Commissioned from Tiugi.

What we have today is a story featuring Enju Aihara from Black Bullet being sent to an apparently legal Cursed Child tickling brothel. If anyone wonders how the hell such an institution could be legal, well, bear in mind that in the lore, Cursed Children have few rights and few supporters. They are born with the Gastrea Virus in their bodies, and since the Gastrea War that ended most of humanity and left the remainder traumatized was only ten years ago, there are a lot of people who despise anything Gastrea with a passion, including Cursed Children. In fact, according to the lore, despite how badly Cursed Children are treated in Tokyo Area, they're actually treated a lot worse in the rest of the world because most civilizations are still led by whatever dictator got the country through the Gastrea War whereas Tokyo Area has a peacetime ruler.

Well, I went off on a bit of tangent there. The point is, this makes sense from a pure lore perspective, but not only that, it also makes sense given the character (Enju the tiny temptress) and the timing (Volumes 5 and 6 of the light novels). And since the series went on permanent hiatus after Volume 7 and Enju played very little role in Volumes 5 and 6, this really doesn't contradict the established story at all so... hehe, you could imagine this as canon, and it would fit.

Enju Aihara could hear something. It sounded like… screaming… begging… and… laughing? It was annoying. She was trying to enjoy her tea party with Tina and Kisara. They were having fun making fun of Rentaro by sitting naked in front of him. Tina and Kisara were both so jealous of how big Enju's boobs were while they were both still flat as a board, and Rentaro was practically bowing down to worship her. When they complained about it, the Lady Seitenshi ordered her men to tickle them until they agreed that Enju was clearly better suited to marry Rentaro than any of them. ...That was where the laughing sound had started, and now that it was time for the wedding, it should have stopped. But it didn't. It was still going? Why was it still going? Were the guests in the audience tickling each other? Lady Seitenshi, take them away. ...No. That wasn't it? Why? Where is that noise coming from? Where…?

The ten year-old girl suddenly realized she was dreaming. No that wasn't correct; she always knew she was dreaming, but now she understood that that sound wasn't part of the dream. The more aware of that she became, the harder it was to ignore. There were… at least three voices crying out for mercy. Probably more; it felt like they kept changing. Why was she lying here sleeping while people nearby were crying for help?

Enju opened her eyes with a start. ...No, wait… They were still closed? That didn't feel right. But she couldn't see any more than she could before. Enju tried to reach up and touch her face, but her arms wouldn't move. She tried to turn her head, but her neck wouldn't move. What? What the hell was going on?!

Bump!

Suddenly feeling as though she'd bounced, the cursed child finally realized her situation. Her eyes were open, but she couldn't see because of a blindfold. She couldn't move her arms or legs or anything because she was all wrapped up in something… admittedly rather cozy. That would help explain why she had a hard time waking up. But whatever she was tied to wasn't a bed; she was tilted more-or-less upright and it felt like she was moving forward. Some sort of… cart or… a dolly or… whatever those things used to move heavy boxes were. She tried to speak, but all that came out was an "Ahhh, ahhh!" as if she were at the doctor's checkup. Of course it did; something was keeping her mouth stuck open. Maybe more like a dentist's checkup, then.

"Uh oh. She's awake."

"Oof, a bit too early."

Two voices, one directly behind her, probably pushing the thing she was strapped to, and one a little off to the side of the first started talking to each other.

"Use a light dosage. We don't want to keep the first customer waiting another hour."

"Right, right, I'm on it."

There was a prick in her arm. Enju knew that feeling very well. She'd lived with it every day since becoming Rentaro's Initiator. She'd just been given a shot, but she didn't think it was her medicine this time. Her eyelids started to feel very heavy, but she refused to go back to sleep. She activated the power of her blood and struggled with all her might. Her outburst made whatever she was tied to shake, rattle and jump.

"Whoa! She's a feisty one!" one of the voices said, moving away from her in the process. She'd startled them. That gave her some mild satisfaction, but it didn't really help. The binds were still holding firm, and it was getting… harder and harder to… keep her… eyes… open…

"We'll need the good… this one. Make sure… to slip out…"

Enju felt like the voices were still speaking, but before long, she couldn't make out what they were saying anymore. All sound faded away for a time. It didn't feel like she drifted off all the way, though; although she couldn't be sure, she felt like she was conscious enough to be vaguely aware that not much time had passed when she opened her eyes again.

