely decent, because her clothes grew with her form. Because, as previously established, cartoon logic was in full effect. As such, it was less monstrous to see her kon-sume an entire house, and more… adorable. Like a hamster eating a cracker, but with bigger bites.
If left to her own devices, Cassandra would doubtlessly devour every part of this house, but she was interrupted when her three friends appeared, once again. They looked at the giant fat ball Cassandra with a 20 meter radius with an appropriate level of awe and shock. …Except for Andreas, who was just sporting the most confused boner in his pants.
Zyrus: “Cassandra, what happened to—”
Before Zyrus could finish that thought, Cassandra sent one of her pudgy extra fluffy tails to nab Zyrus, where she promptly plopped him into her mouth, like he was a fruit flavored candy.
Isadore immediately ran away, plucking up Andreas and carrying him overhead, but they only managed a five second dash before they were nommed just like Zyrus, and promptly fell down Cassandra’s gullet and into… The Belly World.
A land where every tasty treat kon-sumed by Cassandra went, forming lush forests, vast cities, and a diverse subset of different species, evolved from the remains of the food Cassandra devoured. With the help of the critters they encounter, the three had to traverse the deep and vast innards of Chubssanda, all in order to reach her fatty brain and free her from this curse that has driven her to—
Max: “Akumako, we don’t have the budget for that!”
Akumako: “C’mon, I was just trying to give a nice opportunity for a filler arc when the anime adaptation kicks up in a few years.”
Max: “What the fuck’s an animé?”
Akumako: “It’s the reason why any sane person gets up in the morning. It is love, life, and hometown all merged together, where they—”
Max: “We’re already way over budget, and have thoroughly established Cassandra’s a glutton. We. Are. Done. So stop talking like you’re a character, and get back to narrating, you green-haired cunt.”
Akumako: “Hmph! Fiiiine!”
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Sloth
After her great meal, and great love making session, it was time for Cassandra to take a nap during the middle of these trials. But not just any nap! A nap where she would need to test her slothful ways.
Cassandra found herself in a child’s bed, wrapped up in sheets stitched with little fox heads across it, resting her head on a big fox shaped pillow, snuggled up cozily with her fox ears dropping down. Truly, there was never a sleepier fox wrapped so snuggly in such a foxy style… or something. We just found this in the storage closet and—
Max: “Narrate, you smegma-sucking cunt!”
Akumako: “I’m calling the labor union on you, you statutory rapist!”
Max: “Yeah, and I’ll rape you to death unless you do your job! Actually, no, fuck you, I’ll do the introduction. Ahem. …Well everybody, our beloved Cassandra is dozing off. That’s certainly sloth-adjacent, but to test her resolve, let’s see how long she can keep her sleep as we bombard her with, you guessed it, the NIGHTMARE HORRORS!!!”
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
As Cassandra dozed off, dreaming about sugarplum, lollipops, and hiding snacks under the kotatsu, she suddenly saw the world around her… shift. The cozy world of Gaia faded away to something duller, bereft of color, and devoid of imagination. It was the world she called her home for 25 years, and as she looked down, she felt something sink to the bottom of her stomach.
Her ample chest, her pretty clothes, and her straight blonde hair had all been replaced with a form that she had forgotten, but with it resting beneath her neck, she could not deny it. It was her body as it had been so, so long ago, and seeing it filled her with a grotesque mix of despair and disgust. She could feel the shit-brown hairs rubbing against her clothes, that useless slab of meat between her legs, and the hair on her head felt coarse and mangy by comparison. While her beloved tails were gone.
…There was not a doubt in her mind that this was a mere dream, and with her sofa nearby, she immediately flopped into bed, covering herself in the duvet, hoping that she would be able to fall asleep quickly… and she did.
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
She woke up to find herself back in Castle Radiata, back in her true kyuubi form. Relief filled her body… but as she looked across what she claimed to be her bedroom, she saw yet another horror. The sight of her beloved Zyrus and Isadore… their bodies lifeless, and infested in a moving swarm of insects. Their once smiling faces had been shredded into something with barely any resemblance to a human being, and everything there was to love about them was stolen by beings incapable of thought.
Cassandra felt fury in her heart… but knew her friends would not die like this, turned around, and went back to bed.
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
For her third trial, Cassandra found herself face-to-face with Andreas, both resting in her bed back at her demon castle. She quickly realized this was a flashback, to when they shared their first time together. Her arms swung over to Andreas to wrap him in a snuggly hug… only for him to get out of bed, and walk over to the large window before him. He stared at it intently, but blankly all the same. Cassandra tilted her head— like a typical Japanese child— as she watched her husband stare at the window… only to tackle it, shattering the glass, and falling down.
This was the tallest part of the castle, and while Cassandra had no idea how tall up she was… she knew that a fall like that would kill a human. With her powers, she could chase him, use her control of mana to save him… but the bed around her was so comfy. With her fluff, her blankets, and the cushy mattress, she did not have the energy or drive to do anything and just…
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
With the end of the third trial, Cassandra found herself dreaming about herself eating snacks while under a kotatsu. She had conquered the nightmares by consistently choosing inaction, ignoring the discomfort and hoping it would go away, and even in victory… she slept.
Max: “Well, how do you like that? We took everything away from her, and she just kept on snoozing. That’s a sloth if I’ve ever seen one. Now, Cassandra, if you’ll do up all a favor and wake up so we can move onto the fifth sin…”
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
Despite talking directly to her snuggly wrapped person, Cassandra did not reply to Max’s words, for she was too immersed in the joys of sleep. She would not reply to speaking, so Max decided to shove her. Cassandra showed no response greater than a tired moan. He had his slave intern, Akumako, grab him an airhorn, and unleashed it directly next to Cassandra’s ears. But it did squat!
Desperate and pissed off, Max pulled his gun from his suit jacket, aimed squarely for the center or Cassandra’s forehead, and fired a bullet aimed directly through her brain. …While it made a hole, the bullet plopped out of her head and onto the bed just a moment later.
Max: “Son of a… Akumako, get the meat grinder!”
With the grace of a professional, Akumako heeded her taskmaster’s request, trotting out an industrial meat grinder— a staple of all game show storage rooms— and turning it on. The machine whirled like a raging inferno, with its blades moving at a rapid rate, and smoke billowing from the back. It looked more like a weapon than anything, and with Max’s hands wrapped around Cassandra, he did what every game show host has dreamed of since the day they put on their tacky suit. He threw his contestant right into a meat grinder.
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
…Except Cassandra still didn’t wake up even as her body was shredded into hamburger meat. With just a stream of meat oozing out of the machine, it seemed like the end of Cassandra. …For five seconds, before the meat spontaneously poofed back into her kyuubi form, clothes and everything. Following her resurrection, she was fully awake, looked at the two demons on stage… and then went back to her bed, swiftly falling back to sleep.
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
Max: “…Fuck it, just throw her into wrath.”
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Wrath
Thanks to the magic of scene transitions, Cassandra found herself bright-eyed and bushy tailed once more, this time in a plain room looking over a globe. A globe that she immediately recognized. While the land formations were vastly different compared to those found on Gaia, they were an exact copy of the world she hailed from. From the tiny northern island she had lived on for all her life, to the two massive landmasses that occupied each hemisphere.
It was Earth, without question, and as she spun it around, a bemused expression crept onto her face. Wonder and worry filled her mind, only for the host to give her some much needed instructions.
Max: “To be a demon, you must express a deluge of wrath, and I know you to be an utterly wrathful girl Cassandra.”
Cassandra: “Hey! Just because I’m a demon empress doesn’t mean I don’t have morals.”
Max: “Oof! You might want to watch your tongue there girly. Now, the globe before you is an effigy of the world you came from, and everything you do to it, you will do to the entire planet. Just from a cursory glance into your mind, I can tell you despise this world, and—”
Before Max could finish his instructions, Cassandra shot a spark of electricity from her fingers, aimed squarely at the city of Truro, her former home. In an instant, everyone there, their bodies and minds located in another dimension, were met with the same fate, their lives cut short by a massive burst of lighting that eviscerated their bodies and belongings, leaving behind nothing.
With just a single, almost insignificant, gesture, Cassandra killed tens of thousands of people, and she did it without a flicker of hesitation on her smiling face.
Cassandra: “This world was one of suffering, one of despair, a world that made me despise the very concept of life. A world that made me crave death. I wanted to rule it, to rob those who made it this way of their lives and power. But now… Now that I am in such a perfect world, in such a better world… I see no reason to be picky any longer. The easiest way to end the suffering of an entire race, of an entire planet, is to… end their lives. This world, its people, had a chance… and they failed!”
With the world quite literally in the palm of her hands, Cassandra held it high, and sent electro mana coursing through her fingers, covering the globe in a sea of sparks. Every landmass was shattered and destroyed, every life was eviscerated, and the civilizations that humans accumulated, over thousands of years, were eradicated. Nothing was left. No living humans, no surviving buildings, no archives of their accomplishments. There was nothing to see, nothing to recover, and as Cassandra looked at this tattered destroyed world… do you even need to ask what she did?
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! To my friends, I’m sorry, but there was no way for me to spare you and let the guilty go unpunished. To those who made anime, I thank you for providing a speck of joy into my life and helping me realize who I truly was. And to the innocent… perhaps you, like me, will merely be sent to another dimension. And if not… your lives can always be replaced.”
Max: “…Unholy shit! She just killed 8 billion people and over a million species! If that doesn’t count as wrathful, then I don’t think any of us can call ourselves demons! Cassandra, what do you have to say for such an atrocity? You did it with such ease that the people at home are going to—”
While Max tried to lead Cassandra into answering another question, he was instead met with the sight of a kyuubi, sleeping soundly on the floor, bundled up in her tails.
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
Max: “…If she does manage to win this game show, then I think it’s safe to say she will be the worst ruler Hell ever had.”
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Pride
For the past… three hours, Cassandra has been boring everybody in the audience, and at home, to absolute tears. Because somebody thought it would be a good idea to test her pride by having Cassandra do a fashion show. Racks upon racks of clothes were presented before her, an entire convention’s worth of cosplay, and rather than just do a few pics to express her vanity, she decided she needed a few… thousand.
From frilly dresses, to cute contemporary garb befitting a pretty young thang like herself, to kitbashed styles that transcended trends and eras to bring forth a new kind of sexy. Cassandra was acting like a gosh darn fashionista, and no matter what clothes she wore, she still managed to land in the category of pretty, cute, or sexy. Which was true even for her 157th outfit.
