For 30 + advance chapter: patreon.com/Snowing_Melody
(Midnight Author's Note: Happy New Year everyone. I'm exhausted).
"You!... Little brother, you absolutely wouldn't dare do anything maliciously bad to me while I'm completely asleep, would you~~"
The incredibly soft and fragrant Yuyuko had unfortunately woken up to suddenly find herself completely replaced by a stinky, grinning younger brother. The tiny Yukari Yakumo actually panicked violently for a brief moment; after all, she currently had absolutely nothing more than a cheap, small cotton bath towel covering her compared to Ran's usual, fluffy appearance at the Lost Home—she didn't even have a massive tail to hide behind!
But her ancient mind calmed down incredibly quickly. It was literally just being physically naked in a hot spring; back in the chaotic, violent ancient era of Gensokyo, absolutely everyone fought brutally without any moral restraint, and it was incredibly common for protective clothes to be completely, magically destroyed mid-battle by Danmaku. She was incredibly long used to it. Feral, powerful Youkai like Ran who took human form absolutely didn't even logically like wearing restrictive clothes anyway, so it fundamentally wasn't a big deal to an ancient Sage.
Thus, Yukari Yakumo's brief, physical nervousness lasted strictly only a millisecond before she instantly, flawlessly reverted back to her arrogant, 'big sister maliciously teasing a pure-hearted little brother' state, aggressively wanting to toy with Leo's emotions.
"Bad things? Heh!"
Lazily lowering his gaze, Leo critically, clinically glanced at the completely unremarkable, flat figure of the child-sized Yukari Yakumo and immediately let out an incredibly cold, mocking laugh.
At this exact, starving moment, the absolute only thing on his desperate mind was perfectly grilled, spicy squid. He was currently exactly like the legendary Monkey King forcefully entering the heavenly Peach Garden—Seven beautiful Fairies? Absolutely don't get in the way of Old Sun aggressively eating these delicious peaches!
Feeling Leo's critical gaze sweeping over her, along with that incredibly, slightly mocking and deeply disdainful sneer on his lips, Yukari Yakumo violently bristled like an angry cat on the spot. It was absolutely this stinky, plotting brother's entire fault she was tragically turned out exactly like this child, and now he was actually, arrogantly mocking her temporary figure?! Exactly where was the pathetic, groveling look he had earlier when he hugged her leg and said 'thanks for the treat' at the hot springs?!
"If you're finally awake, get up and let's go eat immediately. Specifically because of babysitting you, I tragically missed out on so incredibly many delicious mutton skewers and hot grilled squids."
Leo stood up aggressively and ruthlessly in the hot water, fully preparing to head directly ashore to the locker rooms. Looking down at Yukari Yakumo's current, pathetic state—absolutely never mind whether her childish appearance could safely pass the strict censorship laws of the internet—that completely flat figure, which could arguably be used as a kitchen grater for shredding potatoes, left him with absolutely, completely zero romantic thoughts.
"I'll fight you to the absolute death! Take a really good look at this old lady's true power!"
Being verbally mocked repeatedly by a human, Yukari Yakumo absolutely could no longer physically endure the insult to her pride. She viciously kicked the soft back of Leo's knee underwater, making him yelp and violently fall backward into the hot water with a massive splash.
Her right hand absolutely didn't stop moving for a second, tapping rapidly and aggressively on the glowing red spiritual charms firmly stuck on her left arm in a complex, hidden rhythm. After just a few tense seconds, the terrifying sealing charms that had previously turned into magical tattoos began to violently glow, immediately reverted to their original paper state, and fell completely off into the water! The small-scale, powerless Yukari Yakumo instantly, violently transformed completely back into a tall, curvy, terrifying big sister in an explosion of steam!
As one of the original, genius creators actively involved in maliciously making the shrinking charms back in the day, how could the paranoid Sage of Youkai absolutely not mathematically leave a secret backdoor release code for herself?!
She used to be widely, secretly known as the 'Batman' of Gensokyo—an extremely paranoid, plotting control freak with lethal countermeasures prepared for absolutely every single Youkai in existence just in case they violently turned traitor against her. This terrifying shrinking charm was naturally, absolutely no exception to her contingency plans.
Back then, she and Reimu Hakurei were still strictly in a mutually beneficial cooperative relationship to maintain the barrier, but after spending more centuries together, she gradually abandoned all those previous, lethal plans. One massive reason was that being violently discovered plotting would look incredibly, politically bad for her image—specifically referring to Satori Komeiji reading her mind, which was exactly why she basically never willingly met with the mind-reader; the Sage had far too many dark, terrifying little secrets locked in her heart.
