[$20] Factory AU#2.2: The Chocolate Shoreside (Beta Copy) (Patreon)

Emi and the Chocolate Mines 2

Emi followed the passageway further and further down, the axe hefted to rest on her shoulder.

Her arms were beginning to ache, and the axe itself felt more than a bit heavy. Had she really eaten three of these tools, only minutes ago?

“Ouuaaaggghhh…” another groan came up from the darkness below. It sounded thicker than it should, the voice deeper and more resonate as opposed to its owner’s formally light tone.

To be fair, the girl had been changed from her formally light body.

Emi kept going, her subconscious mind enjoying the slither that whispered up from her grumbling tummy. Her hand skating along the side of the tunnel, Emi’s chocoholic wants tried to steal her attention.

‘Where did this tunnel lead?’ it asked. ‘Will it get me more chocolate? How deep are these mines, anyhow?’

Ahead of her, in the faint light, she saw the bottom level out into a flat chocolate plane. Where most of the shafts looked rocky with bumps, this opening was a completely flat surface, as if fudge had been sliced with a knife.

Emi loved fudge.

Hunger coursed through the young girl like a rippling tide. She had to keep moving. Couldn’t stop, not yet. But with her fingers tightening on her chocolate tool, her mind begged the question, ‘Can I eat while I walk?’

Emerald eyes slowly turned towards the axe head. So close to her nose, the scent of chocolate was overpowering, accompanied by the wet gurgling from Emi’s desire-stuffed belly.

Surely, she wouldn’t need both ends of the pick. She could easily mine this entire place out with one end. All she needed was one point, and then it wouldn’t be so heavy.

Right?

Really, it would be stupid not to eat the chocolate.

She’d be stupid not to stuff her face. Chocolate is too good to just be some silly pickaxe. It wasn’t meant for this. It was meant for Emi!

Then, like wind being released from a too-tight balloon, Emi felt a shock to her senses as she left the tunnel. The flattened ground felt odd in her legs, the sudden emptiness startling her eyes.

Emi turned up and her mouth dropped open, emitting a small, awe-stricken “Oooh…”

The yellow lamp could barely make out the ceiling, far far above in this dark chocolate heaven. An area so large that it felt like a vacuum of empty space and chilly air, Emi noticed several railways running through the rooms center and bits of machinery that were set against the walls.

Multiple minecarts, packed with shredded chunks of chocolate rock, were strewn about the complex rail system, with lines heading down multiple tunnels. Some tunnels, Emi noticed, were lit with the rock candy lights, while others, like the one she’d came from, were completely abandoned. Some of these passages were stacked onto higher layers, platforms of chocolate giving the appearance of a silent hive.

“It’s a quarry,” Emi gapped, turning in a circle as she plodded towards the center. “A chocolate quarry…”

The hungry girl noticed the rails seemed to be paired with the glowing candies in some sort of pattern. An industrialization, perhaps those were the passages that would lead back towards the wrapping room. But there were so many others, so much to explore, and it was hers.

All hers.

With a vibration from her stomach that echoed throughout the quarry, Emi Ibarazaki began to drool over the scope of her possession. So much chocolate, so many bites, and Emi would indulge and indulge and indulge.

She’d nearly forgotten herself, and would have gave in completely to the serpent’s temptation had she not heard a quiet moan drifting up from one of the unlit tunnels.

Emi swallowed, mentally kicking herself before hurrying towards the darkness. Her dim light spread over the chocolate walls, showing a downward path that quickly leveled out.

Another groan floated up with a soft, whiny, “Help…”

Emi trotted down the short slope, with the tunnel’s exit opening up as she reached another flat platform. The ceiling and walls spread into an empty void, a cave that Emi’s headlamp could not properly illuminate, though they plainly showed the center of her concern.

A very round, very exasperated, blonde blueberry.

Lilly Satou moaned again. She lay on her back with her eyes tightly shut, clearly overwhelmed with the dizziness from being rolled end over end. Her long blonde hair shook as she twisted her head back and forth, eyes screwed shut. Her hands, tiny blue appendages that were almost absorbed by her body, clenched and unclenched, while a gentle rocking jiggled throughout her fat-covered body.

She was trying to move, Emi realized. The look of distress on her fattened blue face, the light bobbing that wobbled her belly, Lilly was trying to sit up. To bend at a waist that was wider than the blueberry was tall, and emitting a gentle slosh from all the liquid inside of her.

Tea, the chocoholic remembered.

Emi saw the wall just beyond Lilly, which she’d clearly rebounded from before coming to a stop on her back. She opened her mouth to say something, but both girls went silent as a very loud noise echoed throughout the cavern.

