The Terrible Fate/Grand Order Tickling Fanfiction, Part II (/m, /f)

LOOP 3

Okay. Back to square one.

Astolfo’s game of Concentration solved - check. Astolfo’s stupid luck used to find Ishtar’s gem - check. At the very least, Ishtar had learned around the time that Fujimaru was able to make it back to her with Astolfo in tow, and hadn’t exhausted herself trying to search for the gem before they had made it to her. Though given what Ishtar had described to her earlier, physical strength returned with each reset, but the memories didn’t go away, which took its own toll, and probably even moreso for someone like Lip who was only able to stand in place and squeal. “It’s still really annoying how you know right where to go and look for it,” Ishtar mumbled, eyes narrowed as she snatched the gem out of Astolfo’s hand and squeezed it until the light erupted from between her fingers. “All right, Master. For the time being, us helping Skadi get her wand back is out. Where should we go this time?”

Fujimaru put her fingers to her chin and looked at the ground in thought. “Jeanne is really strong. Maybe she could carry Skadi up the pillar and let her grab the wand for herself? That would technically fulfill the rules, right? So maybe if… hmmm. Oh!” She slapped her fist into her open palm. “You have Maanna, right? And Astolfo can call on Hippogriff! That’s two things that can fly. Maybe if the two of you work together, you can lift Passionlip out of the whirlpool!” That should totally do it! Sure, there was still the issue of Lip’s Masochistic Nature, but surely Ishtar could keep her cool long enough to help Passionlip out of the whirlpool, right?

Right?

---

“You damn cow-tits, fat-ass, good-for-nothing squealing little tickle whore!”

Passionlip wailed with ticklishness even as she stuck out her lower lip stubbornly in the face of Ishtar’s heated insults while Fujimaru buried her face in her hands and tried to keep herself calm. In the beginning, the plan had seemed sound enough. Ishtar on the Boat of Heaven and Astolfo riding Hippogriff had flown out above the water where Passionlip was (again, toplessly) squealing with laughter, her enormous mechanical hands slapping uselessly at the surface, but the relief on her face when she saw help coming was so palpable that Fujimaru almost got a little teary-eyed. Lip was such a good girl who really…

...Really had a mouth on her. “Iheheh-HEHEHEHEHEHEH IT’S NOT MY FAHHAHAHAHAULT YOUR TINY HEHEHEHEHEH LITTLE BOW AHAHAHAHAHAH CAN’T HOOHOHOOLD ANYTHING!” she retorted. Passionlip might have once curled up in tears at being yelled at, but she had learned with time to deal with being teased, which was good! Except for the fact that she tended to thoughtlessly escalate fights by hitting people juuuuust where it was most irritating. If she said about Ishtar’s chest size, then… “YhahahahHHEHEEH YOUR WEHEHHAHAHAHHAHAHEHEHEAPON IS WEHEHEEAK AND TINY JUST LIKE YOUR BOOHOOOBS!”

And there it was. “Ishtar, wait--!” she tried to call out, but the allure of punishing the lippy Lip was just too great, and the Mesopotamian goddess dove gracefully into the whirlpool, coming up right behind Passionlip, where she couldn’t turn or make use of her brute strength, and dug her fingers viciously into Passionlip’s ribs. This had all started when, reaching up towards Ishtar and Astolfo with her (admittedly terrifying) enormous mechanical claws, Hippogriff had balked and flown out of reach. There probably wasn’t any good way for Passionlip to hold onto a living creature without hurting it, so while Astolfo tried to calm his panicky mount they had next attempted to have Ishtar lift her out alone with Maanna. Unfortunately, Passionlip was… heavy. Top-heavy and real heavy, thanks to the massive weight of her claws, and Ishtar just didn’t have the sheer lifting power to pull her out alone. That had led the two of them to bickering, and now, this.

“Oh, is this yours?” Ishtar asked, the heat in her voice audible even from as far away as Fujimaru was, and she fished something shaped oddly, almost the same color as the water itself, from the water, and then pulled it around Passionlip’s face to blind her. By squinting really hard, it became obvious that this was the missing bikini top, and Passionlip squealed as her vision was taken away, only to burst out in keening, hysterical laughter when Ishtar’s fingertips dove underneath of her enormous breasts, tickling the undersides of them savagely. “Ihehe… hehe… hehe… it’s… it’s your fault for keeping these useless huge knockers uncovered! Gohohooing without a top for nohohoo reason! It’s like you wanted to be bullied, youheheheheh you cow!”

Even as her fingertips sank into the pliable, voluminous breast valley that made up Passionlip’s bust, Ishtar herself began to giggle as the nibbling fish began to target her as well, but this only had the effect of making her take more frustration out on the hopeless Alter Ego. Lip’s arms flailed to no avail, unable to turn around or do anything to shake Ishtar off of her back - beneath the water, Ishtar had locked her legs around Passionlip’s waist, and while that exposed her soles and toes to be nibbled upon by the ticklish fish, she focused on her immediate goal: making Passionlip repent by tickling!

“HEEEEE! HEHEHEHEHEHEEH! HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE HAHAHAH NOOOHOHOOOHAHAHAH EHEHEH NO NOOEHEHEHEHEEE!” Lip blurted out, but she could do almost literally nothing to stop Ishtar’s agile fingers. Her Hypersensitivity trait made the gentle nibbling of the fish ticklish enough as it was. Direct, ruthless tickling like this was almost more than she could bear, and the sound of her giggling so helplessly was… Fujimaru stopped herself at the edge of the rock pool, body leaned forward like she’d been poised to dive in and join the fray. Passionlip’s laughter just went on, and on, and on, like she didn’t even need to take a breath. Her upper arms were pulled in close to her body, but that only deterred Ishtar from focusing on her ribs and armpits. It was still way too easy for those fingertips to skitter across the huge, indefensible globes of her breasts, and especially to tease Passionlip’s nipples with light, flitting strokes, flicking her fingernails beneath the water’s surface back and forth.

“Loooehhehehe! Look at you! You’re so lewd! Not ohoeheh only are you topless but your big, stupid tits are ticklish too! And your nipplheheheheheheees on top of that! I can’t believe you. Master! Did you have any idea this tits-for-brains cow was so ticklish and useless at the same time?” It seemed almost as if Ishtar wasn’t even trying to defend herself against the nibbling fish, even as they inflicted their soft, tickling bites upon her skin just as fervently as they did with Passionlip. It was as Fujimaru had suspected, the light touch was ticklish but not debilitating for anyone aside from the super-sensitive Alter Ego. As the story went, Passionlip’s skin was so sensitive that she was able to ‘feel’ even the hostility of others, even if she didn’t understand the reason for that hostility. She was so supple, though. And she was so amazingly helpless. There was, really, almost nothing she could do to make Ishtar stop, and she had the stamina to endure this sort of treatment for a long, loooooong time.

“PlehehEHEHEEHEHEZE! PLEASE! It tickles it tihihieheheh-hehehe-TICKLES IT TIIHIIICKLES!!!” It was even more enthralling as the light went slowly down, and Ishtar continued to make Passionlip dance to her fingers’ tune. It was like there was no way to miss! Planting her thumbs on Lip’s lowest ribs and crawling her fingernails up and down the soft, slightly chubby belly made her try to double over and cover herself with her arms, but Lip’s arms were only normal up to halfway down her bicep - beyond that point, they were the enormous, heavy, golden claws that were so very useless for any fine dexterity tasks. And that meant, for Ishtar, this defensive curling simply opened up the opportunity to tickle along Passionlip’s back and spider her fingertips along the top of her waist and around to her hips! A few good squeezes of the hips had the poor girl’s back arching, causing her arms to reflexively move away from her sides.

“Gotcha~” The cruel grin on Ishtar’s face was difficult to see in the dying light, but somehow, Fujimaru knew that Ishtar was wearing it anyway. The goddess had a mean streak all on her own, without any outside assistance. Fujimaru realized that while Astolfo was mostly immune - and circling around above this tickle carnage on his winged steed Hippogriff with a clueless look on his face - Ishtar had no qualms about exploiting Passionlip, egged on by the bizarre invitation to bully that was Passionlip’s Masochistic Nature. For that matter, Ishtar had exploited the other Servants of Chaldea for her own ends on a scale just as grand as BB had done, so she didn’t even need the additional prompting. It was just sort of the icing on the cake, really. There was something strangely enchanting about watching this spectacle unfold in the ethereal, glowing light that the pool itself seemed to be emitting, now that the sun had gone down --

The sun had gone down?! Fujimaru snapped herself out of her reverie, to see Astolfo not too far away with a little campfire going and a tent pitched, cooking something over the campfire on a little twig. Notwithstanding where he had come across all of those things, since when had it gotten so dark! Trying to tear herself away from the vision of Passionlip being mercilessly tickle tortured by Ishtar, she asked Astolfo: “How long has it been dark?”

Astolfo looked to be deep in thought for a moment. “I dunno! Maybe an hour or two? I wasn’t really paying attention. Oops!” Before his marshmallow caught fire, Astolfo retrieved it and squished it between a pair of graham crackers and some chocolate, then blew on it a few times and took a bite. “You want some, Master? I love making smores at camp!”