It was a purple graphic tee titled ‘sweet bebe,’ featuring a pink haired cat girl making a heart with her hands, with a subtitle of ‘the game is on’ written in video game-y text, along with a pair of jean shorts. Despite wearing something so bizarre and casual, she still flaunted it like a champ, with the clothing hugging against her smooth curves, and amplifying the overwhelming perfection across her body.
With a Hell-made phone in her hands— a Solomon Gehenna 6Xtreme— she took selfie after selfie of herself, using both her phone camera and a conveniently placed mirror before her. In the mirror, she saw herself and smiled, still dazzled by her voluptuous form even after all these months, but as she stared deeper into the whole of this image, she noticed something was amiss in the background.
There were three miniature pigs behind her, waddling about onto her stage. Their fur was vibrant and colorful, giving them a far greater allure than the regular garden variety pink piggies, so Cassandra’s mental database classified them as ‘sufficiently cute’ and she wandered over to them, grabbing one of them in her hands.
Cassandra: “Why, hello you little cutie! How are you?”
Mini Pig #1: “Well, I’m a pig for one, and that sucks.”
Cassandra: “Whhhoooaaa! They even have talking animals here! Sugoi!”
Mini Pig #1: “I’m Isadore, you airhead! You were so preoccupied with your little fashion show that you couldn’t hear us as we were screaming for our lives!”
Piggy Andreas: “Yes, darling. It was very disheartening to see you trying on another wedding dress… while I was literally turning into a pig.”
Cassandra: “D’aw, Andreas is such a cutie patootie of a pig!”
Piggy Zyrus: “Well, at least you proved yourself to be so vain that you would ignore us while you were busy trying on clothes. I would say I’m surprised but…”
Piggy Isadore: “Look, she finally noticed us, so could we please get on with the—”
Piggy Isadore found herself dropped out of Cassandra’s hands and onto the floor, while Cassandra went over to a princess dress amongst the racks, and proceeded to plop it on. It was not a disappointing turn of event for the three humans-turned-pigs who were looking on. They knew Cassandra was a ditz, but it was still frustrating enough for them to hit her where it hurt… So they started eating the rack of clothing she was trying on.
That certainly got her attention… but not the kind the heroes turned pigs wanted, as her answer to their revolting ways was to fry them using her lightning. Immediately, their bodies popped and morphed in a tuft of smoke, going from miniature pigs, into a trio of plump sausages.
When faced with the food at her feet, Cassandra immediately plucked one of them up— the sausage that used to be Andreas— and proceeded to sink her teeth into it. His juicy succulent meat filled her mouth as she ravenously consumed it like a fox consuming their prey.
However, being a glutton, Cassandra was not merely content with her husband’s sausage, so she gobbled up the other two much the same. Deep down, she knew she just consumed her friends… again, but she was distracted by the cavalcade of clothes before her, and began to continue with her fashion show. …Or at least she did before realizing that her belly was now bulbous and fat, so the clothes didn’t look as good on her as they did.
Cassandra: “Drats! I’m not even a cute fatty now… I’m just a fatty! Um… Mister Max, can we—”
Max: “Huh— What— Oh, it’s you Cassandra! …You’re a little bitch, you know that? You completely fucked over the broadcast schedule because, no matter how many times we shot you, no matter what we did, you kept on trying on clothes after clothes, after clothes! Fuck you for making me wait, for wasting my fucking life, on your stupid bullshit! By Beezelbub’s balls! Do you have any idea how—”
Max continued to berate Cassandra for another 11 minutes, during which Cassandra cried like a sweet bebe, unable to find or hurt Max no matter how much she shot lightning from her hands.
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Greed
Cassandra found herself in a living room set, sitting at a kotatsu with a 500 page book open before her. Although, calling it a book was something of a misnomer. Truly, it was a shopping catalog— a wishbook— but one that took that name, wishbook, in a more literal sense. With the aid of a magic magenta maker, the reader could summon any item they desired just by circling it or ticking off a box at the side of the page.
This magical tome allowed Cassandra to flood the room she was in with a positive cavalcade of stuff! They started simple, with LEGO sets, plushies, and technological gizmos comparable to what was available on Earth circa 2016, and were plentiful enough to fill up a majority of the room. However, as Cassandra kept going… she began to circle bigger and more absurd things. When she got to pages with fashionable clothes and fancy dresses, she would circle the entire border of the page, and cause the room to expand, creating closet space to store what ballooned into hundreds of outfits.
When she got to the mail order homes— an American staple— she made sure to circle a good three, just because they looked so kyute. And when she got to the back half, her colorful eyes sparkled at the sight of trains, planes, and most especially warships, all available to be hers, just by circling them in this book. Without thinking, she selected all of them, one after another.
She kept going and going, finding incrementally ludicrous things in this reality altering wishbook, and with each purchase, her little pocket reality grew larger. The backyard she could see from the window was replaced with a fleet of trains and planes, and an entire dock to fit all eight of her warships.
Normally, this is where even the most insane of people would stop, recognizing they had enough stuff. But Cassandra kept turning the pages, kept on circling the things she wanted, over and over… until her desires began reworking the reality around her to an even greater extent.
The living room and associated house she was in eventually morphed into a mountain shrine as she circled a mountain. Her ample plush friends were soon supplemented with an army of a dozen foxes, all as friendly and cuddly as could be, after she circled a picture of a mail order pet fox… a dozen times. And then…
Akumako: “Max, what the fuck did you include in that wishbook? She summoned a Japanese— sorry— Hinomoto-style high school, an entire small town that she labeled as Wrightsburg, and— screw the fourth wall, I’m going in!”
Pissed right the frick off about this fluffhead wasting all of our budget (most of it was just an illusion, but still, mana might grow on trees, but you gotta drain it), I hit up the set. Dressed up in my intern jumpsuit, looking like a hot sweaty mess, because this has been a 16 hour shoot at this point. Even in Hell, those work hours are illegal!
Akumako: “Cassandra, is there any point where you would stop wanting things? Do you want a fucking skyscraper next?”
Cassandra: “Non. Heights like that are scary.”
Akumako: “Bitch, you own three planes!”
Cassandra: “Planes are comfy and their technology is cool!”
Akumako: “I… look, do you actually want this?”
Fox #3 & #8: “Yip! Yip! Yip!”
Cassandra: “Hai! I want all the fluffy friends, I want a mountain shrine because it is quiet and pretty. I want a town so I have little shops and restaurants I can visit. I want a school so Zyrus, Isadore, Andreas, and I can have high school adventures and fun times. I don’t want to wage war with warships, but they are marvels of mechanical engineering, and they brought Andreas and I together to boot!”
Akumako: “…You bonded with your husband… over boats made to murder people? Screw it, she’s a demon. Max… get off the fucking couch in the staff room. You know Big Nicky filled it with cum last week, and that thing is getting ripe.”
Cassandra: “Actually, I think I just figured out something else I want.”
Akumako: “Well fuck Jimmy Christmas with a fire engine! What do you want, you epitome of greed?”
Cassandra: “Cow!”
Akumako: “Wuzzat—”
Max: “And would you look at that, ladies, gentlemen, and the superior ones who fuck that binary to death! Your intern— who gives shit-tier head by the way—just got crushed by a drop cow. And what’s that? It seems like this is not a normal cow, but a Hell cow, and I don’t need to tell you what— And there goes Akumako, swallowed whole in a single bite! This Hell cow must’ve been hungrier than a fox, folks, but Akumako— rotten cunt that she is— is still dominant and, yes, it happened, the cow is now brown and her hair is green! Akumako has finally gained a form worthy of her personality, because this cunt’s a fucking cow! Let’s hear it for the intern cow, everybody!”
Akumako: “Fuck yoooou, Max! This was noooot part oooof my coooontract! I have rights!”
Max: “LIAR! You actually signed a clause for this specific scenario, and you know what that means? Whip out the meat grinder again, ‘cos it’s burger time, bitches!”
Sin to Win: Episode 17027 – Finale
After much turmoil and numerous delays that saw every member of the audience of 666 denizens depart, Cassandra had finally passed the seven trials of sin. Now, all she had to do was win this final test, a test of strength against the reigning leader of Hell, its one and only CEO, Max Flare.
The battlefield was the roof of a 50 story building, filmed by flying cameras overhead, capturing the fight from every angle, while the spectators were limited to just three. Isadore, Zyrus, and Andreas, all naturally cheering for Cassandra to win. …Despite the fact they were eaten by her twice.
Cassandra stood valiantly, with her staff in hand and dressed in her signature black and blue kimono. Her eyes were literally radiating with electro mana as she looked on at Max Flare, who had assumed his true demon CEO form. He traded in his suit for a pair of simple gym shorts, exposing his plentiful muscles, but also his bold, big, demonic wings. He stomped his clawed feet on the roof beneath him, causing the surface to crumble, before unleashing a demonic howl.
Max: “You know, I normally love it when a challenger comes my way. I get to cut loose on all of my impulses, host a show, and if they succeed, test my true power. But you, Cassandra… you just disappointed me.”
Cassandra: “Hmm? How so? I did everything you asked.”
Max: “You spent six hours circling a wishbook, even after we kept telling you to stop, and you spent three hours trying on clothes and taking selfies. We were live, you stupid fox!”
Cassandra: “Well, I didn’t hear anything!”
Max: “Because of you, we had our worst ratings in centuries! And for that, your path ends here! I have honed my body to resist all you can do, and once I lay my hands on you, I will fill you with pain so great you’ll wish you hadn’t destroyed your original world!”
Isadore: “Fat chance! Cassandra cannot be beaten, and you’re what? Level 666? Scary, for sure, but compared to Cassandra, you may as well be a common grunt!”
Zyrus: “She’s right. Cassandra’s strength… really makes me glad she’s on our side.”
Andreas: “And why I’ll make sure I never get on her bad side…”
Cassandra: “Exactly! I am the ultimate kyuubi, the ultimate demon, and none can withstand my overwhelming POWER! Stand your ground, Max Flare… and embrace electric DEATH!”
A cascade of violet lightning billowed out of Cassandra’s staff with that command, soaring through the air at a rapid pace, before striking Max’s chest. A blinding flash followed from the impact, but despite the torrent of energy being released from her staff… Max did not flinch. He was not damaged by the attack, and as the four heroes looked on, they reached the natural conclusion.