*Plop*

Emi turned towards the noise, her mouth falling open in silent wonder, as Lilly’s wobbling slowly came to a cease.

“T-that wasn’t me… was it?” the blueberry asked, her voice sounding raspy and dry.

Emi couldn’t answer.

To her left, not ten feet away from where the blueberry lay, was a dark ocean of soft, gooey, melted chocolate. It shined in the light of Emi’s headlamp, an underground spring of liquid chocolate that went on further than she could see.

With her stomach quaking enough to jiggle her thighs, Emi shot past Lilly, dropping her pickaxe and ignoring the blonde’s sudden panic-filled gasp.

She flung herself to her knees, cupping her hands and plunging them into the mass. It was warm, prickles of heat flooding up to her wrists and making a part of her realize just how cold the mines were before Emi’s mind was silenced.

Like sifting through cream, gooey and heavy and oh so enticing, Emi lifted her hands to her mouth and drank ravenously. She hungrily and animatedly slurped from the mess before loudly lapping at her chocolate-stained hands. Warmth spilled down her throat, stimulating her body and filling it with its hot reassurance.

This mine was hers.

All hers.

She plunged her hands back in and drank more, giggling with glee from this heady sensation. The warmth spread over her hands, cascaded up her pudge-covered arms, before tickling her shoulder and throat in a tender embrace. The serpent’s tongue flickered across her body, a wonderous sensation like a kiss on the neck, while the warmth quickly centered inside of her growing, hungry tummy.

Drinking it was so easy, so quick, but it wasn’t fast enough for the wanting Emi. She couldn’t lift the drink to her mouth fast enough, dipping lower and lower until she was bent over the sea, the tips of her twintailed hair dipping into the chocolate. She was about to plunge her face into the mass when she heard a cough from behind her.

Emerald fire burned brighter than her lamp as she spun to face the unwelcome interruption, her light brown hair whipping brown trickles of chocolate onto the floor.

Lilly lay there, unworking eyes rolled to her forehead as she fruitlessly tried to turn upwards. “W-water,” she scraped, her voice sounding weaker. She coughed again, her entire body bobbing from the simple exertion. Her blind eyes shut, her hands waggled, but she still couldn’t move. Her fingers went limp and she opened her eyes again. “Water,” she managed again. “Please. My throat is so dry...”

Emi blinked at her. How could she have possibly forgotten that Lilly was there? She was so close to her, only ten feet away, and she needed her help.

Emi turned, dipping her hands into the chocolate pond, and quickly drank the small pool she’d gathered. Again, the intoxicating aroma flowed over her, and she felt herself quiver in happiness.

Then she shook her head and stuck her tongue out, whipping at it with the cuff of her fur coat. What the heck was th-

Her tongue met a bit of chocolate on her stained wrist and again she felt herself shake, letting out a low moan of pleasure.

“H-hello?” managed Lilly, before devolving into a fit of coughs. Emi looked at her, the soft yellow light illuminating Lilly’s round blue body. She could see her hands clench and pivot, giving the impression she was trying to cough into her hand.

Emi pursed her lips before closing her eyes before dipping her hands into the liquid, her spine turned to steel. The chocolate was sending needle pricks of pleasure through the palms of her hands.

‘Just drink it. There’s plenty. Why would you share what’s yours?’

Emi forced herself to stand up. Each step felt like a hurdle of effort. She had to open her eyes to make sure she was heading the right way and barely had enough will to lock her lips when she dipped her face into the chocolate. She pulled back and gasped a breath of air, chocolate dripping from her chin and nose. Taking the last few steps in a hurry, she came to Lilly’s head.

“Open!” she ordered, not waiting before dipping her hands.

Lilly barely had enough time to spread her plump lips before the cupful of warm chocolate rushed into it. Her tongue, which Emi noticed was startlingly its normal pink color, was quickly drowned in the gooey warm chocolate. Some pooled over her blue lips, with gravity sending a drip streaming towards her blonde hair.

It was too much for her.

Emi braced herself on Lilly, bending over and catching the drip with her tongue. The sweetness of the chocolate was enough to nearly drop the chocoholic down to her knees, a moan escaping her lips and a purr from her belly.

“Umm…” Emi opened her eyes to see Lilly’s blind blue ones gazing back at her. Both of her hands were braced against the tops of Lilly’s towering blue breasts, her tremendous cleavage poking through several gaping holes in her shirt where golden buttons had been ripped free when she’d swelled. Her round cheeks were a vibrant violet with Emi’s twin tails framing a very uncomfortable look. “Please, umm… Please don’t… do that?”

“Oh my gosh,” Emi exclaimed, tipping backwards and landing on her butt. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry I just saw the- and then I- Oh my God I can’t believe I did that!”