“It… it shouldn’t be dark! That’s the problem here, Astolfo!” Fujimaru turned to look out over Ishtar and Passionlip again. Was she losing her mind? Was the entrancing sight of Ishtar’s fingers sliding under Passionlip’s arms, and ticklishly dancing on the tops of her breasts, enough to make her lose track of time? It felt totally possible that someone could just get sucked into the sight of those agile, slim fingers sliding beneath those impossibly heavy and totally defenseless and ticklish tits. Now it even looked like Ishtar was nibbling on Passionlip’s earlobe which was both strangely erotic and - of course - ticklish. Passionlip’s strange, masochism-enabling quality did have a bizarre allure that could make people think and act differently around her, but did that extend to the point of getting so engrossed in her tickle suffering that she’d spent literally hours watching Ishtar tickle her?

Or was this BB’s doing? The first time through, when she had been checking all of the different traps for her Servants, Fujimaru was able to mostly recall how the days had passed, but it felt like the second time through was slippery, somehow. Then again, that had ended in some extended ticklish penalties in the pit where Skadi was still trying to climb up to her wand. Without reference to the sun or any clocks anywhere, it was totally impossible to tell how much time was passing. More to the point, BB’s control of time was something she had proven she would abuse for the purpose of messing with people and her own twisted amusement. Now Fujimaru was doubting her own sense of time, which she couldn’t help but feel was exactly what BB had been aiming for.

This whole twisted loop of logic was making her head whirl, and before she knew it Fujimaru was watching Ishtar and Passionlip again. For that matter, how could she so clearly picture what Ishtar was doing in spite of it being some distance away and under the water? It was plain as day in her head, the way she could see Ishtar’s fingers tickling wickedly across Passionlip’s hips, chasing them back and forth as she scratched gently with two fingernails on one nipple, lifting the huge breast up to expose the sensitive underside and exploiting the ticklish nerves that were usually covered by that soft, pillowy breast. Why did it seem like Ishtar’s movements were less furious tickling and now sort of a sensual, ticklish tease? Wait, why was Passionlip blushing, panting - it seemed like all the strength had gone right out of her body - Ishtar’s lips twisted into a cruel grin and --

“STahhahahAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHEHEHEHE STOP PLEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEEEHHEHE HEHAHHAHA HEHEEEZE NOOHAAHHAAH NOT AGAAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAIN!” The wail of ticklishness seemed to jolt Fujimaru out of her reverie. This kept happening, like she was falling asleep and dreaming only to be roused suddenly. It even felt like she’d been asleep, waking up to the sunrise and… and… Astolfo was sound asleep, covered by a blanket, a look of contentment on his face. Groggy, Fujimaru stumbled over to him, shook his shoulders violently, and then took his hands, placing them over her own ears, and squeezing her eyes shut tight.

“Yaaaaaawn… morning, Master,” he said cheerfully, but Fujimaru cut him off.

“Astolfo. Keep your hands over my ears and don’t let me turn around to look at Passionlip or Ishtar. I need you to do a couple of things for me. Can you keep them all straight in your head? This is really important.” Astolfo nodded. The good thing about him, the really good thing, was that he was able to recognize when something was important enough to focus really hard on. “Good. First, I need you and Hippogriff to take me back to the center of the island where all the paths meet. Then I need you to fly back here and try to get Ishtar out and bring her back to where I am. Before you go, make sure you tell Passionlip that I didn’t forget about coming to save her, but BB is punishing me for guessing wrong, so I need to make sure I have the absolute right answer before I come back again. Can you remember all that?”

“Just leave it to me, Master! Hehe. Astolfo is really super helpful and reliable, so you don’t need to worry about a thing!”

---

By the time Ishtar had been extracted from the whirlpool, and flown back to where Fujimaru was, she had her face in her hands and her blush was so deeply red that it seemed like her ears were about to let fly with fountains of steam. It took her a while to make any sort of sense; after a lot of wailing about how she hadn’t thought she was into girls like that, and sometimes rather painfully detailed retellings of all the things she remembered doing, Fujimaru directed them to take her back to the clearing where the Queen of Sheba was probably still falling into monkey traps. Now that Fujimaru could think with a clear head once again, however, she realized that even the failure to save Passionlip had taught her some things, and she reviewed what she knew.

It was apparent from Ishtar’s recounting of their activities that she recalled everything she had been doing to Passionlip quite clearly, so whatever foggy haze that had been affecting Fujimaru’s recollections and sense of time hadn’t worked on Ishtar. While she had been waiting on the sunny, grassy hill in the center of the island, Fujimaru had also been looking at the position of the sun. It had taken some time to persuade Ishtar to stop tickling Passionlip and fly her out of the whirlpool, and the sun had seemed to move roughly an hour’s worth of time in that interval. So that felt normal at least - if BB was screwing with the flow of time, she had the presence of mind not to do it when someone was paying attention. Given what Ishtar had said, it also seemed possible that she really had just been falling into a trance watching Passionlip suffer, but that was a problem that could be avoided if necessary. BB playing fast and loose with the rules was a bigger concern, but if Fujimaru couldn’t figure out how and when it was happening, there was no way to stop it. If it could be stopped.

The last point was that, since Astolfo could carry her on Hippogriff’s back, and Ishtar could fly with the Boat of Heaven, they could make much better time going from place to place, and they set down outside of the bizarre toll booth that blocked entry into the grassy clearing where Sheba had gotten herself into another predicament. Flailing dramatically, Sheba dangled upside down from an overhanging tree branch, her ankles caught in what looked to be a snare made of vines. Her cat-paw mitten hands flailed about uselessly as she spotted the arrival of Fujimaru, Astolfo and Ishtar, and she stretched them out pleadingly towards the trio, an overwrought cry bursting forth from her lips as her tears ran up over her forehead and her ears before dripping down to the ground. “Maahahahahahahahahahaster! Master, pleheheheheheeeze help! Pleheheheheeze there’s money all over the ground and theheheehehehese monkeys have been getting in my way for dahahahahahahahays please pleeeeease help!” Of course it was about the money, Fujimaru thought with a sigh, then considered the situation and her current Servants. This part of it was definitely game-like, though, seeing what she had in her “inventory” and trying to use it to solve “puzzles”...

As before, Sheba was beset by a number of small, mischievous monkeys, no doubt having set this trap for her. High out of her reach they perched on the branch, which wobbled and sprang slightly with her struggles but did not seem like it was going to give way anytime soon. Naturally, they had tossed away her shoes (again) and pulled off her stockings as well, so that her tanned, bare soles faced upwards, her toes wiggling slightly. Or not, actually. One of the monkeys had both of her big toes in its little paws, holding them back, and the rest used their tiny little claws to wreak havoc on her soles. The soles of her feet were a slightly lighter shade of brown than the rest of her skin, although whether that detail had any impact on their sensitivity was entirely a different discussion. Instead, what definitely did have a direct and real impact on her ticklishness was the little monkey claws that were working her over.

Small as they were, they were actually able to gang up two to a foot. The little beasts seemed to be fairly clever, Fujimaru judged, clever enough to attack her with short little scritches starting at the balls of her feet and working up towards the helplessly squirming toes. Sheba was able to do little more than hold her head in her hands and twist back and forth, wriggling like a worm on a hook, or reach upwards helplessly towards the monkeys in an effort to swat them away, which also did not work. A Caster like Scathach-Skadi, her physical strength was nothing to write home about, and the exertion of curling her abdomen up enough to actually touch her toes, much less swat the monkeys away, was beyond her.

Other monkey paws made neat little parallel tracks down the soles of her feet. They really were being quite methodical, belying their appearance as flighty little mischief-makers to execute a coordinated attack upon those hopelessly twitching feet. “Plehehe-hehehe-HEHEHEHEHEEZE please Master plehehehhehehEHEHEh hehheheahahahah PLHEHEHEHEHEEZE! Pleheheheeease I’m really ticklihihiiish!” she whined, the utter inability to take out her frustration on anything - she couldn’t even reach the ground in her state - no doubt ratcheting up the feeling of helpless ticklishness and probably making every little scratch and stroke worse. Tiny hands working their way over every single sensitive nerve in her foot, some marching upwards from the ball and working their way over the firmer, smoother part before descending into the dozens of little nooks and crannies of her toes, exploring the long digits for hidden sensitive spots. Other small fingers, tipped with claws just the perfect size for tickling, stroked downward, catching the sensitive arches and sides of the surprisingly long feet.

“Hmmmmm.” Fujimaru felt like she could take her time with this one, and stared at the sky again. No, the sun was more or less where it belonged still, close to noon of the second day. Even though watching Sheba suffer was kind of amusing, there wasn’t that ethereally alluring quality to her helpless laughter - it felt more like something she deserved, for some reason. Maybe. She could watch those bronze soles get tickled by little monkey paws with an entirely clear head. It must be some weird thing about Passionlip that distracted her, or something.