Isadore: “That dastard! He must have found a way to make himself immune to electro mana. Cassandra, use your tails instead!”
Cassandra: “You got it, Isadore!”
Taking her friend’s advice, Cassandra brandished her tails and cast them out at Max, aiming to bind him and take action from there. She sent her nine tails flying forward as she rushed Max… only for him to grab all nine of her tails in a single motion. A snicker appeared on his purple face as he saw the fear click in Cassandra’s mind. She needed to escape… but before she could think of a method, she found herself being smacked down onto the roof, where it collapsed.
Cassandra should have been strong enough to withstand a gosh darn nuke to the face, but Max’s strength was so great, and his numbers so high, that this left Cassandra feeling achy and hurt for the first time since she entered this world. She groaned and moaned in this state, while Max cackled and her friends screamed, rushing to her aid, while knowing they could do nothing.
Andreas: “Cassandra! Please tell me you’re alright.”
Cassandra: “Ouchies! I forgot what pain felt like…”
Zyrus: “It wasn’t much damage. You just need to come up with a third strategy, and you can win. I know you can! I believe in—”
Cassandra: “I have a plan!”
With that, Cassandra flopped out of the collapsed roof, and looked the demon CEO in his eyes, shooting him a smirk and a wink. Max scoffed at her playful demeanor, and went on the offensive. Using his demonic wings, he dashed toward Cassandra and wrapped his hand around her face. With his target blinded and silenced, Max swung his arm down, eager to shove Cassandra deeper into her crater… only for him to become blinded.
Cassandra used her tails to wrap Max into a ball of fluff, from which no light could enter. Max paused for a moment, and that was all it took for Cassandra to pry her face free. Max could feel her approaching him, but in this absolute darkness, he could not tell what she was doing. He stayed on his guard, ready to retaliate from any attack… only to be met with a kiss on the lips.
Max was puzzled by this attack… but wasted no time punching Cassandra in the gut. It was an impact so great and so sudden that it shattered the ball of fluff that surrounded the two, and sent Cassandra flying back, where she flew toward the edge of the roof, only for Andreas to throw himself in front of her. The two lovers collided and fell, nearly teetering off the building together.
Isadore: “By the Divines! What was your plan, girl?”
Cassandra: “The power of kissu!”
Zyrus: “A kiss? Why would you—”
Cassandra: “Look. It’s starting!”
Cassandra pointed at Max Flare, whose tall demon lord form had crumpled onto the tattered rooftop. His purple face was drenched in a layer of sweat, rapidly pouring out from his pores, while his breathing became heavy and battered. With her opponent in such a sorry state, Cassandra walked forward, strutting with an exaggerated swagger, and looked at him closely as he struggled to comprehend what was happening to his body.
Max: “W-What did you do to me? It… it feels like my body is melting from within.”
Cassandra: “Oh my! It seems like my plan was a success. You see, Max, you remind me of someone. One of the greatest cuties a friend could ask for! When I heard your name, I expected you to be like them… but you weren’t. And with this one little kiss, you will be just like them….”
A mixture of confusion and dread plagued Max as Cassandra kept her wods vague… and then he felt his form regress. His wings, bold and large, sunk deep into his back yet again, compressing against his spine before being sealed within a sheath of skin. While his protruding muscles shrank into something slimmer, with the demonic mana that once filled them flowing out of his mouth in a tuft of smoke.
Max stared up at Cassandra as he returned to his default state, hoping that her cryptic words existed only to stew fear within him, but as he tried to stand, he fell to the roof once again. As he fell, Max felt his arms shaking violently. The shaking soon spread to his entire body, leaving him lying on the ground, unable to move through his own fruition.
It was a weakness unlike any he had ever felt before, and all he could do was look at his body, awkwardly splayed before him, and more specifically, his hand. His hand, its size befitting that of a warrior more than an executive, shook just as much as any other part of his body, if not more, and as he saw his digits flail about. He could not see the details in the blurring motion, but as he stared intently at this appendage, he could see a change in scale. Through the erratic vibrations, he could see his hand was growing smaller.
The instant he registered this transformation, he began to feel and hear it across his body. The bones in his feet cracked and squished as matter was destroyed. His arm crawled closer into its socket with each passing second, and as he clenched his teeth, he felt the bones of his skull grow slimmer. The effect was subtle, but in a way that made it feel all the more insidious, as if his brain was failing to process reality.
The changes piled onto each other, happening all at once, and the overwhelming emotion plaguing Max was… utter horror. He was a man, he knew himself to be one, and he did not want to be anything shorter, smaller, or weaker. But as he tried and failed to break away from this curse, he felt his strength reduced to a mere fraction of what it once was.
Struggling to verbalize his rage, Max flipped himself over from his stomach and onto his back, where he looked away from his hand and at everything beneath his neck. He stared at the purple chest, and grunted at what it had been reduced to. Something devoid of muscle and replaced with a tuft of fat. He scowled at this sight… only for the changes to pile on even further, as his rich purple complexion changed, keeping the same dark saturation and value, while changing to a dark brown hue.
Max finally realized what was happening to him. This so-called demon empress was robbing him of his very species and the power that came with it. It was a callous underhanded way of achieving victory, and was located in a gray area within current Hell law. Mostly because something like this was seen as impossible with a contemporary understanding of mana, especially in a way this succinct and rapid. Yet… it was happening.
Once his skin color stabilized, Max attempted to rise once more, only for his attention to be broken by the cackling of the woman who transformed him.
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! We aren’t even at the best part, my dear. Take a look at your chest!”
Max did as Cassandra demanded, and looked down at his torso, at the lack of pronounced abdominal muscles. The very sight upset him as he contemplated the months of effort it would take to regain a facsimile of what he once had… but then he felt a harsh pressure plague his chest. He was struggling to keep everything in, exerting every last ounce of might he had to stop something from breaking down the barrier and flooding something deep within his person. He felt the intensity rise, felt as if his very bones were cracking… Only for everything to snap at once.
From his head, his short pink hair yanked itself from his skull, growing no less than two feet as it oozed out an inch a second, but rather than the sharp pink color he always knew, it was a distinct black.
From his chest, a pair of breasts pushed against his skin, loosening it as the fat billowed outward from an untraceable source, and stretching out the bumpy skin around his nipples into a pair of areolas.
While the most extreme of transformations was saved for the penis between his legs. It went from flaccid to fully erect in just a single second, and before Max could so much as glance at it, he found himself at a climax. Honey-colored semen erupted from his cock, spraying upwards and showering down, practically glazing the entirety of his shaft in this ooze, and emptying his testicles of every last drop.
The pleasure of this offset the pain, numbing Max’s senses as he went from resisting to passively gawking at these changes. With hair covering one eye, he struggled to look at his penis, and by the time he found the right angle, he saw it… shrinking. Receding deeper into his torso before oozing into the skin, melting away as its flesh sunk inward, rearranging itself.
The afterglow of his ejaculation made him oblivious to the pain, but once his newly formed vagina reached his prostate, he felt an explosion go off in his guts.
Max: “FFFUUUUUCCCKKK!!!”
As Max spoke, a spurt of blood flew out of his mouth, where it landed on his breasts. In it, he could see a small chunk of bloodied cartilage. Even from the sounds of his panting, he could tell what it was… and what it meant. His voice was now higher and softer, and his body was… that of a human woman. He could feel the extra fat cushioning his ass as he laid on the roof, surrounding his wider hips, and as he looked at his arms, he did not see a speck of hair.
Max: “You… why would you do this to me? What point would you have to deprive me of everything I— Oh… No. Please… Please, whatever this is, make it stop! MAKE IT STOP—”
Within Max’s mind, he felt something clawing at him. Something malleable and with an insidious aura he could feel even within the confines of his own mind, in a mentally generated subreality. One where he, as the demon he always knew himself to be, was overwhelmed by something unknowable. Something without form or substance, while retaining the capability to consume. He could not fight, so he ran, but running… was merely a delay of the inevitable.
When this imperceptible threat made contact with him… it was as if he never existed. He was merely a part of it. A part that instantly became overwhelmed, and was sent deep within this entity’s being, hidden, suppressed, and cataloged only to be forgotten.
As this loss of control happened, Max’s mind was no longer in control of his body. Instead, someone else was at the helm. Someone who looked at their surroundings with confusion… before being hugged by an overzealous kyuubi.
Cassandra: “Maxxie!”
The person in Max’s body’s eyes flicked as they heard that name— their name— and as Cassandra wrapped her arms around their mostly naked form, they did the same.
Maxxie: “Whoa! A fox girl… wait, where the hell am I?”
Cassandra: “Hell! You’re in Hell, Maxxie!”
Maxxie: “…So, am I dead or… ah crap! I don’t freaking remember anything! Never in my life did I think I would be the amnesiac protagonist. I always was more of the spunky supporting character… or, at least I think I was. …I also think that I didn’t have IRL fox girls where I came from.”
Cassandra: “Please, I’m a kyuubi, not a mere fox girl. Because I’ve got these nine tails!
Maxxie: “Is that a big deal or—”
Cassandra: “It is in my world— in Cassandra’s world!”
Maxxie: “Well, Cassandra, are you here to help me, or—”
Cassandra: “You betcha! You’ve been recruited into Cassandra’s Cutie Corps, Miss Flare!”
Maxxie: “…Your what?”
Cassandra: “All will be explained soon enough my cutie, but for now, Cassandra is tired, and she wants to snuggle, so she’s gonna snuggle you, and all the other cuties!”
With a memory wiped, personality rewritten, and naked Maxxie Flare before her, Cassandra began to wrap her tails around her, snuggly wrapping her in a warm and fluffy embrace. But rather than let the new girl hog all the fun, she took her free tails to grab her friends from the sidelines, bringing them closer before wrapping all four into a tight and snuggly hug.
The cameras overhead captured this sight, broadcasting the new Controlling Empress Overlord across the bountiful subsets of Hell for all its denizens to see. Their thoughts did not reach Cassandra and company as they were up on the rooftop, but before they could lull themselves into yet another fluffy nap, they were met with the sound of a door slamming open.
Akumako: “Alright, you won, Miss Wrought. Follow me and we’ll get started on all the bullshit paperwork.”
