of the Last Golden Witch - Ch. 3: Power Over All Witches

Outside the mansion, two figures huddled together in the rain, approaching under the shadow of a single parasol. It was a red-headed young man and a beautiful blonde woman. The two were dressed in such elegant finery that it felt a bit quaint to see them walking anywhere in the rain. Still, they were clearly very familiar with each other, and didn't have much discomfort getting close.

"We could have given your cape a hood, you know," the witch Beatrice commented. Although she was in this awkward position, she still wore a dignified smile, her head tilted up.

Ushiromiya Battler, on the other hand, wasn't fretting over appearances as much. Although he wore a lordly cape, he was happy to duck under the single shelter and share a cozy moment with his wife. "No, you're thinking the same thing, right? When the two of us show up at the mansion after so long, we have to look the part! It's best if we look just like we did back then."

"I think you're just enjoying the situation," Beatrice remarked, although she looked like she was struggling not to laugh. "Even if I am no longer the ruler of this mansion, a certain level of dignity is required of me. We are not the only guests your sister saw fit to invite to this reunion, I would wager."

Battler frowned. "Oh. I don't mind seeing my folks and your furniture buddies again, but are you saying you think she invited those two?"

The witch smirked as she reached the stair landing, lowering her parasol before dismissing it entirely in a magical cloud of butterflies. "Lady Bernkastel in particular is very attached to dear little Ange."

"Point taken." Her husband shook the raindrops off of his cloak fussily, looking like he wished he could get rid of it in the same way. "I'll try to smile and be nice to your magic buddies, so you play nice with Ange, okay?"

His wife turned to him and gave him a frightening grin befitting of a witch... one that lasted only a second or two before she couldn't keep it up, giving him a quick and easy kiss on the cheek before he could react.

"And careful with that, too!" Battler reminded her, smiling in spite of himself. He reached out and grabbed the handle of the mansion's door, feeling the odd sensation of returning to this impossible place once more. It caused him to reflect... Truthfully, he still didn't understand why, over a year later, his sister had suddenly taken interest in ruling over this mansion and inviting guests once more. "Ange's probably going to be putting on airs, trying to act like a proper hostess. You need to try and take this... seriously...?"

Truth be told, for as much as Battler and Beatrice had been talking about seeing Ange after awhile, and as much as they'd be unsure of her reason for suddenly inviting them, neither was expecting any big surprise. In their minds, after all, Ange was still a serious and awkward young woman they had to struggle not to think of as a child. But as the doors swung open to an adult Ange that was wrapped up in a cape like bum's blanket, sitting on the floor surrounded by booze, the two were at a loss to adjust their expectations.

Of course, that was hardly the biggest adjustment of expectations they had to face. Just to the side of Ange, in front of where the portrait for Beatrice herself ought to hang and greet visitors to the mansion, a large tarp curtain had been hung. On that curtain, sloppy words had been written in blue and orange paint, words the two were struggling to make any sense of:

"BOUNCECASTLE

AND

LUMPYDUMPY

THE CLOWNS"

Ange was struggling to rise to greet the two. She twirled her half-remembered staff in the air as she stood, causing the curtains to split open and slide out of the way. At the same time, bright spotlights hit the two figures revealed.

The blue clown, "Bouncecastle," was performing a balancing act, expertly twirling four teacups and saucers on the tops of tall poles. Two were balanced on her yellow gloves, while the other two were balanced precariously and preposterously on her huge honkers. Those must have been where the "bounce" part of her name came from, as she was able to make them sway with even slight movements of her torso, generating the gyration needed for the act. Although this looked tricky to perform, she seemed to barely be paying it any attention. Instead, her empty eyes were trained on Battler with a sharp glare, as though trying to convey something to him. It might have just been an effort to have him recognize her, as otherwise, it would be impossible to do so through the many layers of buffoonery she'd been shoved into.

Meanwhile, the orange clown, "Lumpydumpy," was perched atop a very tall ladder. She was leaning over and attempting to pour tea into the cups as Bouncecastle balanced. She had an expression of concentration, as if she believed this tricky task could be life-or-**** for her. The pouring only seemed to form half the difficulty: the other came from her impossibly huge caboose, the sheer unnatural size of which threatened constantly to throw her off balance. In fact, she seemed to have been rigged up to a safety harness suspended to the ceiling for her safety (or perhaps to humiliate her as a witch who ought to fly naturally). As another final, strange detail, her thighs were clenched around a pole, tipped in a plush horse's head. Occasionally, she'd temporarily go off-target in her pouring, raining tea down on the head, shoulders, or breasts of her clown on the ground, who barely seemed to notice.

