Chapter Fourteen

The sound of the door opening roused Candy from her phased torpor. Her exhaustion and the banal existence in the room offered her no clues as to the passage of the time and because there were no windows and the light was always on, even the passage of days was removed.

She lifted her weary head to see the same two kamube marching in. The door slithered shut behind them and they immediately began to strip off their meagre clothing. She stared at them with bemusement as they shed their garb and then stepped out before her. They were now naked save for nipple rings and collar.

The taller of the women had a slightly more slender build and had dark hair that was almost black. Her features were slightly angular, bestowing a more gaunt and vicious countenance. Her breasts were small, but they were very pert. The woman closed her hand about the flogger and ran her fingers through the thick suede-lined leather strands.

‘I am kamube Ivy.’

The other crouched down before Candy and hoisted her chin in one hand before the other slapped Candy’s swollen cheek. The woman was shorter and more curvaceous than her partner, with ample breasts and enticing curves. She had brown hair and hazel eyes that glittered with malevolence.

‘And I am Kamube Petal,’ she snarled and added another couple of slaps to make Candy cringe and whimper as she tried to get away from the abuse. The woman grabbed her feeding hose and pulled up to make the prisoner cry against her gag and snort for breath as the huge oral anchor sought to emerge but could not fit through her pained maw.

‘You dared to slander this great and devoted House? I cannot even begin to comprehend such dishonour,’ said Petal.

‘But what can one expect from a barbarian?’ commented Ivy.

Candy gave a startled look to the woman before her. The kamube read the expression and simply grinned before letting go of the pipe. Candy sucked in to bring the gag back the tiny measure it had moved and ease her sorrow a little.

‘Yes, we know who you are, you slut. You’re Hachiman’s little imported whore from Earth,’ snarled Petal.

‘We hate people from the other side, don’t we, Petal?’

Candy gave a wail against her gag as her anal pipe was snatched and pulled to make the capturing plug drag against her sphincter. Her hands clawed against the cushions and she thrashed her head from side to side.

‘Indeed we do. Especially stuck up little privileged bitches who don’t know their place,’ said Petal and stepped to the wall to arm herself with the broad paddle. Her partner let go of the pipe and Candy wilted within her straps.

‘Just because you have been honoured beyond equal to have been in the presence of the Kami...’ said Ivy, and then after a pause brought the flogger down in an overhead arc that had it lay its thick strands across Candy’s back.

‘...does not mean you are no longer kami-tsu-ko,’ she continued and then commenced with a slow and weighty beating. The leather tendrils slammed to her back and filled the room with their stark signal as a struggling heat started to swell within Candy’s back. Every swipe escalated the distress, and as the woman continued to growl her words between swipes, Candy started to find the weapon less easy to endure.

‘You are a slave. We are kamube. Our master is Imbe Yeng, and you are subservient to us! Understand! You are our plaything!’

Candy flinched with every stroke and bitterly regretted her earlier words. She had caused great offence and these women were now going to avail themselves of the chance to punish her for it. Candy was actually frightened. She had never before been so abandoned. There were always Kami around to study her, use her, protect her. Now she was alone and defenceless. These former slaves could do anything they wanted to her with impunity, and this made her scared.

‘And this ungrateful barbarian has been blessed to be used by Lady Uzume, Warlord Hachiman, and even the Supreme Warlord of Water no less. How can someone who has been given such treasures be so disrespectful!’ added kamube Petal and Candy flew to attention as the paddle swung around and clapped to the sole of her foot. The tender skin exploded with turmoil and she tried to curl her toes in and protect the region. The woman flung the weapon overhead and laid it to Candy’s rear. Her cheek rippled and lucid heat swelled within the assailed skin. The other buttock was attacked, and the flogger began to again rain down on her back.

‘Toyo-tama-hiko lent you to our House,’ said Ivy. ‘...and you should be grateful to experience what we offer.’

Petal grabbed Candy’s big toe and pulled down. She tried to stop her but the severity with which the woman was treating her intimidated her into giving up. She closed her eyes and relaxed her foot to give the woman the target she wanted.

‘You will be released when Toyo-tama-hiko desires you returned to him,’ said Petal and started to lay the paddle to the bared sole. Each stroke made Candy spasm as she tried to scrunch up her toes and defend herself but the woman now had her target and was not letting go. Candy’s shriek wafted through the gag in the form of feeble murmurs. She cast her head around in torment while instinctively fighting to get away from this infernal monsoon of discipline.

‘Whereas we suffered long and hard in the fields and barns, in the kennels and cages before we were elevated, and yet you dare to slur our beloved Imbe with your words and show us no respect?’ growled Ivy.

‘Well we’re going to pay you lots of visits, cowgirl. We’ll make sure you get all the attention you believe you are due.’

‘We are kamube of House Uka no mitama, and if you cannot respect the House, then oh by the Sun-Goddess you’ll learn to fear it!’

Petal jumped forward and started to energetically alternate from cheek to cheek with occasional hateful swings into Candy’s inner thighs. Her partner continued to drop the broad tentacles of the flogger onto Candy’s back and she was lost in a tornado of anguish.

She jolted and felt her sanity being carried away on a tide of desolation. The fright caused by these harridans with their derision and scornful comments made it impossible for her to find any pleasure in this abuse and when they finally stopped, it took Candy a few moments to realise that fact. Her swimming sight cleared to see them getting dressed and Candy was left with throbbing back, feet and rear. Again, she dropped down onto the plinth and just let her mind drift on indistinct half-thoughts and vague recollections of her past.

She had no idea how long it was between their departure and the next time she was milked, given an enema, and force-fed, but when had just finished her next session of brutal milking, forced pleasure, and feeding, the door shuffled aside and the two women entered, this time both wearing curling elegant cowboy hats and bearing bullwhips in their hands.

Ivy dropped her whip and grabbed the feeding hose as her partner marched over and took up the enema pipe. Candy was mortified to see the woman offer a malignant smirk and then bend the hose over several times to crimp it. She could guess that Petal was doing the same.

The hose started to chug quietly to itself and then began to shudder as the build-up started to cause more distress to the machine.

‘Ready for a binge, cowgirl?’ hissed Ivy and simply dropped the hose.

Candy’s eyes bulged as a huge measure of backed up food was forced into her maw. It thundered down her throat, swelling it and making her snort in apathy. As the massive flow decreased to a more stolid level, she jerked to attention as another swollen influx rushed into her rear and made the area just beyond the tightly fastened plug swell to horrible levels. The bloated douche stretched her tracts and made her cavort against her bonds as she fought to operate her canals and ingest the sudden excess.

‘Ready for another?’ asked Ivy and reached down to slowly take up the deserted hose. Candy threw her head around and tried to keep the item out of the woman’s hands, hoping to avoid her long enough so that the feeding would finish before she could bend the hose.

Ivy stepped over the hose and settled down. Her rear pushed down and snapped the line taut to make Candy mew as the gag was pulled on. Her mouth could not allow the swollen item free and so it strained at her features to engineer a cruel anguish.

‘Hmmm, that gives me an idea for tomorrow,’ came Petal’s sultry voice and then Candy felt the flow of the enema suddenly stop.

Ivy grabbed the hose, stepped back off the pipe, and bent it over.

‘I can’t wait to see it,’ said Ivy, her eyes locked to Candy’s imploring stare as she again cut off the flow. Candy sobbed and watched as the hose started to quake from the accumulating backup.

‘Here we go, cowgirl. Enjoy!’ she snarled and both of the villainesses dropped the hoses.

Candy flexed and struggled as a sudden massive wall of fluid and food slammed to her rear and mouth. Her tracts thundered with engorged misery as she was forced to process more than she could ordinarily bear and as she suffered and offered keening whimpers, the women just laughed.

‘What a silly beast,’ accused Petal.

‘And she smells like a filthy one,’ said Ivy.

‘Well let’s correct that shall we?’ laughed Petal and strolled to the wall opposite the door upon which hung the weapons and the only unused hose. She paid out the length and turned the valve at the tip. Cold water trundled forth and poured over Candy’s body. The heat in her skin from the fight to get free was instantly stolen and she jerked as it continued to roll over her, numbing her skin and making her cry out from shock.

Candy gave a squeal of resentment when the tardy flow was turned onto her pussy. She was still hot after the fucking the machine had given her and the water felt freezing from the contrast. She fought to close her legs and the drastic drop in temperature made her hurl her head from side to side in a bid to get free. She stared up at Ivy with utter imploring but the woman stood aloof and disdainful, merely mocking Candy’s expression with another detached chuckle.

The nozzle closed in and the flow started to pour into her recently ravished sex. Candy’s entire physique launched to a tensed and rigid stance. Her squeal of dismay even managed to hum over the gag as the cleansing continued and stripped her humid pussy of all its previous warmth.

‘There we go. Nice and clean. Fresh and ready to serve,’ attested Petal.

She switched off the flow and hung up the hose. Candy could not relax even though the abuse had finished. Shivering, her body flinched and flicked as the cold continued to haunt her hide. The inserted flow dribbled from her pussy and into the waste hole and she let her head hang limp down the front the plinth.

‘We had best get a move on, Petal. We don’t have much time to get to the breeding pens,’ whispered Ivy, and without any more consideration for the hapless female they were so thoroughly tormenting, the pair of vixens sauntered cheerfully from her stall.

Candy just lay where she was and tried to stay calm and recover some body warmth. She barely noticed a priest open the door and enter, look around and check her hoses before finding all in order and departing. The backup in flow had caused someone to investigate, but without the capability for speech, she could not inform about her abusers. Besides, why would a priest ask a mere cowgirl what had happened. It would probably be considered beneath her intellect.

Candy loathed this role. She did not mind being regarded as a sex slave, as a toy for the amusement of others, or in being humiliated, degraded, and insulted, but to be utterly ignored was most infuriating. She found herself reminiscing about previous exploits, and even the stern encounters with sadists such as the Wani daughters were now a most welcome memory. Even though they had treated her horribly, they had still acknowledged her existence and had used her for their own grim purposes.

Yet another banal period of time passed and was marked with another milking and another session of feeding and internal cleansing. As she expected, the two cruel kamube again entered her stall and again started to strip off their token attire.

‘Time for me to remind you of your place, cowgirl’ hissed Ivy, and this time she availed herself of the cane. Candy whimpered when she heard the spiteful women test the weapon with a few broad hacks at the air.

‘As I remind myself of how much more elevated I am than you,’ added Petal.

The woman turned her back to Candy and stepped over the feeding hose. She lowered herself a little until the hose was taut and then rolled her hips forward. The corrugated ridges rolled through her pussy and caused the gag to drag at Candy’s face. The woman moaned wantonly and swayed, her ponytail flopping from side to side as she shifted her hindquarters against the pipe. Candy stretched her neck forward to try and ease her lot, but Petal lowered further to ensure that the ridges bounced firmly against her sex. Lines of moisture appeared on the hose as she obviously exalted in her masturbation, and Candy was left to stare with utter envy at the sultry curves and inviting rear of the nude woman as her knuckles went white against her own thighs and her grunting moans started to echo through the room.

‘See how we can do whatever we want with you?’ said Ivy. ‘And as you watch Kamube Petal ride your feeding hose, I’ll take my pleasure from your backside.’

Candy cried out as the bamboo sceptre started to hum against the air and strike her rear. Every time it fell, she could not help but jolt, and this drew the pipe up between Petal’s legs and made the woman arch over and groan with glee.

‘Harder, Ivy! Harder! I want to feel her pain between my legs!’ bellowed Petal. Her thighs were trembling as every vicious swipe translated into a pull that further delighted her.

The rhythm of the cane remained constant but now it started to land on the upper regions of Candy’s thighs to make her responses all the more drastic. Candy shrieked and fought to get free as she was brutalised for her ill chosen words.

‘That’s it! I’m almost there! Oh! Cane her, Ivy! Cane her harder!’ screamed Petal.

Tears flowed down Candy’s cheeks and she stared wide eyed and frozen at the image of the gorgeous woman before her taking all she wanted from her captive without any consideration for her well being or sanity.

Petal suddenly stumbled forward, her steps awkward as she kept herself pressed to the pipe and made Candy’s maw thunder with pain from having to keep it tightly drawn between the woman’s pussy. The steps caused the ridges to course against her clit and the woman squealed with ecstasy as she climaxed. She stole a great breath, threw her arms around herself and held tightly and then started to take a few steps back. This took her rapture further and she had barely taken three small steps before she could take no more and flung herself from the pipe. The naked curvaceous form collapsed on the floor and shuddered as Candy managed to pull her gag back in a little and ease the suffering in her face. She could see the moisture on her pipe and was torn with jealously and regret for what she had done.

Ivy stopped her attack and hung up her weapon before she moved to comfort her partner. She knelt down beside her and held her close while the woman quaked and slowly composed herself.

With their play at an end, they again dressed and simply deserted Candy to the ongoing process of her new role.

If only she had kept herself fixed to the role of a beast, then this would not be happening to her. The milking was a ghastly imposition, but the pleasure the dildo dragged from her bound and spread body was a definite compensation. However, by daring to anger these women, she was earning herself an unwanted deluge of additional duress.

Candy dropped her head down and wept tears of self pity for her lot. She just wanted to be returned to the care of a Kami and not left to this lowly and desperate fate. Candy knew that she was being softened up for transfer to House Hohodemi and the process was working perfectly. After having served as sheep and cow, she would do or say anything to have a bit pressed between her teeth and to gallop at the end of some reigns. Hated though this imprisonment was, it was making her appreciate her former duties, and making her greatly hunger to finally get away from these fell barns and fields. However, the day of her freedom was unknown and until then she had to patiently endure the abuse of these irked kamube.

Another milking passed and a short time after, the two women again entered her stall. Candy just hung her head and mewed in despondent woe as they chuckled and started to strip off.

‘This time, cowgirl, it is you who will do the pleasuring!’ said Ivy and stepped over the pipe, but this time facing Candy. She stepped back and stood with legs flexed and parted.

Candy whimpered as she felt cord being tied around her big toes. She was familiar with what this might entail, and when she felt the slack being drawn in to bend her feet forward, she was not entirely surprised when a pair of pegs were clamped to her earlobes.

‘Well. Get going. I’m getting bored!’ growled Ivy.

Petal revealed that she had selected the whip but with such a small target she instead crouched down and simply took the very tip of the weapon. With this foot of single tail, she started to thwack Candy’s soles.

Candy squealed and her head jerked back to draw the hose between Ivy’s legs. The wicked women shuddered and her hands tensed against her sides.

‘That’s it. Keep going!’

Candy’s head dropped back and she managed to haul upward again and continue to draw the ridged length against Ivy’s pussy. She stared with aghast despair as the dark pipe rippled through the parted wet lips of the woman, who just glared down at her with contempt even as Candy desperately fought to pleasure her.

Petal busied herself with the most terrible swipes across Candy’s feet, thrashing them with callous disdain and making every attempt to shield them haul at her earlobes and add to her tribulations.

Candy’s neck was aching terribly but when Ivy complained about a flagging rate, her partner increased the speed and strength of the brutal swipes to restore a decent rate. Candy sobbed and continued to throw her head up with all her might, trying to please the woman before she did herself serious harm.

‘Come on cowgirl! Pleasure me!’ snarled Ivy, and Candy gave a squall as the whip crossed a particularly vibrant intersection of welts.

Candy improved her efforts as her entire neck burned and the muscles throbbed because of her exertions.

‘Haul up and stay still! Now!’ roared Ivy as her thighs shivered.

Candy cast her head up and pulled the pipe tight to the woman’s sex. The black length slid through her lips and leant itself to her swollen clit. The woman answered the entry with a cry and started to jiggle against the pipe as she rushed into the arms of a potent climax.

Ivy settled down even more and this tested Candy’s ability to stay where she was. The back of her neck coursed with anguish and tears welled in her eyes as she chewed on her gag and fought to keep the position.

Ivy shifted forward until her belly was pressed to Candy’s face. The view of the twitching stomach smothered Candy’s breath and the woman held tightly to Candy’s head as her hindquarters skipped back and forth in tiny shuffles while she shrieked and savoured every instance of her pleasure.

Ivy stepped off and Candy’s head dropped down. The scent of arousal plagued her nostrils and Candy barely responded when the pegs were removed and her toes freed. The women just deserted her again, and she just continued to whimper and pray for an end to her ordeal.

On their next visit, they settled their naked loins onto her toes and demanded that she pleasure them. By wiggling her toes she could dance them upon their clitoris’ as they crouched over each foot, and they made sure she did as each wished by raining cane and crop down into her thighs and rear.

Candy swore that she could withstand no more. The women were destroying her mind with their callous use of her bound body. How much longer was it until the celebration was to be thrown? How much longer until she was reclaimed? She hoped that she had not been forgotten, because the mere thought of being condemned to this demeaning life was too nightmarish to entertain even for a moment.

Chapter Fifteen

Candy sobbed and struggled with elation when she saw the elegant and handsome form of Toyo-tama-hiko appear in the mirrored portal. It slithered aside and he smiled as he recognised her.

‘Well, Candy. Have you been enjoying what this House has to offer?’

He stepped in and the door slithered shut behind him.

‘Perhaps you would like to stay longer. It looks like you have made some friends,’ he blithely commented and let a finger trace across the welts that now coated her rear. Candy jolted and bellowed her denial against the terribly effective gag.

‘Have you endured enough of being an animal, slave? Domestic pets are very neglected are they not? Would you like to take a step back towards some attention and become my puppy?’

Candy threw herself against her bonds and the hose whipped up and down as she tried to confirm her assent. Anything would be better than a domesticated caste, even puppygirl was preferable, and it would mean that once more she would be at the side of a Kami and away from the petty spite and diabolic ministrations of the kamube caste.

‘Then I will free you of this role,’ he announced.

Candy sobbed with joy as his hand trailed along the feeding hose before it reached her face and caressed her swollen cheeks.

The Warlord continued onwards and reached her rear, whereupon he unfastened the hose and then opened the two flanges of her anal plug. Candy pushed her bonds to their tolerances one more time as he suddenly pivoted and drew on the terrible item. Her sphincter was stretched to intolerable levels in an instant, but the item did not come free.

Toyo-tama-hiko let go and she sucked the disc back in, her anus now pulsating with a keen ache. He gave her a moment to recover and then repeated his haul, drawing the disc until Candy was squealing against her gag. This time he did not let go and merely held it where it was, educating her flesh to stretch before he allowed her to devour it.

‘We’re getting there, slave. Endure this, if you want to leave this place. My puppy’s are toilet trained and there will be no need for this particular item.’

Candy instantly strengthened her resolve but as her orifice was pulled open to a hideous degree she again hollered and writhed before the Warlord let go.

‘This time it’s coming out, slave,’ he warned.

Candy bellowed against her gag for him not to do this, that she needed just a few more pulls to loosen her bottom.

‘No slave, it’s coming out. Right now. So get ready.’

Candy lowered her head and readied for the agony. The disc started to emerge and on a steady and lethargic pull, it hauled her open and as she thrashed and wailed as much as she could, it finally popped free. She immediately dropped into an exhausted heap as the pain in her rear started to ease and then vanish. She had done it. She was finally rid of the item that marked her as a controlled and utterly helpless beast. She quivered as the oral gag deflated of its own accord and slipped from her lips then mewed pitifully as her long stretched cheeks and jaws finally managed to close and the skin raged with misery from the process of withdrawal.

The straps began to release her body and she was finally able to move her long contained limbs. They responded meekly and she had to shuffle aside before she flopped recklessly onto the floor. She instantly lavished kisses to the boots of the Warlord.

He accepted them for a brief time and then leaned down to help her back onto her unsteady feet. A collar awaited her and after buckling the slim leather item about her throat, he snapped a leash to it.

‘Come with me, slave,’ he said, and started to walk away. Candy was giddy with excitement. She had forgotten just how delicious it was to be collared and to walk at the end of a lead behind her master. She writhed with lust as she ambled in his wake, recovering use of her limbs while her eyes feasted on the enticing curves and fetching physique of the Warlord. He had put her through hell, but now she was back at his side and she felt all the more admiring of him because of what he had done to her. She had suffered greatly in the field and barn, and it was all for him, whether he had seen her distress personally or not, he knew what this House did to its captives. Candy entertained notions of him, with a slave impaled on his cock, or even better, his hand upon his own shaft and images of Candy, weeping and imprisoned as a cow or sheep running through his minds eye as he played with himself.

She was taken to the main palace and it felt as though she had been given the greatest of gifts as she walked up the steps and entered the reception hall.

Stumbling in his wake, she was taken aside and up a flowing staircase that delivered them to the upper floors. As soon as she entered the corridor she gave a croak of shock upon seeing a row of female heads emerging from wooden mountings. Each prisoner stared blankly forward and wore a leather hood that bestowed her with a pair of moulded antlers. Candy’s horror turned to wonderment when she saw one of the women look round a little and regard her.

The Warlord continued to lead her into the palace and Candy was astonished to see even more rows of captive females, all mounted inside the wall with their heads being the only portion that emerged. Some were brutally gagged, others were not impeded in any way. The House had been training the women as deer and she wondered if they had either eluded capture long enough to merit this fate, or as was more likely, they had been caught and served to this bondage to punish them for their lack of skill. The hounds in the courtyard suddenly made a lot more sense and Candy was greatly aroused at the thought of a team of Kami with their bondage hounds, hunting down and pursuing this luscious female prey.