Cassandra turned her head to see the face matching this familiar voice, and saw the green-haired demon, Akumako. She was no longer in the form of a cow, but she also wasn’t just a pile of talking ground beef. Instead, she looked normal… or about as normal as one could look while dressed in a hamburger costume.
Cassandra: “Not now. Now is time for snug.”
Akumako: “Don’t you at least want to fuck your friends on a bed?”
Cassandra: “No sex, only snug, and while beds are comfy… this is fiiiine!”
Disgruntled, Akumako sighed, looked at the ball of floof, and decided to move it the most efficient way possible… by kicking it off the roof!
With a heavy kick the likes of which would cause a professional soccer player’s leg to fly off, Akumako struck the cozy ball of fox tails and sent it falling off the building onto the ground below. Cassandra and friends screamed in horror as they fell down 50 stories to a cruel, uncaring, floor below. …But then they just bounced on the ground, and started rolling down throughout this Hell city, aimlessly bumping against every building and car that came their way.
Chapter 5: That Time I Crashed A Rocket Into The Moon
Nine months after their adventure to Hell, things have been delightfully quiet in the world of Gaia. Hell was under the management of an autonomous board who was beholden to Cassandra’s will. The distant nations were all in the same boat. And in the kingdom of Radiata… there simply wasn’t much to do. The world was without war, without significant strife, and with no resources going to prepare for conflict, there has been a boon across all lands.
Soldiers had returned to being farmers. The technology of Hell spurred the beginnings of an industrial revolution throughout all of Gaia. And with all governments under the order of making things better for its citizens, public satisfaction rates had never been higher in this world’s history.
Cassandra had truly lived up to her title as demon empress… Depending on your definition. If you judged her actions based on how demonic she was, she was nicer than 98% of humans who ruled in this world. And if you judged her as an empress…
Cassandra: “Zzz…”
Cassandra spent half of her days lazing about Castle Radiata. Sleeping, snuggling, snacking, and overall taking it easy. She had power beyond any other on this planet, but her favorite thing was spending time doing these things, and hanging out with her friends. Zyrus, Isadore, Andreas, and the (not so) recently introduced fifth member, Maxxie Flare (TSFS017 Ver.).
All of them sat on the ‘sofa throne’ where they were wrapped in blankets and Cassandra’s kyuubi fluff, quietly snoozing the night away. A tranquil expression resting on all their faces as they went on rich, cheery, fulfilling adventures in the land of dreams.
Truly, their lives were good. They needed nothing, had everything they wanted, and with every day promising to be a barrage of easy going fun, they were as fulfilled as could be.
…And then some 5 meter thick rock fell through their ceiling and crashed into the center of their cozy slumber party room. Windows were shattered, carpet was shredded, an empty bed was blown to bits, the floor cracked under the force of the impact, and small tufts of flame were spreading onto the curtains. The gang woke up in an instant, all looking at the rock in the center of the room in sheer confusion. They immediately cast the blankets away and moved the tails… only for the still sleeping Cassandra to pull them back in.
Cassandra: “Zzz… No… Stay…”
Andreas: “D-Darling, you need to let us go. The castle’s on fire!”
Cassandra: “Just call Elizabeth…”
Isadore: “Elizabeth’s asleep, and it’s our room! When I say let go, you let go!”
Isadore bonked the sleep-talking Cassandra with a karate chop, causing her eyes to spring open, and her hands to leap to her head.
Cassandra: “Owie owie! Isa, that wasn’t nice—”
While Cassandra complained, her four friends began getting to work. Andreas used hydro mana to put out the flames. Isadore used cryo mana to cool off the sweltering hot rock that stood in the center of the room. Zyrus controlled the fire as it spread, using his pyro mana to starve the flames into nothing. While Maxxie channeled the aero mana she mastered offscreen to take care of all the smoke that was filling up this room.
The four moved with the care and precision of a well trained strike team as they addressed this later night disaster and through their quick thinking and skills, the room was saved from destruction.
Cassandra: “Good job team!”
Maxxie: “Says the girl who didn’t do anything!”
Zyrus: “She was our… emotional support.”
Cassandra: “Do you need me to lift this thing out of here?”
Andreas: “Cassandra, you do realize that… this rock is not from this planet, right?”
Cassandra: “Oh? How do you know?”
Isadore: “Well, for one, it’s bright yellow, I doubt someone would use an assassination catapult, and there isn’t a bird on the surface who could carry something like this!”
Maxxie: “Exactly! The most likely answer is the right one 90% of the time. The other 10% is what we in the bizz-nizz call an oopsie doodle!”
Cassandra: “Fiiiine! I’ll open it up!”
With a flop and a hop, Cassandra rose from her sofa, summoned her staff, and gave the meteor a light bonk, hoping to gauge its density, only for the spherical rock to… split open like a finely cut melon. Inside, they found the rock to be filled with a soft clay-like substance thatsurrounded a cluster of objects in the center.
Objects that seemed foreign and strange to Zyrus and Isadore, but to Cassandra and Andreas, they were intimately familiar bits of technology that reminded them of their original world. Slowly, they pulled these bits of metal and plastic out… only for it to start moving on its own, rearranging itself and reassembling into something with a humanoid shape, and a height of 80 centimeters.
Their head was that of a giant green floppy disk with a smiley face drawn on it with what looked to be a silver marker. Their body was that of a hard drive, but one several times larger than its usual size. Rather than have legs, the moving pile of computer junk had two mismatched mice, one pink and the other a deteriorated beige. Their right arm was a microphone arm, with their hand unsurprisingly being a microphone— specifically a USB microphone. While the left arm was a mess of different cables wrapped together to look like an arm, but instead of a hand, they had 21 different cable ends.
Oh, and as if this image couldn’t get more bizarre, this machine-like creature also had a UK power cable sticking out of their hard drive torso, and a miniature top hat that not so subtly contained a webcam.
The five all looked at this strange being as they waddled across the ground, walking with the whole of their body, before bringing their microphone arm to Cassandra. She looked at them, utterly baffled, and decided it was best to try engaging with this creature in a civilized manner.
Cassandra: “Hello there. Who, or what, might you be?”
To her surprise, the creature spoke from a speaker in the webcam, and muttered words in a high-pitched and unnatural sounding text-to-speech voice. Also, they ended their very sentence with the suffix ‘a-lou.’ Like a Japanese mascot character who was a toilet for some reason.
Mechanical Creature: “My designation is Fruitalou Reporter Flopalou! I have come from the moon to request your aid-a-lou!”
Cassandra: “Flop-a-lou! Aw, you’re just a little cutie! I’d pick you up, but I’d worry that you would break.”
Flopalou: “Please do not patronize me-a-lou! I have an entire society’s worth of knowledge stored on my yottabytes of storage space-a-lou! I know more than any flesh lifeform-a-lou!”
Maxxie: “Uh… I’m still not hip to the history of this world, but do you guys have aliens on the moon? …And are they supposed to be junk robots like this?”
Flopalou: “I am not junk-a-lou! I am made from the most advanced hardware by the most advanced race in this entire system-a-lou! The lunalous!”
Isadore: “…We don’t know anything about lifeforms on the moon, but—”
Cassandra: “Let’s go to the moon!”
Andreas: “C-Cassandra, you do realize it’s late. I’m sorry little robot friend—”
Flopalou: “Don’t use the R-word around me-a-lou! I am a synthetic lifeform and I have a soul just like you-a-lou! In fact, I have three-a-lou! I am a god among all other beings-a-lou! Yet the lunalous only want me to record and observe-a-lou! So don’t be a bunch of brat-a-lous! Follow me to the moon-a-lou!”
Zyrus: “I am not too used to these computerized machines, but… I believe you’d refer to this type of behavior as a ‘bug,’ right?”
Flopalou: “Watch your mouth-a-lou! My software is the greatest in the universe-a-lou! And with a superior body, I would conquer-a-lou!”
Cassandra: “Hmm… I don’t think we should trust a Flopalou if they keep on talking like this.”
Flopalou: “I apologize-a-lou! Crashing through the atmosphere might have affected my data-a-lou!”
Maxxie: “Wait, how are we supposed to get to the moon anyway? This ain’t Ultima, and you can’t just ask the local blacksmith for a spaceship!”
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! You seem to be forgetting something about your empress, my sweet Maxxie. You are not only dealing with the demon empress of Gaia, but a kyuubi who has spent 4,000 hours in Avorion! If there is one thing I know, it’s how to build spaceships!”
Isadore: “Hold on, why should we just listen to this… ‘synthetic lifeform’ just because they asked? What’s in it for us?”
Flopalou: “…Adventure-a-lou! Seeing the moon-a-lou! Being in space-a-lou!”
Cassandra: “Yeah! Now you’re speaking my language! Gimme a little bit, and I’ll make us a rocket!”
Eight hours later, the sun was hanging high in the sky above Radiata, morning was well into its own, and everybody without a penchant for slumber was up and embracing the day. …Or at least they would, if not for the fact that there was a bloody rocket standing just a few hundred meters away from the castle. People gathered in droves as they basked upon this metal marvel, this feat of science that was leagues beyond the comprehension of people who didn’t even know what trains were.
Castle guards kept them from veering too close, urging them that this was for their safety while refusing to explain what was going on. In part because they were about to get the show of a lifetime!
Cassandra, Andreas, Zyrus, Isadore, Maxxie, and of course Flopalou all found themselves strapped in, all dressed in their usual outfits. Which for Maxxie meant a short white dress, pink jacket, and a pair of bright blue socks.
Uncertainty painted the faces of everyone except for Cassandra… and the perpetually smiling Flopalou. None of them had ever been on a spaceship, and while they learned to trust Cassandra with their lives, they were less confident with her methods. As, rather than accumulate fuel, Cassandra planned on powering the spaceship with… herself. With the electro mana coursing through her level 9999 kyuubi body.
It was a sound theory… but there was a non-zero chance they would all explode as she tried to send them flying. Still, nobody ever achieved something by being cautious, so they ventured forth, determined that their determination would be enough to stave off death!
Cassandra: “Are you READY?!”
Isadore: “As ready as I’ll ever be
Maxxie: “I’m Ready to Die, even if there is no Life After Death!”
Flopalou: “Her transdimensional references are strange-a-lou… But yes, Flopalou is ready to go to the moon-a-lou!”
Zyrus: “I feel like this is the end of our journey, a final frontier… And I’m ready to embrace it!”
Andreas: “You heard them darling, let’s go to the moon!”