As Battler and Beatrice struggled with what to say, Ange seemed to lose her words, as well. She stared at Battler for a long moment, then turned her attention to Beatrice, thrusting her staff directly toward her chest. "You! Welcome to the show. It's important preparation for your arrival. I'm your hostess, ANGE-Beatrice."

Beatrice worked hard to recollect the dignified appearance she'd planned to present. Somehow, it now felt less like a formality and more like a defense mechanism. "It is my pleasure. I am the Golden Witch, Beatrice. May I say, I love what you've done with the place... Although your idea of entertainment appears to be far different from my own!" She gave what she thought was a charming laugh, but was frustrated to see Ange return it with a blank, half-there stare. "I confess, it is strange to see you of age to drink. You seem to have inherited a stomach for it from your grandfather-"

"It's not 'cause I'm a drunk!" Ange defended herself with a red face, stumbling. "Ahem. I mean, this isn't about how drunk I am. Let me start over. This show is important preparation for your arrival. Yes, you... you fancy magical witch with your dumb little butterflies... You're, uh... Hold on a second, I thought of something clever to say here."

The Golden Witch and her husband watched Ange with concern as the clown show continued on behind her. Suddenly, Ange sprang to life again.

"Right! ****. Tonight's about ****. I offered those two the chance to apologize for messing with my family, and when they didn't I made them clowns. But I'm not even giving you that chance! You took my family away, and my brother, too!"

Beatrice wore a tight smile, trying to figure out how to navigate this outburst. "Now, Ange... Surely, the Witch of Resurrection is broad-minded enough to consider this water under the bridge? Considering you are capable of reviving them at any point, and considering you've understood the deeper meaning to my tale-"

"My brother, too!" Ange repeated herself. "I can hardly even think of Battler anymore because any time I do, I'm always imagining what kind of sick multi-year honeymoon stuff you two are always getting up to. In the first place, you're supposed to be an alchemist for the family, aren't you? You could have used that golden magic of yours to grant the Ushiromiya family's wishes, in the truest sense. Yet instead, you... with your blonde hair and your big boobs..." Her accusation became a ramble once more. "A-anyway! No, I'm not forgiving you. This show is important preparation for your arrival."

The unforgiven witch sighed, crossing her arms. "Yes, you said that already, a couple of times! You know, the ruler of this mansion ought to comport herself with a bit more dignity, mm... I feel like my reputation is at stake here."

Battler was still struggling to decide how he felt about all of this, but he did interject with a laugh. "Oh? I seem to remember another witch getting drunk off her ass and throwing a tantrum during one of the games, ihihi!"

"Not helping!" Beatrice shot back at him. "Ange... er, Lady Ange... what do you mean 'preparation for your arrival?' If you wish for me to speak an apology that I thought was already implicit and beg for forgiveness..." Still frustrated, the witch nevertheless grinned. "You understand I'm not that kind of character, riiiight? I'll be happy to settle any hard feelings in a duel of magic, if needed!"

"No magic fight today," Ange muttered. She didn't grin back, but she did wear a funny smile. "We're having tea, can't you see? You witches looove having tea. It's just about poured..."

"You don't say," Bouncecastle grumbled from the peanut gallery, feeling another trickle splashing around her jester cap.

"It's out!" Lumpydumpy called from the top of her ladder, shaking the teapot to demonstrate it.

Ange shut her eyes, then took a deep breath. "Perfect. I said this show was preparation for your arrival, Beatrice... Now, we're ready." She walked over to the two clowns whose performance was complete. She glanced at the transformed Bernkastel, who was still aimlessly spinning the plates. She met her eyes. Then, with no further warning, she tipped over the ladder. Lambda was left hanging and spinning from the harness, bobbing eccentrically due to her unbalanced weight and clinging onto the fake horse with her thick thighs, as if scared it might drop and hit Ange. Bern, meanwhile, let every dish fall as she tried to run from it, throwing herself on the ground and landing on her cartoonishly huge boobs as the ladder fell on her ass. With her face on the floor, her limbs spread at her sides, and her mammoth mammaries squished below her, there was no hint of the dignity of the Witch of Miracles left.