She was brought into a circular chamber where a trio of kamube awaited her with her next uniform. Unfortunately, Ivy and Petal were also present amongst them.

Candy was grabbed and her body inserted into a fishnet catsuit. The form-fitting garment covered everything save her breasts and her loins. Next came a shimmering leotard of polished rubber with holes in the crotch and at the chest along with a spry slender tail that jutted up just beneath the area where the base of the spine would soon be. She stepped into the high cut leg holes and gave a tremble as it was brought up over her shoulders. Her breasts were eased through the two openings at the front and the back zip was hauled up so that the whole garment embraced her with a close fondness. The high collar of the garment reached her jawline and a small padlock was established to run through the zipper and the two small rings that existed on either side of it.

Tall gloves and stockings appeared and each bristled with moulded straps. Each also had a pad that resembled paw halfway along them. Each latex item was drawn up her limbs until it could be buckled tightly to upper arm and thigh so that her feet were sealed within tight socks and her hands were lost within tight featureless mittens. The three slim straps created a firm hold that clearly would not let her wriggle free of the items.

The artificial paws now covered her knees and elbows and Candy realised that she was to be a four legged pet to her master.

She was summarily forced down onto her knees and her devolution continued when they bent her arms up so that her hands touched the front of her shoulders. The clusters of straps were drawn around her folded limbs and wrenched tight before being buckled. Her calves were hauled fiercely into the backs of her thighs and her forearms were similarly hauled against her biceps.

Before proceeding with any other additions, they decided to silence her with an animal countenance. An open faced rubber hood was pulled down over her head and dropped into place over the collar of her leotard. The hood had two perky ears jutting up on either side of her head but they were not open so the hood muffled her hearing somewhat.

Next came a sculpted snout in which she could see an interior stalk that sported a swollen pliant ball of translucent purple jelly.

‘Open wide, slave.’

She stretched her jaws wide, but clearly, the item was still too big for her to accept.

‘Wider!’

Candy strained her jaws until they throbbed and she could accept the orb. It slipped over her lips and nudged to her teeth. The Imbe pushed harder and she gave a keening whimper as her jaws were parted more than she could happily endure. A brief flash of pain afflicted the corners of her maw and the enormous gag popped into her mouth. Such was its size that her teeth were still kept far apart as they chewed impotently on the mouth-swelling sphere.

The padded rim of the snout nestled against her face. Straps reached up over her head and were drawn around the base her skull before they were hauled tight and sealed. The final pulls caused the ball to be pressed deeper into her mouth and she gave a gurgle of response as it pushed almost to the back of her throat.

Perched on her knees, she was embraced from behind and a grapple was established around her neck and waist. Her folded arms were drawn apart and two harnesses of latex were brought towards her. Candy struggled against the priests holding her when she spotted the rows upon rows of tiny studs that flecked the inner surface of each collection.

Candy gave a mewling howl as the first straps were tightened around the base of her breasts. The small fangs pressed against her skin and created struggling waves of misery. As she gasped for breath, every inhale made the tiny and wicked fangs more distinct. The interior of the snout grew hot and humid as she gurgled against the gag and fought to get free. The snout had only a few airholes and these were not very large and this made it hard for her to even gasp or pant.

Equally spaced around the garrotting breast strap were four more belts, and each was similarly armed with interior walls of spines and each reached forth to fasten to the perimeter of a metal hoop.

The ring was placed to the tip of each breast so that it ran around the mamilla and then they started to draw on the straps. The rings pulled her breasts into her chest and the spines made the skin rush with discomfort as they dug in. Her assets were compressed to her and swelled impotently against their tight cocoon. Every breath now caused each brutal ensemble to pulse with new sensation. She jiggled to seek some slack or a way out, but this only made matters worse. Any movement made the inward facing arsenal of spines escalate their effects. Her concerns were heightened by the fact that her ringed nipples were still very much accessible in this format and were already throbbing from the strangling hold that had been set around the root of each breast.

The grapples came away and Candy dropped onto what had once been arms but was now effectively forelegs. She snorted into her animal face and cringed as she continued to feel the effects of the breast harnesses grow in potency.

Giddy from the restraint, she looked up and saw Toyo-tama-hiko gloating at her degradation.

‘Quite an attractive pup,’ he commented.

The Warlord reached up with the toe of a boot. Distracted by her efforts to come to terms with her latest role, Candy paid the extremity little attention until it nudged her swollen breast. She gave a cry and scampered aside. Her limbs tangled beneath her and she collapsed onto her side. The impact further aggravated her breasts and she gave a squawk against the gag.

‘But a little awkward,’ said Toyo-tama-hiko with a chuckle.

He crouched down and placed a knee to her side to keep her in position. Her folded limbs flailed and she looked up at him with a beseeching expression. The Warlord ignored it and reached down between her legs so he might casually massage her loins.

The openings in catsuit and leotard offered him complete access and he used this to stroke the lips of her sex. His fingers rushed along her pussy and Candy quaked with glee as she was roughly masturbated. His other hand groped her mesh-smothered flanks and ran along the smooth contours of her latex-clad torso and legs.

‘Will you be a good girl? Or must I put you on a leash,’ he pondered.

Candy’s eyes drifted shut and she laid her head against the floor. Panting, she felt him start to paw his fingers against her clit and she gave a series of whimpering barks of response.

A hand moved to an exposed breast and his fingertips grazed her nipple. She knew that this tenderness would not last and so she savoured every second as he teased and tweaked the stiffening peak. His fingers traced the metal hoop that was pressed down around the teat and then he began to knead her flushed flesh. Candy groaned and shuddered as the points shifted against her and dug in more acutely, but the savage groping of her pussy made his spiteful grope a delicious woe. He squeezed harder and Candy surged against her uniform when his fingers slid into her tracts.

Toyo-tama-hiko’s stretched out his fingers and placed his palm to her nipple. The digits closed in and squeezed fiercely to create a strong grasp that kept her on her side. His other hand curled back and he curled in his index finger and then flicked her exposed and vulnerable clitoris. The shocking and spiteful slap of his finger to her intimate regions made her release a shout of shock, but then the finger laid to what it had smacked and swirled round and round. He flicked her again, making Candy convulse and pain her own breast as her body tried to pull away from his uncompromising hold.

Grinding her teeth to the soft but resilient dimensions of the gag, Candy stared up at her abuser as he alternated between the most sterling rubbing of her clit and infuriating and startling flicks to the same defenceless target.

His hands fled, grabbed her tail, pulled it down between her legs, and fed the smooth rounded tip into her eager sex. Candy moaned wantonly as she felt the cool rigid strut being used to penetrate her and then withdraw so that it could tickle her clitoris and vulva before it stole entry into her rear. Armed with her own wetness, the tip breached her sphincter and was fed deeper and deeper until the Warlord simply let go.

Hands once more snatched her pussy and breast and Candy juddered on the floor as the curled stem pressed against her canals. The spry tail started to emerge and as her innards twitched and assisted in ejecting it, the feeling of its passage pouring from her body made her cry out from startled amusement. The tip popped free and snapped back up to attention.

Toyo-tama-hiko arose.

‘We shall see,’ he said calmly. ‘Heel.’

The Warlord turned and began to stroll towards the door. Candy shook off the debauched haze and clamped her thighs together. She desperately wanted to continue the task herself, but there was clearly no way to do so. Resigned to her lot, she rolled and flipped herself back onto her fake paws.

Waddling after him with as much speed as she could gain, she found the demands of the uniform very taxing to meet. The sway of her torso was one of the most loathed aspects because each swing made her breasts lurch against one rank of spines and then the lean against the other. In addition, when her forelegs bumped the strangled orbs, this further caused bothersome aches.

The Warlord paused and turned to her.

‘Keep up, girl. Or it’s a leash to the nipple rings!’ he warned.

Candy gave a jerk of sudden alarm at the prospect and instantly threw herself into the role to offset this punishment. She scampered with all her might and soon she was no longer fighting the uniform but rather working with it. If she swayed correctly, if she timed her steps properly, the pain lessened and she could actually acquire a decent rate of travel.

Trotting a few paces behind Toyo-tama-hiko, Candy barely registered her surroundings. The uniform sought all her awareness, and any distraction threw off her rhythm and slowed her. When she saw the Warlord increasing the distance between them, she had to concentrate even harder and fight all the more diligently to catch up. The process of recovering lost ground was not easy, but the threat of a lead to her rings was not one she intended to encounter.

Corridors and chambers passed by. The sounds of other slaves was diminished by the hood and then completely lost because of the sound of her scuttling paws and the panting breaths that flowed down her hollow snout. Her pained gurgles and mews of distress further helped drown out all other audio input. Candy briefly detected daylight and with a sudden scudding rush of her folded limbs she sought to catch up with her master.

The Warlord stopped and laid his hands to the handrail of a barrier. The fence had curling metal struts that reached up to support the leather padded rail and sunlight poured down onto the scene. Candy trotted over and settled at his side. She tried to catch her breath, but when she looked up and through the bars, it was stolen by total awe.

The plane was vast, flat, and would be barren in its natural state. It appeared that it might have once been a lake that had long ago dried up to leave this smooth mountain-enclosed field.

The scorched earth was pockmarked with countless raw craters and was surrounded by a wall of stone that had been reinforced and augmented for destruction. Set along the base of the mountains around the whole plane, the barrier was least two hundred yards in height and had countless weapon emplacements aiming a seemingly infinite variety of weapons inward. Cannons, catapults, howitzers, ballistas, flamethrowers, trebuchets, missile and rocket launchers, mortars, miniguns - there were heavy weapons from every time period all amassed and situated in hardened locations and manned by Wani and human warriors.

From the ranges of battlements that rolled around the wall were more warriors, all with an equal array of modern and primitive missile weapons at the ready. Whether the projectile was bullet, grenade, rocket, arrow, or quarrel, they were all trained on the vast open landscape.

There was one huge doorway that reached almost to the top of the wall, and this monstrous gate was still slightly obscured by dozens of stories of scaffolding that hinted that this titanic entrance was a recent addition. Other, much smaller portals existed and these great gates with their spike encrusted portcullises could be seen spaced along the base of the wall.

Further areas poured forth great rivers of cables and piping. The tight bundles wove out through the devastation and reached into rocky mounds that she immediately recognised as the last few remnants of a stripped submarine or ship. The stranded nuclear reactors had been reinforced with their own defences and then connected to the Empire’s power grid.

The wrecks of other craft could also be detected across the plane. They were not easily seen because they had been subjected to a stripping that left only the most basic components behind. The skeletal remains of aeroplane and ocean vessel lay contorted and broken where they had been deserted.

Candy and her master were located close to the uppermost reaches and along the wall at the same height she could see other such balconies and hints of regal forms emerging onto them.

‘Hmmm. It should be here by now,’ muttered Toyo-tama-hiko with a sense of concern.

Candy gave a cry when klaxons tore through the hesitant quiet and roared across the whole region. She dropped down and huddled to the Warlord’s feet as the unearthly bellow continued to resound and thousands of troops hoisted their weapons and drew aim.

With a grim sense of foreboding and an intrigued fascination, Candy hid within her tight uniform and just watched.

The alarms cut off and were replaced by a scratching sound. The grinding developed into a crackle that suddenly exploded into a brilliant circus of electrical arcs.

‘Ah. Here we go. I was worried that this was going to end up being another stray,’ said the Warlord. He reached down to absently pet Candy’s smooth head and continued to peer around and see where the arrival would materialise.

The jagged forks exploded from the air and gouged at soil and atmosphere. Candy was mesmerised as the sight of the very same phenomenon that had delivered her to this realm was repeated. She did not notice the thousands of observers, including Toyo-tama-hiko all turn their heads and close their eyes.

There was a sudden brilliant pulse of light that filled Candy’s gaze with white. Everything went quiet for just a few seconds and then a deafening crunching boom poured out.

The impact made the walls quake and Candy released another frightened wail as she feared that the ground would give way beneath her. Blinded by the savagery of the lightning pulse, she pressed her snout to the Warlord and screamed as the land rolled and bucked beneath her.

The Warlord merely held tightly to the rail and did not even flinch. He had seen this many times and was not fazed by it. This was the only thing helping keep Candy calm because in her blinded state she was now suddenly terrified of what was going on.

She told herself that everything was normal. She was safe and in no danger. Her master was untroubled, and this meant there was nothing to fear.

‘The generosity of Izanami and Izanagi be praised. May this offering strengthen the Empire and replenish us. May our gratitude be great,’ whispered Toyo-tama-hiko and Candy vaguely detected the voices of countless multitudes all offering a similar uttered prayer. Their unified voices engineered a sibilant dirge that faded behind the sound of the reverberating impact, and as the sounds eased, another chorus of various metallic cries ruled the air.

Candy blinked and managed to peek out again. Still a little dazzled, she gave another pip of shock when she saw the warship dominating her vision. The huge grey metal beast was leaning to port and was still crackling with a few residual arcs of power.

‘This is my favourite part,’ hissed Toyo-tama-hiko as he brushed her from his legs and stepped back. Candy’s eyes remained locked on the vessel. The whole situation was unnatural - a ship, stranded in the middle of the mountains, separated from its waters and even its own world.

A terrible and uncompromising voice roared through the various amplifiers to fill the air with its stern decree.

‘Warriors of Earth. Surrender or perish!’

The words were punctuated with the roar of artillery. Shells arced in and grabbed great areas of earth all around the ship’s cracked hull and hurled it into the air amidst belching clouds of fire and smoke. Chunks of burned rock rained down and created a xylophone tune as they pelted the stranded vessel. While the shells were still on their approach, Toyo-tama-hiko had dropped behind her, grabbed her mesh covered haunches, and thrust into her. Candy’s holler of answer merged with the explosions and her eyes bulged as he sheathed himself to the fullest extent.

‘Now for the encore!’ growled Toyo-tama-hiko and as he drew back and plunged into her, he reached forward and captured her strangled breasts in his hands. Kneading them with callous disdain, he made Candy whimper and squeal as she was ravished.

A hundred bestial shrieks rose up and from the numerous smaller gates galloped the Mitama. The armoured Tyrannosaurs charged at great speed and in rigid formation. The effect on the crew of the ship was immediate. Many had taken the option of surrender by default because they simply stood and screamed or dropped to gibber and rock as their minds were snapped by what was occurring. Some even hurled themselves overboard rather than continue to bear witness to this scene.

‘Such terror! Such victory!’ snarled the Warlord as he watched the battle unfold while thrusting into a puppygirl and punishing her bound breasts.

After the Tyrannosaurs had emerged, legions of Wani stormed forth in their wake. They drew their blades, threw them high, and roared praise to the Empire.

As the terrifying cavalry charge continued, several batteries on the stranded craft began to move.

‘Unwise,’ chuckled Toyo-tama-hiko and she felt him swell within her as arousal and anticipation caused him to squeeze tighter to her assets. His hips slammed to hers and Candy sobbed with delight as she was taken.

The turrets awkwardly started to turn and were seeking to try and aim on the monsters that were closing in on them, but the batteries on the walls were already poised to meet this expected response.

Thunderclaps sounded and the turrets disappeared amidst plumes of acrid smoke. The fireballs rolled up into the sky to unveil charred twisted pits of wreckage. Hands immediately started to go up from the crew that were still visible on deck as hatches started to open and others emerged, also with arms held high.

The sight of such mass defeat caused the Warlord to groan with added desire. He slowed his rate so he could let his cock slither back almost to the point of departure before he dove back in, choking her pussy with his length and making Candy shudder beneath him. Her arms and legs wobbled as the rapture of such molestation overwhelmed her.

Rope ladders started to fall down the side of the vessels and the crew began to humbly descend as the towering dinosaur cavalry formed a cordon.

‘Now they are ours,’ uttered Toyo-tama-hiko.

His hands released her breasts and one snatched her hips for steadiness while the other reached under and started to paw at her loins. His fingers groped and pawed at her clit as his manhood continued to rush into her on energetic and lust charged drives. Such expert attention caused her to instantly orgasm and she jolted and shuddered, every thrust making her cry against her gag.

The Wani streaked through between the cavalry and began to subdue the new arrivals. Those who resisted were immediately cut down. Resistance on board from small arms did little to the metal and ceramic plated monsters and the chatter of rifles and machine guns savaged the areas where snipers were trying to fight back.

The sight of the devastating assault made the Warlord sway and gasp with relish. The Wani hurled grappling irons up and began swift ascents while the humans continued to climb down on their own ladders. Screams and cries joined the roar of the merciless beasts and the angry snarl of assault weapons as the interior of the craft was scoured and pacified.

Candy let her arms slip from beneath her and she dropped to the floor. With her rear still hoisted into the air, she pressed her breasts to the cool stone and savoured the angry streams of pain that were engineered by the spines. Her arms flopped beside her and she kept her cheek to the ground as she climaxed a second time. Staring out through the guard-rail, she felt Toyo-tama-hiko swelling within her. Her gaze was distorted from tears and the uniform slithered on her from the sweat that now saturated both her skin and the catsuit. She was incoherently begging for him to stop but her body refused to move. The intensity of the pleasure was too much, but her body had suffered greatly under the ministrations of the Supreme Warlord of Water and it wanted the pleasure it had been denied for so long. Shrieking in terrible bliss, Candy floundered beneath him as she felt a third and even more potent orgasm swelling in her cock-stuffed loins.

A small squad of Mitama dismounted and followed the Wani into the ship. They emerged shortly after with several civilians and a handful of officers. These were bound and then handed down for transport back to the walls.

Candy was dumbstruck at the swift and vicious subjugation she had just witnessed. From what she had viewed, just the sight of the Empire’s forces would have as profound an effect on the forces of Earth as their weapons.

Such notions vanished when Toyo-tama-hiko threw himself into her. The savagery of his thrusts lifted her knees from the ground and he crushed his hands to her sides while he bellowed with delight. Candy screwed her eyes shut and wailed as her body was submerged in rapture and the feel of molten heat being deposited within her carried her mind on a velvet curtain of satiation.

The Warlord slowed and merely threw her hindquarters aside. She dropped onto her side and lay where she was, panting, twitching from residual flashes of rhapsody that tightened her physique.

As the crew were formed into a single column and marched for the wall, great carts started to emerge from other portals. Pulled by massive quadrupeds, the wagons delivered legions of salvagers to the wreck. Sparks started to fly and the clank and cry of metal on metal sounded as the meticulous stripping of the ship commenced with dutiful frenzy.

Chapter Sixteen

A priest applied a lead and towed her groggy devolved form out and down through the many floors of the fortress. Possessed by the cosy afterglow of the coupling and dazed by what she had seen, Candy paid little heed to her environment until she once again emerged onto open land. There she found the other Warlords of Water being shown to sumptuous litters, each of which was borne by six muscular females who were strictly restrained and held to their allotted posts by force.

Her muzzle was unfastened and the gag drawn from her lips. It was unscrewed from its internal fixture and then the emptied muzzle was restored to her.

Licking her lips, she watched the women hoist the ornate wooden carriages with ease, and Candy was surprised when her lead was used to pull her into one of the interiors. The gossamer curtains were drawn apart by servants and she found that her current master was lounged upon the soft pillows within and was reeling her in. She settled at his side in a proper canine pose and savoured his attention as he started to pet and stroke her. His mood became more licentious and Candy quivered when he started to grope and fondle her contained form.

The women broke into a steady and perfectly timed trot that ensured that the litter did not bump or jolt, only gently rock as though it floated on a calm lake.

The extent of this new journey was lost on Candy. Perhaps it was because of the shock of the outrageous sights she had seen on the plane of Izanagi, but it was more likely that she was again sinking into the mentality of a pet. Her chameleonic sexual vices were again running wild within her, resculpting her thoughts and turning her into exactly what she needed to be in order to please those above her and thus allow her to gain the most intense personal satisfaction from her experiences.

The scent of flowers reached through the curtains and intrigued her. She shuffled aside and brushed a curtain with the tip of her snout so she might see.

They were being carried across wide open fields where clusters of trees offered token shade. In the distance she could see a large hill that was bathed in golden sunlight. Perched atop the emerald mound was a massive pavilion. Various pastel panels were arranged on the slopes to create a loose maze that helped to break down the gentle evening breeze. The tent was easily the size of a significant hall and she could see a steady flow of people wandering into its various openings.

The Warlord yanked on her lead and dropped her back at his side. Unwilling to disobey, she merely curled up, closed her eyes, and fell into a contended and idle snooze.

A short time later, the litter came to a halt and without word he drew her out when it settled on the grass. The bearers hoisted it once they had left and continued on to some prearranged location. Scuttling at Toyo-tama-hiko’s side, Candy was slowly led up towards a pair of green curtains that were embroidered with the symbol of the Houses of Water.

Courtesans in flowing silken robes parted the curtains and withdrew with heads lowered. The smell of luscious foods immediately poured out and caught Candy’s nose, even through the muzzle. She had never smelled anything like it. The scents were sublime and they led her onwards more effectively than the leash did. So luscious were the scents that it took her a moment to detect the sounds of raucous merriment and when she did, she looked into the hall and saw the celebration that awaited them.

Toyo-tama-hiko gave her leash a small tug and started to march forward. Another pair of scantily-clad servants appeared and reverently showed him to his allotted position.

A low wooden table was divided into four sections to create a circle in the middle of the room. Each curved section was carved with detailed emblems and symbols relevant to the element of the Great House seated at it.