Cassandra: “Right! Say it with me now!”
Everyone: “To the moon!”
Flopalou: “—a-lou”
With their affirmation, the merry band of six felt the electricity coursing through this metal craft, causing it to whirl and shake as the engines spurred to life. They looked out the windows, cumulatively as eager as they were horrified. Then, just when they feared that a sudden sharp sound would ignite an explosion… they began their ascent.
The rocket pierced through the bright blue sky, penetrated the clouds, and moved at a speed no being on this planet had ever experienced. It was far from a comfortable journey, with the rocket rattling and clattering as it pushed against the atmosphere, but by the time the oxygen and heat of the planet faded into nothingness, they had already made it.
The vast deep blue sky gave away to a black canvas, colored and brightened by thousands upon thousands of lights, shining a barrage of vibrant lights. Cassandra thought back to the time she looked up at the clear night’s sky when this world was still new to her, and how, within the recesses of space, the stars looked brighter than ever.
Silence persisted throughout the rocket as the six basked in the beauty of nature… but they didn’t have much time to gawk, as the rocket was moving faster than ever. With the engines still running at full force, and the vessel reaching 2,000,000 kilometers per hour. With speeds like that, they were making their way to the moon… and fast! Which begged one crucial question.
Andreas: “C-Cassandra, do you have any idea how to slow this thing down?”
Cassandra: “Uh… I forgot.”
Maxxie: “You forgot to add a stop button?”
Cassandra: “Ehehehe… I was sleepy when I made this, so—”
Isadore: “Please tell me you at least made sure to pack some resurrection potions.”
Cassandra: “I made sure to pack some resurrection potions!“
Zyrus: “Cassandra, I know you’re a demon, but we promised, no lying!”
Flopalou: “Oh, this is just great-a-lou! Because of your rampant incompetency, we’re gonna die-a-lou! Or at least you will-a-lou! I’ve got backups-a-lou!”
Andreas: “No, no, I made sure to pack 60, so we should be fine.”
Isadore: “Isn’t that a bit excessive?”
Andreas: “We might not have the right herbs on the moon, and 12 lives for each of us seemed like plenty.”
Maxxie: “Wait, but if we crash… then who’s going to use the potions on us?”
Andreas: “Hmm… that, I did not think of.”
Flopalou: “…Well, it was nice knowing you-a-lou!”
Seconds later, the rocket crashed into the moon, rippling against its surface at an absurd speed, and sending the six flying forward at the sudden change in speed. Their health drained rapidly as their safety harnesses dug into their flesh and bones, but rather than having their lives ended with a surge of explosive flame… the moon crumbled against the force.
The rocket managed to successfully penetrate through the 50 meter thick crust of the moon, decimating its front, shattering many vital components, and causing its engines to screech to a stop. With no way to propel or stop the rocket, it slowly fell down into the hollow area beneath the crust, where it landed with a… splash.
The six scurried to the cameras showing the exterior of the spaceship, and quickly identified that they were in a pool of water. Complete with fish swimming about and crustaceans scurrying across the 80 meter deep floor.
Maxxie: “Fuck yeah! Space crabs! I call dibs!”
Isadore: “Yeah, how about no. The last thing we need is to go around eating some poisonous crab.”
Flopalou: “According to my positioning systems, we’re close to our destination-a-lou!”
Cassandra: “Well, isn’t that just kon-venient? C’mon, Flopalou! Take us to your people!”
Flopalou: “Of course… but do I look like I’m waterproof-a-lou? Because if I’m submerged in water, I will die-a-lou! I will feel incredible pain-a-lou!”
Andreas: “I should be able to use hydro mana to create a bubble to protect you.”
Flopalou: “Have you practiced such powers on a world with a sixth the gravity of Gaia-a-lou?”
Andreas: “Uh… no?”
Flopalou: “Then remember, my life is in your hands! And if you kill me, you will be forever haunted-a-lou!”
Isadore: “You just said you had backups, and you already fulfilled your purpose, so why should we care if you die?
Flopalou: “…I will remember your words-a-lou. I will remember them for as long as I still function-a-lou!”
Once all six were out of the sunken spaceship, Isadore prepared a raft made of ice. A structure strong enough to float them, yet light enough to be brought forward by paddling away using salvaged parts from the ship. All the humans found themselves on paddling duties, with Andreas and Maxxie handling one side while Zyrus and Isadore took the other. Flopalou was left sitting impatiently as they looked up at the bioluminescent moss along the underside of the crust, offering just barely enough soft green light for them to see a meter in front of their faces. While Cassandra was on fluff duty, wrapping her tails around her friends to curb the cold chill of the ice raft, rapidly kicking her feet in the water with the force of a weak motor.
They continued on like this for some time, asking Flopalou noisy questions they answered tersely, all while inching closer and closer to their destination. A structure of a brilliant radiant emerald embedded in stone. At first, they assumed it to just be the size of a typical home, but as they grew ever closer, the residents of Gaia realized it was a jewel as large as a castle, emitting a soft, welcoming hue.
As the six hit land, they immediately filtered off of the raft and walked even closer, eager to see this marvel up close… only for Flopalou to stretch out their mismatched arms, commanding them to stop.
Flopalou: “Behold, the marvelous twenty-seventh city-a-lou!”
Cassandra: “So pretty! What’s its name?”
Flopalou: “I just said, it’s the twenty-seven city-a-lou! Or city 27 if you prefer-a-lou!”
Zyrus: “Are they expecting us? Do they know about your mission, Flopalou?”
Flopalou: “Of course-a-lou! We are not a bunch of cave folk-a-lou! We have sophisticated communication to unify every dwelling across our planet-a-lou.”
Maxxie: “Hey, so I was never great at the sciences, but I’m 90% sure a moon’s not a planet.”
Flopalou: “Shut your dirty lying mouth-a-lou! I have sent a signal to my people-a-lou, and they will come to escort us soon-a-lou!”
???: “Actually, we came when we saw the big hole appear in the celestial shell.”
The group darted their heads around this dimly lit coastline as they heard this unfamiliar, slightly gravelly, voice. Nobody was around them, and the lunalous did not appear to be talking birds, so all they could do was look at nothing… until they felt a slight tremor beneath their feet. The soft gray silicon rock cracked and crumbled before eventually bursting open with… another rock. A bright yellow rock with two eye holes that emitted a soft yellow light, a mouth, and what looked to be two ear-like holes on its sides.
The five travelers looked at this sight with mutually bemused expressions, only for the rock to hop out of the ground below, revealing itself to be a fully formed creature. A creature with a large head, stout body with stubby arms and legs, and a height of roughly 90 centimeters. Every part of this creature’s body was made of a yellow stone, one as coarse and uneven as the average rock, but given enough shape to inarguably resemble the body of a human child. Right down to the tiny cluster of pebbles on their hands that resembled fingers.
The confusion evolved into awe as this creature looked at them, smiled, and even blinked by dimming their eyes, turning off their ‘eye lights’ as it were. While Cassandra had encountered many bizarre creatures in her time, there was a certain surreality to seeing such a… cute looking pile of sentient rocks, and one that spoke so clearly.
Rock Person: “Forgive me for the sudden introduction, but it is much easier for us lunalou to travel via the mines, and I momentarily forgot that was not an established standard across Gaialing societies.”
Silence ran throughout the group as they contemplated first contact and who would ruin it. Everyone was a potential destroyer of interspecies relationships… and Maxxie decided it was her turn.
Maxxie: “Oh my gush! It’s a cheeseman!”
With that declaration, Maxxie pounced on the lunalou before them, and immediately tried to bite their head… only to get a mouth full of calcium.
Maxxie: “GYAAAA! You’re not a cheeseman!”
Rock Person: “Correct. I am a lunalou, and you can call me Aihtez. I do find your biting to be an odd way to express affection and excitement, but it did not deal any damage to my being.”
Flopalou: “If she did that to me, I would declare international war-a-lou!”
Aihtez: “Hmm… It appears that there is some error in Flopalou’s verbal processing. I will send them into the lab post-haste. But first, follow me into my hole for a trolley ride!”
The land of the lunalous was one of unrelenting splendor and care. It captured the organized rigor of an insect colony, the organizational skills of a being with intelligence comparable to a human, and a natural beauty as epitomized with radiant gemstones. There was constant motion as lunalous went about their business merilly and swiftly, carrying supplies, riding in carts, or just waddling around on their tiny legs as they walked from place to place. The vast ceilings and wide corridors made it easy to forget they were underground. And despite mostly being stone, there was still a wide variety of plantlife strewn about. Moss stretched across walls like fields of grass. Mushrooms and regular fungi grew as tall as trees. And there were regular looking shrubs and ferns mixed in there for good measure.
Cassandra suggested traveling through this pretty new world, ditching this railed tour and going on an adventure! But Andreas tempered her enthusiasm, urging her to stay patient and listen to the lunalous. After all, they still had no idea what anybody wanted from them, and they would not know until they were funneled into an auspicious room. One with blue gemstone walls, a massive silicon table, and hard stone chairs with… water cushions of all things.
Reluctantly, Cassandra, Andreas, Zyrus, Isadore, and Maxxie all sat down at this table, attended by a dozen other lunalous. All of whom strongly resembled Aihtez. They were the same height, build, and general shape, but if you looked closely enough, you could tell the exact shape of their bodies was different. Fortunately, the twelve lunalous sitting as they arrived all wore different hats, so it was easy to tell them apart.
Zyrus: “I thank you for granting us this opportunity. As a ruler, I have always upheld peace as the strongest principle, and wish to unite all nations through kindness and understanding. I am completely ignorant of your culture, but I will do all I can to ensure that relationships between our worlds remain as amicable and beneficial as possible.”
Lunalou With Top Hat: “We are powerfully fortuitous to have a being such as thou in our midst, but I must admit that our goal is not to open diplomatic relations. At least not within the scale of this interaction.”
Isadore: “Then… why are we here?”
Lunalou With Graduation Cap: “To speak with a broad painter’s brush, we have detected something… peterusual within the other end of the Creamy Beamy galaxy— the galaxy our moon and Gaia are located within.”
Lunalou With Fisherman’s Hat: “That sure is one way you can make it sound with your mouth hole, Doctor Professalou, but I won’t be sitting outside for any lying under the Emerald Goddess, ya scope? We have a mighty hankerin; that something’s out in that there space place, eating planets!”