Beatrice watched this along with her husband, unable to hide her shock. Seeing the two senior witches as bizarre circus performers had been one thing, but seeing Ange actually kicking ladders from under them or onto them was another.

Ange dropped her staff on the floor, then reached up and grabbed the horse pole by the throat. She slid it out from between Lambda's thick thighs, ignoring her squeal. Then, she took a dramatic and tipsy batter's stance, spinning her "bat" with her elbows bent and her eyes squinted. Lambda's candy-stuffed ass was an easy target, even moving, even for a bleary-eyed drunk. She gave a big swing.

It was always going to be a soft hit, considering the bat was headed by a plush toy, but from the way Lambda yowled, anyone would have thought it had been tipped with spikes. That was probably the effect of getting a spanking when you were used to decades of tearing people apart for fun. The strike sent candy flying everywhere. If the colorful-shirted candy-bag of a clown that had been the Witch of Certainty resembled a pinata, that was surely by design.

Although playing with her new party toy had been fun, Lambda's humiliation had only been part of Ange's goal. Tossing the plush-headed rod with her now-typical carelessness, she easily grabbed the teapot Lambda had been holding. She was actually a second too slow, but the teapot politely floated in the air for a moment before it would have landed and shattered, allowing Ange to grab the handle. She raised it easily, demonstrating it was clearly empty... Then, she began to rub the side, as if polishing it. "Back to what I was saying earlier... You should have been granting my family's wishes, Witch. I decided it's not too late for that." She wore a crooked smile. It wasn't as toothy as the grin most people who called themself "Beatrice" wore, but it was full of mischief, all the same. "I've inherited your title, Predecessor, so I've decided to give you a new one. You can be my brother's personal Golden Genie."

"What?" was all Beatrice had time to voice as a complaint before Ange's polishing effort suddenly paid off. The teapot began to whistle, which gave the immediate impression of boiling. Instead of expelling steam, however, it was emitting a vacuum of suction. The former Golden Witch had never seen a magic attack like that before. Frankly, this kind of thing was an illegal move in the world of witches: if Ange was going to pull out a "power move" like this, she was supposed to register it or at least hint at it in the pages of the Mariage Sorciere first! That was just how it worked! Instead, Beatrice was **** to dodge, morphing into a cloud of butterflies as she often did. No human could ever catch a witch in this form.

Unfortunately, ANGE-Beatrice was no longer a human. Her unfair attack was at least as suitable for catching Beatrice in this form. The funnel of suction emitting from the spout was directed by Ange like she was waving a ghost-catching vacuum cleaner, and not a single familiar of Beatrice could escape her sweeping motion.

When Beatrice's butterflies were almost entirely captured, she began to form again, probably figuring that was a reasonable way to escape. After all, the teapot should simply shatter if something the size of a human was caught inside, right? However, Ange's trap wasn't so brittle. Beatrice's human body was only visible for a second, and only from the waist down. Her entire lower body stuck out of the spout impossibly, her feet kicking in distress for just a moment as more and more of her was slurped into the "lamp." Then, with a pop, even her feet disappeared inside. Her clothes, somehow, didn't follow her: everything from her ornate dress to her lacy underwear drifted to a messy pile on the ground.

Ange was smiling at this victory, watching the lid on the teapot jingle as if something was fighting to get out. When she looked over and saw Battler's distressed face, however, her own fell. "Brother... Ah, sorry. It's probably gross seeing your sister using the magic we both hate so much, huh? Even I feel a little nasty doing it."

"Is she... okay?" Battler asked, not looking fully reassured.

"Okay? Yeah, she's fine!" Ange looked upset at the question. "I wouldn't hurt her... I'm not a cruel witch like those three. In fact, she's better than okay! Now she can actually grant your wishes! Ahem..." She rubbed the magic teapot feverishly, seeming eager to prove herself to Battler. "Arise, oh great Golden Genie! You shall serve Ushiromiya Battler!"

Naturally, the genie wasted no time in freeing herself from her cramped prison. When one thought of a genie appearing from a lamp, one might expect a cloud emitting from the spout and solidifying into a majestic form. Instead, Beatrice was **** to knock the lid off the teapot and struggle to get herself free, stretching out with cartoon logic one arm at a time. Soon, her shoulders and up were visible: the visible portion of her body seemed basically bare aside from some golden bangles and a hairpiece, tying her hair up into a distinct blonde up-done ponytail that fell long to her back. Still, she was mostly trapped, and she was struggling to get the next part out. She put her hands on the rim of the teapot and pushed herself up and out...