Clearly this was a peaceful gathering because the great powers were clad in simple comfortable robes that while exquisitely decorated and formed from the most extravagant fabrics, were clearly worn to allow the concubines access to them. Another indication was the complete lack of guards. Rarely had she seen the primary forces of the Empire gather without there being squads of heavily armed Wani or equally lethal Mitama present nearby.

In the area within the divided table was a gratuitous display of sexual gymnastics. A dozen men and women writhed and flowed. There bodies were slick with oils that were tinted with the same pastel colours that influenced the pavilion. The subtle rainbow hues helped them seem even more unnatural because of the positions they could twist and contort themselves and each other into. Such was their flexibility that she considered if there were perhaps hints of Wani blood in them, but she could see none of the reptilian traits or influences that might indicate such a vaulted heritage.

Toyo-tama-hiko sat cross legged between the burly form of Naka-tsu-wata-dzu-mi. and the bearded form of Soko-tsu-wata-dzu-mi. He drew Candy close and she knelt with her arms held straight to keep her back arched and her head up and proud. Naka-tsu-wata-dzu-mi stroked her back and she shivered before Toyo-tama-hiko took up a small piece of food and popped it into the hole in her muzzle. She flipped her head back and devoured the nugget. The taste was divine and was easily the equal of the grope. Candy rolled her eyes, savoured the flavour, and continued to watch the erotic show.

The various leaders of the houses were chatting and conversing freely, sometimes drawing a concubine down so they might avail themselves of her services or simply appraise her attributes on a whim.

Again, the text of the conversation became a unified background chatter. Even the talk that occurred right beside her was indistinct. It was as though she had forgotten or rather just did not care to interpret the language. Indication, simple command, and leash was her language at present and she stubbornly refused to acknowledge any other.

The only thing to break her from this state of complete subservience was when she saw Hachiman enter and take the head place amongst the Kami of Fire. His countenance was a delight to her senses and it took all her resolve to refrain from rushing over to him. Candy was aware that she was besotted with him, and indeed fantasised about him and what he had done to her many times, but until she saw him in the flesh, she had not realised just how fanatically she adored him. Every muscular curve, every subtle expression on his handsome features, every movement, every breath, they were hypnotic and she found the efforts of the performers tedious when compared to the act of just staring dreamily at her true owner.

Toyo-tama-hiko snapped his fingers and indicated to the ongoing display. When three of the performers began to slither towards him, this caught Candy’s attention and drew it away from Hachiman.

To her surprise, the Warlord nodded towards her and the slippery players moved towards the right hand side of their table. He handed her leash to Naka-tsu-wata-dzu-mi, who passed it to his neighbour Midzu-chi, who unfastened it just as the performers reached her.

Their warm wet hands closed upon her body and started to draw her out into the middle of the room. She was reluctant at first because it was intimidating be so brutally exposed to the assembled mighty Kami. When she had been before them before, she was usually tightly bound and helpless and although the pup uniform was highly restrictive and kept her subjugated with ease, she had grown used to and even fond of the uniform, so it was hard to process it as bondage.

The delicate perfume of the oil had an almost euphoric effect on her and swallowing for strength, Candy gave in to their touches and allowed them to draw her into the midst of the throng.

The crowd briefly parted and formed into a swaying circle of lascivious flesh. Candy trembled a little as she knelt in the middle and looked from side to side to see what was going to happen next. The performers were staring at her with eyes that glittered with frenzied lust. The degree of arousal being expressed on their lust-contorted faces was intimidating and Candy actually started to grow worried as she questioned whether she could handle this.

Suddenly, like a pack of starved animals they suddenly launched forward and she found herself imprisoned within an ever changing mesh of limbs. Extremities coiled around her, trapping her as fingers started to caress and tease. Candy felt herself roll over, invert, and spiral as the mound of bodies continued to manipulate her. She tried to move but could not. She fought to slither free but could find no avenue of escape. She could barely even gain a glimpse of the rest of the hall because a body, face, or extremity always rolled passed her vision and hid it.

Against the sensuous riot, Candy was dragged screaming through orgasm after orgasm. The slithering body wide tickle engineered such a level of heightened arousal that climax could not diminish it, and each time she came, she was given only seconds before she was being ferried back towards a repeat.

At some command that she could not see, she was ejected from the mass of gymnasts. Her slick form was squeezed from the group and she collapsed before the Warlord. Giddy and utterly exhausted, she just lay where she was and let her senses recover from the extreme demands that had been placed on them.

‘What do you think of her, Hohodemi?’ asked Toyo-tama-hiko.

‘Who? The bitch?’ he replied with an almost derisive snort. Candy lifted her head a little and saw that a tall and regal male had been stopped in mid stride by the question. He had strong features and a shaven head that revealed a smooth field of blonde stubble.

The Warlord gave a murmur of affirmation.

‘She’s passable. Is she yours?’

‘No. She was acquired her from Hachiman and she’s on loan as a favour.’

The fact that she was important enough to warrant being passed around as a favour alerted Hohodemi’s interest. Toyo-tama-hiko leaned back and gave a small sigh of satisfaction as he regarded Candy. Hohodemi settled in beside the Warlord and gave her a closer look.

‘Yes. I can see why Hachiman is so smitten with her.’

‘Smitten? With that?’

The derisive tones were riling. Candy liked being a precious commodity, even when she was devolved. She liked to lose herself in the simple roles, but there was always the reassurance in the back of her thoughts that she would be promoted or returned to her owner soon enough. Perhaps it was because Hohodemi was such a purveyor of bestial roles. Did normal serviles bore him? Only when they were trained and harnessed, turned into ponies did he become interested. If he and his House were obsessed with the creation of ponies, all else must seem like a distraction, especially to the perfection obsessed Kami.

‘Oh she is quite wild...sometimes. But she’s crafty. She can be the most satisfying submissive one moment, but the next, well, you never know what she’ll do.’

‘A substandard training,’ grumbled Hohodemi. Clearly the thought of such ineptitude made him exceedingly angry, and Candy saw him flick a scathing glower her way.

‘Not at all, rather it’s the product of an unusual background. She’s an elite from Earth.’

Hohodemi turned from regarding Candy and watched as Toyo-tama-hiko folded his arms and continued to stare licentiously at her. The man’s eyebrows perked as he solicited an answer or more explanation but Toyo-tama-hiko played his hand well and left him in suspense. The silence was speaking volumes as to her worth, and the fact that she was wild was like a code phrase to activate Hohodemi’s fervour.

‘Earth?’

‘You heard correctly. Uzume brought her in from the Wastelands. It seems that she has had quite an effect on her, and Hachiman himself was similarly beguiled with her attributes. As a favour to me, he offered her to me at my palace. It’s a debt that I had not realised the significance of until I started placing her in new roles. She’s already dazzled the Uka no mitama.’

‘Experienced and yet still recalcitrant?’

‘More accurately she’s eager and with a lust for rebellion just so it can be ruthlessly crushed.’

‘Quite the filly then,’ uttered Hohodemi.

‘I suppose so. I don’t think she has been introduced to such a role as of yet. Why, do you think you would enjoy an opportunity to try and break her to harness?’

The deliberate use of the word ‘try’ was not lost on Candy. The mere implication that her training was not a certainty made Hohodemi all the more committed to ensuring his reputation was reinforced.

‘I have not undertaken the task of training an Earth woman in many years. And she was a power you say?’

‘Held the fate and fortune of millions in her hands and on her whims from a hidden throne.’

‘Crafty and sly.’

‘Indeed.’

Hohodemi paused and regarded her again.

‘What would you ask of me?’

‘To borrow her? Well, she’s not mine to give away, but I could definitely loan you her for awhile. It would be a challenge to get her used to a bit in such a limited time.’

‘I relish a challenge,’ hissed Hohodemi.

‘Then I hope you will accept her then.’

‘You have my gratitude, Warlord,’ he stated with a snarling smile of intense eagerness.

Chapter Seventeen

It was morning by the time they reached the stables of House Hohodemi. The land had been covered with a gentle blanket of mist that crept through the tall grass and the sporadic trees that covered the land. Birds cawed gently and the hum of insects caught her ears as they continued along a cobblestone road towards a silhouetted structure.

The sun had peeked over a distant mountain range and was ineffectually attacking the swirling morning mist, making it glow like a blank and yet incandescent canvas. The soft heat was melting the dew and this made the air crisp and every breath an absolute pleasure to draw. Candy drew deeply and exhaled slowly to watch her breath add more steam to the shifting folds.

She had been extracted from her pup costume and then ushered into a close bamboo cage that rocked and swayed upon four sturdy wheels. A pair of draft ponygirls had been fastened to the yoke and the muscular women stomped forward with precise heavy beats, drawing her ever onwards towards the indistinct bastion of House Hohodemi.

Candy shifted across the straw covered floor and took hold of the bars so she might steady herself and peek through. As she watched, the sun gathered more might and started to strip away the mist, and by degrees illuminate the landscape and reveal the details of their destination.

A series of great ranches were situated around a sprawling palace and everywhere she could see discreet pens and paddocks in which the forms of groom and pony could be spied. Forks in the road led to various locations, but the one she was shown down escorted her to a great cathedral like structure.

A pair of priests in leather riding attire stopped the ponies and another pair opened the cage to bring her out and show her towards the building.

The doors were massive wooden affairs and like the walls, they were extensively carved with myriad patterns and symbols, all heavily influenced with equestrian styles. As she approached, they slowly swung open and exposed a massive hall which resounded with the clop of hooves and the whinnies of trained concubines.

The domed roof bore several long skylights that allowed great beams of golden radiance to stream in and make the flagstones glow. Huge pillars reached up to the roof and merged into it. Their heights bore iron sconces that were shaped like rearing horses and bore the hall’s illumination at night. The lower reaches bore a circle of dense iron rings that could be used to quickly secure a slave.

The walls were lined with numerous individual stables, each fully equipped with all the accoutrements for its resident. Candy could see arrays of exquisite brushes, spare tack, and the means to restrain and subdue those of a more frisky temperament.

The tools of the House were virtually identical, however, there were as many different examples of human equine as there were of the four legged genus.

Some of the women were slender and lithe, others were minute, almost midgets. Some were elegant salacious beauties with physiques that would shame even the most fastidious model or dancer and also there were muscular titans and towering amazons. Each was as varied in costuming as they were in physique. Some of the ponies had only token adornment, with only the most necessary trappings, and in some cases, a simple bit was all that remained upon their nude bodies. Others were permitted applications of lingerie, and a number of these were impeded by simple restraints such as cuffs and perhaps a hobble chain.

The most common variety of outfit involved a torso-encompassing harness, cuffs, and a plexus of straps that embraced their heads to keep bit and sometimes a muzzle in place.

There were those who were kept in catsuits of nylon, fishnet, vinyl, leather, or in the most extreme cases, latex figure-hugging cocoons. She could see that some of the women had been treated to the most diabolic levels of restraint, and in some cases, it seemed almost impossible for them to serve their role because their bondage was so intense. Inhibitor bars that restricted them to the meekest steps on ballet boots that would no doubt be a hellish affair for their feet to endure for any length of time. She could also see that others were mounted upon their bars, meaning that rear, pussy, or both orifices were equally abused. Their every curtailed step and any other attempt at greater motion was intimately chastised by these impeding devices.

Many of these women had seen their arms held prisoner within sleeve or restraining harness and more often than not they were twisted up behind them and tied tightly down to deprive them of any hope of manual dexterity. Hoods sealed them away from the outside world, and in the more extreme cases, inflatable versions that stole all sight were applied. This meant that they had to surrender complete trust to whoever it was that was currently leading them, not that they would ever know who these people were in their intensely deaf, dumb, and blind state.

As usual, Candy’s eyes quickly glazed over the more delicate versions and soon found solace in regarding the infernal and ingenious ensembles that would have an occupant crying out in loathing against them. It was a sense of obligation to her master and to her own desires that motivated this obsessive need for the extreme. Any concubine, whether novice or experienced veteran could handle and master the average pony girl costume, but these most brutal examples would require skill, patience, calm, and above all a great deal of endurance to be able to wear them, operate within them, and still be able to satisfy whatever demands the grooms and equerries of the House might demand.

Perhaps her opinions were also jaded by some measure of pride. A concubine who could gallop and prance in a standard costume was not exactly that impressive, however, one who could even maintain a small shuffle and not fall over in the most savage examples had shown a degree of exemplary skill.

So with all these considerations in mind, she was almost disappointed when she drawn away from the dark brooding cells in which the most doomed steeds lurked and instead found herself approaching a nearby area with less brutally contained females. When she cast an eye over those ponies adjacent to her stall, her disappointment faded a little because the outfits were still fairly demanding. Besides, Candy knew she had an appetite that sometimes far exceeded what her body could handle, and perhaps throwing herself to the most severe end of the equine spectrum might not be the wisest move. As titillating as she found the fantasy, she had to consider whether she could survive the reality with sanity and physique intact.

A vacant stable beckoned and she could see that the various provisions for her new caste were already hanging up in readiness. With a soft sigh, she readied to again accept the process of transformation from one mode of beast to yet another.

It seemed that the priests were accustomed to kami-tsu-ko being somewhat reluctant to surrender their evolved status. Probably because the concubines of the great houses sought advancement and eventual acquisition of kamube status, something that a pony would be very unlikely to be able to even conceive off. Kami-tsu-ko of the Empire also dreamed of being used by the higher powers, of coupling or satisfying Mikado, perhaps even a Kami themselves, and again, when bound and kept on reigns, there would be very little ability to actively saturate themselves in the joy of the experience. Candy could understand the frustration, to be so near to a living God and not be able to touch, or feel, just bear them and dwell on the end of their reigns, goaded by whip or rope, perhaps even blinkered so that the sight of the elevated deities would not confuse or distract them. However, Candy had been with many of the powers, and was devoted to absolute service. If she was to be a mere pony, then she would dedicate herself to it without regret, remorse, or reservation.

A single metal pole was taken down from its hook and the square bar was quickly slotted into the middle of the floor. The hole accepted a full foot of the shaft and left a yard or so standing vertical before her. Near to the base was a set of leather cuffs with a pair of buckles to help seal them, and at the summit was another strap. The priests bent her over and it was swiftly buckled about her throat. Each forearm was then dragged down and similarly taken captive to leave her hunched over and trapped by neck and hands. Her hindquarters swayed in the air and she tugged at her bonds to verify their power.

The sounds of activity started to rise in volume as grooms began to file in and start to select various steeds to be taken out for exercise, training, or discipline. Candy pulled at her bondage and tried to turn around because she wanted to see what has happening. Unfortunately, the square design refused to let the pole pivot and so she was left staring impotently at the poised collection of anonymous leather garments. The details were hard to discern in the gloom and with a lowered gaze, but the wink of refracted light on the buckles, rivets, and straps could not be mistaken.

The priests turned to her legs, and working together, they hoisted a limb and slid a tall leather thighboot onto it. Her feet met an interior that resembled that of a set of towering stiletto heels, but the outside of the item was sculpted to accurately resemble a hoof.

Bands were riveted to the thighboots and the buckles allowed them to be tightened forcefully about her ankles, above and below her knees, and about her upper thighs. Once these fierce belts were established she had no hope of sloughing off the wickedly tight garments.

With her body now arched downward because she was perched on her hooves, she watched as they acquired the next portion of her uniform.

A pair of priests grabbed her by the flanks and hoisted her into the air as another duo slapped hands to her hooves and leaned back to stretch her lower half. With her legs level with her body, a fifth priest appeared and enclosed her waist within the dense sheath of a corset. The thick leather ran from her hips to just below her breasts and the substantial metal boning ensured that there was no way for her to bend once it was in place. Three ‘D’ rings were spaced down either side of the laced rear, and the smooth front was set straight before the suede interior leaned into her skin as the laces at the back started to vanish with energetic tugs and hauls. The slack continued to vanish and Candy groaned aloud as she was squeezed ever tighter by the mighty fist of leather. The two jaws continued to head towards each other and when they finally met, her ribs felt ready to collapse inwards. Every inhale now had to battle the waist cinching shell and when she tried to take a deep breath she found it cut short.

When her legs were set down she found herself in a most awkward pose because now she couldn’t wilt in the slightest. Her spine was set level by the corset and she wobbled on her heels and pawed at the pole as she tried to accept this level of impediment as amiably as she could.

Each arm was released from its cuffs and adorned with a long leather sleeve of a similar design to her boots. Her hands were cupped together by a close mitten that removed all manual dexterity and sets of belts at wrists, about her elbows, and at her upper arm made sure that she could not slither free of them. The reason for the ‘D’ rings located on the inner side of each belt was immediately explained when small locks were used to gobble up the ring and lock it to the corresponding one on the corset. Her arms were now locked to her back and there was no way for her to get free.

A plexus of thin straps appeared and they reminded Candy of the variety usually employed to sport a strap-on, save this one clutched to her sides and ran down over the crease of her upper thighs to merge just beneath her pussy before it ran up across her rear and parted again to run over her hips. At the base of her spine, the harness presented a small cone of metal from which poured a great plume of delicate hair. The locks tumbled down and tickled the backs of her thigh before culminating at her knees.

The final portion of her transformation appeared and was carried towards her face. The leather harness cupped her chin and pressed to her cheeks and forehead. The numerous delicate straps were drawn across and tightened so that the whole ensemble closed inward and took hold of her skull. A pair of artificial pricked ears jumped up over her own, and finally her bit made an appearance.

The thick solid rubber strut had a large ring set through either end and she eagerly allowed it to slip over her teeth and nudge into the corners of her mouth. She clamped her teeth to the item and watched as a muzzle was brought over. The hollow snout had a pair of air holes at the far end that resembled nostrils and when she breathed down the snout the scent of leather washed through her senses and made her shiver licentiously.

A small strap was buckled to a fixture on her forehead and two more straps reached along her jaw line to snag anchors near her earlobes. Two semi-circular grooves in the leading edge cradled the bit and kept it held into her maw. She now saw that unless her snout were removed, she was powerless spit out the bit.

Candy chewed on the rubber and watched as a pair of blinkers appeared and a trio of snap fasteners allowed them to be pressed to the sides of her head and lock them down. Her periphery vision was lost and all she could see was the area immediately before her. It was a little unnerving but she was sure that she would get used to it. It was strange to have something that was ordinarily taken for granted deprived. She had been blindfolded before and had numerous senses eradicated, but this minor impediment was unusual and all the more aggravating because it was not one thing or the other. She wasn’t left in darkness, nor was she able to look wherever she pleased. Her lust for absolutes had stumbled into an annoying grey area.

The collar was opened and she was tugged upright. She tottered a little as she fought to accustom to the hooves and as soon as her equilibrium strengthened, a set of reigns were clipped to the exposed rings on either side of her bit.

Walking on the end of a set of reigns, Candy followed obediently, if awkwardly, out of the stall and across the stables to a set of doors opposite to those that had brought her in. It was marvellous to sashay and swing her rear because it made the tail flip about and even through the thighboots she could feel it brush against the backs of her legs.

The doors were already open and the smell of another lush warm day in the Empire managed to sneak in amidst the smell of leather to reach her nose. Candy could see the various paddocks and pens in which the other ponies had been introduced and now she was prepared to join them.

She was led towards a circular enclosure to one side and once the metal gate was opened, she was escorted in. Several other grooms were leaning upon the fence, chatting idly and pointing out interesting sights and other steeds.

Hohodemi appeared and walked passed her and into the middle, paying out the reign as he went. Candy then saw that he had acquired a lengthy lunge whip when he walked passed her.

There was a sibilant whistle and a raging shock of pain bored into the side of her rear. Candy jerked upright and her arms wrenched against the rings that held them at bay. She howled against the bit and as the full fury ebbed a little, the strength seemed to leave her legs. She dropped to her knees, denting the soft soil.

She wanted to embrace the throbbing weal but all she could do was cavort her torso left and right. She couldn’t even bend over and fold into a ball as a defence from this attack.

The reigns were given a flick and the motion flowed down the woven length before it snapped at her bit. Candy could guess what this meant and fought to rise.

With wobbling motions, she managed to get back onto her feet and immediately let out another wail when a second vicious swipe caught the exact same region to greatly improve the level of misery already lurking there.

Another hack crossed the backs of her thighs and she ambled forward while kicking into the ground with staunch fury. She danced from foot to foot and tried to ease the pain, but there was nothing that could be done.

When another attack failed to materialise, she realised that he was encouraging her to move and so rather than endure another blow, she started to march forward while pulling outward to keep the reign taut in the hope that she might be able to stay out of easy range. She kept her eyes down and studied the terrain, afraid that any lumps or pits in the dirt would cause her to stumble and fall and thereby acquire more discipline. Although she could see the imprint of hoof and boot endlessly intertwined and impressed over each other, the pen seemed relatively flat. Dribbles of saliva escaped her parted lips and started to run down her neck and onto her chest. The heat of her breath in the snout made puffs of steam leap from the nostrils, but the same warmth vanished from her spittle much more quickly so that when it reached her skin, it was quite chill.

The whip tapped her knees and then flashed up to make itself visible to her blinkered vision before it lowered and nudged into her chin and hoisted it. Candy lifted her snout upward and although she could hold back her drool, she could no longer see where she was putting her feet. It was frightening not to have the ability to see where she was stepping and it made her feel even more abandoned to this caste because she was now totally reliant on her trainer and had to offer them her complete trust.