“NUuuhhhahahahahaa noooo nooheheheh NOOOhhhohohoheheheheh stoppit stoooohoooohoooop MAHAHAHAHAHAHAHASTER pleeeeeeeeeeeease!” Weird. She seemed to be sensitive around the heels and the sides of her feet especially, places that Fujimaru would have assumed were less sensitive, but when the monkeys’ claws tickled all along the inner sides of Sheba’s feet, she burst into bawling laughter and briefly renewed her efforts to wiggle free before collapsing into pathetic ticklish sobbing. “IhahahaHAAHAHAhhehehe I cahah-hahahahan’t MAHhahahahster it’s toooohohoo muahhaahahahahahahch! Puh-lehehe-HEEEEEZE!” Come to think of it, there had been six monkeys originally, right? There was one holding her toes, and two each on her feet. That was five total. Where was the sixth one? Or had Sheba somehow gotten it? Hmm. The way those claws really made her howl with laughter when scratching deeply into the upper part of the sole, close to the outside part of the foot and just under the ball, sort of underneath of her big toe… that might be useful information to keep in mind for later. When Sheba was being a brat and asking for camels in the future, it’d be a great way to keep her from going off and doing something ridiculous. Or maybe Fujimaru could use that knowledge to get Sheba to give up extra lottery box spins and ascension materials if she ran the event shop again. The thought was very appealing, and she found herself grinning.

As Sheba’s arms drooped to the ground, just dangling above her head with exhaustion, the sixth monkey made its presence known, scurrying down along her legs to perch itself on her lower back, and with a wicked glint in its eye, started to tickle at the smooth, taut flesh of her sides and belly, which prompted a re-energized shriek! “NUUUUHUHuheheheheheh! HEHEHEHeheheh stoppit!” Sheba whined, reaching up to swat at its paws, and succeeding in driving it back up along her legs out of reach, but when she let her arms droop again, it slid back down her body… and teased her by poke, poke, poking the area around her navel, still a ticklish motion, but one that introduced the dilemma: was it REALLY worth the physical exertion to stop that small amount of tickling? After a moment’s dithering, Sheba apparently decided it was not, and let the monkey poke around her navel with one claw, offering no resistance.

One claw became two, one on either side of her navel, its paws poking and wiggling randomly and lightly into her skin, and again she made as if to exert the effort to curl up and swat the monkey away, before letting out a great big ticklish sigh and surrendering to this sensation as well. Of course, the tickling claws marching across her feet endlessly were still a much greater source of her suffering - but the sixth monkey’s activities were more akin to… adding insult to injury. To Fujimaru, it read very much like it was figuring out how much tickling Sheba would tolerate before she summoned the effort to chase him off.

In this case, when it started to tickle either side of her navel with short, scratching motions using two fingers on each paw, that seemed to trigger her response, and she groaned, bending up to swat at the monkey and chasing it up along her legs, then letting out a pathetic little whine and slumping downward again. The moment she had done so, it was back, this time reverting to poking and wiggling to either side of her bellybutton. Sheba seemed to realize it was testing her in some way, and since she hadn’t reacted to this amount of tickling before, it was going to sit there and tickle around her navel until she did something about it!

As entertaining as this was to watch, Fujimaru did finally turn to her two Servants. Ishtar was curled up in a ball by the side of the path, her face still beet-red and mostly hidden behind her arms. Fujimaru didn’t even ask, and turned to Astolfo. “Astolfo, can you go and help her out?”

“Sure thing, Master~ Don’t you worry about it a bit!” At least someone here was still cheerful. It was easy for him to make the short hop onto Hippogriff and then hover over the clearing, whereupon he jumped down into the grassy area. The moment his feet hit the ground, the monkeys all froze, looking in his direction, and then scurried off. “Oh wow, that was easy! Guess they were just little scaredy-cats after all, hehe. Come on, let’s get you down. One, two, three!” Quick as a flash, Astolfo had cut the vine suspending Sheba upside down, and caught her to prevent her crashing headfirst into the ground, although the fox-eared merchant queen opted to cry on his shoulder for a minute. Astolfo patted her on the back, nodding. “There, there. It’s okay! We came to save you, Master is gonna save everyone. That’s how it always goes, right? Say, were there always all these vines hidden in the grass? No wonder you got tied up in one! Hehe.”

As the ground almost literally erupted in vines, thrashing and hissing about like so many angry snakes, Fujimaru reflected that at least she was learning what it looked like when she made a wrong guess. But there was something she had to consider here, courtesy of BB and her unhelpful rules; the puzzles were meant to be solved a certain way, and trying to “cheat” her way around the restrictions was not something the malicious little AI rewarded, despite possibly being the biggest cheater in the history of ever herself. But if that hypocrisy was ever pointed out to her, she’d probably just say something like “It’s only cheating when YOU break the rules, Senpai! I just change the rules sometimes when they’re not any fun and I can get away with it because I’m your adorable little kouhai heroine~” or something to that effect.

Astolfo and Sheba had both been wrapped up by the ankles, their legs hauled into the air - but not off the ground, as had happened before. Instead, both of them were flat on their backs, but with their legs pulled up and tied together, so they formed a sort of upside-down T on the ground with both pairs of feet wiggling slightly in the air - their wrists had been pulled up over their heads and anchored to the ground with vines, and vines looped around their thighs, calves, and ankles, securing them to one another and making almost any resistance impossible. Unlike the other traps, which had encouraged a lot of useless struggling, it seemed like there was no getting out of this one, and a flurry of feather-tipped vines rose to assault the row of four feet bound ankle to ankle to ankle to ankle.

Fujimaru watched as those feathery vine-tips began to slide and saw in between their toes, Astolfo’s pale feet lined up beside Sheba’s bronze, their laughter mixing in harmony as the struggling began almost immediately. Thin vines had looped around their toes to restrain them, meaning there was really no stopping this once it had started, and Sheba’s wailing laughter mixed together with Astolfo’s musical giggling to produce a fine duet. The feathers’ touch was quite delicate and accurate, not just sneaking in between the toes but also taking the time to brush against the base, sometimes threading the entire length of the soft, off-white colored tuft through two or three toes at a time, and then slowly drawing it out to finish with a flourish of laughter. The delicate touch was duplicated on their soles, where long, flexible bristles weaved their way over slightly struggling and flexing arches. Ishtar and Skadi had had enough trouble coordinating their struggles with a much more forgiving bind and only two feet together, so with this tighter and more restrictive setup, coupled with the fact that all four feet were bound, neither one of them had much of a chance to make any sort of headway.

Though the foot feathering seemed to be the main focus here, it would be wrong to say that the rest of their bodies were ignored. From the soil had sprouted many vines, and the designs of their tips were different. The ‘feathery’ portion was only on one side of the vine, more akin to a brush of some sort, and from the way the vines moved, it seemed as if they were stiffer, too. The bristly touches stroked over their ribs, sneaking their way up and into the pair’s clothing - though Astolfo obviously had no breasts, his outfit was curiously designed to cover his chest as if he did, so it ultimately made no difference in the way they were tickled. The outsides of Astolfo’s pectoral muscles, and the edges of Sheba’s breasts, were tickled in just that same way, the light but insistent stroking of those brushlike vines upon the skin, something that seemed to bother Astolfo more than it did Sheba, but neither one of them were immune, and Astolfo’s increased struggles availed him of nothing.

Fujimaru wasn’t even trying to rouse Ishtar from her downward spiral of embarrassment and self-consciousness. She should have taken heed to BB’s warning from the start: this ‘game’ was designed to cause failure, and Fujimaru needed to learn from it in order to succeed. It was just like BB to include the twisted ‘encouragement’ to do better not by making her suffer, but by forcing her to watch her Servants suffer instead. This pattern was making it fairly clear what was happening: trying to solve the puzzle in the ‘wrong’ way didn’t work. It wasted time and wore out her Servants with extra, more intense tickling. That realization about lost time being a penalty made things sort of fall into place a little more, because sometimes it was actually pretty subtle. Trying to search for Ishtar’s lost gem herself had taken the better part of an entire day. Listening to Passionlip laugh had distorted her sense of time in an almost hypnotic way. The penalties for trying to help Skadi and Sheba in the ‘wrong’ way were more obvious, but they had the same impact.

The question was, could she do anything to help out once the ‘penalty’ had been triggered, or was she forced to sit here and just watch? Knowing BB, it was probably the latter. She liked that sort of thing, and probably set it up in such a way so that Fujimaru WOULD panic, and waste time racing around trying solutions that wouldn’t work, rather than reflecting on what had gone wrong and trying to learn. Typical BB, setting up clear conditions for victory, and then sneaking around in the shadows throwing up as many traps and obstacles as possible to impede progress. Fujimaru sat down on the path, eyes giving a thousand-yard stare to the scene of ticklishness in front of her, and tried to sort out her information.

Astolfo’s navel was being brushed methodically by something that looked like a cattail. The light, fuzzy bristles that topped the plant normally were good for teasing, but too fragile to survive being plunged into the navel, yet that’s exactly what the plant was doing, taking advantage of the fact that Astolfo seemed to react more to the tickling across his torso, stroking at his ribs, and his underarms, and his navel too, prompting rather more struggling than he’d displayed when caught in the gentle embrace of the lamia. Oddly enough, he did not beg or plead as he laughed, just seemed to accept what was happening and probably lost somewhere within his own head. Airheaded though it seemed, that might have been the best way to deal with these sorts of things. Her more prideful Servants like Jeanne Alter and Ishtar seemed particularly susceptible to the mental side of being tickled to excess, making things worse on themselves as they went along.