Finally, her impressive chest came free of her cage. Her two breasts flew upward from the ****, nearly slapping her in the chin. They were exposed except for a golden plate capping each nipple, hanging on as if by magic.

As Beatrice regained her composure, her body kept coming out. Her belly button and slender waist appeared next, followed by her blonde bush and the crack of her ass...

Then, before her legs could join her body, it tapered into a wispy tail. This form presented just enough of her to ruin her modesty, but not enough to give her legs to stretch. The tail still terminated in the lamp, and the body seemed to have no weight, hoisted as effortlessly by Ange as if the vessel was empty. As if to further demonstrate this, Ange shook the pot mercilessly. The action ought to have, by ordinarily logic, caused Beatrice's wispy tail to drift along with it. Instead, it jerked her whole nearly-naked body around with enthusiastic motion, leaving the former witch's boobs slapping from side to side and her blue eyes spinning.

Once that ride came to an end, Beatrice put her hands to her head and groaned. When she recovered, she bared her teeth at Ange. "Disrespectful little girl, I am your predecessor! Your superior! Cease now and I may... s-stop! Stop moving around, damn you!" The captive genie waved in the air as she felt herself being carried back over to the still aimlessly dangling Lumpydumpy.

Ange continued to smile, looking to Battler with a smile as if expecting approval. "A genie that won't grant wishes is no good, huh? I'll have to amuse myself with this toy another way." Effortlessly, Ange began flicking her pot-carrying arm with light motion, recalling a child playing with a paddle ball toy.

The result vaguely resembled the same, as Beatrice's body was repeatedly compressed down and rocketed upward. Because of Ange's repositioning, the top of Beatrice's head was in place to repeatedly impact Lumpydumpy's fat ass in the air. It was true that it could hardly be called the most violent use of a witch's cruel magic. Still, as Beatrice clenched her teeth against the repetitive soft hits and Lambda squirmed from the unfamiliar sensation, it could be called characteristic of the way witches treated others as their playthings.

"Stop, stop!!" Beatrice yelped. "W-wishes, right? I'll grant wishes, just cut it out!"

Ange immediately stopped, having gotten what she wanted. "Good!" She hurried over to Battler again with strange eyes sparkling from her red, drunken face. Nobody would dare cross her and tell her how much that expression resembled her aunt's, back when she had become a witch and "played with" her family to flex her new and wicked power. "Hey, Big Brother. I bet you have all kinds of wishes for your new, willing genie, don't you? A guy like you is bound to have more than a few."

Beatrice shot Battler a **** frown, one that was both begging for help and warning him against any tomfoolery. Unfortunately, Ange's brother still seemed to be dumbfounded (and, Beatrice thought, enjoying the nearly-naked part of her plight a bit too much). She couldn't think of a way out of her predicament, but she couldn't help taking a retaliatory shot at her captor. "Don't you know, Ange? As your dear brother's wife, I make his wishes come true all the time, in all sorts of ways. Why, just one look at my-"

Ange got baited way too easily. She was still smiling, although she spoke in a loud voice when she interrupted her captive. "I know! Big brother, you're a hopeless pervert, right?"

"Who says?" the young man replied, wiping the dumb expression of of his face and tearing his eyes from Beatrice's big, visible, and constantly jostled bosom.

"I'm sure you are," Ange remarked, staring up at Beatrice. "After all, only a hopeless pervert would marry a weak, powerless woman with a crappy attitude, just because she's a blonde and her boobs are kind of big. But my brother can do way better! You'd like a wife with a way more fantastic body, right, Battler?"

Unable to believe what his sister was telling him, Battler still grinned and gave an easy laugh, responding without thinking. "Ihihi! When'd you learn to talk like that, Ange? But uh, yeah, are there really guys who don't want 'em as big as they can find 'em? I really lucked out with your sister-in-law-" he tried on a conciliatory note, trying to remind Ange they were all supposed to be family.

"I heard Battler say he wishes his wife had a crazy body! Genie, get to it. Make that wish come true. They'd better be as big as he's ever seen."