She was in a candlelit room secured to a bed with lace curtains on it. The room had a very pink and red design-the sort that she might've liked under other circumstances. The heart-shaped pillows under her head and similarly motifed bed were both extremely cute, and she couldn't help imagining how she could use this to seduce Rentarou. However, the bindings holding her naked body down and her mouth open put a damper on her mood, as if being kidnapped wasn't bad enough by itself.

It was all coming back to her now. Rentarou had been arrested and accused of murder. Enju didn't know the details, but men from the IISO had come and taken her away, stating that she would be interrogated on what she knew, and if they were satisfied she wasn't involved, she would be put back into the system to wait for a new Promoter. One might think that the situation Enju was now in was the beginning of the interrogation in question, but that was actually over and done with quite easily. Despite their obvious immense disdain for cursed children, the men had orders from Lady Seitenshi herself not to treat the girl with unnecessary cruelty, and though they made no secret about how frustrated it made them, they quickly concluded that Enju was not a liar and truly knew nothing of Rentarou's crime.

Of course, Enju didn't believe that Rentarou had committed any crime in the first place, but they wouldn't listen to that. They even told her that the Lady Seitenshi had revoked his status as a Promoter as the evidence against him mounted and that her dear friend Tina Sprout was now being investigated as a likely accomplice and fellow murderer. Enju insisted throughout it all they were wrong or liars up until they shoved her in the room she would be staying in until the higher ups selected a new Promoter for her. And then, once they were gone and she no longer had anyone to yell at, she cried herself to sleep.

That was the last thing she remembered before waking up here. Was she taken away by her new Promoter while she was asleep? Whoever they were, they didn't seem to be as nice a person as Rentarou. That wasn't surprising; very few Promoters were kind people. The vast majority were criminal scum who didn't deserve to have Initiators by any definition, but the government allowed just about anyone to have Initiators due to the fact that the need for more people who can fight Gastrea is simply that bad.

Whoever tied her down was smart. Her cuffs were decorated with a pretty pink fluff, but that's just what they looked like from the outside. She could feel cold metal against her wrists, and judging from the slightly queasy feeling she experience if she moved her arms or feet too much, they were probably made of Varanium. Varanium didn't affect cursed children as strongly as Gastrea, but it did have some effect. The big thing was in regard to their regenerative properties. Enju had learned from other Initiators that it was possible to escape from handcuffs by pulling until the skin peeled off. Not fun, but possible, and for a cursed child, nothing they couldn't heal up good as new from. But cuffs made of Varanium changed that; if bits of the metal shaved off while she was pulling out, the wound would never heal without surgery. Even a more battle-hardened cursed child like Enju didn't have the stomach to hurt herself that badly if there was a chance the damage would be permanent. For that matter, she probably didn't have the stomach to do it under any circumstances at all.

Suddenly, Enju heard the sound of a door opening, and when she looked over, she saw a large gorilla of a man in a suit holding the entrance and gesturing for someone to come inside. "Right in here, sir. Would you prefer the door open or closed?"

("No! Nohohoho! Plehehehehease mahahahahaster!")

A lanky man with glasses walked in with an unpleasant smile on his face and wearing a police uniform. He stared at Enju while he responded to the bouncer/waiter/...whatever-he-was. "Closed, please; I don't want the background music distracting me."

("I cahahahahan't! I cahahahahahan't! Nohohohohot thehehehehere!")

"Yes sir. If you need anything at all, just ring the buzzer on the wall, and someone will come down to assist you." The man in the monkey suit closed the door behind him, cutting

("Ihihihi'm a tihihihicklish toy! Ihihihihi'm a ticklihihihish tohohohoy-")

off the sounds of laughter and pleading leaking in from outside the room and returning it to eerie quiet.