For the Queen of Sheba, there was still some perfunctory tickling around her upper body, and still a good amount of effort being taken to stroke at the sides of her ticklish belly and tease her generous breasts with a slithering, feathery vine, but it was clear that she was far more distressed by the goings-on at her feet. The delicate strokes of the feathers upon her soles, and those slithering between her toes, prompted cries of hysteria that often drowned out Astolfo’s more subtle but constant giggling, as if she reached great peaks of laughter and then dipped into exhausted valleys, where Astolfo was just always climbing a slow gradient of laughter. Her legs tugged and pulled, trying to overcome both the restraining vines and Astolfo’s legs, but for the most part her feet stayed right where they were, vulnerable to the licking feather tips. Curious that such soft and unhurried tickling could cause ever-more increasing tickle distress in the greedy Caster, but then again, at this point there was literal days of data and experience to fall back on, and these penalty traps probably designed to explicitly target particular weaknesses.

Fujimaru’s eyes followed the particular sweep of one feather as it licked across Sheba’s arch, moving in a fairly regular pattern from the lowest part of the sole, just above the heel, and trailing along the inside part of the arch, more or less following the side of her foot, flicking over that vulnerable spot beneath the ball of her foot, before curling up and over to slide its way into the gap between her first two toes. There, it would glide gently into that narrow space until the entire length of the feather was through, wiggle a little bit, and then literally do the entire process in reverse, in that same slow motion. That was just one of about six feathers working her feet over, and though the motions of all of them had seemed random and wandering to begin, now Fujimaru could see how each one was following its own pattern that synchronized but did not interfere with the others, weaving a tapestry of tickling over the Queen of Sheba’s helpless feet.

Though her laughter had that sort of whiny, pleading note to it, it didn’t captivate her in the way Passionlip’s laughter had. There was definitely something going on there, something that Ishtar had been caught up in as well, judging by the fact that she was still muttering bleakly to herself about her preferences and questioning everything she’d ever known. It wasn’t actually a new phenomenon, come to think of it… while lost in the simulation of Passionlip’s Breast Valley, even the notoriously man-thirsty Queen Medb had expressed a desire to punish Lip in the naughtiest of ways. But that was neither here nor there. Passionlip had the effect of drawing on the naturally sadistic side that existed within someone. Astolfo had been mostly unaffected, but herself and Ishtar had fallen under that spell. Would Sheba succumb too? It was definitely possible - in the pursuit of her own greed, she could act rather unscrupulously. And Jeanne Alter was totally out of the question - not to mention that Fujimaru was still convinced that saving Jeanne required Passionlip. But, Scathach-Skadi was notoriously cool-headed, so she might also be able to resist.

Speaking of Skadi, the message that Fujimaru had gleaned from the last cycle’s disastrous attempt to help her was that Skadi had to be the one to reach her wand. So she’d need someone who could help Skadi achieve that goal, rather than do it for her. Maybe something like a buff or support? For that matter, the weird vending machine that was selling Monster and ice cream and ramen outside of Skadi’s cavern was still there. Was that some kind of clue? Of those three things, the one that had the most to do with Skadi herself was ice cream, but Fujimaru didn’t think that tossing her a popsicle was going to suddenly imbue her with the strength necessary to climb up the pillar and reclaim her wand. Although, if the solution was to buff her somehow, then maybe that was the whole point of Sheba?

Speaking of Sheba… going into the clearing like Astolfo had done was clearly not the answer. Not unless she wanted to watch him get tickled which was, admittedly, kind of fun. Seeing the brushy things slide up into his armpits and stroke them to make him giggle, and getting to see the outlines of the vines slithering beneath his tiny, tight little black top, definitely appealed to her, and it was the sort of thing that she might talk him into doing when they finally got out of this mess. Of course, just her fingertips wouldn’t be able to reach so many spots at once, but Fujimaru was sure she could do a better job of tickling with her fingernails, skittering them down over his sides like how the brushes were stroking along that slim torso. Or tickling into his bellybutton with a fingertip. Astolfo would be a good boy and sit there in her lap and let Fujimaru tickle him alllllll over just like that. She might not be able to reach his feet, but given the way the plant’s feathery softness stroked along his upper body and made him squirm so deliciously, that might be okay.

But as far as actually solving the puzzle went? Think. The only actual handicap Sheba was facing was those weird cat paw mittens locked onto her wrists to reduce her dexterity. The task she was facing wasn’t too hard, just to pick up coins scattered in the grass and deposit them in a slot, but with a bunch of mischief-making monkeys setting traps, stealing the coins, and otherwise inhibiting her with lots of tickling (they really looked like they were making a lot of headway on her ticklish sides). The first time Fujimaru had seen her, she’d been crawling around, which exposed a lot of her sides to their precise little claws, and also her feet as well. She’d really been having a hard time with that, especially with how they’d strung her up and stroked along her tanned soles. If they’d had feathers, they might have done what the tickle vines were doing right now, but it might not even have to be feathers. What about a soft twig?

That could definitely work. Fujimaru could see it now, the next time Sheba ran the event shop, just sitting her down in a chair, pulling one of those feet up into her lap, and going to work. Hmmm. With stockings or without, though? Her bare feet did seem very, very sensitive. Taking something soft and running it under her toes, like that soft feather was doing right now, making sure to brush against the base of each one and occasionally dip in between to tickle the sensitive sides of each toe - that would be worth a couple of lottery box spins. And a discount on ascension materials. Sure, she would protest, squirm around, giggle, swat helplessly, but with the promise of getting a cut of the QP they’d shake her down for, Fujimaru was sure she could get someone strong to make sure that she didn’t interfere while they tickled riches out of her helpless foot.

The actual problem, getting back to the issue at hand, was the monkeys. Without the monkeys, Sheba could probably finish her task relatively quickly. And if it was just a matter of chasing off the monkeys, someone who had the ability to hit things from afar, like an Archer who was capable of shooting a half-dozen beams in rapid succession. Maybe someone like an Archer who was busy feeling sorry for herself right now. Well, when this show finally ended, maybe Ishtar would be able to pull her head out of her own ass and give that a try. There were still a few uncertainties about how to go about a couple of obstacles actually, but. As darkness fell, Fujimaru could only hear the laughter of Astolfo and Sheba, and so she turned away, settling her back against the toll booth, and tried to get some sleep. Apparently BB wasn’t going to show up with a trick campsite every time. That was probably for the better, anyway… when she did show up, she always made things worse.

The next day things didn’t go as smoothly as hoped - the tickling had stopped, but Sheba and Astolfo were still bound up helplessly, although both of them seemed to have fallen asleep at some point as well. While Ishtar had recovered enough to actually be coherent, Fujimaru judged that trying to go into the clearing to untie the two of them would just trigger a worse punishment, and instead decided to spend the final day of the loop gathering information and formulating a plan. Ishtar spent most of that day flying around to scout the remaining three Servants and their status, and try to see if BB herself was around to provide additional intel, and as the sun set on that final day Fujimaru outlined the plan that she hoped would break through BB’s scheme once and for all.

---

LOOP 4

“I’ve been negligent, haven’t I? Hehehehehehe. Poor Astolfo, you’re one of the big draws here, and I haven’t come to pay you any attention personally!”

Bright and early in the morning, with Senpai probably still waking up and making her way to Astolfo’s concentration game, BB sat beside the pink-haired Rider - although, maybe he was a Saber with the forced clothing change? Hmm. No, he’d been riding Hippogriff around, and that meant he was still a Rider, and thus not any real danger to her. That Saber NP was really overpowered, though. In any case, she was seated on her small pillar of red-and-black tentacles, one leg crossed over the other, leaned over and propping her chin up on her left hand. In her lap was one of her white gloves, her bare right hand and its fingernails idly crawling up Astolfo’s right side. Since she knew Senpai would be coming here first, she’d dispensed with the formality of letting Astolfo fail at the game of Memory himself, and simply had the lamia projection bind his wrists behind her head from the start, adding her own hand in with the six already crawling over his torso, more for fun than for any other reason. BB did a lot of things for her own amusement, but she did have Senpai’s best interests in mind, too! The management of Chaldea was such a mess and they continually ran short on vital materials, while some of the Servants there ostensibly in service of Senpai grew fat on their riches. What good was all that money doing just sitting there, and not being parted from the fools owning it?

Without even realizing it, BB had let her fingernails start digging viciously into Astolfo’s ribcage, and the pink-haired boy started to struggle rather more vigorously against the binding tail, but to no avail, of course. She’d only been going to tease him, but thinking about how foolish humanity could be had vexed her, and she decided to run with it, wiggling hard into the weak spot and letting her grin of perverse amusement grow wider. “But that’s okay, Astolfo. I’m sure everyone is getting their money’s worth watching you suffer!” As his laughter grew and his struggles strengthened, BB only focused in harder on tickling his weak spot, even sneaking her fingertips underneath of his skimpy little black top and scratching at the effeminate Servant’s nipple, which prompted a cry of laughter and a shaking of his head, making those lovely pink tails of his flutter in the morning sun. “Tiiiickle tickle tickle tickle… aww, is it too much for you? You’re so lucky Senpai has to come save you first!”