"Get to what?! His wife's body is already- Hey, hey!!" Beatrice complained before being suddenly stopped in her tracks. As if controlled by the golden jewelry on her wrists, her hands suddenly clapped together. Against her will, they were held palm-to-palm. Her head, shoulders, and hips swayed in alternate directions in a **** dance she'd never practiced. As her jaw dropped, she saw that with each bounce to the side, her tits and ass seemed to be ballooning up bigger, swinging more dramatically with each jiggly jerk of her body. Being a weightless genie was turning out to be part blessing, as she could only figure the increasingly heavy hangers she saw swinging in front of her would be a literal pain in the neck otherwise. Still, she was in no mood to count partial blessings. "Ange... this is quite enough playing around, don't you think? Battler, can you please control your sister?!"

Ange shook her head. "Battler's having fun, isn't he? Look, they're bigger than her head! Isn't it great?"

Battler's eyes were growing proportionally to his wife's boobs, but he recognized the time had come to put an end to this. "Uh..." he started.

"He's not satisfied!" Ange interrupted her brother. "I can hardly blame him. The body's just like he'd want, but a guy like you wants to see thighs too, right? And there's still the matter of that creepy, toothy smile of hers, and that mouth that won't stop running. I think I've got an idea of how to fix both of those at once."

With a small hiccup that turned into a burp, Ange began rubbing the lamp again. The suction resumed from the nozzle, despite the fact that the target was already inside. In spite of that, Beatrice found her face being pulled down towards it, her body being **** to bend at the waist. Before she could let out another yelp of protest, her ponytail was being sucked into it; then, with a strange slurp, her head was popped inside as well. On the other hand, her lower body had been pulled further out, allowing her nude body to be seen down to the knees. The end result was a bizarre image: Beatrice was stuck bending down as if she were a diver at a board, her head vanished in the spout and her knees down vanished in the lid, leaving her in a kind of loop that left her bare bottom defenselessly thrust out.

Ange observed her senior's strange bondage with her smile fading. She wandered behind her idly. "How vulgar..." Without hesitating, she landed a couple of hard slaps on the witch's pale backside, leaving her new and impossibly curvy body jiggling, her free arms thrashing around for a target they couldn't see. "Don't you want a turn, Battler? It's supposed to be a present for you."

"..."

Her brother had a faraway look on his face. As he witnessed his sister pulled into the world of witches in the most textbook way, taking **** upon others who had wronged her in a fake world of magic where anything was possible, he considered what he ought to do. He was remembering what he'd been told about magic in the past: humans could be shown any kind of impossible image, but the important thing was to look past the illusion and understand the intent behind that illusion. He was thinking about what he needed to do.

Ignoring the humiliated witches around him, he focused on the one in control. He approached his sister without hesitation, showing her that she was his focus. Finally, he put his hand on her head. "Ange... This isn't a present for me, right? It's a present for you. It's your birthday, after all."

Ange glared at him with a frustrated expression. "No, Big Brother, this is supposed to be for you! I turned them all into humiliating, perverted toys because they needed to be punished for what they did to you... For taking you away from me! That's what you'd want if you had magic, isn't it?"

Battler crossed his arms. "Nobody took me from you. I'm right here, aren't I? And Ange... we already won a victory for our family and for humans, remember? You don't have anything you need to prove to anyone. But putting that side, this is your birthday! If this is what you want to do with it, you should enjoy yourself. But if it's not... maybe you should put an end to this? You've been, uh, hitting the sauce pretty hard for a first timer. I remember when the old bastard used to, he'd always talk about his regrets after. You don't want to have a bunch of regrets, do you?"

Ange looked at her feet. Then, she hugged her brother and began sobbing into his chest. "If I was going to spend my birthday as a witch... I should have spent it with my family... making them happy with my magic..."

Her brother said nothing, patiently stroking her head and letting her work it out. He only spoke up when she's been quiet for a while. "So you aren't happy with how this turned out?"

"... I guess it's fine. It was pretty funny. And..." Ange paused, looking as thoughtful as she could when so thoroughly sloshed. "I think I might be a lesbian. Or bi, or something. Because if all of this wasn't for you, and it was for me instead, this is... I mean, it's kinda uh... One of those dreams that means something, maybe."

Battler said nothing in response to that either, this time because he had no idea what to say. He just gave her another pat, knowing she'd have to work it out of her system and that it might take the rest of the night. Of course, regrets wouldn't be the only thing Ange would be working out of her system tonight, he thought to himself with a painful wince.

Just when he was thinking that this might finally be wrapping up, there was a loud knocking from the sound behind the two of them.