The sleazy-looking man started walking over to Enju. "So you're the Initiator of the Hero of Tokyo Area. When they said you were on the list of available girls, I thought for sure it was a scam, but considering the recent news, it just seemed possible enough to waste some money on." The smile on his face was one Enju knew well; it was the face of someone who was utterly disgusted with her existence and wanted to punish her for that alone.

Enju flinched and cowered for a moment in the face of such a person, but she was also a battle-hardened veteran despite being only ten years old. Even though she was scared and miserable and desperately wanted to find and hide behind her beloved Rentaro, she absolutely refused to let this man see such weakness. So she brought her facial muscles under control, gritted her teeth, and practically hissed at the man in front of her. She tried to say something in response but she couldn't because of the ring gag. All that came out was "Aaas ah! Ah oh heho in oh hohi ho!" which no one could've possibly understood as "That's right! I know people in the police force!" so her implicit threat to the apparent dirty cop completely failed.

The man went on as though she hadn't said anything, speaking for his own self-satisfaction as if she were just a potted plant or a pet he was venting to. "You know, some people actually thought you deserve thanks for fighting off the Gastrea. It's sickening, really, to hear anyone argue that a devil spawn deserves any shred of compassion just because we were able to turn them against other devils." Walking over next to the pinkly decorated bed, the man opened the drawer of a night stand, the light on top of it casting a sultry glow over the room, and started meticulously looking through it in a deliberately slow and taunting manner. "But thankfully, they've all shut up now. Turns out the 'Hero' was just another shitty punk Promoter like all the rest, so people are finally coming back to their senses."

Enju screeched out furiously at him, but it was all unintelligible. Even so, as he pulled a long, stiff feather out of the drawer with both hands like an archeologist examining a rare find, his smile somehow grew even more sinister. "Oh? Did I hit a nerve? You're not still arguing that he's innocent, are you?" Enju's eyes slowly widened at what the sight of what he was holding, the pieces of a puzzle clicking into place in her mind one by one. The dream she had when she was first waking up, the laughing and the begging while she was in the hall… it all pointed very clearly to where this situation was headed, but it was so surreal and terrifying she didn't want to accept it. But the police officer turned toward her, bent over the bed, and dangled the feather over her tummy, and any desire to deny this reality was quickly replaced by the desire to escape from it, her body bucking instinctively in the bondage even though she knew she'd already concluded slipping out would do more harm than good.

"Worthless Red-Eyes." The scummy man spat the words at her, his expression twisting and wrinkling from diabolical joy to disgust in its purest form. "I'm going to take away whatever human dignity you think you have, and make you feel a small fraction of the pain your kind have caused everyone."

The cursed child stared at the feather, shaking her head almost violently. It hadn't even touched her yet and she was already broken. Then, as the feather descended slowly downward, the attack hit her from an unexpected direction. "AAAHahahahahahaha! NOhohohahahahaha!" The cop had used his free hand to start goosing her ribs while she was distracted. The feather touched down and started twirling around her belly and belly button a moment later.

He was attacking her body like a blunt brute. Apparently taken over by his rage, the policeman threw all air of snobbish superiority out the window in favor of trying to overload her mind all at once with animalistic ferocity. "Yeah, how do you like this, you fucking Gastrea?! You don't even get the chance to show off those cheap regeneration powers you love so much! Heh, I'll bet those powers are so perfect that your body basically doesn't ever get less ticklish no matter how much you've been hurt in the past. This must be absolute torture for you."

His assessment wasn't wrong, but it was off the mark. It wasn't the sensation itself that was torture. The fingers clawing at her body and the fluffy tool sending her nerves tingling and jumping-that wouldn't normally bother Enju. As a rule, the girl actually liked being tickled. And even as young as she was, that included being tickled sexually. She had very fond memories of one time she came out of the bath wearing only a towel, trying to seduce Rentaro, and half-succeeding (in her mind) by getting him so flustered that he decided to tickle her until she agreed to put some clothes on. He never did it again after that, unfortunately; he apparently didn't like the fact that she told all the neighbors that he'd run his hands all over her naked body. Which was a shame because in hindsight, she felt like they'd gotten close to second base that day. She'd fantasized about Rentaro tickling her after a bath, or better yet, in the bath, or even better yet, while they were getting naughty in bed many, many times since then.