A cruel upward flick caught the underside of a breast and made her squall in misery and jerk forward until the defiant walls of her corset stopped her. The whip instantly informed her as to why it had been deployed and tapped her knees as she stood and shuddered in pain.

Another swipe into her rear told her not to tarry and Candy tumbled forward into an awkward lurching march while struggling to fling her knees up and meet the demands set out by her trainer. She felt the impact when her knee hit the loitering whip and because each step met the weapon, she was sure that it hadn’t been towed back to punish her. So long as she maintained the required gait, the whip would stay there as a measuring stick rather than a sceptre of chastisement.

Candy realised that not one verbal command was being offered. She was now being regarded as a beast of performance and burden, one unable to comprehend normal speech. Her education was going to be conducted through input and instinct, and no words would give her insight into what was required. If she performed correctly, she wouldn’t be punished, it was that simple. However, she could not help but wonder what exemplary conduct might acquire. Did House Hohodemi reward its ponies, or were they expected to do their best and so long as they did this, they weren’t punished.

Round and round she marched and her thighs started to burn from the effort of keeping to the exaggerated strut. Several times, she lacked the energy to throw her knees high enough, and this of course led to the inevitable consequence of a sound swipe across her bottom, or if the failing were more acute, then the searing stripe her breasts acquired definitely encouraged her to throw more effort into her performance.

The whip pressed across both breasts and slowed her to a halt. Candy stood panting for breath. If it were not for the restricted vents at the end of her snout she was sure that she would be hyperventilating. Fortunately, she could only gather what seemed to be three quarters of a breath with each gasp and this helped stop her losing control altogether.

Hohodemi marched her round and round the paddock, demanding every greater levels of effort. Sometimes her tolerance was reached, but he was a masterful trainer, and the moment the subtle clues of her imminent dissent appeared, he applied the whip and drove her rebellion from her with the cruelest of slashes. Defeated before she even had the chance to defy him, she then returned to obeying him with a mixture of fear and respect replacing her resentment.

Her initiation took until the late afternoon, whereupon she was reeled in and then with her hooves feeling like one ton weights, she was led back towards the stables. First though, she was shown to a small enclave to the right where she could see ponies being cleansed of the sweat of exertion and the process revived her with sudden anticipation.

The grooms removed the reigns from their pony and attached a pair of chains. The clips grabbed hold of either end of their bits or their collar and left them standing in a row before a sodden wall. Hoses were then turned on the women and each jolted and whinnied with delight as they were showered. Once cleansed, their dripping bodies were taken away and back into the stable.

Candy was fastened into place and she turned to watch the regal form of Hohodemi accept a hose and then turn the potent spray onto her. She shrieked with shock and bliss as the chill stream stole the heat of her exercise. The sparkling cascade rushed over her body, stripping away her sweat and leaving her skin tingling in its wake. She ground her teeth on her bit and skipped from hoof to hoof as she was hosed down and then casually removed from the area.

Shivering slightly, she was shown back to her stall where she was secured so that she could not leave. A few pellets were popped into the end of her snout and then Hohodemi patted her head.

‘Not bad for your first day,’ he commented, and then left her to hoist her snout and negotiate the small morsels over her bit so she could swallow the concentrated food pellets. They were bland and dry, but as she continued to learn the process of eating, she noticed the small flexible tube jutting from the wall. She looked around and saw that other ponies were sucking on them so through trial and error she managed to insert it into a nostril hole and then get the pliant end to her lips. It was extremely difficult but eventually she managed to establish a seal and suck on the hose, whereupon she gained a small sip of water. It took her a long time just to gain a few mouthfuls but each tiny serving was an absolute delight.

As the sun left the sky, the iron sconces in the hall were lit. They provided a token light - a warm cosy radiance that soothed the exhausted women held here. Enthralled with her new lot, Candy curled up and fell into a most pleasant sleep.

Her calendar repeated in virtually identical ways after that first day. Like almost every other pony she was taken out in the morning, exercised vigorously all day, and then after being groomed and her needs tended she was taken back to her stall. Nothing really changed.

While it could have been misconstrued that this was a banal existence because the days melded seamlessly into one another, it was most definitely not. The simple life of a ponygirl was an absolute treasure. She pranced and stomped, she cared not for opinion or held any desires other than to comply with the command of whip or reign. The days flowed slowly by like honey, and they were just as sweet.

Chapter Eighteen

The stable had a lethargic atmosphere at night. The ponies were all tethered in place and snoozing after a long day of relentless exertion. Everyone was exhausted, and the chance to relax meant that no matter the level of spiteful bondage applied to restrict their movement, few ponies could stay awake for long. The soft rustle when they turned over and shifted position was a sporadic accompaniment to the echoing tune of slow steady breaths and deep contented sights.

Candy opened one lazy eye and panned across the main hall and the feminine mounds that occupied each location. Her eyelid started to drift shut and she felt herself sinking back towards sleep again.

A sudden hint of movement in the shadows caught her attention and roused her a little. She was sure she had seen something but now she wasn’t sure. Assuming a trick of the light, she lowered her head back to the ground and stretched before drawing her limbs back to her body to embrace a small pocket of warmth.

Another shadow moved as she lay there and intrigued, she stared to pull herself back upright. A pair of lithe forms sprang up onto a set of the dividing walls and looked across the occupant. They moved with no sound and when they did not find what they had been looking for, they leapt high into the air and landed into a perfectly balanced crouch on the next wall. Because of the grace and stealth of their motions, they seemed almost mystical, and the opaque black garb that swathed each of them only leant further credence to the assumption that there were indeed ninja.

Perhaps this was the medium through which the Moon God operated. If there were indeed a covert agency that operated within the Empire, then surely these shadow beings would be ideal. The agents that went across to Earth were infiltrators, but to police the strange realm of the Kami Empire, with its tight knit communities, immortals being, fanatic priests, and ever vigilant Wani, infiltration would take too long and be an implausible medium to gather information. Thieves in the night could monitor, copy, steal, and pilfer with ease while concubine, priest, and Kami slept soundly or were distracted with perverse indulgences.

The light that was descending on her changed in strength and Candy looked up to see a trio of the dark clad forms peering down at her from above. Crouched on her walls, they looked to each other, nodded, and before she could even gasp, they were upon her.

In a split second everything was over and Candy was in a different place. For a moment it seemed as though she had slipped through the cracks in reality and had again somehow shifted to another world.

One moment, she was laying in her stall, and the next, there was a flurry of black and a token feeling of falling before she landed on hard, warm stone and was somewhere else. The ninja were either gone or had transformed as drastically as the surroundings had.

She was in some sort of crude underground passage with roughly hewn walls. The corridors branched off from one another and stretched out to form an intricate labyrinth. Located on the walls were random copper flues from which flowed a slender column of flame. The dancing amber torches crated warm pools of light and located between them were bleak wells of shadow.

A pair of heels stepped out before her and Candy slowly looked up and when she did, she gave a brief cry and promptly buried her head back down. The woman that was standing over her was a terrible image to behold and was made all the more intimidating by the bleak lighting that seemed to avail her with even more horrible menace.

She was swathed in a mixture of black latex and sections of vinyl and from the attire sprouted large conical spines of midnight rubber. These fearsome decorations changed in length and size and made her appear like some sort of porcupine woman. Gauntlet gloves spiralled up her arms and her long black nails were sharpened to wicked points.

She wore a mask that hid her entire face and much of her head, but allowed a great plume of ragged black hair to halo her head and cascade down to the middle of her back. The mask exaggerated the attributes of her face and upon the peaks for chin, cheek, brow, and temple, there sprouted another spine. The largest rushed from over her mouth like an acute snout, and the depth of the artificial brow hid her eyeslits amidst copious shadow. Only the twinkle of her eyes could be discerned in them, and offered a delusion that she had luminous sight.

When she spoke, it was with a strange hissing rumble that while still strangely feminine, was a cruel and wicked sound to hear.

‘Welcome to Yomi.’

Candy jerked her head up and regarded the demon woman. A moment later as the words seared her brain, she yelled against her bit and tried to get up and mount an immediate escape attempt. The terror brought by the revelation of her destination was an anticipated one, and from nowhere, a trio of forms jumped forth and snared her within their limbs as a fourth brought out the means to effect a more lasting subjugation.

Each woman wore a dense leather bra, slim corset, tall collar, and a thong that was decorated with rivets and red sections that formed into curling flame-like designs. The same decorations had been applied to the sections of leather that encompassed their forearms and shins, where smooth ankle boots or fingerless gloves loitered beneath to encompass their extremities. A fishnet catsuit left their thighs, torso, and upper arms contained within mesh, and each of these devilish females had been embellished with heavy macabre makeup to compliment the ferocity suggested by their shaven head.

A pole was set to her back and the tight belts that were riveted in foot long intervals along it were quickly thrown around her body and tightened with brutal yanks so that they hauled her to the metal. Candy struggled to get free before she was condemned but the women were as strong as they were quick and before she accomplish anything, she was bring crushed to the pole and left inert. A foot of steel stretched up passed her head and passed her feet, and each end had moulded handgrip slotted onto to reveal that she was to be conveyed in this format.

The servile women retreated and cowered as the spike covered female drew closer. The intimidating aura of the tyrant had a similar and distinct effect on Candy. She shut her eyes and trembled as she began to weep.

The knowledge that she had been sent to Yomi was terrible. It meant that she was now lost to all and could never again see the surface. Candy had changed hands and changed facets and castes countless times, but this latest was an irrevocable transfer, one that could not be undone.

‘You are wise to weep, slave. We have many more tears to coax forth though, and it is good that you get into practice.’

The woman lifted a leg and placed her towering heel onto Candy’s breast. She allowed weight to fall behind it and the spire started to push down into her flesh and create a mordant dimple. Candy chewed on her bit and whimpered. She shuddered and strained against the straps and the woman mocked her efforts with a sibilant laugh. With callous merriment she started to turn her extremity first one way and then the other to drag at the soft skin and make it thunder with anguish.

‘Hachiman has become more devoted in his efforts to find you. Toyotama-hiko has told him that he knows not what happened to you, that you must have been abducted by another Kami. I think there is some feud between them, and he wants to make Hachiman suffer by depriving him of you. Hence he came to us of Yomi and requested that you be made to disappear into our midst. Here you will learn to suffer, slave, and never again will you know the touch of sunlight, or Kami.’

Candy’s distraught response only served to satisfy the woman’s cruel designs. She gave a contented hiss before she cocked her head to one side, drank in Candy’s sounds of despair, and then swiftly marched off into the corridor.

‘Bring her. I am of a mind to commence her education in the dark abuses of the underworld this instant. But first, ensure she is stripped of her former status before she comes to me.’

The ends of the pole were grabbed and she was tugged up into the air. On quick trot she was ferried off into a side tunnel and then along a winding route that culminated in a small rocky cavern. Two men in leather trousers with the same flame design stood in the middle of the room with arms folded across their bare chests. They grinned when they saw her and Candy was intimidated to see that they wore full contact lenses that made their whole eyes appear black.

The women set her down and started to undo the straps before they yanked her back onto her feet and then shoved her towards the men.

She fell into their arms and they sprang into action. Slim stubby blades appeared in their fingers and they started to dance the silver edges upon her attire. They slashed with such skill that even though they worked with drastic and exaggerated movements, never once did they even graze her skin. Even so, the ferocity of being stabbed at made her skin go numb and her to shake and flinch as she saw the weapons continue to rage around her, shredding materials and turning her pony outfit into a collection of ribbons. The fright passed and the last vestiges of her former caste dropped to her feet.

The eldritch tailors spun her around and shoved her back into the arms of the women. As soon as she left their care, they sheathed their blades behind them and folded their arms so they could watch in silence as she was taken away.

The females grabbed her with brute care and their disdain was shown constantly in their impatient towing of her away from the scene. The sharp corrections to her passage made her limbs flash with pain, but it was a discomfort they ignored. Such rough handling made her quail, it made her feel as though she had done something wrong. Her time as kami-tsu-ko had left the distinct impression that while she could well be tormented until she howled for clemency, this manner of barbarous handling only came about from genuine error or serious failure. This mistaken mindset made her bear their abuses without resistance.

A portal presented itself. The barred gates were flanked by similar guards to those who carried her, save that these were armed with serrated halberds. Their bodies were rigid and to attention, their eyes fixed forward and devoted to their duty.

The darkness beyond flowed onto a set of steeply descending stairs. The walls were rough and damp, and the faint smell of corruption hung in the air, tickling her nostrils with hints of some foulness as yet unseen. Fat insulated cables swung from fixed point to fixed point, swinging along the ceiling and randomly spitting out wire caged bulbs. The lights were weak and stained the areas with their dirty amber to make everything seem even fouler.

The warmth of the surface started to give way to a numbing chill but not because their descent into the depths was depriving the tunnels of the suns heated stare. The cold came because Candy was growing increasingly terrified with every step down she was made to take, because it meant that it was another step away from the surface and away from any hope of escape.

When she stumbled, they increased the severity of their grip and shook her back to an upright stance. The treatment still failed to incite rage and resentment and so they continued to escort her down.

The group emerged from the stairs onto a winding zone of convoluted tunnels. The thin passages were lit by sporadic bulbs, with sunken alcoves whose brief descending flight of steps accessed a weighty portal. The solid wooden affairs were held shut by dense beams. It was apparent that barring in this manner was another consideration to the lack of metal because the use of locks or bolts required use of the precious substance and a massive beam set horizontally across them was a far more effective and impenetrable means of securing these dungeon portals. Candy rarely saw such frugality with regard to metal on the surface, perhaps it was because the Kami were rich in the material and could squander it as they wished. Perhaps it was because of the sheer multitudes who were condemned in this hellish domain. Was there such a population down here that there simply wasn’t enough metal to employ in such mundane facets? Had it all been used up on restraint and implement?

Almost at random she was presented to one of them. One of the guards pinned her arms behind her back. Her vigilance in keeping her under control bordered on the paranoid while her partner slid the beam into an accommodating slot in the wall and opened the door.

A truculent barge sent her careering recklessly down the steps. The speed caused her to stumble and then collapse to strike the floor with a harsh slap and skip to a halt. Her side bore an abrasive graze that was only eased by the strange dampness that made the stone slick.

Sat within the darkness, she curled herself into the corner and closed her eyes, riven with worry as to her eventual fate. This entire situation was a nightmare without equal. What could she have possibly done to warrant such treatment? She was no great exponent of fate or luck, but she did not deserve this.

Minutes dawdled by and the bleak isolation only helped refine her chagrin. The door gave a deep resonant thump as its weighty bar was set back and with a mewling rusty groan it swung out, letting the soft light of the corridor seep reluctantly in. The pane of light widened and revealed Candy’s pale skin, exposing her fully and making her sense of vulnerability peak.

Two burly guards joined her in the cell. Their elaborate leather armour opened only to reveal the intricate flame tattoos that flowed along their arms. The stiff sections of dull black hide were fluted in places, making it appear almost like misshapen scales or protective plates taken from some sinister monster. Each wore a sturdy leather mask that gave them a subdued but nonetheless disturbingly demonic visage.

Candy wilted before their approach and then lifted her arms protectively as she began to mumble her fractured pleas for mercy. The proffered limbs were grabbed and without any display or hint of care for her plight they tugged her roughly to her feet and marched her forward. Her legs flailed as she stumbled, her panic making her movements uncoordinated, her terror making her stomach flutter and her breathing to emerge in rapid uneven pants with only the occasional despairing sob to contrast it.

The dank corridor ended with a set of double doors whose outer surface had been carved with depictions of interlocked monstrous beasts. The ornate carvings burrowed deep into the surfaces, almost lending them a grim semblance of reality as braziers on each side added animation with their flicking fires. The dancing lights cast their cavorting shadows and brought such a disconcerting half-life to the door that Candy found herself struggling even harder as she was dragged towards it.

The guards pushed open the doors and revealed a spacious hall whose low ceiling was almost within reach just from standing on tip toe. The air was a cloying mixture of smoke and incense as more braziers and smouldering sticks saturated the atmosphere.

At a casual glance and from the scents and ambience it could have passed for a temple, but this was no place of ordinary supplication, it was far darker place of grim worship. The brooding statues were engines of restraint and suffering - racks, crucifixes, crosses, with wooden limbs embellished with carvings and decoration, disguising their truth from a fleeting glance, and intimidating those who bore prolonged examination.

She was brought through the chamber and as she was led through the various horrible instruments and implements she began to discern a looming ziggurat in the distance. When she dawdled to look upon a particularly vivid or confusing item, the guards gave her a rough shove. The disdainful treatment began to erode her fear and the fire that was her will to rebellion began to swell. Just because she had been sent to Yomi, did not mean she would stay here. She had endured so much, experienced and seen so many marvellous things. She wouldn’t end her days here. If escape from Yomi were indeed impossible, then she would be the first to prove them wrong, and if not, her ability to withstand all that the underworld could throw her at her would be legendary.

As soon as that specific thought struck her, she stiffened slightly and adopted a wry grin. Candy trembled faintly as she started to saunter forward. She was no longer hunched over from the burden of her fate, she had goal now. Perhaps escape from Yomi was indeed impossible, but if she could endure, if she failed to break, if she failed to be destroyed by whatever vile machinations these demons intended, then word would spread. Her best bet to be found and redeemed by her beloved master would be to take the avalanche of depravity that was about to befall her, and stand erect and unbending in the face of the most extreme adversity. Soon, others would hear of this Hafuri-tsu-yomi who defied all attempts to break her, who did not kneel, who could not be tamed. When these words finally reached Hachiman, or Lady Uzume, then he would know for sure where she was and if his victories on Earth were as big as predicted, then allowing her to be pardoned would be a trivial favour amongst the debt that the Empire, the Sun Goddess and the Moon God owed him.

When another push had her stumble forward, she threw a fierce look over her shoulder. The savage glower caught the guard by complete surprise and he actually froze as though she had just slapped him across the cheek. Before he could recover his pride by assailing her, she scorned him with a brief huff of derision and then started to continue towards the ziggurat. She could almost feel the two escorts regarding each other with a quizzical look before they rapidly fell in behind her. She was no longer a cowed slave being shown to her doom, she was a recalcitrant creature defiant of their power, one who would resist them at every turn.

Candy strolled casually now and let her hand trail over the odd smooth strut or beam as though she were enticed by these engines of restraint. She no longer feared these machines, in fact, she was looking forward to what the stern rulers of this place would do to her once she was on them. She was about to be taken further than she ever had before. She was in the underworld, condemned, lost, and so no pity or clemency would be shown. If she could make it through the coming trials, what a sterling slave she would be. Even the most sadistic dominant would have the luxury of not holding back. They could act with impunity in the precise manner their hearts and fantasies desired, and she would be all the more delighted at having brought their darkest dreams to fruition.

Through the smoky folds of the room’s cloying air, the pyramid grew ever clearer and the ceiling started to retreat upwards until it was lost behind the loitering overhead fogbank. The pyramid loomed out suddenly and revealed itself clearly to her and Candy stopped so she could pan her gaze up the roughly cut steps. Along each corner was a slim trough down which flowed flammable liquid that blazed with a tepid crimson radiance. The four streams of fire gathered in small pools at the base where they either drained away or were steadily consumed.

Atop the eerie ziggurat was a strangely simple throne. Formed like a pair of tori-wi with a velvet cushioned seat situated across the bowed upper surface, it held the seated form of the spike encrusted mistress of this realm. Her hands were clasped to the hand rests and her legs were demurely crossed as she peered down across this field of restraint and torment.

Candy smiled and crossed her arms across her naked chest.

‘Well, what now?’ she said brattily. ‘I guess I’m supposed to beg for mercy or something?’

Her guards kicked into the backs of her knees, causing her to drop to the floor with a sharp bark of pain. She again flung a glower over at them before she returned her gaze back up to the throne.

‘I guess I’ll kneel then.’

A hand clasped the back of her neck and flung her down onto all fours.

‘Show respect to the Demonatrix!’ he hissed with utter outrage.

‘And what will you do if I don’t!’ she muttered.

Again there was a sharp intake of breath and a sudden flurry of motion suggested that they were about to pummel her where she lay.

‘Halt!’ came the voice of the woman. The guards stopped in their tracks, freezing in mid strike as they prepared to pound her for her vile levels of disrespect.

The creak of vinyl and rubber had Candy again hoist her head and watch as the woman sauntered regally down the steps with precise and equal steps.

‘So there is some fire in this new arrival after all. How very interesting. Those that come into my personal care have such fleeting capacities to endure my affections.’

‘Well, maybe you just haven’t met the right girl?’ retorted Candy and gave the woman a coy wink.

The Demonatrix chuckled to herself. Candy wondered if the woman had seen through what she was trying to accomplish. If she was as ancient as all Kami, then it was likely that she had seen everything, done everything, perhaps even had another Earth woman kneeling before her in this very spot, showing the same pouting level of brattiness. Perhaps the laughter was a reminiscent thing for a time she had spent with someone else like Candy. A magnate from the forties? A Victorian royal from Europe? Perhaps even a feudal warrior maiden from the middle ages?

If the memory of this person were a good one, perhaps it might temper the abuses, or would it only worsen them as she sought to outdo herself in terrible acts, eclipsing the last time she had inflicted them on a slave.