But in the meantime, she was going to have some fun. She’d been flitting around to the various Servants’ traps, making things more difficult on them, or simply calling out infuriating commentary, especially to Jeanne Alter and Ishtar. Watching Jeanne go nuclear every half an hour never got old, especially because it almost always threw her off her game and she ended up tickled as a result of messing up one of the barriers. Seeing Ishtar crawl around in the gemstones like a dog with her ass in the air, pounding the stones like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum as the vibrating gems swarmed around her like so many ticklish insects, was also hilarious! It was a shame that even in this state Scathach-Skadi was still able to maintain her cool, as it would have been a ton of fun to see someone so regal lose control. Oh well! This really had been a lot of fun, and Senpai suspected but hadn’t really figured out the trick with the passage of time. Besides, there had to be the epic conclusion, and as the heroine of this episode BB was going to make sure it was a blockbuster!

It was telling, to Fujimaru anyway, that when BB was pleased about something she often ended up acting even more cruelly. So when she made it to the base of the grassy knoll and heard Astolfo’s laughter ringing through the air rather more powerfully than it had before, it was no surprise to see that BB was perched there, with that huge, evil grin on her face, worming her fingertips into a particular spot on the side of Astolfo’s pectoral muscle and delighting in his fruitless attempts to escape. “Oh! Senpai, I aaaaaaalmost didn’t see you there. Good morning! Hehehehehe. It seems like you’ve figured things out, hmm? Or have you? You’re not out of the woods just yet, Senpai… so make sure you keep putting on a good show until the end!”

“MahahahhaahahahHAHahahehhehahah Master please whhehaheheh win quickly theheh-theheheh this is actually kind of bad!” Astolfo pleaded, his body pulling away from BB’s wicked nails as much as he could, but the lamia behind him was still holding his body tightly, and tickling him with those gentle, wandering touches that were so different from BB’s relentless focus on one spot. It seemed like that intense reaction was making everything else around it worse as well, and when the gently wiggling fingernails found his hips and squeezed them softly, Astolfo gave a squeak like a chew-toy and bucked forward in the lamia’s grip. Spurred on to action, BB discarded her other glove and crawled her fingertips down to his navel, prodding as deep as she could go and wiggling fiercely. Astolfo seemingly had no other choice but to arch his back, which simply provided a better surface for BB’s tickling fingers to work with!

“I’m going, I’m going,” Fujimaru said, taking her place at the ‘table’ and looking at the cards laid out. However, it wasn’t as smooth as she would have liked - the moment that she cleared her first card pair, she could feel the intense sensation where BB was tickling, right in her sideboob too. The urge to keep her right arm pulled tight against her torso was overwhelming, but that made literally no difference at all. Moreover, Astolfo’s ticklish laughter had reached a level of urgency that she hadn’t heard during her previous encounters, and it made her keep turning around to see how BB was doing it. The navel and hips too, huh. She could feel that for sure, and by the time she had gotten five matching card pairs Fujimaru was facedown on the table, slamming her fist on it with laughter as BB looked over her pitilessly.

“Oh, come on, Senpai~ you’re not even feeling the full effects of what poor Astolfo here is feeling! I know you’ve been disappointed by how easily he’s been getting off so I figured to make things a little more fair this time around. It’s not my fault you just started playing while I was in the middle of doing it~ Hehehehehe. Don’t mess up too much now! This is your big day where you save everyone and overthrow the Great Evil BB and fix up the Singularity! You didn’t even have to risk your neck for it this time. Unless you’re ticklish there. Are you, Senpai?” Her fingers briefly abandoned Astolfo’s navel to spider up underneath of his chin and tickle there, which resulted in a squeak and the Rider’s chin coming down to his collarbone for protection. Fujimaru made the exact same gesture almost simultaneously, and missed one of the cards being drawn, allowing the lamia to make something of a comeback, much to Astolfo’s dismay.

“Pulheehheheheheeeeze Master don’t lose!” Astolfo squealed, and then -- exploded with laughter. Fujimaru turned around to see BB sitting astride his lap, both hands inside of his top, ruthlessly tickling the sides of his pectoral muscles and ribcage, a sensation that assaulted her a moment later and caused her to yelp, clapping both hands to her sides and falling off of her makeshift seat. “Nuuhuh-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH MAHAHAHAHASTER NOHHHHEEHEEE! HEHEHEHEHEE! HEEEE! PLHEHEHEHEHEHEEZE NOOHOHOO BEHEHEHEHEHEH BEHEHEHEHEHE PLEASE!” His pleas fell on deaf ears - for a minute, anyway, and then BB relented, her gaze cast down at where Fujimaru had rolled slightly down the hill, panting and gasping with exertion, as BB finally let her fingertips relax, although ominously, she did not move them out of Astolfo’s top.

“Oh, Senpai~ I’m so sorry. I just got a little carried away! It’s too fun watching you and this airhead suffer that I couldn’t help myself.” Warily, Fujimaru picked herself up off the ground, but it was clear BB was having an effect on her concentration, made more acute by the fact that she would deliver a brief second of that ticklish torment when the Master turned away to watch the cards. But still, BB waited, until there was a clear chance for Fujimaru to match another pair and retake the lead. “You do know that every pair you turn over strengthens your link with the pretty boy here, right? I’m sure you already have felt just how stupidly ticklish he is, and he can endure it because he’s got a Servant’s stamina. But you don’t, Senpai. Do you really want to turn that card over?”

Fujimaru didn’t turn around, but she did freeze, one card already turned over, her hand on the matching card, but not yet revealed. She didn’t turn around, or answer, but with a sudden hissing intake of breath flipped the card, moved the pair to her stack, and then hugged her body tightly, curling into a ball, waiting for the inevitable… the inevitable… inevitable… “Damn it, BB - NyhahahaAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH DAMMIT!” Of course, of COURSE she had waited, waited, and waited until Fujimaru turned around to drill her fingertips into Astolfo’s weak spot again for a few seconds, causing the redheaded Master to drop to her knees with ticklish giggling, before she slid her hands out of Astolfo’s costume to leave him drooping and giggling still from the lamia’s much more gentle teasing. Hands on hips, BB stood looking down at Fujimaru, that wicked gleam in her eye.

“Give up, Senpai. The only reason you even stand a chance of figuring any of this out is because I’m being nice to you. If I was being mean, you wouldn’t ever have gotten even a single Servant freed. It’s nice to watch you run around like an ant with hot water poured into the anthill, but you should know when you’re outmatched. If I don’t want you to win, you won’t, so just give up, figure out which one of them you like watching suffer the most, and go enjoy yourself for a while.” Her smirk became sly. “Maybe you could go see Passionlip. I know you’ve spent hoooours watching the top-heavy cow struggle, and even lied to her about coming back to rescue her when you ran away --”

“I didn’t lie!” Fujimaru snapped, the heat in her voice bringing her head back up, even though she was still down on all fours. “I am going to save her. And everyone else. I know you’ve set this up to be as maddening as possible, BB, but I’m still going to show you that humans do learn from their failures - and learn how to overcome any odds!”

“Very nice heroic speech, Senpai. I guess that sets the flag for this one being the loop where you reach the final boss fight, huh? Don’t disappoint me, Se~n~pa~i. I’ll be waiting…”

---

Win the card game to free Astolfo.

Use Astolfo’s Evaporation of Reason to find Ishtar’s gem and free Ishtar.

Next, they arrived at the toll booth where the Queen of Sheba was pinned beneath half a dozen monkeys, who had (again) pulled off her shoes and were swarming her feet, leaving the hapless, camel-obsessed queen facedown on the ground and pounding her fists into the soil with ticklish pleas on her lips. Ishtar was able to easily shoot the monkeys down from the path outside of the clearing, and though it took Sheba a somewhat annoying amount of time to gather all of the coins with the cat-paw mittens, soon enough she had done so, and all but flung herself into Fujimaru’s arms, sobbing with exaggerated relief. After letting her indulge for a few minutes, the group continued onward, to Scathach-Skadi’s cavern, and Fujimaru explained the situation with the remaining Servants to Sheba. As she’d hoped, Sheba had an idea for how to assist Skadi with reaching her wand, and they passed by the ridiculously out-of-place vending machine to enter the cavern and come to Skadi’s aid.