Lunalou With Rainbow Afro: “Ya got that right! We’ve seen whole-ass stars get yeeted into blackness! We don’t know what the holy Hubbard Heckerum be doing this, but we know it’s defo something!”
Andreas: “So, you want us to… investigate?”
Lunalou With Detective Hat: “Indubitably my dude! This is not something that merely affects us lunalous, as if this enigmatic menace ‘the second’ society finds either of our worlds, we will be in a trouble most profound!”
Cassandra: “Why do you need us to do this? Don’t you have robots and spaceships too?”
Lunalou With Fez: “Uh… yeah, we could do that if we were really jazzin’ to get murked and shaz. But look at us lunalou. Do we look like we know diddly dunkin’ ’bout fighting? ‘Cos we never tried going to war or nothin’. It’s just not in our stones, bae.”
Maxxie: “Question! What do you actually expect us to do? Build a spaceship, go to space, and fight… whatever this thing is?”
Lunalou With Propeller Beanie: “Yee.”
Maxxie: “How do you think we can do that? Just because Cassandra made a rocket to the moon doesn’t means he can—”
Cassandra: “Do NOT underestimate me when it comes to spaceships and space warfare. I’ll have you know that I have eradicated entire planets, wiped out entire fleets with a single ship, and became the undisputed ruler of entire systems. I do not care what the threat is. So long as I have the tools, I will not only fight… but kon-quer!”
Andreas: “…What my wife is saying is that if she has the necessary resources, she can create a spaceship, and would be more than happy to help save the galaxy.”
Cassandra: “Whoa! Now you’re misinterpreting my words! …But yes, I will help you… if you give me everything I demand!”
Lunalou With Head Ribbon: “Splendiferous de Terrificus! We as a society of the lunalous are most happy and most eager to most offer the mostest to our glorious hostess! We’ll reworky-woo our entire society for you, doing whatever is the do! Slavery is okie doke when running from genocide-die-bow-wow!”
Isadore: “Did you have to phrase it that way?”
Lunalou With Head Ribbon: “Correct, for respect!”
Cassandra: “Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho! To think, after all this time, I now have the opportunity to build the ship of my dreams. Even in this new world, the Avenger of Doubt will live on! Come, my friends, we have much to do! And you, you cutie rocks, I hope you understand how demanding of a woman I am. I will not settle for anything less than perfection, and what I have in mind demands perfection.
Lunalou With Wool Cap: “Oh jeepers, with creepers! Hum, hum, hum… I can get you 50,000 lunalous by tomorrow morning, and our 20 best engineers and architects within the hour.”
Cassandra: “Hmph. I suppose that is a decent enough start… But now this will not be built in a day. For I want my baby to be the grandest in the universe, and be able to kon-quer it when all is done!”
Lunalou With Fedora: “Ayyyyy! We really gonna listen to this vixen? If all she’s gonna do is dominate us, is that really better than just burnin’ out if this thing ever gets to us? ‘Cos I think I’d like to take my chances with Mistah Unknown!”
Cassandra unfurled her tails as she glared into the eyeholes of the Lunalou with a fedora, before speaking to them in a hushed yet vicious tone.
Cassandra: “I might be a demon empress, but I’ll have you know I can be a kind and kon-siderate kyuubi when my subjects swear to my rule. Life under me will be a utopia if you obey… and if you don’t, I can promise that your suffering will be everlasting. So, tell me, do you really want to get on my bad side?”
The lunalou with a fedora fled in terror as Cassandra finished that speech, and Cassandra looked at those remaining at the table with a smug smile.
Cassandra: “So, when can I begin?”
Flopalou: “I can help you now-a-lou!”
As the text-to-speech voice of Flopalou graced Cassandra’s fox ears, she looked down to see the floppy disk-faced robot. Fresh from getting a tune-up!
Zyrus: “…So, about Flopalou, is there any reason why they finish their sentences with ‘a-lou’? You all seem to have different speech patterns, so—”
Aihtez: “Flopalou is a lower form of life, so we gave them a speech impediment.”
Flopalou: “Yes-a-lou! And every day, I thank you for making me different-a-lou! For I am programmed to-a-lou!”
Cassandra: “Regardless of how they speak, Flopalou, I hope you realize how important your role is. For I will be relying on your computational power to achieve my dreams. I will be relying on all of you for this. To help me transcend from being a mere empress of Gaia… to become the Empress of Space!”
Flopalou: “Do I have a choice-a-lou?”
Cassandra: “Non.”
Chapter 6: That Time I Saved The Universe In An Epic Space Battle
I should have been sleeping, preparing for the inevitable battle, but instead, I was looking out of the window of her cabin, out at all the vibrant colors of hyperspace. It was the third night I spent without my Andreas, the third night I spent without my friends, and it was cold. Colder than the recesses of space. So cold that even my nine tails couldn’t warm me up. So, I thought back to how this happened. About how I lost them.
The building of the spaceship of my dreams, the Avenger of Doubt was one of the most intense yet rewarding things I could ever imagine doing with my life. It was not just a spaceship. It was a floating fortress as well as an opulent palace. It contained everything I would ever want, and everything I could dream of.
The vessel was truly massive, over 13 kilometers in length, and bearing the shape of an inverted sword. With a long body and a massive arch that gave way to its main weapon. The Plasma Accelerator. A weapon capable of blasting through any ship, any target, in the universe, and leaving behind a burning husk.
Its body was colored a vaillant white and bold blue, sprinkled with vibrant lights of the interior through its countless windows, and containing enough weaponry to decimate an entire armada. Its scale, elegant design, deliberate curvature, and segmented design was something that took me months to model. Seeing it before me, presented at its true scale, with every detail lovingly created… was one of the happiest moments of my life.
However, there was more to this ship than its exterior as, inside, it was a thing of even greater beauty. The ship’s central corridor was 100 meters wide and home to its own internal transit system, ferrying cargo from one end to another, while teleporters moved personnel with ease. It contained a small city’s worth of habitable areas, each with their own miniature ecosystem, allowing personnel to breathe in fresh air, and enjoy every comfort that they would find by living on a planet. From a robust shopping center to a lush forest, with everything between, and even more.
The Avenger of Doubt also featured its very own palace, complete with a throne room and a concert hall. Both of which were more than capable of commanding the bridge if need be, and empower the ship with my own power, all through the catalyst of song.
It was my pride and joy, and it’s crazy to think that the lunalous made all of this in just one year. I mean, I get that they don’t need to sleep or anything, and hundreds of thousands of them were working on this at the same time but… still!
The day it was fully ready, and I was given a tour with my friends… left me in tears. Even before I came to this dimension, this ship was special to me, and now it was… real. I could feel it, I could touch it, and I could walk down the halls, seeing things I only modeled and imagined. I was happy just to be here… but I also knew I had a mission.
For the first week, we were all checking out the facility while traveling toward our enemy. Toward the former home of vanished stars. Andreas, Zyrus, Isadore, Maxxie, Flopalou, and me. It was like going on holiday after a long vacation, in a weird way, as every day brought it a new adventure and new discoveries as we dug deeper into every detail of The Avenger of Doubt.
If things stayed this way, I would be happy, but after a week… we finally found them. Or I guess I should say… they found us.
I woke up in the middle of night to the sound of an explosion. The Avenger was under attack, taking heavy damage. Immediately, I went to the throne room, commanding the bridge, ordering the lunalous on the controls, and launched my retaliation. I destroyed hundreds of ships, and wiped out the enemy fleet to nothing more than a few cowards who fled.
I ordered a full status report, a full headcount, and after running scan after scan, I was confronted with the bitter truth. That my friends… were gone. Their bodies could not be found, and the Avenger suffered no breaches. The lunalous poured over the security system before finally finding the answer. All of them were abducted in their sleep by a group of androids, and the one seemingly leading the charge… was Flopalou.
I demanded an investigation, and waited for the results, hoping that this was all just some misunderstanding. But then, at my lowest point, I received a message from… him.
The creature responsible for this, responsible for stealing my Andreas, my Zyrus, my Isadore, and my Maxxie, showed his face to me… and I wish he hadn’t. This creature was a chimera of different animals, their parts arranged in an uncanny and sickening manner. He had the head of a horse, the torso of a crocodile, the arms of an ape, the hands of a human, the antlers of the moose, and the feathers of a peacock on his back. It was a truly disgusting mismash… and that was before I saw that he lacked any legs or feet, and instead had a squirming mass of tentacles, of all shapes and sizes, coming from beneath his waist.
His name was Gregg Vava Darn, and he somehow became twice as disgusting when I heard him move his horse lips. His pompous voice reeked of an aristocrat who viewed every other lifeform as beneath him, and his laughter was a wretched combination of a horse’s whiney and scraping nails onto a blackboard. It was hard to respect, let alone listen to, someone like him, but I did so, withstanding his relentless boasting and claims that the universe was his personal plaything, before he finally told me what I wanted to know.
My friends were in his custody, and Flopalou had been his pawn since the very beginning.
With this news, he gave me two options.
Gregg Vava Darn: “Option one, you offer me an unconditional surrender. I want you, your ship, all those little lunalous you have running around it, but most of all, I want your body. Just the sight of your fluffy tails, all wrapped around such succulent gams, it moistens my tentacles. Oh, to think of the things I would do if I claimed you for myself.”
Cassandra: “Pass. What’s the other option?”
Gregg Vava Darn: “Quite simple. I kill you like the bitch you are. You might think you are powerful, with your little plasma gun, but I destroy worlds. I harvest stars for their power, and exterminated trillions of sentient lifeforms. Next to me, you are a mere dog.”
Cassandra: “…I am not a dog.”
Gregg Vava Darn: “It does not matter. You will be the same once I wring my hands around your neck, and tear that pretty little face of yours to shreds with my meticulously maintained molars.”
Cassandra: “I will not die. I will not run. I will find you, I will bring an end to you, once and for all. And there is nothing you can do to stop me!”
Gregg Vava Darn: “My, aren’t you just a pitiful little thing. I hoped you would see reason, but you chose the path of destruction.”
Cassandra: “Non. I chose the path of vengeance, the path of kon-quest!”
The lunalous pinpointed his location immediately, and we’ve spent the past three days traveling in hyperspace. I’ve barely slept, barely ate, and could barely think about anything other than him, my friends, and everything that could happen to them. Whenever I shut my eyes, I’m met with a nightmare. Whenever I eat, I’m reminded of him and his horrific teeth. I knew I was not in the best state to go to a battle like this… but there was no choice. There was no decision. I had to act, here and now.