And… that was what was so horrible about this. Enju did like being tickled. She really did. And she would give anything to have Rentaro be the one with her in this room right now. She really would. But he wasn't. She was tied up on an adorable bed, naked and ready and being tickled like crazy, but… this man wasn't Rentaro. He didn't even like her, and she certainly didn't like him. The fact that any part of her still felt any pleasure about that sensation dancing up her sides and into her armpits, slipping occasionally over her flat chest, digging into her hips… it was so incredibly wrong. So violating. Her body was sending signals to her brain saying, "This is awesome!" but her brain was sending signals back to her body that, "This is torture!"

The feather took one last trip from Enju's left armpit, over her chest, down her ribs, over her stomach and teased for a moment on top of her vagina before the cop pulled back seeming to have regained a bit of his composure. As the cursed child panted heavily, he cursed and mumbled to himself. "Right, even a Gastrea like you still needs oxygen. Take a moment to breath. I'll have some new toys picked out for you in a moment."

"Ahhhh! Noh ih ohh! No hor!"

Chuckling to himself as he peered back into the drawer, the cop continued speaking as though Enju weren't anything more than an inanimate object. "I'm not doing anything illegal, you know. It might shock you, but cursed child brothels like this one are quite legal, even here in Tokyo Area. The Lady Seitenshi has been trying to shut them down, but no luck." Pulling out two scrub brushes, each designed to be easily attacked to the tickler's palms for easy one-handed use, he turned around and started walking toward the foot of the bed, tapping Enju's leg with one finger with each step. "I think these institutions are absolutely necessary. They're extremely cathartic for people who've been traumatised by you monsters, and they're also good for punishing upstarts who start thinking they're human."

Sitting down in front of Enju's feet, the wretched excuse for an officer started to give them quick teases, making Enju jump and let a whoop out of her perpetually open mouth. "You're one of those, right? Rumor is that your Promoter was really nice to you. Bought you lots of gifts, let you eat good food, sent you off to school… They also say that he was grooming you into a willing sex toy. I can kinda understand that, but letting you think of yourself as human is just disgusting no matter what his motives were." Technically, the latter part of those rumors was completely untrue. That was the faulty impression people tended to have of Rentaro partly as a result of Enju's efforts to make them an item and partly Dr. Muroto's to ruin Rentaro's reputation for the fun of it. ...Well, not like Enju would've admitted that Rentaro felt no romantic attraction for her even if she could correct this guy. And even thinking such thoughts was nothing more than an effort to escape the cruel sensations and crueler words.

"You're not human. At best, you're a tool. Right now, you're a toy. And someday, you'll be killed before you become a man-eater." The brushes started to pick up speed, intensity and consistency, making Enju switch from occasional whooping to steady laughing. "This is what you freaks deserve. And your Promoter got the death sentence he deserved too."

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHahahaha LIIIIIHAHAHAhahahahar!"

"Hey, I understood that one." The cop stopped for a moment and leaned over to look Enju in the face. "You're half-right. The guy's not dead. But not because he didn't get the death sentence." The man's face twisted with spite again, and he squeezed the brushes in his hands hard enough for them to make a plasticky squeak. "He escaped from custody en route back to his cell after the Seitenshi stripped him of his rank."

He escaped? The news barely had the time to register before the policeman shoved the brushes against Enju's sides and started rapidly scrubbing them up and down from her armpits down to her hips and back again. "Do you know how many of my friends were hurt when he flipped over the minivan taking him back to the jail? Three! Three people who were just doing their jobs! It's a miracle they all survived!"

Three innocent people got hurt? By Rentaro? That didn't sound right at all, even if he was trying to escape. The Initiator wanted to argue, to reject, to explain that Rentaro would never do that and something else must have happened. But even if the ring gag hadn't been muddling her ability to say anything, she was laughing too hard at this point to say anything coherently anyway. The brushes were very craftily designed to work marvelously well on more than just feet. Her mind kept playing tricks on her, fantasizing that it was Rentaro feeling up her sides so passionately. But that wasn't the case, and a deep, deep disgust with how these tingly feelings kept invading her head and making her want to enjoy the situation lodged itself in her heart.