Since the loop had just turned over, her physical condition was reset to its starting point, but the toll of being tickled for literal days on end had to be telling. When they arrived, Skadi had her back to the white pillar, shoulders slumped, lifted off the ground and wrists held above her head so that the delicate-looking white hands that formed from the pillar’s surface had free reign of her upper body, tickling with a similar slowness to that of Astolfo’s tormentors, but rather than a light, wandering teasing, these seemed to focus on her weaknesses with a particular relish. As the group came up to the edge of the ‘bowl’ where Skadi was trapped with the tickle-tentacle floor, it was plain to see the way that those fingernails scratched and stroked in her armpits, the sound of fingernails against satiny dress almost audible, along with the peculiar sound of those same fingernails tickling along the similarly sheathed soles of her feet, and the sound of Skadi’s laughter as she looked up to see Fujimaru along with Astolfo, Ishtar, and Sheba, and - even in this predicament! - she managed a genuine smile. “Mahahah-hahahha-hahahahahaehehehe Master, you’re doing… weheheh well… hehehehehe… hehehehe. I knew I was rihehehah right to trust you…”

Fujimaru turned to Sheba. “Do you think there’s any way you can help her get up to the wand up there?” She pointed up at the ceiling, but Sheba had already unfastened something from her belt: a magic lamp. Giving it a quick polish with her wristband, the Queen of Sheba then gently blew on the spout, pointing it in Skadi’s direction, and the smoke from the lamp coalesced into a thick, fluffy white cloud which floated within easy reach of the beleaguered goddess. With an effort, Skadi pulled herself free of the restraining hands, and stumbled uneasily towards the cloud, landing on it with a sort of ungraceful flop, but she was draped over it enough to float off the ground, out of reach of the tentacles on the floor and the hands manifested from the pillar both. Astolfo and Ishtar let out hopeful little cheers as Skadi levitated up off the floor, and pulled herself onto the cloud enough to sit upon it, floating within easy reach of the wand, and snagged it in her hand. “All right!” Fujimaru cheered, and without incident, Skadi floated down to join them, the pillar and tickle tentacles both dissolving into a sort of inky black residue before dissipating entirely, and the panting, flushed, but smiling Scathach-Skadi was delivered to them.

“That was quite the ordeal, Master. Not just being tickled, but it has been so hot for so long, it was making it difficult to focus.” Fujimaru had to sympathize. While she was wearing the skintight Chaldea Combat Uniform, at least she could use the Mystic Code to regulate her temperature to some degree. It was still warm, but not unbearably so. Skadi, however, was effectively wearing a formal (if skimpy) gown in the tropical heat, and had been exerting herself while doing so. “But, I am free, so that is what matters. There are only two left to help, no?”

Fujimaru nodded. To be honest, she still had not solved the problem of how to save Passionlip, which was the last remaining mystery in this whole scheme. Astolfo and Sheba had wandered outside, and Ishtar had her arms folded, leaning against the cavern wall, and pretended not to be listening. She was probably still embarrassed over her last encounter with the titanically top-heavy Alter Ego. “Right. Passionlip is stuck in the middle of a whirlpool, and Jeanne Alter is trying to bust out of a gauntlet of barriers. I know Lip can help Jeanne get free, but I haven’t figured out what to do about Passionlip…” At that moment, Sheba and Astolfo came back inside. Astolfo was sipping from a large green-and-black can of Monster energy drink (why the hell was that out here, anyway?) and Sheba handed Skadi something that was wrapped in white plastic. Curious, Skadi unwrapped the item, and --

“Ice cream!” Fujimaru blinked. That was the most passionate she had ever heard Skadi be about anything, and the goddess stuck the twin chocolate popsicle in her mouth, both hands going up to her hair to gather it back in a ponytail and keep it out of her face, fixing it after days upon days of being tickled and it going everywhere, and the release of tension from her body was so palpable that it was visible to the others gathered there. Skadi simply kept it in her mouth for a minute, eyes closed, before she finally pulled it out of her mouth and gestured with it, as if the ice cream and not her wand was the source of her power. “Come, Master. We are not finished, no? I think I have an idea to save the voluptuous one. Let us make haste.”

Fujimaru was glad Skadi had had the idea, because she wouldn’t have come up with it on her own. With Ishtar waiting some distance back, hands over her ears, and eyes shut tight, Skadi walked confidently up to the edge of the rock pool, waved the half-finished ice cream, and touched the toe of her heeled shoe to the surface of the water. In a flash, it began to freeze, spreading so quickly that the entire pool was frozen solid in a few seconds’ time. Lip was, of course, still trapped in the middle, but now she was trapped in a block of ice. Uncomfortably cold though that may have been, it was a solid now instead of a liquid, and her monstrously strong claws came down upon the ice with shattering force, sending chunks of it flying through the air, glittering in the tropical sun as Passionlip released her pent-up frustration from days and days of being tickled. She paused only for a moment to retrieve something, and then made a straight line of flying ice chunks and general destruction towards the edge of the rock pool, and leaped out finally, her eyes full of tears when she had finally escaped.

But she didn’t say anything, because she’d been carrying in her mouth the top half of her bikini. It was, at best, a skimpy garment, and the tickling would inevitably cause her to bounce right out of it. Hurriedly, Fujimaru went to re-fasten the bikini top around her breasts while Skadi covered Astolfo’s eyes. “Uwaaaah! She knows I can’t put one of these on if it falls off! That was so mean!” Passionlip’s lower lip jutted out stubbornly. “Master, we need to go and teach Mo-- I mean, BB a lesson once and for all! She can’t be allowed to get away with this sort of thing! The nerve, setting up a trap based around my Masochistic Nature and making people want to be mean to me!” Ishtar quivered with each word as if being struck by an arrow, steam all but rising from her ears as Passionlip went on indignantly.

---

Was this Hell? That scheming little bitch of an AI liked to call it that, and though Jeanne Alter usually dismissed it as stupid boasting, she was starting to wonder if maybe the malicious Moon Cancer wasn’t too far off the mark. Every time, she had come so close to escaping this hellhole on her own. Every time, near the end, her body just wouldn’t do what she wanted it to do anymore. No matter how careful she was, how methodically she ascended, there was always that one point where she didn’t quite break through the wall, where she waited too long to try the next one, or whatever. Then the reset would come, and she would be back at the bottom to do it all over again. Refreshed, sure, but at this point Jeanne was certain that BB had only set it up that way for her own amusement, forcing her to try and escape again and again, to literally beat her fists against the wall of futility - because the alternative was… this.

Her wrists had been caught by the creeping black goop, and she was laying flat on her back, her arms buried in the thick, tar-like substance up past her elbows. It had also crept forward enough to cover her vision with something akin to a blindfold, and though she pulled on her arms to free them, doubt clouded her mind. What was the point? BB had designed this whole shitshow for the sole purpose of making her suffer, and was obviously getting off on the sight of her struggling just as much as this damned tickling. Maybe she should just stay here and deny BB at least one of those pleasures, even if - “NYAHHAHAHAHAHGHHAHAHAHAHAHAHCKKK!!!” Oh, shit, shit. This was a bad idea, she shouldn’t have… Without any warning, she felt those hellish, spined tentacles in her armpits. The tips were just blunt enough to tickle like hell, their lengths covered in those ticklish, flexible spines, stroking against her perfectly exposed armpits. It was absolutely maddening.

This outfit didn’t even need to be taken off to expose her everywhere. Irrationally, Jeanne cursed herself for insisting on this damn bikini last year - BB had been able to use that altered Spirit Origin of hers to easily put her back into this revealing outfit. Her pale skin was utterly at the mercy of the tentacles, which simply stroked up and down, covering the greatest amount of surface area as they could with each and every touch, the ticklish sensations maddening but also now familiar to Jeanne. The way they simply radiated out from the tickle spot, sending frantic signals to her body to pull away, cover up, protect the weak spot, and somehow made her laugh. Howling, frantic laughter, and her body thrashed with its inability to make the tickling stop. Her feet kicked frantically in the dirt and her head tossed back and forth, but nothing made the sensations any easier to bear. At least it wasn’t her feet being tickled again. That was absolutely horrible. She hated it.

She hated having her armpits tickled, too. A sharper point - the tips of tentacles, that felt like fingernails - started to trace, gliding around the roughly stroking tentacle that curled around the shape of her armpit, following the contours of her ticklish skin. The scream of frustrated laughter inevitably gave rise to a string of curses: “DHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHA DAMN YOU BBHHHEEHHEEHEEEEE! I HAHAHHAHAHAHAH HATE YOU! HAHHAHAHAH!” It burst out before she could stop herself, and it only made Jeanne angrier. What was it about this tickling bullshit that made her body react in all the ways she hated? Like when it couldn’t escape the tickle sensation, all that energy somehow went to powerless flailing or impotent curses? BB was probably getting off to the sight of her helplessly cursing, cackling in that garish pink BB Channel studio or wherever the hell it was she went when she wasn’t sitting up there on the ledge being an annoying smartass. Now, if there was something which was really infuriating, it was that.

It was like, even over the sound of her own laughter she could hear the voice on the edge of her mind, taunting her as those tentacle tips stroked in her armpits, making her absolutely want to destroy something at the same time she had to fend off the feeling of abject despair at being caught in BB’s endless loop of tickle hell. “....anne! Jeanne!” She could hear it, but all BB wanted was for her to freak out again and laugh at her. She hated it so much! But if she just sat here and suffered, didn’t BB like that too? If only she could stop herself from laughing like a helpless little… “Jeanne! Hang on, we’re coming!” Wait, wait. That wasn’t BB. That was Master’s voice! That was… oh, shit! She couldn’t be like this in front of Master! If she didn’t get out of this soon, it would be a humiliation she’d never live down for a million years!