Lilly rocked slightly forwards from Emi’s push before tipping back again. Her long hair spilled into Emi’s lap. “Emi? Is that you?” she stared quizzically. “Thank goodness, I’ve been rolling for… I don’t know,” Lilly said, puckering her chocolate-marked lips in a juicy pout. “I was so dizzy. Is there any water nearby? Or are we back in the room with the river?” Her face changed, blonde eyebrows raising in fear and she began in a pleading voice, “Oh please don’t let me fall in that river, Misha nearly clogged up the tube and I’m sure she’s not nearly as large as I am now…”

Emi reached up, touching Lilly’s blushing cheek. “Woah woah woah, there’s no river. We’re in the Chocolate Mines. You, err, rolled way way down here. There’s a little lake, I think.”

Lilly’s head hung back, and Emi could barely see her short fat neck below her chin before it smoothed into her blueberry body. “Chocolate Mines? A chocolate lake? My… Oh, my…” A long, slow breath greatly lifted her belly before letting it out. “Would you be so kind to get me another mouthful? My throat is a… a bit parched…” Lilly coughed lightly.

When she’d taken the tea, her usually soft-spoken speech had heightened into a worrying pitch while her body rushed into immobility, and while she’d been relatively quiet when they first rolled her away to the tune of blueberry rock, Emi remembered the intensity of her screams as she tumbled down the mineshaft.

A pang of empathy struck a chord in her stomach, and the light brunette nodded. “Of course.” Emi swung around to her hands and knees before finding her footing, lifting herself up while her headlamp spread wide, letting the girl appraise her classmate.

Lilly Satou was wider than she was tall now, and she had already been much taller than the lithe little Emi. Now, Emi only came up to a little above halfway of the blueberry while she lay on her back.

In the light of Emi’s headlamp, Lilly’s fruity blue skin shimmered with a bright highlight, and leaving dark shadows around the curve of her body. Lightly askew, Emi could see the lip of Lilly’s navel, now so fat and pulled tight that had become a horizontal roll. The grandiose belly stuck out over her dark blue pants as if she had eaten a few hundred pies too many and revealing all the gaps in her clothing.

The stretching powder had done wonders, saving several unburst buttons from Lilly’s blue button-down, but her pants must have torn from all of the rolling, with a rip at the seams showing smooth blue fat that pushed for any way to escape. It took a moment for Emi to notice that she also had a different sort of smell from the surrounding chocolate environment.

Lilly smelled like blueberries.

And that taste…

Emi cleared her throat. “I could roll you over there, if you like?”

Lilly pursed her lips. “I’d rather you didn’t… I don’t want to,” she paused, her tongue moving about in her mouth as she tried to find her words. “Get too close...”

Emi nodded to herself. “Okay, sure. That makes sense.” Emi went to the chocolate’s edge, barely noticing the desire this time, and quickly returned to Lilly.

When Lilly opened her mouth, Emi tipped it in this time, being gentler and pouring it in slowly. The blueberry swallowed two gulps of chocolate before sighing, her taunt body sagging ever so slightly.

“That’s better,” she said. “I was afraid I’d hurt my throat… although before I suppose I was simply afraid.” Lilly closed her eyes and smiled a bit sadly. “Thank you, Emi.” Then she opened them, her body slightly bouncing in place as her body was still capable of moving. “How are you? Are you well?”

Emi blinked a couple times at that, not knowing how to respond. Surely, Lilly’s problems were bigger than hers, even as there was a growing discomfort inside of her body. The smell of blueberries overpowered the chocolate, while Lilly’s eyes seemed to look right through her.

Emi looked down at herself, seeing the damage that was constantly being done to her former figure. She looked like she had eaten Emi Ibarazaki, practically doubled in size while her hips and her belly tried to hide her legs from her sight. she raised a hand to rub behind her head, intent on claiming she was fine, but was cut off by her fur jacket tearing at the arm.

The ripping noise was immensely loud in the silent cavern.

“Ah… I understand…” Lilly said softly.

“Wonderful,” Emi grumbled lowering her arm looking for the tear. “I’ve already snapped one of my stockings. The other has rips in it too…”

Lilly waited for a moment before blushing. “Are you wearing anything else?” she asked slowly.

Emi narrowed her eyes before rolling them. She found the rip around the back of the jacket and felt a slight electric shock at the squishy feeling of the doughy skin that spilled though the rip. She pinched her pillowy side in frustration and began looking herself over.

“I’m wearing clothes,” she said. “A jacket… and a dress.”

“Oh?” Lilly’s head tilted. “Hmm… you never seemed one for dresses.”