This kept going for what felt like hours. Maybe it was, or maybe it was mere minutes. Time didn't really mean anything here for the captive on the bed. What mattered was that the dirty cop had scrubbed those brushes almost everywhere by the time he relented and gave her a break, and Enju was panting so hard in the aftermath that she started to think maybe it would be better to risk the physical damage so slip out of these cuffs. If she could reunite with Rentaro, maybe they could escape together. The problem was that escaping from wherever this place was with her hands and feet ruined probably wouldn't be possible, but the longer she was tickled and verbally abused, the more tempting it was to try.

The policeman had stopped speaking a while ago, apparently having tired of hearing himself rant, but as he pulled a thin makeup brush out of the drawer and looked it over, he got a glint in his eye and started up again. "I'm sure you must feel absolutely miserable after all that torture, so I'll be 'nice' and do something a bit softer until the others get here." Others?! There were going to be others?! Even Enju didn't know if she could handle being tickled by several people at once. There is such a thing as too much after all. Distracted by this thought, Enju didn't hear what else the cop was saying until a ticklish touch in a very unexpected place gripped her attention. "What do you think about that? Is that better than me torturing you harshly? Heh. Kinda wish I could understand what you were saying now."

"Ahahaha! Stohohahaha thahahaha! Nohohoho theahahahahaha!" He was tickling her pussy. He was tickling her pussy!

Hewasticklingherpussyhewasticklingherpussyhewasticklingherpussy.

This fact shocked Enju on some core level of her being, and her mind couldn't process anything she was feeling for several moments. The first thing she comprehended was that it felt weird. The second was that it felt wrong. And then almost a full two minutes later, she comprehended why, albeit simplistically.

Enju was a powerful Cursed Child capable of superhuman feats, but she was also still just a 10 year-old girl. She was an early bloomer in all fairness, but even then, it was far too soon for her mind to fully understand sexual feelings. She often led people on to believe that Rentaro had perverted thoughts about her, and she had figured out that touching genitals was something that adult lovers did, but she didn't really get it. The sensations that she felt in that instant weren't proper sexual arousal, but they were something approaching it. Like how a child feels puppy love in their youth, what Enju felt as that brush tickled her most private spot was an immature, undeveloped form of sexual arousal that felt extremely foreign and weird to her.

The one thing Enju understood with clarity as the situation was drilled into her by the maddeningly tingly touch was that this was something only lovers were supposed to do. If it were Rentaro, she wouldn't mind. Hell, she'd tried to get him to touch her there before in an effort to get him to view her as a lover. But this person, this pervert, this freak wasn't Rentaro. Enju went passed the point of mere anger or hatred and in the realm of true fury. She screamed enough distorted curses at the man that had he heard it, Rentaro would have been forced to rethink the language he used around her.

The policeman, meanwhile, enthusiastically taunted and demeaned her with the dominance he held over her that she had no power to dispute. "You know what I heard? They say that Cursed Children are born ready for sex. Is it true? Are you turned on right now? I really don't know, but I guess I'll find out pretty soon. Tickle, tickle, tickle. Let's see just how much of an unnatural demon you really are. Come on, cum for me; show me your inhuman side." Whether he really thought that was possible or knew full well it wasn't was unclear and unimportant. What mattered was that he made clear to Enju that he was demanding something from her that she wasn't old enough for, essentially saying he wouldn't stop until she did it.

Enju's body laughed and twitched involuntarily under the invasive administrations for quite some time, often jumping into overdrive when the man used his free hand to tickle her upperbody suddenly, digging into her sides, stomach, ribs or armpits at random intervals "to keep you from enjoying it too much", as he put it. The unfortunate girl didn't know what she hated more: the fact that he assumed she liked this, or the fact that a part of her did. Shut up! she started screaming in her mind. Shut up, shut up, shut the fuck up! Stop talking! Please, at least stop talking! Rentaro! Make him stop! Rentaro! After what was probably hours of being torn in two extremely different emotional directions, Enju was ready to beg for help in front of her captors. But since she couldn't do even that, her distress manifested in the form of tears.