As I dressed myself in my usual space uniform, that of a blue and white shrine maiden outfit, I saw the vibrant array of hyperspace disappear from out my window and heard a lunalou on the speaker system. We would reach our destination in 30 minutes.
Ten minutes later, I was sitting outside of the airlock, waiting for it to unlock. A kind lunalou came to give me some juice and bread as I waited, and though I ate it, I did not taste anything. I was too focused, too eager to get this over with.
I waited, waited, and waited some more until the light went on and the airlock was clear for use. Standing up, I grabbed the nearest communicator from the wall and made my speech to my crew.
Cassandra: “My lunalous, you have been the greatest and most proficient crew I could ever ask for. You build this ship out of nothing more than a bunch of rocks, and have dedicated your lives to serving it. It is with a heavy heart that I must leave you alone in this final battle, but Gregg Vava Darn is a threat that I can only defeat on my own. Destroy his fleet, destroy his weapons… but leave him for me.”
I ended communications before I could hear any cheers or applause, and entered into the airlock, wearing nothing more than my miko outfit, and carrying only a single weapon. Though my staff had done me well, for a mission like this… I needed something more lethal. Something stronger. And I settled on a katana. A weapon capable of decapitating that horseheaded fucker in a single strike.
I took one last breath of the air of my ship, and opened the airlock. In my old world, this would have killed me, but here, I could not only breathe in space, but I could fly. Fly away from the Avenger of Doubt, and take on Gregg’s armada for myself.
Using my electro mana, I propelled myself forward at a rapid pace, but not fast enough to go undetected. I was immediately met with thousands of cannons shooting lasers at me and dozens of missiles honed in on my body heat. I spun, I dodged, I weaved through them like the nimble kyuubi I was, and after I was close enough, I launched my counterattack. Every one of my nine tails stood tall, and from each, I released a beam of purple electric death. It shredded through the hulls of ships, bursting them into smithereens, and when one ship fell, another followed half a second later.
Everything these beams touched, they destroyed… but that was not enough. With my arms free, I reached into the shealthe on my waist and drew my katana. It was positively sparking with electro mana, filling every facet of the blade, and with my target locked, I swung it.
From my blade, a wave of electro mana formed, flew, and with every inch it traversed, it grew. Bigger, wider, and thicker. The armada attempted to dodge the line of purple electric death, but few maneuvers were successful, and all ships caught in its path were cleaved into two. Including my target, nestled in the very back of this expansive fleet. The mothership of this whole twisted operation.
My friends were there. I could just sense it, and to get to them, all I had to do was tear through the thousands of ships before me. As one drew near, gave my tails a break, and planted my sandal-clad feet on the exterior. I ran across the ship as a platform, slashing my sword as I came across any vital components, and firing waves of electro mana at any who attempted to attack me.
My movements were swift, agile, and carried with them the grace of a dancer as I hopped from ship to ship, leaving behind nothing but death and explosions in my wake. I was a force of destruction, all who challenged me failed, but they still kept coming. Even as I deflected their lasers back with a single strike of my katana. Even as I threw out balls of electricity that overwhelmed the ship computers, leaving pilots stranded in floating coffins. And even as I barreled through destroyer-class ships and reduced them to nothing but scrap.
I was a level 9999 kyuubi demon empress. There was nothing I couldn’t do. There was nothing that could stop me. And I held onto these truths, I found myself at my destination: the mothership.
It was already half destroyed from my tails and katana slashes, but the crew still chose to fight me. They were simple soldiers, two arms, two legs, brandished in armor and carrying weapons that fired lasers. They were nothing more than pests. I slashed, I shot lightning from my hands, and I used my tails as weapons, throwing them into walls and into the recesses of space as they came after me, one after one. And no matter how many I killed, no matter how severe their wounds, they kept coming after me, like the most militant cockroaches. Their shouts, their cries, their rallying calls, it was so bothersome I could barely even think as I struck them all down.
Silence, if you could even call it that, came when I found myself in front of an elevator, its car long-gone. I shut my eyes as I trusted my senses, feeling for our bonds I searched this tattered ship. By the time my violet and pink eyes opened, I looked up at the top of this shaft, leapt onto the walls, and ran upwards as quickly as my body would let me. Each step telling me I was closer to them.
I broke down the door to the top floor with a mighty kick, and was met with a hallway. Quiet, clean, and dimly lit. I could tell they were at the end of this hall. Past the shuttered doors, past the floor that clanked as I made each step. I felt my heart swell in my chest as I walked forward, eager to finally see them again, to rescue them from whatever torment this vile creature subjected them to.
The door opened as I pressed a button, but as I looked into this room, I felt my heart dry up and shatter into a thousand pieces.
What I saw… was not my friends. It was not Andreas, Zyrus, Isadore, or Maxxie. What I saw was… a monster. An amalgamation of flesh and machinery, arranged in a manner that was horrific to behold… and had to be agonizing to experience.
They were a creature with made of three humans smashed together, their flesh melted together like rubber, and everything held in place with crude machinery that looked… familiar. The cables, the shards of metal strewn across the body and the… green plastic melted and molded against skin.
I did not want to look at it. I did not want to think about it. But as I stared into its four remaining human eyes, I realized who this was.
I saw the dark brown eyes of Maxxie, one of Isadore’s emerald eyes, and one of Zyrus’s amethyst eyes. There was no mistaking it, but I wish that there was. This… this was my friends. This is what Gregg Vava Darn did to them. And as I repressed the overwhelming disgust, I saw this thing move its mangled arms— made up of three arms wrapped around each other before merging into a ten digit cyborg claw. I wanted to scream, I wanted to run, I wanted to take my word and strike this mistake of a cyborg… but I knew that would be wrong.
This… they were my friends. I had to help them. I had to save them. And so, with teary eyes, I spoke to them.
Cassandra: “E-Everyone… What happened to you? How… How can I help?”
They moaned at my words, breathing with all three mouths in unison… before speaking in three voices.
Cyborg Abomination: “DIE!!!“
The cyborg abomination lunged its huge body at me as it shouted, and tore through a metal wall with a single punch. I dodged the initial strike, but tripped on the slick metal floor. Even with my strength and agility, it took me a second to get back up, giving this hulking cyborg the opportunity to launch another attack. I anticipated another punch, but instead they held out their misshapen hand and channeled mana. Pyro, cryo, and aero, all at once, all together, all aimed directly at me…
My body was sent flying through the wall, and by the time I opened my eyes, I found myself drifting through space. My miko was tattered, my tails were scorched, and my body was all hurty and achy in a way beyond anything I experienced since I came to this dimension. I had bruises, I had cuts, and while nothing was broken… this spoke volumes about this creature’s power.
I was scared. Scared by how this thing looked. Scared if this really was Zyrus, Isadore, and Maxxie. And scared… of what it could do to me.
I looked out at the mothership. It was in tatters. The parts that weren’t destroyed were covered in darkness, and the only light could be found in a chamber at the highest point of this ship. Right beneath that, there was a cloud of smoke flowing out into space, and from that smoke, I saw them again.
Cyborg Abomination: “GRARG!!!“
They flew at me with both their arms glowing with mana. I could run, but I knew they would just follow me, and I wasn’t sure if I could outrun this monster. With my choices limited, I decided to launch an attack of my own, raising my nine tails, taking aim at my target… and firing nine beams of electric death!
Their explosive mana clashed with my lightning, and mine proved to be more powerful. The electro mana flowed through the cyborg abomination’s body, they screamed in three voices from the pain… only for the mana to flow into their arms. It gathered in their palms, mixing with another three elements, growing and billowing in power that it became as big as… me.
I ran, using the mothership as a shield as this monster charged up this attack, and diving into its narrow corridors. I moved as fast as lightning… but their attack moved faster than lightning and wind combined. It was a burning orb of destruction that consumed all it came into contact with, gobbling up the metal halls like it was kindling, before finally colliding with my tails.
By the time I woke up, I felt an agonizing pain lurch throughout my spine. My entire body screamed at me, and I couldn’t help but scream back. It grew, harsher and harsher, eclipsing any pain I had ever felt in my life, before something snapped. The pain reached its climax, and in its wake, I felt a ripple course through my body. Allowing me to feel my ears, my limbs, and my… tails. I could feel… one, two, three, four, five, six, seven… seven. Seven tails… and no more. Two of my tails were… gone, and as I turned my body, still drifting in space, I saw where they went.
This cyborg behemoth had torn out two of my tails, and proudly held them above me as if they were trophies.
Cyborg Abomination: “GRAHAHAGRAHAHA!!!“
This… wasn’t right. I am the demon empress. I am supposed to be the most powerful creature in this world. I am supposed to be a kyuubi, my nine tails are my pride and joy. But… this thing stole that to me. It stole my friends, it stole my tails, and because of it… I was left shaking in pain.
Cassandra: “This… this thing could kill me.”
As I whispered those words beneath my lips, I realized I had to go all out, kill this thing before it killed me… and with all this metal around, I think I had an idea.
I flew down into the remnants of the mostly destroyed mothership, where I tore a long shard of metal from a wall. My katana was lost in the scuffle, probably destroyed like my clothes, and I had to improvise with whatever weapon I could get.
Predictably, this cyborg beast followed me, screamed as it saw me, and with a metal spear in my hand, I threw it as hard as I could. It landed in their chest, penetrating the green plastic guarding their guts. It was just enough to leave them staggered for a moment, and in that moment I struck. I struck with the power of 10,000 bolts of lightning, all centered around a lightning rod that spread into a system of flesh mingled with electronics.
My body became coated in electro mana, spreading out from my remaining tails and hands before jumping onto and into this abomination. The electricity flowed through every cell of their blood, fried their circuits, and as the pressure grew too much… they burst. The metal around their body burst… And so did the flesh. I expected them to be reduced to globs of viscera, but instead, they remained in a single piece. A single bloody piece of exploded electronics and mangled flesh.
In this sorry state, they drifted in space, limply floating into metallic shrapnel, but not moving of their own fruition. Their eyes were closed and, due to the lack of air, it was impossible to tell if they were still breathing.
My body was weak, I was tired… but I knew I couldn’t allow them to live. I reached into the rubble yet again and grabbed a jagged pipe. I told myself what they were, what this thing was, and that it should die. I raised the weapon high, ready to strike, only for this creature to speak to me…With the voices of… my friends.