“Yeah, well, this one probably won’t last too much longer…”

The pink fabric stuck to her like a second skin, pulled so sheer that she could see her skin beneath her the yellow glow of her helmet. She tried to get the fur coat off, but it wouldn’t budge over her fluff-packed arms.

“Gaaah,” Emi made a noise of discomfort, hands falling to her waist and grabbing handfuls of fat. She shook her belly and it bounced up and down, and beneath the layers of chocoholic lust she could just start to feel her belly’s contents.

Emi was packed to the brim. Stuffed from her toes, up to her nose, with heavy chocolate, and it was filling her out. She noticed her thighs touching, no, molestingone another, spilling out over the remains of her socks and giving her prosthetics a comedic look while they strained to hold onto her. Both hands on her belly, Emi twisted to see the hem of her dress sitting atop of a wide butt shelf.

“When did I turn into a friking pear?!” she grunted, hopping once and feeling the large strain on her runner’s muscles, hidden far below all of her now jiggling flab.

The blueberry sighed. “I wish I was a pear.” The tea inside of her sloshed as she awkwardly kicked and her body bounced. “And the worst part is that I’m actually hungry. What a day to pack a light lunch…”

Emi looked up at Lilly’s immense body, back to herself, and quickly decided things could be much, much worse.

Still though...

Emi turned to the chocolate pond, muttering to herself in a spiteful vow, “I am so eating all of the chocolate in here.” If this place thought it could change her, she’d show it just how wrong it was.

She would change it.

The serpent slithered around her stomach, causing it to mewl in agreement.

Lilly, though, was clearly confused by the proclamation. “Shouldn’t we be trying to find some way out?” she asked.

Emi looked up from her belly to Lilly’s confused blue face.

She didn’t have to be here. She wasn’t even supposed to be here!

Emi was going to eat these mines all by herself!

It was hers!

“Yeah!” Emi hopped, “Of course!” She looked around Lilly back to the entrance.

The slope seemed a lot higher going back up than it had going down.

“So how do we go about doing that?” Lilly asked. “And, umm… if you wouldn’t mind getting me some more chocolate?”

Emi looked from the entrance back to Lilly, the deep purple blush filling her fattened cheeks and smooth round chin. “Sure,” she shrugged before heading to the pond.

She turned and went for more of the stream, her mind now occupied with how to get Lilly out of here. If she could somehow get her back up to the main pathway, then she could take her pickaxe and head further…

“Damnit,” Emi cussed, her hands full of chocolate and missing the ache of her heavy tool. A taste flickered over her tongue, something not chocolate, and which had been bothering her since she licked Lilly’s cheek.

Lilly bobbed, “Emi? Is everything okay?”

“Huh? Oh, sorry,” Emi said. She drew nearer to Lilly. Just thinking. The only way back would mean rolling you up the ramp. Here, open.”

Lilly complied. A bit of the chocolate washed over her lips as her tongue moved. Emi caught the drop with a finger while Lilly swirled the liquid around in her mouth once, filling out her fat cheeks before swallowing it back.

The blonde blueberry sagged with a satisfied sigh. “For all of today’s…” she paused, lightly rocking, “oddities, he still does really make good chocolate.”

“You mean Hisao?”

Lilly nodded. “Yes. It has such an acute taste to it, so rich and creamy. My mother used to send Akira and I imported sweets from Belgium, but in comparison to this…” her head shook.

“You seem to be taking this all quite well,” Emi remarked.

Lilly blinked, before her eyes fell to halfway. “I know my current condition is…” she let out a much deeper sigh, “worrying. That fact is certainly not lost on me. And I appreciate you waiting to discuss it with me besides simply… Well, rolling me up the ramp.”

Emi grimaced. She didn’t think it’d been obvious, but Lilly had always seemed more observant than others. She must have quickly put together Emi’s own discomfort with the idea, pushing a girl that was multiple times her own fattened size.

“We should start on though,” Lilly folded her lips, her face quickly becoming more uncomfortable. “If you’re hungry, of course. Sipping chocolate is hardly filling.”

A very, very, very low, very wet growl emanated from the blueberry. Lilly’s face went entirely purple, the coloration affecting even her chest in the dim yellow light.

“I-I’m so sorr-” she began, but was cut off by the bright noise of Emi giggling.

“A light lunch, huh?” Emi asked, lifting up on her tip toes and poking towards the height of Lilly’s belly.

The blueberry tenses, as if trying to fold her chin into her flesh so she may hide herself. “I-it was only a sandwich… it seems so quaint now. I’d have something gummy when we arrived in the first room, but other than that…”

“Well, at least you had a cup of tea,” Emi said sisterly, poking Lilly’s side much to the berry’s ill-amusement.