Bouncecastle, the clown who'd been forgotten as an afterthought, was standing with a hint of her amused, cruel expression visible under her heavy makeup. She was holding the staff Ange had discarded in her drunken stupor earlier. "In your tawdry, imitation play-world, this thing is a symbol of Beatrice's authority, isn't it?" As if in answer to her question, she felt her body morphing back into its original form: straight purple hair, a slender body, and a tasteful gown instead of carnival wear. She tapped the staff's butt on the ground a couple more times, enjoying the sound. "Yes... Lambda," she spoke without turning around, "Isn't it time the two of us show these two humans how real witches play?"

She continued to sneer at Ange, although her sneer began to falter when she didn't hear a response from her fellow great witch. "Lambda...?" She tapped the staff on the ground again and felt no impact, accompanied by silence. She realized with frustration that the staff had been replaced by Ange's other magic implement of the night, a wine bottle.

Ange let out a shaky burp, then wiped at her lips. "I never said the staff was powering my magic, idiot!"

Bernkastel scowled deeply, releasing the trump card she'd collected and letting it crash pointlessly to the floor. "Imbecile... You're the one who's not following the rules. There's evidence in the stories that Beatrice uses her pipe as a wand in the stories. If you simply make up... thingsh...?" The witch's complaints came to a stop as she suddenly got a strange sensation in her cheeks and lips. "Ange, if you turn me into a clown again, sho help me--!"

"No, I'm done turning you into furniture for entertainment. You really weren't that funny. Instead, I thought you might work better as an appliance."

Bernkastel considered her capacity for cruel and unusual punishment exceptional, but even she couldn't imagine what was happening to her. On the other hand, she did realize Lambda's chirping had been suspiciously silent. Even if she wasn't in the mood for bragging or threats, she ought to at least be whining. She turned to her fellow senior witch, and seeing what was happening to her was informative.

From the neck down, Lambda looked like her ordinary pop-cute pink-dressed self. Her face, however, wore a look that Bern was sure must match her own in bafflement. More importantly, her mouth had grown huge, circular, and basically featureless, with her nose nowhere to be found. Inside of her bowl-shaped mouth, her teeth and tongue looked painted on, and any attempts to move her mouth simply resulted in a rubbery pop. As she felt around her head, probably alarmed by whatever similar transformation she was seeing in Bernkastel, her arms suddenly shot to her sides, leaving her straight as a rod. As her head turned to point up, the rest of her body grew stiffer and stiffer. Her extremities seemed to recede, from her toes to her fingers and the peaks of her breasts, all flattening until they were painted images on the cylinder that remained of her body. All form and texture of her clothing were becoming details, painted on to her new rigid and immovable form. Then, once she'd taken a recognizable form with a bowl-shaped rubber head and rod-shaped handle, she began to shrink, more and more detail disappearing.

Bernkastel intended to whirl around and protest this treatment, to launch an attack, make a threat, or try some diplomacy, when she suddenly found her feet couldn't rotate at all. Actually, it was as if her legs had fused together, yet were curling into a fetal position at the same time, as if her body was giving up the notion of moving anywhere at all. The hem of her long gown extended until it fully reached the floor and seemed to fuse there, almost as a pedestal. Meanwhile, she had felt her mouth growing both wider and longer. Her lips were stretching from her face, eventually reaching the point where she could see what looked like a flat plate just by glancing down. She tried to feel what it was, but she found her hands were now useless: one was stuck in a strange formation as if trying to make a bunny ear too low on her head, while the other had lost form entirely and disappeared.

She was surprised to find she could still speak, and even more surprised to find that doing so resulted in the "plate" she'd seen before raising and lowering. The new feature, which she realized was behaving as her lips, was wide enough and in her face enough to completely block her side when she yelled. "Ange!!" When she talked, there was a splashing sound. She felt like her mouth was full of water she couldn't spit out.

The only proper witch remaining in the room was admiring her handiwork. "It's always concerning when they start making noise... Luckily, I have a servant for this tonight."

With a loud snap of her fingers, she summoned her aunt Eva, who appeared in a barely-announced cloud of butterflies. She was now at least granted the dignity of her maid uniform, but she was still very much a maid. It seemed she'd also learned the score in terms of how things worked, even if she didn't understand why. "You called, oh great Lady ANGE-Beatrice?" When she followed Ange's line of sight, what she saw confused her even further. "Why are these things in the lobby?"