The policeman noticed her crying after a couple minutes and finally paused her ordeal. There was an indescribable look on his face. As though he was conflicted over how he should feel at the sight of his hated victim in tears. Did he, perhaps, have a moment of conscience where he wondered if monsters can cry and, if they can't, just what it was he was doing? Or was he just disgusted at the notion that a demon in human skin would use tears as a means of seeking pity and potentially freedom?

Before Enju could hear whatever the next words out of the cop's mouth might be, there was a knocking on the door, and a voice then came over an intercom from the other side. "Sir, your acquaintances have arrived. Shall I let them in, or do you require a moment's privacy to prepare?"

Shaking himself out of whatever internal dialogue he was having, the police officer stood up, brushed himself off, and walked over to the door, hitting the button on the intercom next to it. "No, no, I'm fine. Please bring them in."

"Of course, sir."

"Ahhh! AhhahhAHHahh!" Enju grunted out over to the man, no longer trying to form words but still seeking an explanation for what was going on.

In response, the officer leered at her and waved a hand dismissively. "I had the day off today, so I came here early. But I'm not the only officer on the force who's pissed at you and your Promoter. Oh hell no. There's over a dozen of us. Lucky for you, the limit per visitation is five."

As if on cue, four more police officers, all of them in uniform-probably with the intent of destroying all hope of salvation from the law to the Cursed Children they tormented here-sauntered into the room, three more men and one woman. They started exchanging greetings with the man who'd been tormenting Enju for who-knew-how-long, thanking him for warming up the toys for them and asking how many times he'd made her squeal and other obscene things that should absolutely never come from the mouths of policemen.

Enju was barely able to keep up with who was saying what. It didn't feel like it mattered. They were all the same. Even the woman of the group eyed her… not exactly with lust, but definitely a clear sense of malice. The only positive change was that several members of the group weren't pleased about the ring gag in her mouth. "How are we supposed to know if she's begging or not?" they complained until the first man agreed to pull it out.

Incidentally, there was a reason why it was standard practice to employ ring gags in this brothel. Cursed children's bodies heal unnaturally quickly, so it wasn't uncommon for the poor girls to bite their own tongues or lips in the hopes of grossing customers out and getting a break from their ticklish torture. After all, it would heal back, and a bit of pain had to be better than even more tickling, right? So the cursed children of the brothel would usually have ring gags kept in their mouth until that "misbehavior" was thoroughly trained out of them.

Not that Enju knew any of this, nor did the idea occur to her at this point. She was too exhausted and on the verge of being broken. Being tickled by one pervert was bad enough; now there were five. The moment the ring was removed and she could use her jaw muscles again, Enju started half-threatening, half begging for her freedom. "You c-can't do this! M-my Promoter is the best in Tokyo Area! He'll save me, you'll see! And, and the Lady Seitenshi will be upset too! So just stop it!"

"Oho! The great Lady Seitenshi will personally come down from her high horse to punish us! I'm so scared!"

"No, no, it'll be that fuckin' cop attacker. He'll come through that door like a knight in shining armor for his monster princess."

"Heh, I can kinda believe that one. But too bad, so sad, there's no way. Half the city is looking for him. He'll be back in custody before he can get anywhere near here."

Enju's threats were met with jeers, and each of the officers started flexing their preferred tickling tools and surrounded her like vultures. The two sides-the victim and the predators-traded insults for several more moments, but it was blatantly obvious which side was bluffing as the cops slowly closed in, waving feathers and fingers and brushes of all varieties in the air ominously, smirking and winking at each other. The officer who'd been with Enju all day started lecturing the others on what he believed the girl's most ticklish spots to be and which ones gave the best reactions, and any complaints Enju had against it shot down with "truth tests."

The first of these were her toes, which the man was happy to inform his comrades were incredibly sensitive to both fingers and feathers. In particular, the middle toe of each foot seemed particularly ticklish, a theory that they readily tested by pulling them back and shoving an electric toothbrush against them one by one, taking an especially long time to tickle that middle toe. He turned out to be wrong, though; it was actually the one next to the pinky that had Enju squealing the hardest. Whoops! In response to this discovery, they all acted as though Enju had intentionally lied to them, and tickled her feet thoroughly, with special emphasis on those toes until she was apologizing profusely just to make them stop.