“Gahh-ahahha-RAHAHAHH-GRAHAHHAHAHGHHHHHAHHAAAA!!!” She still had her strength. She’d just been wallowing in self-pity for some reason. There was no reason Jeanne couldn’t get free from this stupid black slime crap! True, she was in a bad position on her back, but with a scream that was more laughter than she would have cared to admit, Jeanne tore away from the black goop’s clutches and stumbled forward, panting with exertion, and then looked up to where Fujimaru was waving her arms and jumping up and down on the rim of the crater. There - there was everybody! Master, ditzy Astolfo, spoiled Ishtar, greedy Sheba, uh… okay fine Skadi was just Skadi, and stupid titty monster Passionlip.

But it was the titty monster who was coming to her aid. Those gigantic golden claws of her were no joke when it came to destroying stuff - not only was Passionlip way stronger than she might have appeared or acted, but when it came to destroying things, she was stronger even than BB. Things that didn’t move, like the barriers, stood no chance against her Trash & Crush skill, and Passionlip was able to shred them almost as fast as she could walk. Being rescued was kind of annoying, it was no lie - Jeanne had been secretly harboring the fantasy that she would be able to free herself without Master’s help, and then get to brag about it to the others, but at this point she was willing to swallow her pride and accept it, if that meant she was able to leave this tickle pit even a second sooner. If the situation were different, Jeanne would have had to establish dominance by bullying Passionlip for a while before accepting her help, but in this case - JUST this case - she’d save that for BB.

Jeanne almost went back on her word when, upon meeting up with her, Passionlip went in for a hug, which, because of her claws, meant that she instead just used her upper arms to pull Jeanne’s face smack into the middle of her giant boobs, but in the end, they all gathered at the rim of the crater.

“All right. Time to finish this - I’m pretty sure that BB will be in the middle of the island where I started, and she’s not going to go down without a fight. She loves her final boss spectacles, so get ready for it.” With a mutual nod of determination, and a full team of six Servants, Fujimaru went to finally settle things with BB once and for all.

---

The sky began to turn an eerie twilight, even though it was still the middle of the day, and it didn’t seem like BB had turned time forward like Fujimaru had suspected she’d been doing while they were distracted dealing with the failed-puzzle penalties. No, this felt more like the final-boss event flag where everything got all dramatic, and by the time they reached the center of the island, BB stood there atop her twisted pillar of red-and-black tentacles, with that great big evil smirk on her face. The wind had started to blow, and black clouds were forming in the sky. A thunderstorm was a thematically appropriate and dramatic setting for a boss battle, of course, so Fujimaru wasn’t surprised - it was probably all for show, too, which meant there wouldn’t be rain, because who liked to be outside in the rain? The breeze was good for making BB’s cloak and hair blow dramatically, and she had to admit the setting made everyone play their parts without a word of instruction, fanning out at the base of the hill, letting the silence settle over the battleground so everyone had their moment of looking appropriately cool. If there had been a camera, everyone would have gotten a close-up of their battle stance before zooming out to show the group.

“Well, well, Senpai. Looks like the fun and games are over now, aren’t they? Just one last thing you have to do before we can all go back home.” BB spread her arms wide, dramatically. “Win the boss battle, claim the Holy Grail, and go home and turn in all of your event currency for ascension materials. But if you lose… maybe I’ll send you all back to the beginning again. Maybe I’ll even freeze you all in time and set up an entirely new set of puzzles you have to solve all over again! Think of it like a New Game+ where everything is familiar but in a different location and you get your abilities in a different order. Wouldn’t that be fun? Hehehehe. Hehehehehehe!”

“Fuck that,” Jeanne Alter retorted, bringing up her right hand and bracing her left hand on her right forearm as if stabilizing her fingergun. In this case, however, the purplish black energy that gathered in her arm was real, and not just a metaphorical expression. Without any further banter, Jeanne let loose, and the blast caught BB’s tentacles in black fire as the AI herself leapt off of them, long red scythe in hand, before she blurred into four copies of herself and attacked! Passionlip leapt to the front to deflect the attack with her giant claws - and instead fell onto her bottom with a squeal of laughter as the four copies clustered around her, tickling under her arms, underneath of her breasts, and around her belly with quick, squeezing motions, eliciting a cry of laughter before the four became one once again, and Jeanne hissed in between her teeth. “You aren’t even going to fight us normally? Give me a fucking break!” Drawing one of the three katanas she had decided were totally necessary for a bikini outfit, Jeanne lunged forward at BB, only to come to a sudden halt mid-stride!

“Third Eye - open. I’ll make a nice specimen out of you!” Jeanne’s attack was stopped right in its tracks, and BB dodged out of the way of Astolfo’s saber thrust. Ishtar charged forward with Maanna, trying to attack BB with the bladed guard at the front of the “bow”, and then unleashing a half-dozen streaks of light at her, but forced to defend herself when BB gathered her tentacles into an enormous spiked ball and swung it at her. Ishtar retreated into the sky and waited for her chance to strike. In the meantime, the air around Jeanne flickered and when she started moving again, she collapsed to the ground like Passionlip had, kicking her feet with frantic howls of laughter, unbuckling her sandals and throwing them off one by one. Fujimaru could see that their surface had become infested with small, wriggling tentacles, and during the time-stop had tickled her feet for a good ten seconds before all that sensation caught up to her. Just as she was about to turn on Astolfo, however, what could only be described as a tunnel blizzard blew over her with ferocious intensity for a tropical locale, making BB squeal with the cold. “Ouch! That’s freezing! Not at all sporting for a tropical bikini getaway to use ice!”

“You are one to talk about sporting,” Skadi retorted calmly, raising her wand to draw a rune upon BB from afar before a tentacle burst from the ground beneath her, wrapping around her form and lifting her from the ground - all of that impressive size, yet the most effective part of it was the tentacle tip that flexed into the armpit of the arm where she was wielding her wand, causing the regal goddess to burst into another spate of laughter. Astolfo changed tack, hacking at the tentacle restraining Skadi with his sword, but Passionlip had risen from the ground and, with the aura of the Queen of Sheba’s Charisma about her, pressed the attack on BB. Ishtar came to her aid, raining beams upon BB not with the intent to hit, but to limit her ability to dodge and keep her in Passionlip’s forward vision!

“You always take things too far!” Passionlip exclaimed heatedly, her gigantic golden claws tearing apart the soil where they struck, and shredding BB’s black-and-red cloak where she caught the garment a few times, but frustratingly unable to land a hit while she flailed wildly! “You say you like to play games with everyone but you don’t pay attention when they say they aren’t having fun! You only think of yourself!” Neither her attacks nor her words seemed to be landing a hit on BB, so Passionlip paused to regroup. Then, she set her jaw and steeled herself, placing her hands together and spreading them wide like a giant set of teeth ready to come snapping down on her foe. “My hands may be cold steel…!”

“Ohohohoho~ is that how we’re playing, Passionlip? Hehehehehe. Hehehehehehehehe!” BB caught sight of Fujimaru in the back, hand extended towards Passionlip, the red glow on the back of her hand showing BB that Senpai was playing for real and using a Command Seal. “I guess I have to be serious too, then!” Reaching into one of the wide sleeves of her cloak, BB produced a golden goblet, tilted it to her lips for a moment, then tossed it aside. “What is a man but a miserable pile of secrets?!”

“ -- but I won’t let myself become a monster! Go! Brynhild Romantia!!” Passionlip’s enormous metal claws detached themselves from her arms, and sped through the air with terrifying velocity at BB, chasing her around through the air when she jumped, but unable to make contact as the evasive little AI successfully kept out of the way of Passionlip’s heavy, fight-ending blows. With a sudden forward dash, BB escaped the two hands that clanged together heavily in a crushing blow, and exploited Lip’s temporary loss of her hands to skate her gloved fingertips up into Lip’s armpits, sending her down to the ground again, and bounded forward to stand before the Queen of Sheba, who put her arms up in defense - and missed BB’s shadow extending beneath her before erupting upwards, catching her ankles in thick, black goop!

“NOohahahahaHAHAHAHEHEHEHEH oh no not this aga-hahah-hAHHAHAHAIN!” No actual protrusions manifested from the shadow, but that didn’t stop the Queen of Sheba from feeling what felt like a hundred little claws tracing over her soles in a dozen different random patterns! Sheba flailed her arms helplessly, but the shadow also had her ‘stuck’ to the ground and left her unable to move - but before BB could take further advantage of that, Jeanne Alter careened in from the side, wreathed in her black flames, and struck BB solidly in the side to send her flying. Astolfo had finally freed Skadi from the binding tentacle and helped her back to her feet along with Fujimaru, where the three of them seemed to be having an impromptu whispered conference.

