「Child.」
"...!"
「Listen to my words.」
A chilling, eerie voice, heavy with awe, struck Rian's mind.
"Ugh..."
He recognized the voice, and his entire body felt as if it were twisting. There was no pain, which only made it more unpleasant. It felt as though his flesh were sloshing like jelly or being wrung out like a pretzel.
Simultaneously, a vague, distant fear—like being cast into the void of space—tightened around his throat.
A nausea that transcended mere motion sickness scrambled his brain.
'It's agonizing.'
No sooner had that thought crossed his mind than—
「Se...aaaaah..?!」
The distant, unpleasant voice let out a sound like air escaping a balloon, shrinking with a *psshhhhew*.
「W-what is this!?」
As the voice, previously so dignified and terrifying, shifted into an incredibly cute, dainty tone, the nausea in his head subsided.
Rian opened his tightly shut eyes and looked toward the source of the sound. A cute creature the size of a human head floated in mid-air.
It had a round face, a stubby body, and eyes like chocolate balls. Its mouth was shaped like the number three, resembling an otter.
'Uh... a magical girl mascot?'
The creature, resembling a magical girl mascot, wore a thoroughly flustered expression. It lifted its soft cheeks with small, stubby hands as it spoke.
「Why has the great me become such an ugly thing!」
It huffed in fury, but even that was cute. Rian stared at the creature in silence, then quickly reached out and grabbed it. His rough handling squashed its cute face like a dumpling.
「Uet?」
Perhaps never imagining it would be grabbed so roughly, the mascot let out a deflated sound. Rian kneaded it like dough as he spoke.
"Did you drag me here?"
「Ueeet, euoooh... st-stopiiiit...」
With its face squashed this way and that, the creature's words came out garbled. Even so, Rian didn't stop.
'You have to properly break the spirit of these mascot-type bastards to make them talk.'
That was right. In the Gag World, there were, of all things... magical girls! Magical girls in the Gag World could be anyone regardless of age or gender—tired office workers, middle-aged men, or grandmothers.
The problem was that those who became magical girls didn't do it because they wanted to.
Entities called mascots created black companies, using their cute appearances to deceive others into signing fraudulent contracts. Simply put, the magical girls were the victims, and the mascots were scammers preying on innocent people.
Rian had encountered mascot scam rings a few times.
He had witnessed one smoking heavily in a secluded spot, berating a subordinate in a heavy voice, only to turn to a pretty woman and say in a cute voice, "Won't you become a magical girl? Let's protect the world together!"
If it had looked like a thug, the pretty lady would have slipped away, but because it had a cute exterior, it easily lowered the target's guard.
Rian had immediately rushed over and kicked the fawning weasel mascot, *bam!* The pretty lady was worried about the scammer, but once Rian showed her a wanted poster he'd peeled off a telephone pole, she realized it was a dangerous fraud and thanked him.
From that day on, Rian was marked by the crazy weasel mascot.
The weasel mascot, who held a fairly high rank, started chasing Rian like a madman, claiming he would turn Rian into a cute, adorable pretty girl to work for him.
Coercion, threats, kidnapping, and so on.
After overcoming all sorts of dangers, Rian discovered the mascots' weakness. They were vulnerable to violent skinship. If you stroked their backs roughly or kneaded them like dough, they would melt into a puddle and tuck their tails.
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Ever since learning that fact, whenever Rian found a mascot, he would first break its spirit by kneading its whole body until it turned to mush before starting a conversation.
That was why he had started kneading the creature in front of him the moment he saw it.
「Th-this, let goooo, hnyuuuuh...」
The creature let out a cute breath, *hnyuuuuh...*, and began to go limp. Its round eyes half-closed, and its three-shaped mouth went slack.
Rian stopped his hands then and spoke.
"Why did you bring me here? Where is this? And who are you?"
As he rattled off his questions, the limp creature went *boing!* and regained its round shape. The eyebrows above its chocolate-ball eyes slanted diagonally, showing a confident expression.
「Hmph, why should I tell you that?」
Seeing it wiggle its stubby legs as if throwing a kick and pout its lips, Rian steeled his heart.
'I didn't want to use "that technique"...'
Just as Rian was resolving to do something, the creature was staring straight into Rian's eyes.
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「'The traces of Hamulina were cut off from this human, and there are even traces of a stupid god left, so I tried to rummage through his head... but how did I end up in this state?'」
The creature was the boss... or something similar, of Hamulina, who had been swallowed after hiding deep in Rian's psyche. They perceived the flow of time very slowly, so they hadn't questioned Hamulina being absent for three years.
But it was a different matter for an existence to disappear completely. They were faithful servants of 'That Person,' so they were beings who couldn't—and shouldn't—die easily.
In such a situation, Hamulina had been erased as if by an eraser, so it was only natural for her boss to be flustered.
「'Even if my body is in this state, the Authority I received from That Person remains! I don't know how he turned my body into this, but... if I rummage through his head, I'll find out!'」
The creature looked deep into Rian's pupils, known as the gateway to the soul, with an arrogant expression. Since the creature's status was vastly higher, the opponent should go insane just by meeting its soul.
If that happened, Rian would naturally fall under its command, and it would be able to escape this ridiculous form. Plus, it would be able to know exactly what kind of power Rian possessed.
「'Heh heh, come now... show me your soul.'」
As its chocolate-ball eyes sparkled, the creature looked beyond Rian's eyes. And...
「...?」
Nothing was visible.
「'That shouldn't be possible?'」
To look into a soul, one must first peer into the mental world, the bridge connecting body and soul. But the 'mental world,' that connecting part, was empty, filled only with pitch-black darkness.
「'I couldn't observe the mental world of a mere human?'」
Her pride wounded, she activated her Authority strongly. Then, as if eyes adjusting to the dark, something began to appear.
「'Hmph, as expected, the mental world of a human is...'」
Arrogantly gloating to herself, she discovered ▉ in the darkness.
▉ was looking at her...
"Tickle, tickle."
「Hkyaaa..! Kyaaahahaha!」
Because Rian started mercilessly tickling its soft body, the Authority was canceled, and its life—which had been pushed into the tiger's maw—was saved.
Rian, unaware of this, just kept moving his hands, intent on conquering the mascot.
The ticklishness, pouring down before it could even feel relieved about surviving a situation where it almost ceased to exist, was unbearably intense. She shed tears and thrashed about.
"Still not going to talk? You won't tell me?"
「Hit, hi-hic! Stop, stop! Uhyahyaaat!」
It swatted at Rian's hands with its stubby, soft hands and even showed tears, but Rian keenly knew it wasn't time yet.
Rian only stopped his cruel tickling when the creature seemed to be gasping for air.
「Hii... hiii...」
The creature went limp in Rian's hands, gasping for breath. After some time, having regained some stability, the creature rolled its eyes and began to break into a cold sweat.
Rian thought the mascot was finally in a state where it could communicate, but the reason she started watching Rian's reaction was because of ▉, whom she had encountered in Rian's mental world.
「'What on earth was that earlier? I-it was like facing That Person.'」
She shook her head lightly at the blasphemous thought that had occurred to her without her knowing.
「'Ugh... now I know why Hamulina disappeared so suddenly. She must have disappeared because of that monster-like thing from earlier.'」
As she trembled in fear, Rian asked a question with a pleased expression.
"I'll ask again. Where is this? Who are you? Why did you bring me here?"
「Th-that...」
She could no longer ignore Rian's words. Her body trembled in fear of those eyes staring straight at her.
「The truth is...」