Candy straightened up onto her knees as the woman reached the bottom step and then moved passed her. A couple of the pliant spines brushed her shoulder and the discreet tickle made her quiver slightly.

‘You are right to tremble, slave.’

‘It’s cold,’ rebuked Candy.

‘Then by all means let us warm you.’

With a mere nod she caused the guards to spring into action. A hand locked to each wrist and then under each shoulder. She was wrenched to her feet and drawn forcibly aside to a low rack that was supported at each corner by a squat cylindrical leg that maintained it about a foot in the air. The escort drew her onto the smooth wooden surface and slapped her hands down into a pair of padded leather shackles. They quickly applied the two dense buckles and this left her arms spread wide over her head. Next they grabbed her ankles and she offered some faint yanks and half-hearted defiance to make them tighten their hold and wrench her legs down so they might apply a matching pair of cuffs to her ankles.

Candy looked up and saw that a pair of chains reached from her cuffs and slipped into a dense wooden roller with a wheel on either end that would steal the slack away and stretch her.

‘I always thought I was too short,’ she chuckled.

The Demonatrix just smiled and ran a gloved hand along Candy’s chest. The touch was delicate and made goosdebumps erupt across her body. Cleary the woman was appraising that which she was eager to see suffer.

The guards manned the two rollers and anxiously grabbed the extended handles before they looked to their ruler in anticipation of the command to begin.

A nod caused them to turn the wheels and a cranking grind sounded as the chain started to curl around the drums and she was immediately stretched taut.

The Demonatrix lifted her right leg and dropped her foot next to Candy’s armpit before she leaned her torso down onto her knee and panned her obscured gaze from toe to finger and back again. Candy’s heartbeat quickened as she wondered what was going to happen to her. This was an enigmatic and implacable sadist whose capabilities at torture were unknown to her.

Again she indicated into the darkness and one of the guards quickly vanished to appear again with a small glass jar. He unscrewed the top and held it up sideways so that the woman could push the pointed toe of her boot into the pale opaque gel within.

The Demonatrix stepped up onto the rack and stood between Candy’s thighs. With her hands on her hips, she maintained perfect balance and shifted the tainted foot toward her. The toe nuzzled into her vulnerable pussy and she moaned as the cool viscous sludge was worked against her flesh.

Suddenly her head jerked up and she released a howl of shock as a ferocious chemical heat started to gnaw virulently at her most tender regions. The liniment cream felt more like molten lava as it seared her membranes. Her muscles bucked and rippled as she hauled at her bonds and cried out. She fought to get free so she could scrape the excess off, but the blazing infernal taint remained constant. Candy threw her head from side to side and then buried her cheek into her stretched arm. She wept as she trembled and strove to withstand the horrible ethereal fires. She desperately wanted to close her thighs, but the woman was intent on taking her further with this initiation.

‘No! No don’t,’ she cried as she felt the toe return. Residual gel was caught by the fabric and rubbed into her again to revive the entire appalling event. The motions grew more distinct as the woman sought to not only apply the cream but also to punish the harried location. However, Candy had a distinct love for this mode of treatment and as the pointed toe churned against her, even as her clitoris was now being scorched by the terrible burning heat of the cream, she was brought to a heightened state of arousal. Suddenly not all of her cries were those of pain.

Gasping for breath when she could, she jerked and cavorted as the horrible anguish flowed against the sumptuous subtle pleasure.

The drums were turned another notch and Candy gave a near ecstatic scream as her limbs were racked even more brutally. Every ligament coursed with fresh mayhem. Her joints seemed to swell and began to vanish within small storms of punishing sensation.

Candy flicked open her eyes and looked up at the sublime form towering over her. The woman was silhouetted against the faintly incandescent mist as the flames of the brazier illuminated the smoke and her dark attire absorbed the light save for the odd refraction upon wrinkle, seam and contour.

The woman pushed deeper and Candy dropped her head back, screwed her eyes shut and just cried out at the top of her lungs. It felt wonderfully liberating to just howl as she wished, knowing that no one cared, and no one was listening. The louder and more impassionate her cries, the more pleasure it probably brought these people and it would in no way lessen what they were doing or intending.

The sight of the luscious fetish clad monster atop her was now stamped on her mind’s eye and was granted an awesome clarity by the extreme distress she was in. The still image was wonderfully alluring and as she jerked and bucked from the ongoing assault, that single picture remained firmly before her to entice, arouse, and help her scrape away a definite slice of the horror and rework it into a dark delicious pleasure.

Another click resounded in her ears just as a similar nova pulse of pain thundered in her joints and coursed through her body. Candy’s jaws flashed apart, her neck craned her head up, and she threw a most virulent holler into the air. When she ran out of air, her head dropped back and she quaked as the new level of distress continued to rage within her, making her thoughts swim. Again, a single look up at the woman responsible for her plight caused her opinion of the punishment to metamorphose and she groaned wantonly while she embraced the ferociously twisted pleasure.

The Demonatrix stepped onto her stomach again and just watched the captive surge and shiver beneath her. Slowly the mordant heat in her pussy began to fade as the liniment lost its ability to hurt her, but the guards administered a fresh variety when they turned the rack onwards another notch. Her body was now petrified by the tightness with which it had been drawn outwards. Only her lips, fingers, and toes moved, and even then they just quaked. Even her eyes were locked forward as they admired the sight of the architect of this agony.

Another click started to steal her cries as she was drawn so tight it became hard to even breathe. Another dropped her into a savage tornado of pain and ecstasy and her thoughts started to become indistinct as she neared a faint.

‘Enough of this. I want to move on,’ decreed the woman.

The rack let go and the slack coils suddenly snapped taut as her limbs jerked in and she shrieked even more potently than when being stretched. The sudden freedom forced a searing sorrow through her tormented frame and she tossed and flipped about on the rack as she tried to endure her reprieve. Being set free of the rack was even worse than being on it.

The buckles were opened as she lay in recuperative misery and she was hauled from the rack and dragged across the floor. Her legs were limp beneath her and her feet just slid against the flagstones. Her head hung forward and she just stared blankly at the dark ground. In her periphery vision she watched the boots of her escort stomping along and after a few moments, the sound of the steady click of her heels reached through the lingering echo of her own cries. Motivated by this sharp sound, she managed to heft her head up and regard the slinking form of the Demonatrix. Candy could not resist the allure of the sadistic villainess. The dark attire beckoned to her, the glint of light upon the wrinkles and smooth panes being almost as hypnotic as the sashay of her hips and the flow of her ragged mane of hair.

A gibbet appeared before her and the woman swirled on her heels before she lounged against the wooden upright. She started to caress the polished black wood with her long acute nails.

Candy turned from the dark glare of the woman and regarded the apparatus from which she would soon be hanging. The gallows had a winch at the base and it poured a single length of steel cable up through several ringlets before it fed it along the extended arm and drooled down from the end before it was fastened to the middle of a broad metal stave. Either end of the spreader bar was equipped with very sturdy restraint. These conical leather items were well padded and Candy realised that this was to ensure that a captive could dwell in them for some considerable time without sustaining any serious harm.

The guards simply walked her around so that her back faced the gallows and then casually dropped her to the floor. Candy managed to throw her arms forward and clap her palms to the ground to ease her descent but the drop onto her breasts and belly was still uncomfortable. After she landed, she started to roll onto her side but a heeled boot dropped into her back and pushed down. The sole turned a little to aggravate her skin and then the heel shoved into her flesh to add more fervid encouragement. Candy did not resist and floundered as the woman continued to pivot her foot to make her skin throb.

The two guards each grabbed an ankle, yanked it into the air until her joints protested, and quickly started to feed the extremity into the awaiting cuff. They yanked the buckles tight and threaded them into place to ensure she was secure, and then stepped back. One of them manned the winch, and the other stepped to the side to await any further orders form their superior.

A slight nod from the woman caused her servant to start to whirl the handle and steal away the cable. Candy’s body was swiftly hauled up and when she entered the air, she swung towards the gallows. She feared that she would collide with it and threw her hands out to defend herself. In that instant, the other guard jumped forward and snagged both wrists before he yanked them back and around. Her captive arms jerked her to a halt a few inches from the gallows and as she regarded the dark wood, she felt her shoulders reverberate with stress as a pair of cuffs were snapped into place and then yanked upward towards the bar. Each leather padded steel manacle reached up with a brief section of chain and snapped onto the spreader bar. Candy gritted her teeth and huffed for breath. Her spine was smarting terribly from the acute contortion of the pose. Twisted backwards, her fingers pawed at the thick metal shackles but she could tell that there was no way for her to get free. The pose was a horrid one that left her exceptionally vulnerable but all she could do was hang there and await her next session of dreadful education.

Candy lifted her head and watched the Demontrix stroll out in front of her. A soft patting sound made her squint and verify what was in the woman’s hands. The dark object was almost lost against the dark shades of her costume and the gloom of the chamber.

The sight of the pliant rubber truncheon had her clench her jaw with worry but she managed to keep her words in check as the woman merely stood still with a hip crooked towards her prisoner and continued to tap the weapon into her palm. The steady metronome pound continued to inspire malaise but Candy just stared at the almost hidden eyes of the female and refused to show cowardice.

The sound of the truncheon and the rising pain of her bondage started to have their usual effect. The discomfort of the pose was frustratingly annoying, and Candy wanted something more vibrant than this bothersome background ache. As she regarded the salacious curves of the tyrant, she could not help but commit to improving her anguish.

‘Are you going to do something with that toy? I’m bored already.’

‘You want attention, slave?’ murmured the woman.

‘Well, I w-’

Candy’s words were cut off when the woman casually flicked the weapon out and had it collide with her shivering rear. The battering attack brought a wash of numbness to the region that settled in the wake of the initial shocking pain.

‘Nothing to say?’ asked the woman and slammed the truncheon back across her rear.

The bruising attack left a potent throb and the sadist commenced a slow but savage beating that targeted her legs and rear and offered occasional upward thuds into her hanging breasts. The impacts drove the wind from her lungs and pummelled her flesh until she swore all feeling had been driven from it save for the relic of a deep pulsating pound.

Candy bit her tongue and took the abuse in silence with only snorts and grunts to answer the attack. A few stern swipes into her calves caused her to release brief pips of strain as she was taken further towards her breaking point.

A final volley ended with a return swing that landed in her belly and crippled her with nausea. As she hung and snorted for breath, she heard a brief crackle of moisture and gasped when viscous material was casually smeared through the valley between her parted thighs. A moment later she released a holler as the truncheon descended vertically and hauled open her sphincter as it began to enter her. Having been untroubled by trespass for some time, her rear had little capacity for this violation and as soon as she finished one cry, the woman started to pivot and churn the weapon to acquire new ones.

The Demonatrix stepped forward, ducked down a little to press her rubber smothered loins to Candy’s face, and then straightened while shifting forward. Candy’s howl was stifled by the abdomen of her oppressor and she was bent back a little more sternly. With her body now pressing her face into the woman, she jerked and struggled, fighting to shift and gain air but all she could acquire were half snorts and vague gasps as she bounced and wriggled against the villainess. The Demonatrix was leaning forward so that she could not be driven back, and Candy was left pressed to her.

The truncheon was hauled out and Candy managed to snatch a decent breath before it escaped in puffs against the latex when the rounded tip dove back and pressed to her deepest regions. The woman pulled the handle down and started to draw it out, making the length stretch and pain her tracts before it popped free.

‘There are so many places for you to visit here, slave. And one by one we will introduce you to the catalogue of horrors we have in store for you,’ quipped the woman.

The tyrant stepped back and took the weapon with her. Candy dropped away and swung to and fro as she let her head hang lose while she recovered from the brief ordeal. Her skin was throbbing from the beating and her anus was pounding from the violation, but still she refused to ask for mercy.

A candle appeared in the grasp of the wicked termagant. The towering black strut was about two feet in length and she watched as one of the guards applied flame. The female turned the candle in her grasp to watch the well of wax gather and as she examined it, the flame illuminated the eerie spectacle of her mask with its ranks of spines and acute alien contours.

Candy closed her eyes as the candle voyaged between her splayed legs and started to tilt. Insubstantial splashes landed on her inner thighs and gave way to a fierce detonation of pain. She flexed and yanked with her extremities, causing herself to bounce and sway but the woman just continued to follow her movements and steadily drip the wax. First it was only to her thighs but her sex and the cleft of her rear were being painted with molten fluids. Candy cried out when these splashes graced her most sensitive regions and this just made the Demonatrix chuckle and repeat the application. As soon as this was done three times in a row, Candy applied all her will to refusing her sounds of dissent because it only made the woman more spiteful.

The twitch of her thigh muscles caused the wax to crack after it had hardened and small particles drifted down before her eyes as she bounced and cried out from the maltreatment.

The villainess turned her attention elsewhere for a moment and began to drip the wax between Candy’s shoulders, catching her on the shoulder blades. This tactic made her sway and jerk even more distinctly because as far as she could recall, she had never once been assailed in this particular region before in her life or during all the long days and nights she had spent at the mercy of the Kami.

When the wax landed along her spine and flowed along towards her shoulders she arched even more acutely and gasped with astonishment at how sensitive this previously untouched region was proving.

Her awareness of this attack was momentarily stolen when a flogger was grabbed midway down its bushel of leather ribbons and small swipes applied to her loins. Candy gave a shriek as the hot punishing slaps were dropped into her lewdly offered sex and each sweep cleared away more of the waxen coat that encrusted her pudenda and thighs. The guard continued to swipe the weapon into her inner thighs, the curtailed use of the mighty weapon being more than sufficient to pain her because of the delicate nature of the regions it targeted.

As she had feared, as soon as she had been cleaned, the candle returned and started to steadily drip back onto the skin, which was now raw from the application of the heat and tender from the mild thrashing it had received in order to prepare it for more cruelty.

‘Feel free to scream, slave. It won’t make any difference, but it might help you to endure that which I am going to continue giving you as long as you are with me.’

Candy sucked in her lower lip and chewed on it as hard as she could as the drips came in two second intervals. The timing was the most vexing aspect because she knew when each was due and it made it harder to stay quiet as they continued to hound her.

‘But if silence is what you want, then feel free to indulge as you wish,’ murmured the woman and Candy closed her eyes as the drips continued to cover her inner thighs and several trickles made their way towards her presented pussy.

‘Still nothing to say? Well, how about now?’

Candy’s eyes flashed back open and she stared wide eyed at the floor when she felt her vulva being parted by the gloved fingers of the woman a moment before she started to drip the wax into her exposed internal regions. The highly sensitive membranes reviled the wax like no other region of her body and she immediately broke into long piercing squalls.

The steady dripping was even more a bane than ever and she kicked at the spreader bar to try and get out from under the relentless attention. The woman kept her hand firmly in place so that Candy was left open to her intentions and could do nothing save cry out as searing impacts fell into her.

‘Feel free to say anything you want, slave. There’s a lot more candle left, and so much time to coat you with it.’

Another series of droplets were delivered into her but all Candy could do was snort and wail.

‘Any words at all?’

Candy went berserk as the full measure of the candle was poured into her in one go. The excess rushed down her body and dripped from it as her sight swam and tears trundled from her eyes. As the agony started to fade she collapsed and hung limp in her bonds, whimpering softly and shedding more tears.

‘You must be thirsty after all your crying and screaming, but I have a desire to see you truly parched.’

Candy watched in horror as a pair of braziers were collected and brought over by the guards. The large copper bowls were filled with charcoal bricks and were set down on either side of her. The candle was lowered to each and imparted its flame. The braziers quickly began to bear a towering flame that soon vanished as it ate into the coals and made the white surfaces glow from within.

The heat welled around her and began to soak into her form. At first, sweat started to form on her skin and flow down it much like the wax had, but then the heat grew to new levels that caused her perspiration to evaporate even as it was emerging.

‘I think that will do for now.’

The woman sauntered away and the guards stole one last look at her and then followed.

Chapter Nineteen

Candy had no idea how much time was passing as she hung in the terrible pose and was buffeted by endless waves of desiccating heat. Her skin had been abused by the heat of the wax, and now it was being lashed by waves of fulgent wrath that made her tremble and her thoughts to sway as she dizzily hung in perpetual confinement.

She strained against her bonds and tried to find some way to loosen them enough so she might wriggle free but it soon became apparent, as it always did, that it was a futile notion.

The hours continued to trail by and the fury of the braziers began to slowly fade. The dark coals first became a snowy white with a furious internal glow of heat and then they started to crumble and collapse into ash.

She was parched. Her throat felt like broken glass and her skin felt chafed as though rubbed with sand. She desperately desired water more than anything, and her fantasies now revolved around glasses of sparkling, clear, cool liquid. Every time she pictured the image she shook and struggled afresh in the desperate desire to try and access this impossible goal. She dreamed again of being a water concubine, of swimming in the deep, of being surrounded and immersed in that which she so desperately craved. She had reviled that lot on some occasions, but now she could not even imagine why, especially when she had been luxuriating in such splendid depths and had experienced the wondrous sensations of cool water rushing over her body in abundance.

The sound of footsteps roused her slightly and she found joy in the prospect of being released and in her thirst being quenched. As the images of her long incarceration now formed around her, she fantasised about being thrown into a swimming pool or similar huge body of water.

The clatter of fresh coals as they were poured onto the braziers reached her ears and made her moan in apathy. Her hopes were dashed and her resistance was shattered.

‘Please! No more! I’m dying!’ she implored, but the two men just laughed, poked the coals around to ensure they caught light, and then marched away.

‘I need water! Please, I’m begging you! Just one drop! Just one!’ she yelled, her voice now cracked from being so parched.

When their forms vanished into the shadows and became lost to her she craned her head forward and tried to blow out the gathering flames. It was a ridiculous notion because the coals were already alight, but in her desperate state any hope was worth clinging to. When the pointlessness of this endeavour dawned, she just hung languid in her bonds, sobbing quietly in the grim quietude of the massive hall of suffering.

The two guards came to her again during the perpetual night and despite her begging solicitations they restocked the braziers. The waves of torrefying heat continued to rage against her quaking skin and her throat and mouth became arid as the hours continued to dawdle away. After a time she could not even dwell on her decisions regarding Yomi and her slavery here, every thought revolved around reviling the heat and dreaming of a drink of water.

The creak of latex reached through the crackle of the coals and she stirred slightly. The Demonatrix sashayed from the darkness and revealed herself in a body smothering catsuit that stretched over her hands and perched her atop skyscraper heels. She still wore her ferocious mask and in one hand she drew the end of a hose.

‘Is my new toy thoroughly cooked?’ she purred.

A hand trailed over Candy’s body and found no trace of sweat. The woman clasped at her spread thighs and then cupped her shivering rear.

‘Very nicely done.’

The tyrant stepped back and her guards moved in to start to extract her. The bonds let go of Candy’s body and she was lowered back to the floor where she settled in a stolid heap. A pair of steel shackles snapped to her ankles and the chain that linked them was padlocked to a nearby ring in the floor.

The sound of a few droplets of water striking the stones inspired her head to jerk up and look for the source of the glorious sound. She found that the woman had drawn forth just a few drops that she had allowed to fall onto her pointed toe.

Candy’s limps operated of their own accord and had her scuttle over on her belly so she could push her lips to the cool spots of fluid and suck them free. The chain snapped taut and stopped her. The guards exploited her moment of confusion and drew her arms behind her whereupon two pairs of chain-linked shackles connected her upper arms and her wrists. Candy tugged at the ankle bonds and her balance failed her. She dropped onto her side and slithered forward to elongate her body as much as possible and reach the water she so desperately craved.

More water fell from above and the meagre rain coated both shimmering toes. Candy gave a long mew of dismay as she watched the water gather and run down the black fabric and settle on the floor where it slowly spread under her sole. She stretched her neck forward as much as possible and thrust out her tongue but she was still an impossible couple of centimetres away.

‘P...p....pleeeease,’ she croaked as she stared wide eyed and delirious at the small puddle.

‘A few questions first.’

Candy gave another hoarse moan of despair as more water fell and tantalised her eyes. She then began to sob as she watched it slowly evaporate in the heat.

‘Anything. Just....I...I...’ she stammered, unable to find the words to articulate the level of need she bore.

‘I know, I know,’ soothingly whispered the evil vixen, and turned the footwear as she continued to speak seductively. ‘But before I let you drink this cool...sparkling...delicious water, I have to know what you know.’

‘Oh please, not again,’ blurted Candy as she flexed against her bonds and fought to slip free. She couldn’t believe that she was being interrogated again. She had thought that condemnation to Yomi had ended this facet of her slavery, but it seemed that it was to unfold one more time.

‘You have been amongst the great powers of the Houses of Water and Fire. The Warlord, the daughters, and Lady Uzume. We of the underworld know that you know something of importance. You are a pawn in a large game, and while you may be inconsequential, this nugget of knowledge you have acquired is most definitely not.’

‘Wh...why?...What do you care? This is Yomi. You’re not vital. You’re not involved in the attack on Earth,’ she managed to burble.

Despite the terrible thirst that was possessing her, she had been a plaything to the Gods and had seen their intrigue. She knew that she needed every scrap of information for her defence, every trinket of secret lore, anything that could possibly help her. The Demonatrix was quizzing her, but she could also slot her own form of enquiry into the process, and the woman was so intent on getting her own answers that she unwittingly told Candy more than she should have.