“Oh, yes. Quite filling,” her blush grew even hotter before returning to a deep blue. “I can hardly imagine my stomach’s size, but it feels almost empty.”

Emi shrugged. “Well, we’re inside of a chocolate mineshaft. Would you like some chocolate? I’ve got a pickaxe.”

Lilly paused for almost ten full seconds before asking, “Is it really edible?” she asked.

Emi huffed a chuckle before heading back to her pick. “Gimmie a second, you can try some yourself.”

She noticed Lilly move, closing her eyes and nodding in appreciation. Her blue hands turned inward, cupping her round sides as if again trying to move, and then Emi saw Lilly’s face shift to annoyance. “I very much dislike that I still feel as if I could put my hands together and bow…”

Emi walked over to the wall, still looking at Lilly. “It’s kinda hard to do that when you’re a blueberry.”

Lilly’s lips puckered in disapproval. “Please, don’t call me that. I’m not a blueberry, I am a lady,” said the blueberry with her nose upturned.

Emi raised an eyebrow but held back from further commenting. With an easy heft and an easier cut, she brought the pick to the wall and broke loose a rock of chocolate. She bent down to pick it up, preparing a comment for the ‘lady’ to come and get her own treat, but it was lost by the slither that slipped around her mind like a tightening waist belt.

Why should the blueberry get any of the chocolate? Her chocolate. It was hers, nobody else’s.

Hisao, Lilly, all of them just wanted it from her. It’s all anyone had ever wanted from her, was her chocolate. It was hers!

That’s why Lilly drank that tea, she wanted to become a blueberry so she could end up here in Emi’s Chocolate Mines! She probably thought she’d be able to eat more if she was as big as a damn house.

Emi’s eyes shifted to her hand without her mind telling them to. She could feel the pressure, as if a hand on her neck were guiding her to it, pushing her to eat it. To break apart the brick and to devour it there and then before leaping into the sea and drinking it all.

“Emi?” A voice pierced through the dark thoughts, the taste of a blueberry on the tip of her tongue.

Emi looked up from the chocolate. She saw Lilly’s eyes, large, blue, and innocent.

Her long golden hair was messy, dusty with chocolate, and yet somehow it seemed to shine in the spotlight.

“I hope I’m not overstepping,” Lilly said slowly, “but would you please come nearer?”

‘She wants your chocolate,’ the serpent whispered in her ear.

Emi’s legs moved like glaciers, slowly rolling over one another in a soft sweeping motion as she approached Lilly, seeing the blonde had closed her eyes.

“Please, sit down near me,” Lilly instructed. “Or… against me, I suppose. Since I can’t really touch you.” Her blue cheeks mixed with a purple hue as a blush entered her face. “I believe you may be having an anxiety attack.”

Emi didn’t move.

A what? Anxiety attack? That was ridiculous.

Emi wasn’t anxious. She was hungry.

Hot and hungry.

Wait, hot?

Emi raised a hand to her forehead. It came away sticky with sweat. A glob of sweat dripped down her nose, and she was suddenly aware of the heat flowing through her, exuding out from where her fattened skin rubbed. Her stomach was sweating, a fat round orb that was drenching the dress beneath her breasts and her bellybutton.

Then she noticed her breath, coming out heavy through her mouth. She listened to the sound of her breathing, felt the heaving of her spine.

“Emi,” Lilly’s voice cut through her senses, carried by her fruity scent. “Please.”

Before she knew it, Emi had collapsed with her back set against where Lilly’s shoulder had been, her fat thighs spread out before her and openly panting.

Emi tore the strap of her helmet off and batted the protective from her head. It landed with a clunk near her prosthesis feet, pointing back to her and her classmate.

Lilly’s hair bobbed and Emi could feel a sense of great movement as she leaned against the blueberry girl, just to the side of and below her head. “It’s alright,” the berry-girl said. “Everything’s alright. It’s all fine.”

Lilly’s voice was calm and smooth, washing over Emi like waves of cool water. A drip of sweat fell from her brow into her eye.

“Try breathing with me.” Lilly directed. She took a deep breath in, and Emi followed her, before breathing it out. They did so again. “That’s good,” she praised. “We can sit here, for a little bit. If you like.”

Emi nodded her head before taking another breath. She was hot, she was tired, and she was so very, very, full. Her belly sent prickles of pain up her abdomen with every breath, making her feel as if she could barely move.

She gingerly placed a hand atop the stuffed orb, watching it throb through her shortness of breath. Emerald eyes looked upon a body that felt as if it couldn’t be hers, belly forcing its way to rest between her thighs, feeling her chin brush her enlarged chest with a new layer of fat.