Zyrus: “Cassandra…”
Isadore: “Please, before we… die.”
Maxxie: “Come closer…”
I couldn’t hurt them. I couldn’t let them die when they were begging for mercy. I loved them. I would do anything to save them. …And if they were about to give me their final words… I had to listen. I went against my instincts, drew near, and placed my fluffy fox ears near their mouths.
Cassandra: “Yes? What do you—”
I then felt something grab my tails, and as I looked into the malformed faces before me, their eyes shot open, and their four voices spoke in unison.
Cyborg Amalgamation: “DIE-A-LOU!!!“
With that, there was a great kaboom. It hurt. It hurt beyond words. It hurt me in every way it could, and by the time it was done, by the time I regained consciousness, I didn’t want to move.
Every part of my body hurt. I was bleeding in my mouth, from my forehead, from both my arms, my legs, and most of all… my tailbone.
They were gone.
My beloved fluffy tails, the seven that remained, were all gone. This monster destroyed them.
I never felt so cold. I never felt so alone. Since I came to this world, I never wanted to wake up and go back home… until now. Why… Why would the goddess do this to me? I asked myself, despite knowing the answer.
I wanted to curl up in a corner, cry until I fell asleep, and keep crying until I was out of tears, I was out of sadness. But then, as I opened my vibrant eyes, I saw the Avenger of Doubt, unleashing its plasma accelerator, a beam of brilliant radiance, that decimated dozens of ships. The lunalou were still fighting. They were fighting for themselves. For their people. For their home. For me. …But what about me? What was I fighting for?
Cassandra: “…Vengeance. Gregg Vava Darn stole so much from me, and now, tails or no tails, kyuubi or not, I will kill him. I will rescue my husband. I will save this universe from all who threaten it.”
The mothership was rendered into little more than scrap. The support systems were failing, and the only place with any lights coming from it was the same place where I sensed Andreas. He was there. I would save him. And even if we lost our friends, we would have each other. We would be able to go home, start a family with three beautiful daughters, and live happily ever after!
I told myself this, swatting away any criticisms I had, and opened the door. The door to the final boss.
The room was bright, opulent to the point of having a chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and was… quiet. My steps echoed as I walked down the tiled hall, nearly tumbling due to my missing tails, but I still made it to the other side… where I saw the walls stained with blood. My steps slowed, my heart raced, and as I inched around the corner, the blood splatter grew bigger. Deep down, I knew what I was about to see… but that didn’t stop my mind from shattering when I saw it.
It was Andreas. It… used to be Andreas. His body was torn to shred, rendered unrecognizable but his head was preserved. In fact, it looked at me with bright eyes… and a smile… while propped up on top of a pile of flesh.
It snapped. I don’t know what it was, but… it snapped. I fell to the ground, what little food I had in my stomach was expelled onto the floor beneath my feet, and even though I didn’t need to breathe, I was still in hysterics.
I could not think, I could not focus, I could not speak, all I could do was sob, breathe heavily, as I tried to process something so deeply horrific.
What sick twisted fuck would dare to do this to a person? To display this just got me? …The same sort of person who would attack me in a state like this.
I felt something strike me in the back of the head. It sent a cascade of blood down my long blonde hair.
Before I turned around, I knew it was Gregg Vava Darn, and I immediately tried to attack him, funneling electro mana through my hands as I prepared to pounce him. …But he knew I was going to do that. As I turned around, he wrapped his tentacles around my arms, my legs, and… every part of my body. They even tore open my mouth.
I tried to resist, tried to fight them back using all the power I was supposed to have, but… I just couldn’t. I couldn’t do anything but squirm in futility and look up at the horse face staring at me with his disgusting beady eyes, breathing a rancid hot breath onto my face.
Gregg Vava Darn: “I told you it was no use. I gave you the chance to escape with something. But now… you get nothing. Everything you know and love will be destroyed… and you will become mine!”
I was dreading what he was going to do, but once he started wrapping tentacles around my ass… I knew this was inevitable.
Gregg Vava Darn: “You know what I’m going to do, right? I’m going to fucking rape you! I’m going to rape you right in this pussy you never deserved! I’m going to rape you to death, and you’re gonna like it! You’re gonna cum. You’re gonna beg for more, like the faggot you are!”
This… this was it. Either I fight now, either I win… or I’ll die. I won’t exact my vengeance. My friends will have died in vain. And my body… will be ravaged in ways I cannot imagine. This repugnant freak stole everything from me… and for that, he must be punished.
He… must… DIE!!!
Cassandra: “I… WILL… KILL YOU!!!“
It was like the world flickered and the entire image changed. Like a setting was enabled while reality was paused, and by the time it resumed, things were different. …I was different.
My entire body glowed with purple electro mana, from the tips of my fingers to my toes, and from my peripheral vision, I could see… my tails, all nine of them, spread out on the floor like a big cushion. Sparks flew off from my body, all of my aches and wounds were gone, and the weakness I felt… was replaced with a strength beyond anything I could comprehend.
Despite this change in stature, Gregg Vava Darn was still on top of me. Still wrapping his disgusting tentacles over my being. Half a second later, he wasn’t. He was on the floor, looking up at the radiant demon empress before him not with the haughtiness of an aristocrat, but the pleading look of an aristocrat who was stripped of his rank and livelihood. He wanted to speak, he wanted to plead… but I did not let him.
I stretched out my hand, and unleashed a blast of electro mana. A small blast, no larger than a baseball, but it was enough to decimate the entire room, fully destroying this mothership.
The smoke and debris quickly faded, leaving behind only Gregg Vava Darn. His chimera form tattered with cuts and scrapes, but still in one piece. He looked as scared as a creature could with the face of a horse, but again, I denied him the ability to speak.
Stretching out my arm, I conjured a blade of electro mana. One that sparkled and crackled with energy, and felt as hot as a flame. Not that I was bothered by a little heat.
I slashed his tentacles off with a single blow, then his arms, then his torso. Every time, it was like bringing a hot knife through microwaved butter.
Gregg Vava Darn: “Puh-puh-puh-please—”
Even as just a head, Gregg Vava Darn was still so pompous he thought he could avoid death. I silenced him by stretching out a hand, sending waves of electricity coursing through his face, until his entire head… became nothing but ash.
I did the same to every other part of his being, decimating it into nothing more than ash. Then, with Gregg Vava Darn fully dead… I felt this surge of desperate power leave my being. I was myself again, clean blonde hair, nine fluffy fox tails, and a miko outfit in all. Everything was… back to normal.
I won the battle.
I achieved new powers I never thought possible.
…But I lost them.
I lost Andreas. I lost Zyrus, Isadore, and Maxxie. They were all gone. And while I had some resurrection potions in the ship… their bodies were destroyed beyond recognition.
They were gone… and all I could do was cry. …All I could do was scream. All I could… no.
No!
NO!!!
NONONONONONONONONONO!!!
Cassandra: “I WILL NOT ACCEPT THIS!!!”
I could feel the electricity coursing through my body, begging to be unleashed in a flurry of destruction. The destruction… OF EVERYTHING!!!
But right as I neared this precipice… everything faded to white. The darkness of space vanished, the ruins of Gregg Vava Darn’s fleet faded away, and I was… alone. I was alone in this white voice, when someone spoke to me in a soft voice. A voice I identified as… her.
Mysterious Voice: “You have done well Cassandra. Through your perilous hardships, you have conquered the greatest threat in your Scenario. With Gregg Vava Darn disposed of, your world is now, and forever, at peace. Congratulations.”
Cassandra: “…What good is peace… if everyone I loved is dead?”
Mysterious Voice: “For defeating Gregg Vava Darn, I am pleased to announce that you have gained a large sum of experience points. 999,999,999,999. Enough to reach level 10001.”
Cassandra: “Is that supposed to make me feel better? You just said I was the strongest in the universe, but… it doesn’t mean anything to me.”
As I asked that, a holographic interface appeared before me, displaying a lengthy list of titles and descriptions, all scrolling by too fast to read.
Mysterious Voice: “For surpassing level 10000, you have the opportunity to change your class from demon empress into any class you could imagine or desire. By changing your class, your abilities and power may change dramatically. So, Cassandra, what do you want to be?
It was a simple question… but one that gave me pause. If I could be anything, then could I be…
Cassandra: “…A goddess. Someone who can control this world, bring my friends back to life, and guarantee nothing bad will ever happen to this world ever again.”
Mysterious Voice: “Congratulations. Class change complete! Cassandra is now… a goddess!”
As the voice said this… I was met with a bright light. A bright light that sent me back to space, but as I looked on at the vast recesses of space, I felt something… new within me. A power greater than great. A power that was… infinite.
Epilogue: Cassandra The Cuddly Goddess
The golden radiance of the afternoon sun basked across a home. A home with windows so large they acted as glass walls, myriad houseplants, wooden walls, wooden floors, and spacious rooms. It all mingled with and complemented the vast forest outside, making everything feel both naturalistic and spacious.
The loudest sound percolating throughout the home was the chirping or not-so-distant birds, their cries seeping past the windows, but suppressed enough that it did not disturb the residents. A group of five people, all cozily resting on a large L-shaped couch, their bodies wrapped in and covered by dense blankets of fox tails, all coming from the woman in the center of this cuddly sight.
A blonde woman with fox ears poking out from her head, her eyes shut as she merrily snoozed alongside her friends. A woman who was… many things. A kyuubi. A demon empress. But now, and above all others, a goddess. A goddess who used her unlimited power to bring about this scene. To bring the four who rested on both her sides. Andreas, Zyrus, Isadore, and Maxxie. Four who she believed she would never see again. But now… they would be by her side forever. Now, she would live a life devoid of struggle, within a world without conflict or pain.
Through her passion and dedication, by never giving up, she had obtained everything she could have ever desired. She had her perfect body, the perfect friends, and… the perfect ship.
Past the synthetic sun, basking the five in a summer twilight, they were merely in one of the many biomes of the Avenger of Doubt. The grandest ship in all the universe, soaring through the unknown on a course of discovery. A voyage that would see its crew spend weeks, months, perhaps even years venturing across galaxies. Seeking out whatever lurked beyond the stars.
It was a daunting task, even for someone as mighty as Cassandra, but with the power of a goddess within her hands and her friends by her side… there was nothing she couldn’t do.