‘Oh Yomi may be the land of the forsaken, but not for much longer. Now tell me what you discovered that has caused such comprehensive plots to see you lost to all.’

Candy hit her smile. Even in this tormented state her mind was still razor sharp and the subtle inflections in the woman’s voice told her volumes. When a century’s old being was so enraged that it let this emotion slip into conversation, well, that exposed just how overwhelmingly potent it was. Yomi was resentful, and Yomi was plotting. The primary military powers of the Empire would be crossing over to Earth and that left the Empire vulnerable on this side. Was the underworld planning a revolt, to ascend when there would be nothing to stop them? If so, then it would behove them to discover all they could about the secrets of the military. Candy knew some of Hachiman’s secrets, of his plans against the Eastern Provinces, and of what Lady Uzume was really doing. The Demonatrix would have been elated to hear these secrets, and it would give these traitors such a weapon to use. If she could hold out, she could even demand elevation, perhaps reach the ranks of the priesthood down here for handing over such vaulted and invaluable intelligence.

Nevertheless there was no way this woman would acquire the secrets of her master. It was Toyo-tama-hiko who had tossed her through the various Earth Houses until she was abducted and taken to Yomi to keep her from her owner. It was Toyo-tama-hiko who had cast her to the underworld to conceal his secret army from his brother and so there was certain sense of justice in Candy not only easing her own situation but also defending her master by betraying the very secret that the Warlord of Water sought to keep hidden. Candy had to be careful though, she had to expose this information correctly and make sure that the Demonatrix had no clue that she had more information. If the woman continued this interrogation, she would crack. She had to ensure that she convinced them that the existence of the Midzhu Wani was her only secret.

‘I don’t know anything. Toyo-tama-hiko is just being spiteful,’ she professed.

‘Oh I know there’s more to it than that. We of Yomi have eyes and ears everywhere. We lurk below and listen. You were tortured with Irukandji. Why would such a horror be inflicted upon you?’

Candy drew forth the thought of betraying her master. She pictured failing him, of letting him down and placing his most covert dealings out into the open for the benefit of these turncoats. The fright thundered through her like a tidal wave and even rode over her thirst to give her moments of strength.

‘It just amused him,’ she said with a distinct tremor corrupting her voice. The deliberate ploy to slot terror in her voice worked perfectly.

‘Now I know that you have information. You are afraid, slave. Afraid of what he will do should you expose his secret. But you are in Yomi now and no one can save you, but also, no one can reach you here. You are safe from reprisal, but you are at my mercy. Shall I show mercy? What coin will you use to pay for it?’

‘Please don’t make me do this,’ she implored, keeping the thought of Hachiman’s secret in the forefront of her mind.

‘Tell me and you may drink, slave. Whatever it is, I need to know, and then you will be rewarded with all the water you want.’

More water flowed over the boot and Candy sobbed with panic. She remembered the meeting room where she had been bound and servicing Lady Uzume as the scheme was hatched above her.

‘I...I saw something I shouldn’t have.’

‘Yes, that’s it, slave. Tell me what you saw. What did you see?’

Candy cast all thought of Hachiman to the back of her mind and locked it up. She replaced this with the other secret she held, and there was enough lingering dread in her voice to shake her revelation and make it seem even more honest.

‘In the abyss. There is an army. Wani that live beneath the waves. A secret army that the Water Warlords are keeping in the depths.’

The Demonatrix paused and Candy started to worry that the lie had not been swallowed.

‘Excellent. Well done, slave.’

The tyrant stepped forward and Candy locked her lips to the boots and sobbed as she sucked all moisture free. As her sight started to clear, she began to see small perforations along the base of the footwear. For a moment she assumed them to be some sort of consideration for ventilation, to make the suit less stifling, but then she was shown their true purpose.

Without a word, the Demonatrix pushed the end of the hose into the neck of her catsuit and turned it on. She gave a soft sigh and arched her chest up against the rubber as it rippled with the introduction of cool water. Candy peered up and watched with ravenous eyes as the water swelled against her cleavage and began to clearly trickle down between latex and skin towards her feet. The woman massaged her loins when the water reached them and her thighs twitched as she swayed her hips and stirred Candy’s approaching drink.

Sparkling gems began to appear on the boots and the villainess just chuckled as Candy thrust her face to them and began to gobble up every drip she could find. The water was salty from being influenced by sweat and had the tang of latex distinct upon it. She feverishly licked and sucked on the toes and clamped her lips to the heel to devour every trickle that ran along them. As her lips and mouth were again wetted, she started to notice the other, more subtle tang of the woman’s arousal from this degrading act. Squirming on the floor, she continued to drink from the woman’s catsuit and body with frenzied enthusiasm until finally the tyrant turned off the hose and handed it back to one her guards.

‘That will do for now, slave.’

Candy pushed herself up onto her knees and although she was slightly hunched over from tiredness, she managed to try and sit as demurely as she could. She placed her hands on her thighs and stared forward at the rubber-clad hindquarters of her oppressor. One of her boots brushed Candy’s left hand away and then stepped onto the thigh so she could nudge her heel into the skin.

‘Touch it.’

With some reluctance, Candy reached up and took hold of her calves. The latex was warm to the touch.

‘Worship it.’

She leaned in and nudged her cheek to the knee of the Demonatrix. The scent of the second skin touched her nostrils and her submission flared. It had been awoken by the interrogation and her recent startling abuses and now seized the chance to indulge in more fetishistic derogation. Her fingers pawed at the tight smooth fabric and her lips wandered upon the impermeable skin as her tongue slowly poured out and began to trail upon it amidst adoring kisses.

‘There, you now see who owns you. You are my possession. My toy.’

A gloved hand stretched into her hair and began to stroke her as she continued to lavish kisses to the leg of her abuser. There was a wonderful sense of covert victory within Candy. She had kept her master’s secrets safe despite the virulence of her questioning. She had wounded the man who had thrown her to this hellish domain, and now she could indulge herself with this humble devotion.

‘Your information is most gratifying to hear, slave. And as a reward, I will give you all the water you want.’

The Demonatrix stepped from Candy and turned to walk back towards the exit. The guards produced keys and opened her cuffs before again hoisting her up and then dragging her in the wake of their superior. Candy tried to walk but once more her legs were too weak to do anything save slip and slither under her.

The ragged tunnels of the domain passed by and finally a new location was presented to her. The domed room had walls that were carved with dreadful nightmarish imagery. Contorted screaming forms were twisted and interlocked and they flowed around a trio of smooth solid metal doors that bore no feature.

With a wave of her hand, the Demonatrix caused a scraping howl to emerge from the cavern. The foot-thick vault door started to shuffle aside into the wall and expose another corridor. As soon as the door had vanished, ranks of burners on the walls sparked of their own accord and their gas jets filled the corridor with radiance.

The passage stretched off beyond her ability to see and all along it were more featureless portals, all set within a small alcove. For long minutes she was drawn down the bland route until an open door appeared and she was shown into the dark chamber it protected.

A spotlight came on and shone down upon a smooth featureless slab of stone that sprouted from the floor and offered a smooth leather surface. She was dropped face first onto the padded table and after a brief voyage to the shadow cloaked walls, the guards returned with new additions for her body. Their life spent underground had left them with keen sight and coupled with their familiarity with processing slaves in these rooms, they could see things that Candy could not.

Unable to spy what else was awaiting her, she relaxed her physique and prepared to accept another transformation.

As though dressing her to imitate their deity they began to slot her into a dense catsuit with socks and mittens already attached. The rear of the garment was zipped up and a hood was drawn down onto her head before it too was secured to the high collar of the suit. The hood had openings for her nostrils and her mouth, and slender slits existed for her eyes.

A single sleeve was gathered and threaded onto her arms to pin them behind her back. Several belts upon it were tightened so that she was forced to arch her chest into the table. From the upper reaches of the sleeve came two thick straps that were irrevocably fastened to a monstrous posture collar that encompassed her throat and forced her to stick her chin acutely upward.

The next portion of her attire was another sleeve that gathered up the whole length of her legs and was sealed about her waist with a densely boned but thankfully brief corset. When she moved her feet, she felt the large flipper that was sprouting from the outward sides of her extremities and realised then that she was indeed going to receive all the water she wanted, and as usual, the act of rewarding her was going to be a punishment to amuse those who owned her.

The final aspect of her uniform manifested in the form of a dense mask that resembled a frightening juxtaposition between a gas mask and that of a scuba diver. It had a transparent visor and a plexus of straps formed a harness that would hold it to her head. The interior beckoned and she gave a brief struggle as the tubes that would enter and sustain her were gathered up and aimed at her features. The posture collar denied her any hope of resisting and so she accepted her lot willingly as the food tube thundered down her throat, making her eyes bulge and her body react violently after her initial submission. The nostril tubes were applied and the mask was set firmly in place.

‘Good. Let’s show her to her new home,’ said the woman and with those words the other end of the chamber lit up.

Candy broke into rabid convulsions as she saw what was coming. She had thought perhaps that this was going to be some sort of punishment, or another sadistic vice of the Demonatrix, but now she realised that these were not rooms designed for fleeting supervised torment, they were rooms whose impenetrable featureless vault doors were places to dispose of a slave, to imprison them for the rest of their days.

The far end of the chamber was dominated by a great glass sphere that was filled with water. It rested upon a metal pipe that was two yards thick and allowed a pair of thick tubes to slither up through the interior and reach the lid. As her eyes accustomed to the light, she now saw that a set of stairs had been cut into the wall. They flowed along the far end of the cave before forming into a platform over the great bowl.

One of the guards grabbed her and flung her over his shoulder as they all proceeded up. Candy continued to writhe but was held tight until she was lowered and pinned down so that the last of her doom might be applied. One of the hoses clamped to the front of her mask and instantly she found herself drawing upon cool reprocessed air. Another fixture was clamped to something near the base of her spine and without even another word or care for her existence, the lid was opened and she was tossed in.

Candy struck the surface and vanished beneath the waves. She flashed around and looked up to see the guards smile as they crouched before the Demonatrix who stood with hands on hips, glowering down at her. The lid dropped down and was sealed and Candy continued to sink down. Through the glass she watched them stroll from the chamber and the door seal and lock to leave her condemned to isolation.

She swam round in circles with her pipes flowing behind her and thought on what was going to happen next. The trouble was, nothing did. Small measures of water and nutrients were introduced to her body and were only detected because of the almost imperceptible quiver in her throat tube. She also detected that the tube to her back was gradually pumping a thin gel into her suit. Every motion made it swirl against her skin, pushing it round and round as it was also sucked out. It was no doubt a consideration to keep her skin healthy, and thus she realised just how easy it would for them to leave her in her fish bowl for the rest of her life.

The time she had spent as an animal had been laborious but had at least resulted in levels of input and occasional attention. After all her time as a slave, this was the worst fate she had endured. Even the Irukandji had been more pleasant for at least she had the fight for orgasm to look forward to and indulge. In this bowl there was nothing.

Candy yearned for attention like never before. She ached to be touched, to be punished, pleasured, anything to break the monotony, but there was no hope. Eventually she tried to pull of her mask, to try and create an emergency so that she would be removed, but no matter what she tried, the straps refused to break and she couldn’t get free of the tube that sustained her in this hideous containment.

Unlike before, her thoughts did not diminish, she did not start to lose herself in the lot of beast and think in a more base fashion. Her mind remained livid with need, with hatred of this numbing imprisonment. After everything she had done, everything that had been done to her, was this really going to be the final chapter in her life? Others had envied her for the times she had spent with the Kami, so perhaps it was a fitting end to her life as a concubine to have nothing but these memories and stark unfeeling existence as her finale. Others may not have enjoyed what she had, but they would at least enjoy sensation for life. She had binged on the most extreme forms and the most awesome couplings but had paid for it in that no other experience save swimming in circles and crying was left her.

Chapter Twenty

It could have been days, it could have been years before something other than silent captivity entered Candy’s shadow of life. A deep punishing rumble ran through the underground realm and shook the glass sphere. Her eyes widened with delight as she hoped that the orb would topple and smash because at least then she would be free of this thing. To her sadness it remained stable.

The tremor faded, but then so too did her breath. Candy panicked and sucked at the tubes with all her might but the respirators were failing quickly. Another resonant clang sounded and the bottom of the tank suddenly broke open. The hatch parted under the weight of the water and as once before in the realm of the Water Warlord, she was flowing down a subterranean chute.

The tubes that were attached to her body popped free from their fixtures and Candy gave a cry when suddenly a harsh light was raging against her eyes. She kicked with her tail and found that she was in open water and even though she had been near blinded by the glare, she saw bubbles rising up around her. She held her breath and followed the direction. Her face was heating from asphyxiation and she swam as hard as she could ever upward.

Candy erupted jubilantly from the surface and dropped onto her back. With the last of her breath she pushed the water from her tubes and snorted in a deep gorgeous breath of air. Spots of water flowed into her lungs and she instantly broke into racking coughs and snorts. Panicked, she operated on instinct and stalled her breath until she could try and repair it in safety. She thrashed her tail, rolled, and in seconds had successfully beached herself. Her rubber-clad body had rocketed along the surface and then rushed up onto a river bank.

So as not to be distracted by her surroundings, she closed her eyes and focused on her breathing. Hunched over into a ball, she managed to slowly recapture some semblance of normal operation. The coughing fits ebbed as she purged the tubes and her insides of water.

Calming down, she lifted her head and looked around. Her body felt unusually heavy and it seemed that she might have been in her bowl for some considerable time if she had grown so accustomed to floating.

Candy saw that against all reason she was in an unpopulated region far from any palaces. Verdant green hills rolled off into the distance and sporadic gatherings of trees reached up towards the cloud flecked sky. The large river into which she had been ejected snaked through the hills and was fenced in by swaying reeds save for a few small beaches of grit such as the one she had managed to shoot herself onto.

She rolled over onto her back and just stared up at the sky as the droplets on her visor quickly evaporated in the warm sun. Birds flew unhurriedly overhead and the river lapped at her tail with gentle beats. She felt her arms going numb from supporting her but didn’t care. For the moment, she decided to enjoy her freedom for what it was worth.

Only once the rays of the sun had saturated her rubber skin and began to warm the gel that was still spread upon her smothered skin did she decide to return to her natural habitat. It was considerably more difficult to enter than it was to exit, and it was an particularly awkward process to wriggle and squirm her way around and then edge back into the river.

Once she was in and the gathering heat upon her was countered, she started to ponder her next course of action. The tremor had either been seismic or military in nature, and had set off some sort of emergency sequence to preserve the prisoners. However, if this were the case, why were there no other fish women in the river? Candy wondered if the many vaults contained a variety of penitentiaries, a menagerie of bondage apparatus, costumes, and other hellish domains to embrace and seal away the hafuri-tsu-mono. This fitted with the cunning and ever enthusiastic imaginations of the Kami and could well explain her loneliness.

Deviating to a much more pressing problem, Candy had to consider her survival. Bound as she was, she had no means to feed herself. Her only option was to swim downstream and hope she came across habitation that might show mercy. It meant that she would probably be handed back to brutes of Yomi, but survival was her priority, even if it meant a return to that horrible fish bowl.

Taking the time to savour her current level of liberation, Candy kicked rhythmically with her legs and continued to swim onwards. She arched upward every few beats, shook her head and exhaled a little so she might snatch a new breath and then duck back down to continue swimming. This style of swimming was exceedingly tiring and although it allowed her to stare at the river bed with its shoals of colourful fish and rippling weed beds, she soon decided to take a more leisurely route.

Floating on her back, she watched the skies and shifted her tail much more lethargically so that she bobbed along and went with the current. Occasionally she brushed the reeds and had to correct her direction back into the middle before she hit the bank, but there were few real hazards for her to care about.

She swam onwards until the sun started to slowly vanish from the skies and marked its departure by painting a stunning canvas of reds and pinks across the heavens before it gave way to an emerging vault of stars. Candy rolled over again and located a small opening in the reeds so she could again swim out of the water and just spend the night under the stars, snoozing contentedly. The sounds of the wilderness were a definite treat after the long silence inside her bowl, and the lullaby allowed her to gain sleep deeper and more refreshing than any she had known in a long time.

The warmth of the morning soon started to heat her bound form more than she could happily accept, and with hunger starting to levy itself all the more potently, she crawled back into the water and continued her journey downriver.

A few lazy hours passed but then without warning she ran into an obstruction. She spun about to go around it, but found that it was not so easily evaded. The net had snagged her mask and as she whirled it came with her to catch her form and then become ensnared on her tail. With a sudden desperate lurch she tried to break free before she became even more entangled but it was hopeless.

The waters closed over her head as the weighted lower reaches of the net dragged her down and Candy continued to fight for her freedom. As she started to fear the worst, a series of steady pulls began to drag her through the waters and to dry land. She emerged from the river and was hauled up onto the grassy bank where she found herself staring up at a rather bemused young man.

The fisherman had a sleek physique with ranks of well developed but subtle muscles, obviously gained from arduous manual labour. His skin was tanned and he wore a short head of dark hair. Clad in loose trousers and rough woven boots, he scratched his head in befuddlement and then began to peel her from the net.

‘What is a Midzhu no me doing so far from the ocean I wonder? Or do you belong to the Warlord of the Rivers? Are you even a water concubine? They tend to have a bit more colour and flamboyance to their attire.’ he asked softly.

Candy dropped from the final portions of the net and just rested before him. The stranger crouched down and looked over her attire, examining the buckles and other areas that held her prisoner.

‘I must admit, I am intrigued,’ he muttered.

The stranger grabbed her about the upper body and heaved her over his shoulder before he began to stroll off towards a slim dirt path that crept amongst some nearby hills. Candy did not resist, without food and water she had no hope of lasting much longer, so she needed to surrender to whoever she found in order to try and find a route out of this costume or least someone to provide her with sustenance.

The fisherman walked down the path for several minutes, whistling a merry tune as he bore her away from her habitat.

‘What have you got there, Sato?’ asked a chirpy female voice.

‘Not all the fish I caught today were edible,’ he replied and dropped her down onto a small pile of hay.

Candy peered around and saw a small discreet cabin with modest fields of crops spreading behind it. A young and slender woman was setting aside the basket that she was currently weaving and was currently looking across her contained form with a wicked leer. She had long dark hair that was fixed into a meticulous plait and cheery green eyes.

‘I don’t know about that. I find her quite delicious,’ she purred.

‘In that case, let’s have a real look at her,’ replied Sato.

‘Isn’t she a water concubine?’

‘Who knows? And there’s only one way to find out.’

‘Her owner might be upset.’

‘Well, Muso, then her owner should have kept a better eye on her. See these,’ he said, and prodded her mask’s fixtures. ‘Feeds for air and nutrients. She was being sustained by them and they either came lose or she broke free of them, either way, she needs help.’

‘Mmmm, so she’s a prisoner in there then,’ said Muso and sank down onto her knees at Candy’s side. The woman’s hands began to explore the tight cell that held to Candy and her hips swayed as she found such captivity titillating.

‘What a callous thing to do to such a pretty toy.’

‘I’ll open her inside. Care to join me?’

‘As opposed to finishing this basket for Oshinataka’s sister? Hmmmm, let me consider this for a moment.’

Sato gave an amused chuckle and lifted Candy in his arms, this time cradling her before him and carrying her into his home as though he were bringing home a bride. Muso followed close behind and was visibly quivering with excitement at what would be found in the dark rubber cocoon.

Candy was laid down on the kitchen table and flipped onto her front so that they could begin work on her freeing her.

‘Actually this shouldn’t be too difficult. It’s quite a simple outfit.’

‘Maybe she doesn’t belong to a Kami after all?’

Sato said nothing and began to unfasten the straps and peel away the latex. Candy liberated from her tail and catsuit and her arms coursed with residual pain as they were finally set free of the sleeve.

Her face mask was opened and when Sato saw the tubes that entered her features he drew it away and let them pour from her body. Candy shook as they left her and then sagged onto the table as her skin tasted fresh air for the first time in an unknown duration.

The hands of Muso were upon her in an instant and started to slither upon the gel and appraise her curves. The delicate touch was most welcome and Candy remained where she was and just luxuriated in this long desired attention.

‘So who are you?’ asked Sato, focusing on fact as his partner busied herself with fantasy.

Candy had been considering what she should do. At present she was anonymous, with an unknown owner who had shown her an almost criminal level of neglect. Sato and Muso seemed to be mere peasants, but they had a kindly demeanour that she found almost intoxicating.

Candy perked her eyebrows and shook her head before she looked around at the simple kitchen. It was a rustic scene, quite unlike the opulent and exquisite palaces she had dwelt in or the eerie domains to which she so often found herself delivered.

‘She’s mute?’ asked Muso.

‘So it would appear.’

After a moment to think on how to overcome this language barrier, he sprinkled some flour onto a cutting board and etched his question into the powder. Candy stared at it with an exaggerated look of confusion and then stared at Sato with an imploring look to express how frustrating this was for her.

‘It’s okay,’ he said and physically expressed this sentiment with a gentle pat of her head and then a stroke of her cheek. She rested her features into the soothing palm and continued to enjoy his partner’s slow groping interest. ‘Looks like she’s illiterate to.’

‘So we have no way to find out who she belongs to?’ asked Muso.

‘So it would appear.’

‘Then we should look after her until such time as her owner comes looking or we find out where she may have come from.’