What was today turning into? She was sitting in a mineshaft having a… panic attack?

No, that wasn’t right.

She wasn’t scared. She wasn’t afraid. Emi Ibarazaki had no anxieties.

So what was it?

She massaged her tummy with her hand, and a shot of pain spiked through her flesh. She scrunched her body up, lifting both arms and her legs to try and cover herself.

Flecks of chocolate dripped onto her chest and toppled off of her dress, like pebbles dripping down an obese mountain. Emi looked at her hand, confused now. Her hand clutched the chocolate brick like a viper, nails digging into the product, unwilling to relent their prized possession.

Without a moment to even think, Emi snapped the brick in half with her teeth. The instant the chocolate met with her tongue, Emi felt the tension in her tummy slacken. Her muscles loosened and no longer ached, her lungs were no longer hard to fill, nor did her legs feel heavy with all her new weight.

‘You were hungry, that’s all,’ the voice whispered in her mind. ‘You’re just hungry.’

But the hiss of the serpent was not the only one in the mind of Emi.

Her own voice reminded her of something else, something it felt was far more important. She wasn’t the only one in the room that was hungry.

Emi looked up over her left shoulder. She could see Lilly’s nose barely above her dark blue cheek. “Here,” Emi said, shifting over to her knees. “Open your mouth.”

On her knees, Emi could see Lilly’s face perfectly. The blind berry’s face looked confused for a moment, before slowly grew into a silent grin before she complied. Emi placed the other half of the chunk of chocolate into Lilly’s mouth.

Lilly made a small, startled noise before giggling. “Mmph. Ai didn-” she cut off, coughing lightly before chewing. Her purple lips worked up and down in a rhythmic motion, chewing the large chunk.

A greed-filled fang stabbed at Emi’s mind, hissing that Lilly was savoring hertreat.

The rest of Emi’s mind outweighed it, feeling her usual beneficial and gladdened mood about being able to help someone else smile.

Emi placed a hand on Lilly’s head, patting her through her still-tied back hair. The blueberry seemed very pleased with the affection, smiling pleasantly though her chewing. She swallowed before letting out a very satisfied sigh.

“I didn’t think it would be such a large piece,” she said, opening her unseeing eyes and grinning. “Hanako and I would also share treats sometimes. It makes me glad to see they have a calming effect on you as well.”

Emi felt a little embarrassed, realizing now just how close she was to Lilly. “Oh, yeah. Umm,” she stuttered, unable to think of something to say. Pink tinged her cheeks.

Lilly spoke up after a moment. “Admittedly, I had a rather odd moment myself…” Emi could see Lilly’s face take a conspiratorial shift, looking uncomfortable. “I tried to cover my mouth. Goodness that’s so embarrassing.” Lilly’s cheeks flooded with violet and she tucked her face towards her rounded body.

Emi found herself giggling. Actually laughing, the sight of the cute, embarrassed Lilly warming her like a comforting blanket. She rubbed Lilly’s head more affectionately, and Lilly herself began to laugh.

The day had become so absurd, and the two girls that they couldn’t help but laugh in the face of all the strangeness that had happened to them.

The moment trickled out, leaving both of them with a warm glow. Lilly sighed, her cheek nuzzling against Emi’s hand, before looking up at her. “Okay. I’m ready.”

“Oh!” Emi said, suddenly remembering. She reached down to the side of her coat to find the spare helmet still hanging from the Velcro attaching it to the fur. “Not yet,” she said.

She tore the headlamp free before fitting it over Lilly’s head. Lilly was quiet, though evidently curious, while Emi tried to fit it on. Her red bow and her massive amount of messy blonde hair made fitting it on bit of a struggle, but after a minute Emi was able to fasten the strap over her plump chin.

“Is this a safety helmet?” Lilly asked.

“Mhm,” Emi reaffirmed. “It’s a miner’s helmet, with a light on it. It’ll help at least a little bit to have two light sources down here.” She reached up and tapped the candy light.

It slowly powered on, the light starting from the deep center before filling the entire crystal with a dark blue. “Ah,” Lilly nodded. “Safety first.”

“That’s what I said!” Emi exclaimed. “I was honestly really surprised you didn’t bang your head or anything when you were rolling without one.”

Lilly’s lips puckered. “I did,” she said shortly.

“Oh… Well, it’s the least I can do. You helped me feel better. I should help you too.”

Lilly’s smile grew and the girl nodded as a show of support.

Emi got up to retrieve her own helmet and snapped it into place over her head. She then took the pick before looking from it to Lilly.

“Be right back,” she explained. “I’m gonna run the pickaxe up first.”