"Don't worry about it. More importantly, it's stopped up. It's so full of <shit> that it's started making funny noises when it ought to work totally silently. Can you do something about that?"

Eva, understanding what she was being asked to do, probably saw this as another part of her own humiliation, nothing more. Her own concerns were so great that she didn't spare a thought to the strange plunger she was picking up, its rubber head decorated with pink and yellow, painted with cute red bows, and bearing a pair of oddly intelligent and justifiably horrified amber-colored eyes. It made a couple of useless pop-pop sounds as if in complaint, quiet enough that it could be confused for the suction noise of picking it up off the floor.

The toilet next to it, on the other hand, was protesting loudly. "Damn you, Ussshiromiya Eva, you worthlesssh piessh! Don't you dare... don't you even think about it!!" It was, surely, quite a fancy toilet, decorated with its tank painted blue-violet, its lid and bowl sparkling porcelain, and its base solid black with an odd decorative pattern like a fringe at the lowest point. Still, it was more notable for the way the painted-on purple eyes expressed offense and hatred, as well as, obviously, the way a woman's voice came through it, distorted, as if speaking around a mouthful of water.

None of this mattered at all to Eva. If Ange had told her to pick up a sword and slay a dragon, she'd have done it just as readily, and she would have ignored any hateful words spewed by the dragon just the same. She wasn't ordinarily one for manual labor, but she had raised a child, and she'd grown up around the kind of awful western appliances her father tended to favor. Thus, she was well familiar with how to use a plunger. She didn't hesitate to lift Lambdadelta easily into the air, hold Bernkastel's interfering lid open, and begin going to work, jamming one witch into the other with the necessary **** to do the job.

Since they were only appliances, this obviously wasn't meant as any disrespect. For the witches-turned-appliances, however, this was a new sensation that would surely chase away boredom for another hundred years. Neither of them had been able to guess how it'd feel until they'd actually made contact, Lamda's plunger lips sucking on the inside of Bernkastel's wet bowl. As it turned out, it felt like the sloppiest, sloshiest, messiest kiss either of them had ever experienced. Both of their eyes screwed up at the powerful and unwelcome sensation. Regardless of any complex love-hate feelings the two might have to each other, for the moment, each of them could only count the dreadful seconds as the **** continued.

When contact was finally broken, Lambda and Bern were both panting as well as their new forms allowed them to, their painted-on eyes spinning in wide spirals. Eva only scratched her head. "My apologies, Lady ANGE-Beatrice... I've done my best, but nothing's coming out."

Ignoring her servant's apologies, Ange was laughing far harder than she had at the two as clowns, nearly in tears after seeing the witches brought so low. She couldn't remember laughing like this in years! "Aha... ha... **** is really amazing, isn't it?!"

"You mean magic?" Bernkastel retorted with spite, unable to help herself. "This doessshn't even count. It'sssh all a delusshsion brought on by an ****-indusshed dream. You've had your fun... Now, it'sssh time to wrap thissh up. You've got to be about to wake up by now, ssshurely..."

Battler had been watching with a tight smile, unable to share his sister's laughter but perfectly able to understand her sentiment. "She does have a point... Anyway, there's another level of regret to **** that's coming up, and you're probably not going to be around friends and family when it happens. You'll make it through okay, though... Probably."

Ange stared at him without comprehension... Then, as if on cue, she began to feel it. She had a sudden, growing dizzy feeling. The color began to drain from her face. "Big bro, I think I'm gonna be... s-sick..."

The plunger began to pop with alarm, and Bernkastel's voice joined it. "No. No!! Ange, don't you dare! This issh your dream, moron! Jusssht wake up and... d-do that in your own damn bathroom if you have to! Or do it sshomewhere elsssh! Anywhere but here, in the middle of the lobby of your damn pressshussh family manssshion!" As the green-gilled lady of the mansion approached, and as Battler picked up his wife's teapot and began transporting her humiliating form out of what was about to become a gruesome scene, Bernkastel's lid continued to flap desperately. "Don't you do it. Don'tsshyou do it!!"

---

Whatever happened after that, I didn't bother to record. What I've recorded so far was enough for our purpose: a record of the first and last time I went wild with magic, and a warning against excessive **** consumption I've kept close to my heart.

Since then, I haven't seen Bernkastel, Lambda, Beatrice, or any other witch again. Maybe that's for the best.