‘I concur,’ he answered with a titter in his voice from his partner’s intense excitement. Clearly Muso was going to seize any opportunity she could so that she could get to keep the new arrival.

‘We should get this goo off her first.’

‘I’ll boil some water,’ offered Sato and moved to the stove.

Muso took Candy’s hands and started to help her off the table and back onto her feet. When her body weight came onto her soles her legs buckled slightly, but the woman’s support prevented her from falling over.

‘There we go,’ she said as Candy started to gather a little more balance. ‘Let’s sit you down before you fall down.’

Muso hooked a small stool with her foot and dragged it over to them before steering Candy around and down onto it. She dropped onto the smooth wood and sagged while breathing heavily. It felt so strange to finally be a bipedal creature again, and there was a sense of nakedness that was far more powerful than from just being without clothing, it was because that for so long she had been encased in the most binding costumes, been devolved by them, been controlled by them, tended by machines and automated systems. To be actually exist without any impediment or any invasion into her body was most unusual and oddly enough, quite disconcerting.

While she continued to try and process her freedom and what she might do now, the couple held each other and watched her recover. Her every movement seemed to entice them and their hands began to wander upon each other as fantasies of what she could do crept through their minds.

When the water began to reach a suitable temperature, they brought the large bucket to the floor and gathered sponges that they then started to dip in and rub across her body. Candy shuddered as the glorious warm water started to take away the nutrient slime that had stopped her skin from being damaged. Sato attended the task with a view to finishing it while his partner handled it with a far more self indulgent hand. Candy allowed her thighs to be parted and with Muso kneeling before her she closed her eyes and enjoyed the feeling of the woman repeatedly cleansing her skin there.

‘She looks tired,’ said Muso.

‘Okay, then. Let’s get her to bed,’ answered Sato with a resigned huff. There was no way to dissuade Muso from experiencing their new playmate.

They each took a wrist and guided her out of the kitchen and to a small bedroom whose windows allowed the sun to stream in and pour across a simple double bed. Candy felt as though she were in a dream. They were not restraining her, not towing her at the end of a lead. Her compliance was being asked, not demanded, and this was such a unusual event that Candy had little idea how to react to it.

She flopped onto the mattress and remained where she was as the couple shed their clothes. Muso prowled onto the bed with a ravenous look in her eyes. She leaned down and kissed Candy’s shins while peering up along the length of her body and to her eyes, never once breaking visual contact with her.

Fingers rushed up and down her calves and the woman began to kiss a route upwards. The slow rise towards her thighs seemed deliberate so as not to unduly spook a skittish creature.

Candy felt Sato sit down beside her head whereupon he drew her chin around and sought a kiss. For a split second she was reluctant, but the feel of a feminine tongue clearing her knee and voyaging onto her thighs dispersed all feelings of antipathy. Lips met hers and lingered until by her own choice, she opened her mouth and responded. Resting his head on one hand, Sato’s other reached in and cupped a breast before his thumb began to toy with her ring and to stroke her nipple.

Candy’s eyes jolted open and she swung her stare down as much as she could without breaking her passionate kiss with Sato because she felt the delicate hands of Muso lay down onto her thighs and press thumbs in to ask her to spread her legs wide and allow access.

No sooner had her limbs drifted apart than the woman stretched herself forward and offered a few precursor kisses to the soft skin before her tongue tip began to draw circles around Candy’s sex. Running around thigh and stomach, she allowed Candy to become used to the feeling before she kissed her navel and then had her tongue sway from side to side and commit to a zigzagging downward path. The warm, wet organ crossed onto her pussy and slid through to tantalise her clitoris with some highly stimulating swirls.

Candy gave a long sultry mew and kissed Sato with more abandon. Her stomach muscles rolled and her thigh muscles flicked and clenched. Her own hands reached around and encompassed Sato. She held tighter as the enthusiastic tongue of Muso gathered new degrees of effort.

Inspired by Candy’s response, the agile tip raged against her clit and Candy jumped to attention as she came. After her long duration of imprisonment, it felt wonderful to climax again. She screamed aloud with victory and rhapsody and this caused the couple to move with energised haste.

Muso grabbed Candy’s left ankle and cast it over to roll her onto her front. Sato shuffled down the length of the bed and slid his hands beneath her hips to hoist her rear into the air just as his partner collapsed before Candy and cast her own legs wide.

Elated to be free and eager to please, she reached up and began to tease Muso’s breasts as she nestled between her thighs and started to diligently adore the woman’s pussy. Candy resonated the intimate flesh with a long moan when Sato’s engorged shaft brushed against her and then committed to a steady driving thrust. His hands clenched to her sides as he withdrew and again sheathed himself within her, and each gradual plunge caused his length to twitch within her.

Muso’s hands clawed into the sheets and her head rolled upon the pillows as she cried out from Candy’s eager attention. The woman began to thrash around so much that she had to let go of her breasts and clamp her hands to her thighs to keep her in place so she could work effectively. Candy could almost believe that this woman had never before been attended in such a way, such was the extremity of her response.

Sato flopped back and propped himself up on his arms so he could launch his hips up into her. Each potent slap made her squeak as she was relentlessly pummelled. When she felt him swell within her and flick with the onset of orgasm, she squeezed her tracts to him and sucked ferociously on Muso’s clit to inspire her to scream and join the two of them in mind-bending release.

‘By Izanagi and Izanami she is an astounding concubine. What sort of fool would let her slip through his fingers?’ gasped Sato.

He slid back and collapsed onto the bed at Candy’s side so he could embrace both women. They all lay panting with their strength sapped by the energetic experience.

‘Oh we’ll make sure that her days of neglect are over,’ murmured Muso. The woman pulled a blanket over all three of them as the sweat of their exertions started to flee and give way to a slight chill.

Chapter Twenty One

For the next few weeks, Candy enjoyed a carefree and wonderful life on the farm of Sato and Muso. The couple were sweet and tender in their affections, and even when they tied her up so they might flog her, spank her, or torment her with pegs, it was a spry and frivolous form of abuse. They may not have been ageless masters in the arts of bondage and domination, but for now, Candy was glutted from having endured the dark depravities of Warlord and Yomi. The innocent dalliances with this couple were a welcome relief from the highly ritualised and intensely experienced machinations of the Great Houses.

When she was called upon to service them, she performed cunnilingus and fellatio with such gusto that she could have been attending Hachiman or Uzume. Her gratitude to the couple was immense, for they had liberated her from the one place in the Empire from which no mortal ever returned. Sometimes in the aftermath of sex, it was a serious fight to keep her words in check. She yearned to reply to them, to thank them, and strained not to reveal that she was anything other than a mute who did not understand the Imperial tongue.

Candy just wanted to stay on the farm. She knew too much. By accidentally discovering the mass secrets in the Houses, she had placed herself in a level of sexual jeopardy she hadn’t thought possible. Rulers sought to pry her secrets from her, or hide her away behind a bit, in a fish bowl, in a sarcophagus. She didn’t want to be pawn anymore. She would willingly endure the loss of her hope of ever seeing Hachiman again just so long as all the other darker personages of the Empire never again crossed her path.

Sato would sometimes fish the river and she and Muso would make love on the river bank, their antics being a means to entertain him as he sat and waited for something else to blunder into his net.

Sometimes they bound her in the barn, other times to their bed, but always she was drenched in attention and lavished with kisses and affection. Several times, she was tied to a yoke and used to plough some fresh fields, and her time as a pony had her recalling the infinite satisfaction she had enjoyed in losing herself within that simple and rewarding role.

One morning, Masu had tied her to a low stool and then settled into an armchair to do some sewing. By pulling in the stool, she enveloped Candy in her thighs and had her perform at a slothful, delicious rate. When Candy became too excitable from attending her, she would prick her with a pin to make her squeak and slow down. Sometimes Candy misbehaved just to acquire this minor chastisement.

Sato stormed in unexpectedly and remained in the doorway. He was out of breath.

‘What is it? I thought you were heading to the village for some more seed?’

‘This, you will not believe, my love.’

He extended a piece of paper and Muso accepted it with a frown. She scrutinised the contents and then pulled Candy’s face up by the back of her hair.

‘You’ve got to be joking?’

‘It explains everything. Why she doesn’t understand us. Why she’s so skilled. Why she’s so beautiful. By the Sun Goddess, I have passed this reward poster almost every day and never given it a second glance.

‘She...she belongs to the Supreme Warlord of Fire?’ said Muso, a hint of sadness quickly creeping into her words. As though to banish them, she pulled Candy back between her legs, whereupon she instantly began to lap with a more vigorous rate.

‘She is the lost property of Kami! And not just some Lord of an Earth House, but the Supreme Warlord himself.’

‘I don’t want to give her up,’ muttered Muso.

‘We have to, my sweet. It is our duty.’

‘But I love her. She’s ours. We rescued her,’ implored Muso.

‘This is not a case of finders keepers, she is important to a ruler of the Empire. Who knows what role she serves? We cannot jeopardise the realm by transgressing against the will of the Gods.’

‘I know. I know. It...it’s just not easy to let her go.’

‘Then let’s enjoy her one last time before I head to the palace of Hachiman.’

Candy felt tears well in her eyes as she was taken to the bedroom. They were a strange concoction, inspired by radically different mindsets. On the one hand she was grief-stricken to lose the couple, but on the other hand she was elated because after all this time, finally, she was going to be returned to her one true owner. She had not felt such mental joy in a long time, and the love she made with those who had brought her to this state was as sterling as it was honest.

Chapter Twenty Two

With her arms bound behind her with rope, Candy bore witness to another eerie sight. She was already familiar with one aspect of this manner of orchard, although from a far different life than the one she had lived since falling through the vortex. The Sakaki, or sacred evergreens, were visited by women who much desired harmony with their husband. Each meticulously tended tree was marked with a small red tori-wi in front of them to reveal their stature. Before several trees she could see bowed females in deep mediation and prayer.

Also situated amongst the grove were other forms of trees where women learned to appreciate their husbands in a far sterner way and also perhaps to inspire less felonious visitors to greater heights of commitment.

The contorted polished sculptures were formed from invaluable steel and rose up from the grass to embrace and contain a single trapped form. They were crushed into immobility by a number of severe metal bands that were decorated to resemble twigs and thereby make it appear as though the metal trees had grown around and encompassed them naturally. The hints of tubing revealed that the channels within the trees fed them and disposed of waste so that they were left to suffer and endure their demeaned isolation in silent contemplation.

Sato led her deeper into the large orchard and passed countless suffering women as well those who bowed before the organic versions in the hope of avoiding the fate of those hanging about them.

A small clearing beckoned and standing in streams of golden light was Warlord Hachiman. Dressed in his battle armour, with daisho at his side, he stood next to a waist high tori-wi. Candy closed her eyes and cleared her mind of contrary thoughts. She feared that her hunger to see her master again was resulting in hallucinations, but when she opened her eyes, the image remained.

Sato stepped into the grove and sank down until his forehead was pressing to the lush green carpet. Candy followed suit and prostrated herself before her beloved master.

The sound of his methodical tread closed in and stopped before them. Both remained where they were and Candy trembled with anticipation, excitement, and absolute lust. She had almost given up hope of ever seeing him again and now he was here, right before her. The aura of his dominance washed over her and made her want to grovel and beg, to sink into the soil in cowed awe.

‘Rise, Sato,’ he said gently, and when the words graced Candy’s ears she had to fight to suppress her licentious moan of rapture.

The farmer drifted up onto his knees and Candy remained where she was.

‘You have done me a service for returning to me that which was misplaced. I will see that you are rewarded for your service to the Kami.’

‘You are too kind, Warlord Hachiman. I merely wish to serve the desires of the Gods and need no reward.’

‘Nevertheless, to know the value of this kami-tsu-ko and bring her to me with no petition for compensation proves your loyalty to the Empire and so it shall be blessed. My Mikado will ensure your comfort and he will meet you at the main gates.’

‘My absolute gratitude for this generosity, Warlord Hachiman,’ announced Sato, and started to retreat from the grove, leaving Candy and Hachiman alone in the quite.

‘Rise, Candy.’

She drew her knees under her and fought her way back up onto her feet. She kept her head lowered and swayed as she saw him standing before her. A hand reached up and lifted her chin. When her eyes met his, she immediately started to cry with jubilation. Hachiman just smiled and let his gaze stroll across her physique.

‘Still as luscious as I remember. Your hardships have done nothing to mar your beauty, slave.’

Candy’s tears increased immediately as she heard the term she so revered slip over his lips and announce that she was truly his again.

‘Thank you, master. It...I’m just so...I...’ she spluttered, unable to find an appropriate sentence to express her joy. Words could not encompass just how much she adored him and how happy she was to once again be in his presence and know that she was owned and his.

Hachiman let go of her chin and wandered behind her. Hands took her shoulders and pushed her towards the tori-wi. Her stomach met the curved horizontal upper strut and her torso folded over it. It was then that she noticed the leather fetters in the grass. Attached to the base of the two supporting beams, they were semi-hidden in the greenery and were quickly buckled about her ankles to leave her legs spread wide and her chest hanging over the other side.

Hachiman strolled around the symbol to which she was bound and stepped out before her.

‘Tongue.’

Candy flung the organ out with such reckless abandon that it hurt the root. Hachiman produced a pair of slim wooden struts and used them like pincers to capture the length. One rubber band was closed about one end, and then another made the jaws close tightly into the flesh and enclose the other. Candy gave a soft purl of discomfort and pleasure as the wooden jaws dug into the corners of her mouth and her strangled tongue was left hanging forth on display. It throbbed with a keen ache that started to gather new potency with every passing second.

Hachiman stepped back and from the grass drew two leather thongs. Already fastened to some hidden anchor, they reached out and after pulling Candy towards them with a pinch to the tip of her tongue, she quickly tied them to the either end of the struts. Any attempt to wilt or retreat now hauled painfully at her captive organ and enhanced its suffering. Her spine started to smart from having to hold her torso up and her thighs flexed with the effort of retaining the stressful position.

‘Many wives have had to prove their devotion to their husband upon this symbol, slave,’ he announced.

Hachiman removed one of his armoured gloves and tossed it over her. She saw it land in the grass and then gave a jerk when the naked palm slapped to her rear. She gave a shocked squeak and then whimpered as warm bliss seeped through the spanked skin.

‘The form of their testing depends on how much disrespect they have shown.’

Another heavy handed smack landed on the other cheek and Candy cried out with elation as he continued to spank her bottom as she writhed and revelled in the salacious chastisement.

‘The cane, the crop, the paddle, perhaps even the bullwhip for the truly erroneous. However, you have been through more than even the most outrageously wayward wife, so I will be gentle...before I take you.’

Candy gave an elated howl at the thought of being spanked and then ravished by the being she worshipped. She pulled back to stretch her tongue and make it pound with new harrowing. She embraced the misery and surged within her bonds as another swift trio of slaps greeted her juddering rump.

‘You have been through many facets of the Empire’s kami-tsu-ko. You have tasted the twisted desires of the Wani daughters, swam in our oceans, served in our fields, and even been owned by a mere citizen.’

Another rapid deluge alternated from cheek to cheek and then a hand cupped the crease of her rear and squeezed her inner thighs. Candy arched up with a shriek of satisfaction as she felt the grip tighten so it could feel her flesh twitch and struggle. Her tongue paid the price for this movement, but the pain only exaggerated her libido.

‘You have seen the Empire as no other slave has, and your journey is now complete, and you are returned to me.’

Six more stern slaps were brought to her rear and then another six were bestowed to the backs of her thighs.

‘It is time for you to know the truth, slave,’ he stated and then paused for a moment before offering a mild chuckle of amusement. ‘Well, perhaps not all of it, but the part that is relevant to the moment.’

Candy sagged as the heat swelled within her skin and made her float upon an intoxicated haze of lust. A hand cupped her pussy and started to stroke her. She almost climaxed from the first touch.

‘Everything that has befallen you has been according to my will. Toyo-tama-hiko had my permission to give you to the Houses of Earth, to make you a beast, so you would experience all, while also serving our other plans that are still in motion.’

The hand came away and was replaced with an engorged cock. His sterling manhood ploughed into her tracts and Candy almost tore her tongue out as she jerked up and screamed from such heavenly fulfilment. The rapture of his entry into her body was almost more than she could withstand.

Hachiman paused and savoured the feel of her tracts squeezing and flicking, adoring his cock with a muscular dance.

‘When we invade, I want someone who knows Earth, and I need them to know that the Empire is far superior,’ he said, and slowly withdrew before he again rushed back into her. The slow methodical drives made her body quake against the bondage as the savagery of the delight raged within her, making her squawk incoherently as she tried to come to terms with the rapture that possessed her. So many times she had dreamed of this moment, and to have such a potent and long held fantasy realised, especially after such lengthy and arduous separation from him was uncannily satisfying.

‘From what you have been through, I know that there will be no lies, no distortions. I know that you belong heart, body, and soul to the Empire and to me. What better advisor could I ever hope for when we cross over and subjugate your people?’

Hachiman continued with steady rhythm and relished her impotent thrashing. Candy screamed when she felt him starting to stiffen within her and her whole body vibrated feverishly as she felt a new orgasm suddenly loom.

The ends of the wooden pincers opened and dropped away. Her tongue exploded with a surge of terrible anguish, and as Hachiman came, she detonated with a delirious mixture of pain and absolute pleasure. Her body bent upward and fell into his arms. His brawny limbs instantly enveloped her and held tight as he continued to thrust into her. Pinioned to his armoured chest, with the back of her head resting on his shoulder, she stared up and squealed at the top of her lungs.

An armoured hand cupped her jawline and held her in place as his naked extremity caressed and squeezed her breasts. Every thrust seemed to take her to new pinnacles of elation but Hachiman never slowed in his steady rate. His lust dragged her through an orgasm the likes of which she had never before encountered.

He jumped back and his flight brought another nova burst of bliss that seemed to suck the energy from her body. Candy collapsed forward and hung on the tori-wi, twitching occasionally as bursts of sensation tightened her startled physique.

Hachiman unfastened her ankles and Candy slithered back until she dropped back onto the cool grass.

‘While you have been passed from House to House, Uzume has instigated war with the Eastern Provinces and this will lead to their defeat. Engineered dishonour for Uzume has allowed her to accept Toyotama-hiko’s offer of co-rulership of a new House of Wani without suspicion. The House of Wani is readying to join the Mitama in the destruction of the Provinces and this will sharpen their war skills in readiness for the invasion of Earth, and once there, because of their position in the frontline they will sustain heavy losses and endure a measure of disgrace. I will remain unaffected by this since they were removed from my command. Then, when House Hachiman defeats Earth, and cements our hold on Pangaea, I will have earned a great and absolutely flawless favour from the Sun Goddess. My request is simple, slave. Lingzhi. For Lady Uzume and I, for all time. And such a wish will readily be granted.’

Candy was suddenly assailed by a fear that after all her trials, she was to be used and then discarded when her usefulness came to an end. She was to be at his side through the war with Earth, but then what?

‘But what of me, Warlord?’ she asked meekly.

‘When I retire from the realm of Earth, I will need to appoint a Mikado to rule in my name. Ame-waka-hiko will be needed to run my House on Pangaea, and deal with the responsibilities and securities of this homeland. However, I have already groomed someone for the position. He has spent time on Earth, he knows the intricacies, the culture, the people, and will be most adept at ruling that land. I believe you are well acquainted with him...’

She looked up and then followed Hachiman’s stare as he looked to the edge of the grove. From amongst the trees emerged a visage she had not seen save in dreams of a long forgotten life.

‘Lei!?!’ she exclaimed, her mind recoiling at the intrusion of something from her life as Candice into her depraved existence as Candy.

Joseph Lei’s face had changed little, but the corporate raider she had first known and been attracted to now appeared ferocious and deadly in the bold armour of the Kami with swords at his side and holstered firearms holstered upon his person. His dark hair was tied back into a high ponytail and his elegant features were riddled with satisfaction.

‘I told you that I was hunting for acquisitions for my sempai, Candy. But it wasn’t your portfolio that was my target, it was you,’ he announced. His voice was potent, full of confidence and authority. The innate charm he had displayed on Earth was still there, but now he could reveal his true power as an agent of an immortal Kami.

When he had mentioned his sempai - the older individual who guides, defends, and mentors the younger and less-experienced individual, she assumed a Japanese executive or other high ranking and important official in his company, not that his sempai was a divine warrior-general from a parallel world planning conquest of Earth and her enslavement to facilitate his ruling of the entire planet. The absurdity of the thought almost made her break into cracked laughter.

‘Wh...why?’ she began, trying to find the words to encompass the sudden turmoil in her head. Sex with her owner had left her aglow and sated, if she were not, she swore she would have swooned from sheer puzzlement.

Lei marched over and bowed deeply to his sempai, who offered him a nod before turning his attention back to Candy.

‘I prepared my kohai to rule Earth in my staid when I retire from Imperial life to live out the endless years with my agent. It was I who asked Amatsu mika hoshi to accept Lei into his House, to train him in the ways required to operate as a covert agent, and then send him across to fulfil those obligations while familiarising himself with the ways of your kind. I have a great responsibility to my kohai and even though he learned much, I encouraged him to seek an advisor, an agent, much like Lady Uzume, but one clearly not as elevated and from the land we intend to invade.’

Candy looked to Lei and saw the glee in his eyes before she turned back to her master.