“That’s probably a good idea.” Lilly agreed. “I’m a little relieved by all of this, actually. The young girl, Mikasa, had been rolling me somewhere where she said she’d sew my pants back together for me. I think she intended to do so while I was wearing them…”

“Oh,” Emi said. “Yeah, no sharp objects. Got it.”

“Thank you,” Lilly replied. She sighed slightly, “I’ve no idea what would even happen, but if I’m as… ‘Juicy’ as I’ve been told, I’d prefer to just avoid the field of thought altogether.”

“Yeah, gotcha. Gotcha.” Emi said, twiddling the pick in her hands. “Actually, before I throw this up there, would you like a little more chocolate too?”

Lilly hummed.

Fifteen minutes later, and a few pounds heavier, Emi worked her way up the uphill slope with the pickaxe. It seemed smaller now. With a tummy restocked on chocolates and a smile to accompany her, the hill wasn’t more than a short little walk, and she was almost at the top. It’d be much more difficult while managing Lilly, but even so, she could do it! If she could just-

Emi’s legs gave out beneath her, not realizing she was falling before she had landed on her gut. She slid on her prosthetics for a few feet before coming to a halt.

“Ouuugh,” she muttered, twisting down to look at her knees. What the hell was that?! Her legs had suddenly gone-

‘Listen,’ she felt the cold slither hiss as it tightened on her spine.

Emi did.

She could hear them, but only barely. The tunnel walls bounced sound all over, but she could hear the voices coming from the quarry above.

She raised a hand and covered her light, but yellow light still forced its way between the cracks of her pudgy fingers. Emi ripped the helmet off and tried to shove it inside her coat, the cold sense shooting tingles of sensation out from her belly.

‘Fear the voices. Fear being found.’

Emi hid the bulky helmet’s light behind her tight fur coat. She managed just barely to crawl up the slope on her belly, reaching the lip. Trickles of light spilled into the head of the tunnel above her, and she peered over the crest of the tunnel.

She could see them. Two figures, short, wearing red and blue safety helmets of their own, carrying matching lanterns which cast long illuminations.

The shorter one, with the red light, she recognized.

“The axe murderer,” Emi whispered.

She could hear them more clearly now, focusing on the two shaded girls.

“I’m telling you, Minecart to Heaven. It’s the perfect song,” the blue lit girl said.

“There’s just no way we can do a song for seven minutes,” the red one responded. “Nobody would listen to us! Heck, I wouldn’t listen to us.”

“Who cares who listens, as long as the song matches?” the taller one asked.

“First, we need to find her. Two of them, thanks to your dumbass.”

The blue light stopped, turning on and fully illuminating the red girl. “You can’t call me that! I’m gonna tell mom you’re swearing at me again.”

The red one stalked off towards the far side of the room, grumbling unintelligibly. She entered one of the tunnels with an attached minecart, her light quickly disappearing.

After a moment, the blue light girl joined her. “Hey wait up! I don’t wanna be alone down here!”

Their lights blinked out, and they were gone.

Emi stood up, moving over the crest and into the room. She looked after them but couldn’t spot even a trace of their lights. She uncovered her own and used it survey the area.

The empty tunnels looked darker now, the ones with light much too revealing. The visage of a hive returned to the girl, with workers manning these minecarts and taking over these machines.

The girls were sure to be back soon. If they were looking for Lilly, chances were good that they’d start with downward tunnels.

Emi shined her lamp to where they had gone, and sure enough the tunnel was slowly pitched downwards. She noticed a small sign with an arrow pointing down the tunnel, but couldn’t make out the inscription without following them in.

Maybe it was another way to that cavernous lake, another small platform before the chocolate body. They wouldn’t find Lilly down this pathway, so they were more than likely to come back to here soon.

If Emi rolled Lilly up to here, she could probably just leave her. The two girls would no doubt spot the tea-filled blueberry, and she’d be on her way back towards… whatever she’d been up to.

What had she said? Sewing pants?

Emi grimaced. Her lips tugged towards the side, watching where the girls had gone.

Surely, it would be better for Lilly to be with them. They probably had some idea of what had happened to her, anyways. But Emi couldn’t afford to be found.

She had a whole mineshaft to devour.

Emi turned to her left. A nearby tunnel seemed to be pretty level compared to some of the others, but quickly wrapped around a bend. No rock candy lights, no minecart rails.

The search party wasn’t likely to find her that way. Her legs quickly put her hefty body into motion, belly bouncing jollily as she strode into the tunnel. She turned the bend to see that the tunnel did indeed run smoothly. There were a few boxes that’d been offset as well, but something else caught Emi’s eye.