He then directed them to Enju's underarms and nipples, telling them that although each was ticklish enough in their own right, the Cursed Child made particularly unique and satisfying sounds when they were tickled simultaneously. This was entirely true; for some reason, tickling in one of those areas seemed to amplify the sensations in the other. Enju didn't know why, and she didn't care. She just wished they hadn't immediately proven it with feathers and makeup brushes. The tickling was so intense, and if she closed her eyes, she could easily fantasize that Rentaro was making her feel these things. But every time she opened them again, it was just that group of disgusting faces mocking her, asking her if she was enjoying it, promising several more hours of it.

After only a few minutes, the original cop decided to showcase what he deemed Enju's "death spot." It was right at the top of her ribs, just beneath her armpits. Digging into this spot, he said, would have Enju crying almost immediately. The group of five found this quite entertaining and each took turns exploiting this weakness for several minutes, which was abject torture for Enju in the truest sense. Just as the first cop had claimed, it truly was a death spot, the one place on the poor girl's body that she actually couldn't handle being tickled for long. Even if it had been Rentaro, it would still have been too much after a few seconds. These people had no interest in stopping anytime soon, and Enju finally cracked here, begging and pleading as much as she could through her laughter-which wasn't much-for them to stop.

"STOP! STAHAHAHAHAHAP! NOHOHOHOHOHO MOHOHOHOHOHOHORE, PLEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEASE!"

She looked into her captors' faces as they tickled her worst spot one after another, each one getting blurred together through her tears. Which was which? Which was the one that kept calling her a disgusting Red-Eyes? Which one kept cooing at her like a baby? Which one gave the monologue about his family's deaths or something? It didn't matter. She just wanted them to stop. If only it were Rentaro. Where was Rentaro? Why wasn't she with Rentaro?

…

The police officers showed her no mercy after that. By the time they had finished with her, the Initiator felt like a jumbled mess, her whole body tingling and jumping. When they left, she thought she was finally being given a break, but the reality of this place, a Cursed Child tickling brothel, was far too cruel. The fact was that Enju was the former Initiator of the city's most famous former Promoter: the Hero of Tokyo Area who'd gone rogue and murdered someone. There was no shortage of customers who wanted a crack at her. Quite the opposite: there were so many that she was barely given time to eat and sleep. Her mutant body ensured that no matter how broken or exhausted she was, she never completely ran out of breath or stamina. Everything about her that made her inhuman was exploited, twisted against her, and used to torment her. This continued day after day after agonizing day, until finally, out of nowhere, several guards came in, drugged her, removed her from her cuffs, and started wheeling her out. Enju thought they were moving her to another room or position. Maybe she was going to be tortured together with some of the other girls she often heard wailing and pleading for mercy in this evil institution.

Her body tingled.

It actually came as a shock to her when she was handed off to an IISO officer and released from her restraints completely. The official had a disgusted frown on his face as he reluctantly read aloud to her, "By order of the Lady Seitenshi, in light of new evidence in the murder of Kihachi Suibara proving the innocence of the previously accused Rentaro Satomi, the latter has been granted his status of Promoter back, rank fully restored, and his Initiator, Enju Aihara, is to be retrieved from her new assignment and returned to him immediately." The declaration seemed like something out of a delusion even though only a few days had passed. Surely any moment now, someone would wake her up by force, digging their fingers into that death spot on her ribs.

Her body tingled.

Enju was half-led, half-prodded out of the building by the IISO, taken away to the main office, and left to wait for Rentaro to pick her up. It wasn't until he entered, a small, relieved smile on his face, that the fact that she was free finally sunk in. "Rentaro… Rentaro!" The Initiator reunited with her Promoter, hugging him and crying in his arms while he in turn quickly lost his stoicism and cried in turn.

There in his arms, Enju finally felt safe again. Protected. Home. ...And yet… as the arms wrapped around her, hands grasping her ribcage tightly enough to make their presence known but not enough for anything more… something… something about it all felt hollow. Empty. Lacking. Not enough.

Her body tingled.

Enju started feeling an incessant need where Rentaro's comforting hands held her.