‘Lei saw the potential in you. You were accomplished, and smart enough to remain behind the scenes. A wily political creature with skill and accomplishment, but ultimately hollow inside. Clearly you had to be filled, and by being trained and used by the various powers and beings of the Empire, you would be enlightened as to the superiority of our ways and thereby show them, and Lei, the proper reverence.’

‘Bringing you across under the guise of acquiring your yacht and new genetic stock was simple enough, unfortunately, we were not expecting you to go Stray on us. Ultimately not a terrible occurrence for it allowed us to expose you to Uzume’s passions as she was sent to collect you without knowing the role you were to play in our schemes.’

‘However, if I were to openly acquire you for my kohai, I would offer others hints as to my eventual plan. After all, why am I arming my subordinate with experts on Earth if I am committed to ruling it myself? If others even suspected me of wishing to retire, it would show weakness, and plots to enfeeble my House or even destroy me would immediately ensue.’

‘I decided to keep you under the pretence that you were to be mine, but then I encountered unexpected bidding from agents whom I suspected of working with the ruling elite of Yomi. This aroused some suspicions that my brother and I have long since held secret, that Yomi harbours desires of revolt and usurpation.’

‘My brother and I planned to work together on our goal to cement our power, and I handed you to him so he might “accidentally” expose you to some of his secrets. A few of his trained concubine elite hounded you until you reached the abyss, pumping you up until you saw what we wanted you to see.’

‘With hidden matters relating to the Houses of Water and Fire, the powers that had tried to outbid me to acquire you would expose themselves, but nothing happened. To make you even more tempting, we decided to send you through the care of the Houses of Earth, but still nothing occurred. We feared that we had overplayed our hand or were wrong, and decided that under the pretence of keeping the secrets of the Houses of Water from me, Toyo-tama-hiko would condemn you to Yomi.’

‘I continued my supposed search for you, adding weight to the supposition that I was either besotted with you and would be a valuable coin that I would pay anything for, or that you held secrets I could not risk being divulged to others - making you equally valuable. And so I trust you have heard from their own lips what is planned, and who is involved?’

‘I have, master.’

‘As I knew you would, and to keep you safe and to continue your education, I arranged an explosion and your “loss” into the rivers. I knew that your beauty would ensure that you were well taken care of by whoever found you, and I knew that my former quest to reclaim you would eventuality filter down through the priests and slaves and reach the citizens. Yomi searched for you amongst the Houses, fearing that you would betray what you had heard, and did not think to seek amongst the citizens where I had hidden you. Now that I have reclaimed you, we enter the final moments of our long game.’

‘As an agent for the Moon God, Lei has been working diligently on the other side and this is a prelude to him taking the reigns of power once I have finished suppressing all resistance. Toyotami-hiko and his Wani will bear the brunt of the failures, Lady Uzume will be embraced by me to protect her from the dishonour as I forgive her for her engineered earlier failures, and with a flawless battle record, I will be in the position to ask my favour of the Sun-Goddess.’

‘I will lead the subjugation of Earth, and you will be at my feet as I do it. Afterwards, I will retire and Lei will become Supreme Warlord of Earth. You will remain with him, and be his. With you as a source of knowledge, he will be most effective, and I am sure he will continue to educate you in our passions, especially after having had to abstain for so long.’

‘Oh my kohai is going to make good use of you, slave. I taught him well, and he will be most eager to avail himself of your body in ways you’ve never experienced, you-’

Hachiman froze as something caught his eye. All joviality vanished from his face and he started to slowly straighten as he stared into the tree.

‘Sempai, what is it?’ asked Lei, scanning for what had perturbed Hachiman so acutely.

‘Yatagarusa,’ he said flatly. Lei gasped and as his eyes widened and darted around at the perimeter of the grove.

Candy remained still and peered into the trees where she saw a crow perched atop an evergreen. It was staring at them as though it was well aware of what it was doing and was actually enjoying the anxiety its arrival had caused.

Hachiman took several faltering steps towards the crow and then flashed around to Candy with a look of concern corrupting his features. The sight of this expression brought an icy terror to Candy’s heart.

‘The Sun-Goddess is about to bless us with a visitation. If you love me, show absolute respect,’ he stated forcefully and dropped to his knees so he might press his brow to the soil. Lei instantly copied him and Candy sank down to once again prostrate herself.

It was strange to see Hachiman revere this woman with such piety because surely he knew that she was just another artificially created deity like himself. Yet somehow, he regarded her as actually divine, in the same way the citizens and slaves and priests regarded the Kami.

Candy watched carefully using her periphery vision. It was a talent she had acquired as a slave, to study in the corner of her eyes so as not to annoy her superiors. It was what made the slave caste such valuable sources of information and the inspiration for so much plotting.

From amongst the trees emerged figures. They were all tall and powerful of build, with clothes that were manufactured from sturdy hide. The white skin was adorned with only token portions of lacquered armour - shoulder guards, breastplate, greaves, and vambraces, and these silver plates were marked with a red ideogram for Yatakagami, the Sun-Goddess herself. Where armour or leather did not cover them, their skin was coated with a comprehensive sheet of tattoos. The complex and elaborate patterns and pictures of mythology were sprawled meticulously across their frames.

Each wore a featureless helm, the smooth dome lacking even eyeslots so that an opaque polished steel face was all that could be seen. They all wore paired katana at their sides and moved with a slow methodical precision that gave them a seemingly ghostly quality.

The warriors formed into a circle about them and then sank to one knee as a gently measured tread sounded against the grass. The crow cawed and took flight, swooping over the humbled forms and settling onto its owner’s shoulder.

‘Warlord Hachiman, it pleases us that you have reclaimed your property,’ came a sultry and aloof female voice.

‘Your servant is overjoyed to have brought you pleasure, divine one,’ replied her owner and used such reverence that Candy was sorely tempted to look and see what manner of beauty could humble a man like Hachiman so flawlessly.

‘Then you will be equally pleased to know that by our decree and the mutual consent of Tsuki-yomi, she is pardoned from Yomi. You may give her to Lei when you deem appropriate.’

‘My most reverent thanks, divine one.’

‘And on matters of Yomi, I understand you have suspicions about the realm below, suspicions that your brother and yourself have been probing into.’

‘We have suspected whispers of revolt, divine one. But wanted to be sure before we brought the matter to higher attention.’

‘Your dedication is most appreciated, but the situation with Yomi is known to us, and in truth was orchestrated.’

‘I...I do not understand, divine one,’ said Hachiman.

‘Amatsu mika hoshi acted under the orders of the Moon-God and began a campaign of misinformation when we first learned of the rising plot beneath the Empire’s feet. The Dread Star of Heaven was performing flawlessly, and then your investigations and own schemes became aware to him.’

‘If I have caused offence, divine one, I will end my life immediately,’ he decreed with absolute truthfulness.

‘There is no need for apology. Your convoluted schemes have aided us immeasurably. Your plans with your brother, your use of this slave, your intrigue concerning the Wani, Lady Uzume, and the Eastern Provinces, all have assisted the greater goal by causing confusion and distraction. By focusing on what you and your brother were doing, they have failed to notice the destructive machinations of the Dread Star.’

‘May your humble devotee be permitted to know the truth of what has transpired, divine one.’

There was a pause as the woman seemed to consider whether to let her subject know what he had helped bring about. She then spoke with a lighter tone that suggested just how pleased she was that Hachiman had acted as he had.

‘The disaffected of Yomi have been given false hope. When the Great Houses of Water and Fire advance on Earth, they believe that they can rise and take the surface. To ensure that the Great Houses are in no condition to retreat and engage them, they have been leaking vital data to those of Earth – to those who can best make use of it. They believe that they have offered enough information to ensure catastrophic losses when you and your brother commence the campaign. They believe their scheme secure, but in truth, it is all part of our attack plan.’

‘The governments of Earth have many entrenched covert divisions that have been operating with impunity for many decades. They could have been a threat to us, and so, these forces have been slipped portions of supposedly vital data from traitors in our midst, and have been dedicating all their resources to this conspiracy.’

‘Supreme Warlord Toyo-tama-hiko’s secret development of the Water Wani and the skill with which he hid them has greatly impressed us and no doubt intimidated the traitors of Yomi. So, we engineered samples that were stolen and then leaked to the appropriate agencies. The biological agents those of Earth have been perfecting will be useless against his forces.’

‘And Supreme Warlord Hachiman. Psychological and tactical data on your Wani and cavalry has similarly been falsified, reproduced, and leaked. The traitors in Yomi have passed it to their Earth agents, and they will find their arrogance turn to despair when their machines and machinations fail them.’

‘The corrupted Kami of Yomi will be removed and replacements established. There will be no cause for fear from Earth or from Pangaea. The time is upon us - war begins now.’

The crow took to the wing and the sound of the ruler striding away reached their ears before it was eclipsed by the soft rustle of departing guards.

Hachiman and Lei clambered back to their feet, not one of them having seen who it was who held such authority over all.

‘We had best make haste for the palace,’ said Lei.

Hachiman laughed and strode over to Candy. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pressed her back to the wooden symbol.

‘Kohai, one must take the time to enjoy the simple pleasures. Earth will still be there in an hour, so let us bind your new toy as tightly as we can, and then take our pleasures from her.’

Candy grinned as she felt them once again capture her ankles. Lei’s hands flowed against her hips as Hachiman stepped before her and hoisted her chin. She was going home, and soon everyone on Earth would know the rapture of being owned by the Kami Empire.

Epilogue

Candy once again stood before the sprawling desolate plain that was Izanagi except that now she was looking out at the ferocious perimeter wall from one of the warships.

She was happily naked on a leash and huddled at Lei’s feet as he sat bold and defiant on the bridge. The large throne was established atop a flight of three steps in the centre of the command room and the vantage point allowed him to see everything.

Each of the battle hulks was built like a gargantuan super tanker with hulls adorned with an interlaced shell of ceramic plating. At least fifty stories tall, if it were not for their obvious ocean going design they could have been misinterpreted as buildings and the plane itself as some sort of eerie city.

Through countless gun ports jutted artillery barrels. Locked drawbridges could be seen along the front and sides to permit the poised forces to spill forth as soon as they arrived.

Battlements and other hard points were stretched around their deck, which hoisted several fort-like towers where missile launchers peeked through openings next to catapults. This was not the only contradiction in eras of technology, for machine guns and howitzers could be seen dispersed amongst ballista and cannon.

Rising amongst the cluster of rotund buildings was a single rough tower. It was in this elevated location that the primary bridge was located. There was a secondary version located deep within the heart of the vessel where it could not be easily attacked, and it had been the first location they had visited. An exclusive lift had brought them to their current location, proving that in a split second, they could evacuate and sacrifice their exemplary view for superlative security.

The ring of large windows that surrounded the uppermost level granted a panoramic view and from it she could see the dozens of monstrous craft now land locked and awaiting their voyage through the vortex. Between the windows were large consoles that were tended by technicians in light armour with side arms. Again there was the strange splicing of machinery in that circuits and computer screens were lodged amongst great industrial gauges whose needles wavered and fluctuated as a steady hum began to fill the air. Keyboards were placed within clusters of levers, and rows of switches and buttons lurked amidst large and awkward seeming valves and dials.

Her side was getting a little cold from leaning against the chill metal of the deckplates so she huddled closed to Lei’s armoured leg. Her new owner was flicking his gaze from the consoles to the view with concerned intensity but still he absently started to stroke her head as she nuzzled in.

An intercom blared into life and the words issued in the room and roared across the whole plain.

‘Attention assault fleet. Confluence detected. Vortex is imminent.’

Lei reached to the side of his throne and pulled out a corrugated pipe with a mouthpiece at the end. The primitive communication system allowed him to address the bowels of the ship.

‘Activate the generators and hoist the goads,’ he said firmly and then settled back to hold tight to his throne with the hand that held her lead while he continued to pet Candy with the other.

Deep metallic peels flowed across the land as each of the behemoths started to respond. The forts atop them began to open their roofs. Powerful hydraulic rams broke the domes into triangular sections that opened out like flowers. Arcs of lightning jumped from within the exposed core and lapped at the metal as the hum in the air intensified and was jointed by a dull squeal.

Each vessel shook slightly as a huge copper orb almost a hundred feet in diameter appeared. Rising upon a telescopic pillar, the polished surfaces started to crackle with arcs of electromagnetic energy.

‘Shut down all non-goad related electrical systems. Activate EMP countermeasures,’ announced Lei.

The fear that the electrical surge would destroy the delicate computer systems and microchips suddenly made it clear why they still employed the devices and machines that would have seemed more relevant to a steam engine or similar Victorian style creation. Even if the swell of power scorched and destroyed their modern systems, their backups would always serve them just as effectively.

The computer screens went blank and the lights and signs of activity in the other modern systems dwindled and went out.

‘Alignment is commencing. All vessels begin countdown to full goad surge,’ decreed the intercom.

‘Here we go, Candy,’ he said with an excited smile.

She looked up and saw that he was staring down at her. He extended his hand and she stretched her cheek into it.

‘Bring the generators to maximum in three-second increments. Watch for power spikes and shunt them to the energy sinks.’

Candy held to Lei with utter adoration. She couldn’t wait to begin – not the attack on Earth, but her ownership under Lei. Her affection for him had been massively enhanced by his exposure as the agent that had been responsible for bringing her to the Empire. Everything she had undergone here, every delight, every torment, the core of all had been his doing.

Her master had given her to him. Lei had been trained by Hachiman, just as she had been. So here they were, both students of a giant in the fields of sensual depravity and bondage. Their appointment to Earth meant that they had at least in some way, graduated. They both still revered their master, but now the two of them would engage in a war of their own. As Earth and the Empire fought each other, so to would they. She would struggle and defy, make Lei train her, have him defeat her, prove his power, and coerce her complete abandonment to his rule. Just as she had been seduced by the captain, by Uzume, by Hachiman, she would demand that Lei confirm his credentials if he were to relish her true submission.

A dreadful shriek filled the air and the orbs above each ship exploded into life. Each one became a screaming electrical nova that lashed at the ships, the ground, and the sky. Candy closed her eyes but the light still managed to pour through her eyelids.

‘The Vortex is forming!’ roared a technician, fighting to be heard over the brutal din. Lei jumped up and threw his stare from one console to another as warning signs caught his attention.

‘Fire a level five pulse into goad’s three and five!’ he bellowed. ‘Stabilise the port cells!’

A pair of technicians each opened hatches and started to spin the large metal wheel that lay within. The ear piercing scream that rent the air made Candy clap her hands over her ears.

‘Dimensional stability is definitely in flux. We’re going through!’ said the technician with a wonderful mixture of ebullience and dread.

The scent of ozone once again ruled her nostrils as her hairs stood up. Candy chuckled at the return of a sensation that had almost been forgotten, and just like that first time on the Pacific that had brought Candice to Pangaea, there was a final flash, and her stomach seemed to rise from a moment of free fall. With a stern jerk and the sound of monstrous splashdown, she was delivered to Earth.

The fleet had arrived, and she eagerly looked forward to a whole new series of adventures.

Glossary for the Kami Empire

Izanagi and Izanami: The creator deities, the names of the two forces whose interplay create and move the vortex between Earth and Pangaea.

The Kami: the various deities of earth and heaven. The lords and manifestations of thought, deed, and substance.

Mitama: The essence or emanation of god or spirit. The name given to the Imperial Army that enforces the will of the Kami and marches under the banner of A-Katsu (I conquer).

Shintai: The God body, the earth form, or symbol of a deity.

The Primary Powers of the Kami Empire

Yatakagami: The Sun Goddess. Supreme Ruler of the land who is always accompanied by her sacred crow – Yatagarusa.

Musubi: Lord of growth. He is the tactician, the planner, and chief advisor to the Sun Goddess.

Tsuki-yomi: The Moon God. The lord of darkness. He is the keeper of time and his House plots the path of the vortex on Earth. His House alone is not subject to the rule of the Sun Goddess.

Amatsu mika hoshi (Dread star of heaven): He knows all, but cannot leave his shrine. He controls a vast and highly secretive spy network that watches the Empire, the lands about them, and trains the operatives that go across to Earth to send ships and planes into the vortex. He is the chief advisor to the Moon God.

The Kami of Water

Toyo-tama-hiko (Rich jewel prince): Supreme Warlord of the Water.

Naka-tsu-wata-dzu-mi (Middle sea body): His House conducts submerged patrols in the ocean waters. His troops ride aquatic Dinosaurs such as the seventeen metre long Kronosaurus.

Uha-tsu-wata-dzu-mi (Upper sea body): His House provides surface vessels and reptilian steeds to protect and patrol the ocean traffic.

Soko-tsu-wata-dzu-mi (Bottom sea body): Warlord of the deep. His House oversees seabed construction and harvesting, along with ocean bed mining for valuable minerals.

Midzu-chi (Water-father): Warlord of the Rivers. His House conducts river patrols to maintain security and order either by boat, or on trained fifteen metre long Phobosuchus (Horror crocodile).

Midzuha no me (Water-female): The concubines of the Great Houses of Water.

Idzu no Midzuha no me (Sacred-Water-female): Concubines that have been elevated through exemplary conduct, like Kamube.

The Kami of Air

Ame no minaka-nushi: Supreme Warlord of the air

Shinatsu-hiko: Lord of the Wind. His House is responsible for the sending of all radio communication.

Shinatobe: Lady of the Wind. Her House is responsible for the receiving of all radio communication.

Hayachi (Swift father): The Messenger. His House handles all overland messages and items of import, and sees to their safe delivery.

The Kami of Fire

Take-mika-dzuchi (Brave-dread-father): The master of thunder, Warlord of the artillery regiments.

Hachiman: the Warlord who commands the Mitama.

Ame-waka-hiko (heaven-young-prince): His Mikado and highest-ranking general.

Uzume (Dread female): His most feared and ruthless agent.

Ashua: Guardian Warlord of the courtyard, protector of the inner lands. His House is the police force of the Empire.

Toyotama-hiko: the Dragon Warlord. He is part Wani and second in command to Warlord Hachiman.

Wani (Dragon): Eggs of the Dinosaur tribes were taken centuries ago and the offspring raised as Wani. From the best of these warriors were bred more until an army was created. They are now fanatically loyal warriors. They are fierce, fearless, and serve as the backbone of the Mitama.

The Kami of Earth

Kagu-tsuchi (Radiant father): The fire god. Lord of power and energy, his House runs the nuclear plants.

Kamado no Kami: The furnace deity. Lord of the furnaces of wood, oil, coal, and hydroelectricity.

Inari: The Lord of the rice fields. His House sees to the feeding of the general population.

Susa no wo: The Lord of rain. His House oversees all plumbing and irrigation.

Oho-toshi (Great harvest): The lord of gathering. His House sees to the harvest and the safe storing of all food.

Uka no mitama: Lord of the food spirit. His House ensures good crops and plentiful harvests. They provide knowledge, equipment, and expertise to guarantee growth. They breed and raise the best herds for slaughter. They also train humans to fulfil the role of beasts.

Ho no Susori: Lord of the fishermen. His House builds boats, provides equipment, and sees to the smooth running of the fishing fleet.

Hohodemi: Lord of the hunt. His House hunts Dinosaurs to replenish the stock. They also see to the breeding and training of new steeds and herd animals for domestic use. They also train human ponies.

Sukuna-bikona: (Little prince): A House of dwarves that see to the brewing of wines and other drink. They also produce many medicinal remedies and maintain a large medicinal thermal springs. It is in his underground palace that the sacred spring of longevity is located.

Temmangu: The Lord of learning and calligraphy. They are the teachers of the young and old, and indoctrinate and educate new slaves.

Ishikoridome: The stonecutter Lord. His House is one of architecture and building.

Toyo-tama: (Rich jewel): His House are jewellers, and makers of finery.

Ohonamochi: Lord of physicians. His House tends the injured, the sick, and the many slaves of the Empire to ensure their health and survival.

Yama tsu mi (Mountain-body): Lord of the trees. His House is responsible for tree-cutting, lumber, timber, and the maintaining of forests.

The ranks of the Kami Priesthood

Mikado: Chief Priests of a Kami. They see to the running of the House and its affairs and responsibilities.

Nakatomi: Mediators between the priests and the Kami. They regulate and assign the slaves of a House as the Kami or Mikado decree.

Imbe: The preparers. They ensure that the lower ranks see to the preparation, cleanliness, and order of slaves, equipment, and chambers.

Hafuri: Inferior grade priests that see to the basic tasks of the House and its responsibilities.

Negi: The lowest priestly rank that is responsible for the most mundane functions of the House.

Kamube: A slave who has earned freedom through exemplary conduct and service and now tends the House as the priest’s dictate while still holding authority over other Kami-tsu-ko.

Kami-tsu-ko: A slave dedicated to a House.

The Underworld of the Kami Empire

Yomi: The land of darkness where slaves and criminals are banished. Once sent to Yomi, one may never return unless via personal pardon from both Sun Goddess and Moon God.

Bimbo-gami: The Lord of poverty. The Kami of sexual frustration, teasing, and enforced chastity.

Naki-sahame: The Lady of weeping. The feared sadistic dominatrix of Yomi.

Ashiki kami: The rulers of Yomi.

Oni: The inhabitants of Yomi. Many are former Hafuri-tsu-mono and have been elevated from that caste to assist in the running of the realm.

Hafuri-tsu-mono (flung away things): Those sent to Yomi.