“You’re an EYESORE! Die! Volkermord… Feuerdrache!!” The flames Jeanne controlled writhed around her body almost uncontrollably, forming what looked like a dragon, before she struck BB full-on with all of her might, built-up frustration and anger all coming out in that single hit, causing BB to gasp and go flying away from the group, bouncing at least twice along the ground as she went. Ishtar, flying overhead, took advantage of that moment to rain down as much bombardment as she could upon BB’s location, screaming with almost as much pent-up frustration as Jeanne Alter had, and indiscriminately pounding the same location with beams large and small until a huge dust cloud had risen from the area. Then, there was a brief silence, before the sound of BB’s giggling resounded through the air, but much louder and reverberating, like she was considerably larger than her normal --

Fujimaru yelled for Ishtar to flee, but an inky blackness poured out of the clouds, resolving itself into BB’s form, towering over the landscape, a vicious grin upon her lips as she snagged Ishtar out of the sky with a giant hand. “I’ll drop you into despair!” she thundered, reaching down to grab Jeanne, who dodged out of the way. But BB’s fingers simply dug right into the ground beneath her, and picked up a whole chunk of the island outright, catching not just Jeanne but the still-struggling Queen of Sheba, and raised them high into the air along with Ishtar. “There’s no escape, now. This is the end of your desires, the dying gasp of your inflated ego.” And with that, she pressed all three of them, the huge chunk of soil and all, together and squashed them between her hands. “Cursed Cutting Crater!”

“No!” Fujimaru yelled, horrified for that brief instant, but when BB spread her hands, and then her giant form faded away, the three of them were still floating in the air, albeit much closer to the ground, suspended in some sort of… orbs of void space. They could still be seen quite clearly, but with the gags and blindfolds each of the three was sporting, they probably couldn’t hear her.

BB’s eyes were red with malice. “Have you learned your place yet?” Each of the three were trapped in a uniquely terrible position - Ishtar, stretched out with wrists and ankles bound tightly, a little rise in the ‘ground’ beneath her forcing her back to arch, as a wickedly whirring tendril with stiff bristles plunged into her bellybutton. Though she could barely move, nor freely laugh, the frantic struggles she did put up against the tickling were enough to see that she was losing her mind. “Each one of them is in a place where they can neither see nor hear nor feel anything else except the sensation of being tickled. Total blackness, Senpai. Ishtar’s bellybutton is being invaded with the cruelest navel torture device, plunging into that little bellybutton of hers up and down, making her scream. And I guess I should mention she’s being tickled eeeeeverywhere else by little buzzing devices, too. Including the ones in between the cheeks of her ass she hates so much, but now she can’t get it out! Hehehehehe…”

The Queen of Sheba was hogtied, with her bare feet helplessly held up above the small of her back. This let her rock side to side a little more than Ishtar could, but nowhere near enough to escape the feathery strokes that invaded the spaces between her toes. This was like having an entire feather duster’s worth of feathers, except each one could move individually to stroke over her ticklish soles, causing the hapless Sheba a considerable amount of distress! Then, finally, there was Jeanne Alter, who was in a different sort of setup - plain old stocks. Her wrists weren’t even bound, but she wasn’t flexible enough to reach down to her ankles, where a pair of pitch-black tongues simply lapped at her trapped soles endlessly. Her toes were all tied back, not even so much tied to the stocks as they were trapped within them, and there was literally no resistance her soles could offer to the licking sensation. Like a medieval punishment involving goats licking a maiden’s feet, or something.

The three of them floated above BB’s head as, somewhat battered and bruised but still very much a threat, she approached the back line Servants menacingly. Passionlip barred her path once again, but BB was able to dispatch her almost without a second thought, tentacles thrusting out of the ground with ticklish intent. Lip went down with another squeal of laughter, leaving just Skadi, Astolfo, and Fujimaru standing. “Now then… hehehe. I don’t think I’ve really paid either of you enough attention, but you’re not strong enough to beat me by yourselves, not with a support Noble Phantasm or that weak AoE one you’ve got, Astolfo. You might be able to stall with all those Evades, but eventually I’ll get you, and Skadi too. You have no idea how much fun this has been for me! Hehehehehehehe. Come on, hit me with your best shot, so you can taste pure despair as I crush your hopes of winning!”

Skadi touched Astolfo on the left shoulder with her wand. “By the wisdom of the Allfather, I bequeath this power unto thee.” Then, the right shoulder. “Be granted the power of the Primordial Rune. May it empower your Quick cards by fifty percent.” BB affected an ostentatious yawn, hands on her hips, simply grinning at him. Fujimaru touched his back with her palm, channeling the power of her Mystic Code to empower Astolfo for this one strike.

“Hehe… well, maybe this is cheating a little? But Master said it was okay, so.” Astolfo took his saber, and sort of slashed it at the air - whereupon it grew into an ever-extending chain, whirling and filling the air, looping in on itself and growing longer and longer without pause, as BB’s jaw dropped open in shock. “I know I’m not supposed to get this until later this year, but since you changed my outfit, I think I can do this just one time? Anyway, let’s see how it works! Volcano Caligorante~!”

“No! Hold on just a damn second, that’s --” But it was too late for BB. Instead of Rider Astolfo’s relatively weaker AoE Quick Noble Phantasm - the Hippogriff he had been riding around all this time - her enforcement of his skimpier costume had enabled Fujimaru to temporarily change his class to Saber, unlocking his much more powerful and Skadi-loopable single-target ability. The chain-blade wrapped around BB, dealing a ridiculously overpowered amount of damage further buffed by Skadi’s Primordial Rune, and the wholly guileless Astolfo stood there at the end of it, grinning and scratching the back of his head, as BB sat upon the ground, glaring up at him, unable to believe how quickly the battle had turned from complete domination to defeat. “Tch! I can’t believe you would cheat like that, Senpai. Using a Servant that hasn’t been released officially yet!”

Her defeat had, of course, released Ishtar, Jeanne Alter, and Sheba from their tickle-bubbles, although all three were understandably rather the worse for wear, but Jeanne had enough presence of mind to grin wickedly and drag herself to her feet, spotting BB’s restrained form and flexing her fingers. “Master, what do you say we spend the rest of this loop making sure BB understands exactly what she was putting us through --? HEY! No! That’s cheating! You damn cheater!” Jeanne howled, as BB began to exhibit that telltale yellow sparkly glow. “No! You stay right here until we’re done punishing you! Dammit! DAMN IT!”

But only BB’s smirking, Cheshire cat grin remained for a brief moment before she disappeared, giggles echoing in the air as the Singularity began to grow unstable. “Hey! Fujimaru!” Appearing at the very end of this whole ordeal was the ghostly blue image of Da Vinci, making contact from Chaldea. “We only were just able to get through to you when BB showed up back at Chaldea again. Don’t worry, we’ve got her under control, and we’re initiating the procedure to Rayshift everyone back. We’ve been able to keep an eye on the whole thing since you started, so you can take a break before the debriefing, but I figure you guys could use the immediate evac! It seems like you all had quite a hard time down there.”

“Yeah, you might say -- wait. Did you say that you were getting readings of us the whole time?” Fujimaru blurted out. Da Vinci paused before answering, confusion in her voice.

“Yes? We always do, you know that. Verifying your existence and all. What, did something happen?”

“No, just… never mind. Let’s go home.” Fujimaru looked up at them all - Passionlip, Astolfo, Skadi, Ishtar, Sheba, and Jeanne, and smiled. “This was probably the weirdest mission we’ve been on to date, but I couldn’t have done it without all of you. Thanks, you guys.”

“Heheh. Don’t go getting all sentimental on us, Master,” Jeanne Alter said with a grin, before she vanished.

“I’m not really cut out for this sort of combat… next time, I’d rather run the store,” the Queen of Sheba lamented, before she too was pulled back to Chaldea.

“Hmph. This was a waste of time, but I’m going to make sure that BB suffers for what she did to me -- I mean, to all of us. Da Vinci is too soft on her! I’m going to make sure that this time --” Ishtar was cut off in the middle of her rant.

“Things are very strange sometimes in this Chaldea of yours, Master, but… I can’t say the activity is always bad. I think I agree with the Queen of Sheba, however - next time, I’d rather be in a supporting role. Preferably somewhere less hot and with more ice cream.” Fujimaru couldn’t help but smile as Scathach-Skadi disappeared.

“I don’t get to be the big hero that often! This was kinda fun, Master. Let’s do it again sometime!” Before Fujimaru could reply with a deadpan ‘Let’s not’, Astolfo was gone too.

“I wish I got to go with you for missions where BB wasn’t being a big bully, but -- I’m glad you saved me, Master. Thanks for always believing in me!” And with that big, innocent smile of hers, Passionlip vanished too, before Fujimaru felt the tugging sensation come for her next, and the swirling tunnel of light that marked a Rayshift.

Home, finally.

---

“Two hundred thirty-seven million QP, huh.”

“Give or take.”

“That’ll keep things going for a while, but I’m still worried about the long term. This will bridge the gap, but is it sustainable?”

“It worked, didn’t it? So all that means is if we need to do it again, we can do it again.”

“But we can’t do it too often or it won’t be as effective. If it gets repetitive…”

“Repetitive? Hehehehe… hehehehehehe. You don’t have to worry about that.

Just leave eeeeeeeeverything to me.”