A sign had been hammered into the wall above the boxes. The wooden plank had an arrow pointing down the tunnel, and the inscription made Emi’s tummy growl in delight.

The Garden of the Chocohals

Emi laid her pick on the boxes before hurrying back to the main chamber.

That’s where she would go. That’s where she’d make her base. What better place to start her hungry crusade? It was meant to be. Emi Ibarazaki was a chocoholic.

Line after reassuring line were whispered with soft hisses into her mind.

“Emi?” Lilly called out to her as she hurried down the slope, “Is that you? Is everything okay?”

‘Perfect,’ the voice hissed.

“Perfect,” Emi parroted. “Come on, let’s get going.”

Lilly let out a soft chuckle. “You’re the one in charge of the pace.”

Emi strode to the far side of Lilly and placed her hands onto the blueberry’s side. Her blue flesh felt soft and malleable, and Emi could feel her hands pushing inwards as the liquid inside Lilly was gently displaced. She felt like a freshly tied water balloon, and the smell of blueberry’s floated through the air. “Alright, you ready?” Emi asked.

“As much as I can be,” Lilly replied. “It’s not very fun to feel this bloated.”

Emi frowned, feeling the slight hesitation. She looked over the crest of Lilly’s round curve to see that she had closed her eyes. “Okay,” Emi finally said, “let’s go.”

She pushed her palms into Lilly’s side. The blueberry’s flesh shaped to Emi’s hands, soft skin spreading out and pushing slightly back against her touch, before Lilly began to turn.

“I will never be able to explain how odd this feels…” Lilly said.

She slowly rotated, her back rising to Emi’s hands. Where her spine should have shown was just more blue round body, though there was some evidence that she may still have something when Emi saw the top of Lilly’s fat-fattened butt cheeks pinched by her tight pants.

She rolled over again, and Emi saw Lilly’s big blueberry belly button pass her fingers by. Side over side, Lilly rolled softly and calmly and sloshing with tea until Emi reached and began moving up the slope.

It was much, much harder than she had prepared. Emi had to strain to even move her, hands digging deep into Lilly’s fat stomach until Emi was up to her wrist. “I think, ugh, you need, ugh, to work out more,” Emi managed in-between steps.

“I’ll consider going on an all-tea diet,” Lilly replied snappishly.

Emi released a sororal laugh and, after a moment, Lilly herself huffed out a fat giggle.

Emi tried to focus on the blue light of Lilly’s headlamp. She counted the amount of spins it took, rotation after rotation, the lamp falling to the floor before turning back to the ceiling.

“This is much less humiliating than being walked on,” Lilly commented. After a moment, she added, “Gosh why couldn’t I have become a pear?”

Emi didn’t respond, too focused on moving. Her tummy grumbled in annoyance, but the physical burn on Emi’s muscles silenced its wishes for sweet sustenance.

Emi lost count after a little bit, and was trying to reorganize her mental train when, suddenly, Lilly became much easier to spin. “It feels like I’ve evened out,” the blueberry informed.

Emi pushed her a few more feet before sighing and letting her burning arms drop. Lilly had stopped on her right side, the weight of her body spreading over the floor. Emi walked over to her head and patted her on her exposed cleavage.

Lilly laughed. “My, my. I wouldn’t have figured Yamaku’s most well-known runner could even get winded,” she said. “Out of all today’s oddities, perhaps this is the strangest?”

Emi stretched her neck but didn’t respond. The serpent whispered in her ear.

‘Go now,’ it said. ‘Leave her. Don’t you want your prize?’

Emi’s neck swiveled to the exit the two girls had taken.

Who knew when they’d be back? It could be any moment.

Emi looked back to Lilly and was surprised to see that Lilly was smiling. Her deep, unseeing blue eyes, seemed to be looking right at her, even though that was impossible.

But she was looking straight up into Emi’s green emeralds, smiling a soft, silencing grin. “I’m proud of you,” she said. “I know that may not mean much, but a friend showed me how much just hearing that can help.”

Emi didn’t know she’d stopped breathing. She let a long breath go, felt the overworked beating of her runner’s heart. “Thanks, Lilly,” she said.

The serpent whispered to her, but it was silent compared to the rest of Emi’s thoughts. She had made up her mind.

She didn’t want to be alone down here, either.

Emi moved to Lilly’s other side and began pushing her towards her escape tunnel. “We’ve still got a little way to go,” Emi lied, pushing Lilly towards the proclaimed garden of chocolates. “Hopefully we’ll run into someone soon. I’m feeling hungry.”

Lilly nodded as her head spun, the blue light twisting with it while Lilly’s impressionable body warmed Emi’s touch. “I am too,” the blueberry said. “I believe I could enjoy just a little more chocolate.”