The other massive reason was that she slowly found a vastly better, less violent way to successfully handle things...
"Do you logically know there's a very, very serious physical problem right now?"
Leo coughed, poked his wet head completely out of the boiling water, looked the towering, restored Yukari Yakumo up and down critically, and then completely calmly posed a question, his face showing absolutely no emotion whatsoever.
"What problem? Absolutely don't even think about trying to cleverly change the subject, boy. Be completely honest with me, do you physically like exactly how Big Sister looks now?!" Yukari smirked, striking a pose in the water.
"I like it just fine, but this specific problem is really, genuinely quite serious for you."
Leo nodded completely honestly. A single, bright red drop of blood suddenly fell from his nose directly into the hot water, emitting a faint, metallic scent of iron.
"What exact problem?!"
Leo asked again, looking as completely serious and grave as if he were currently discussing some massive, apocalyptic event affecting Stardew Valley's ecosystem. This time, seeing his blank face, Yukari Yakumo became completely serious too, instantly stopping her seductive antics. The ancient Sage of Youkai was absolutely still quite professional when it directly came to major matters.
Was it that the bottomless Yuyuko absolutely hadn't eaten enough BBQ and had violently, tragically smashed the entire hot spring buffet area to rubble?!
Or was there a massive, terrifying problem with the little brother's entire farm outside, like being violently hit by another apocalyptic meteorite from the sky?!
Yukari Yakumo quickly, frantically ran through absolutely all massive, possible disastrous issues in her ancient mind and immediately thought of practical solutions. If the expensive hot spring was smashed by Yuyuko, it was smashed; she actually still had a tiny bit of her massive administrative pension left hidden away and absolutely should be able to eventually pay for it in installments. If not, she could just shamelessly beg the little brother to graciously lend her some money. If it was an apocalyptic meteorite strike, it actually didn't logically have much to do with her survival; that would entirely be a massive administrative headache for that specific person in charge, Eirin Yagokoro.
"You... the specific white bath towel you were proudly using before you transformed... was a tiny, child-sized one. Those small towels were specifically, exclusively prepared on the racks for the tiny bodies of Cirno and the Fairies."
Leo's eyes were completely, incredibly wide as he spoke, his face so completely full of pure, innocent righteousness that if you suddenly said he was the legendary hero Hongmao, gullible people might actually completely believe it.
"Now you officially have exactly three choices as I see it. The first is to aggressively use that tiny, wet rag currently in your hand to completely cover your blushing face so absolutely no one here knows who you are. The second is to try and cover your massive chest. The third is to awkwardly wear it exactly like a tiny kitchen apron over your waist."
"I decisively choose the absolute fourth option: exactly as long as you violently die right now, little brother, absolutely no one on earth will ever legally know about this!"
Yukari Yakumo looked down in absolute horror. The previous, tiny cotton bath towel was completely useless, currently floating innocently on the hot water exactly like a pathetic, white rag. She violently picked it up casually, and when she completely looked up again at Leo, an incredibly charming, yet completely, psychotically murderous smile appeared violently on her flawless face.
"SHINE! (Die!)"
Yukari Yakumo aggressively pounced through the water like a wet tiger. Yukari Yakumo violently used the wet rag to aggressively strangle Leo's thick neck! Yukari Yakumo is aggressively exerting maximum physical force! Yukari Yakumo is absolutely about to win!
...Yukari Yakumo failed absolutely, miserably!
As strictly stated before, the current, enhanced Leo was absolutely no longer the fragile, weak mortal who would desperately drown after simply being playfully kicked into the water by Yukari Yakumo. After successfully, greedily eating two massive, magical Stardrop fruits from the system, he could already physically pin the ancient Yukari Yakumo completely down and aggressively play her like a bongo drum. Coincidentally, her terrifying, reality-bending Boundary abilities absolutely couldn't be used at all in the isolated world of Stardew Valley.
"Given your violent, murderous performance just now, I now officially have a fifth option for you. Guess exactly what it is?"
Aggressively grabbing both of Yukari Yakumo's flailing hands and violently, securely pinning them tightly to the rocky shore of the hot spring, Leo looked directly into her panicked, blushing face, an incredibly wicked, victorious smile slowly appearing at the corner of his mouth.
The steamy scene right now was very, very strange and highly compromising. The tightly restrained, towering Yukari Yakumo absolutely wasn't wearing a single shred of clothes, and Leo officially only had a white bath towel securely on his waist.
If you suddenly say something incredibly popular and explicit is aggressively about to happen here, the damn, cowardly author definitely won't agree—I'm absolutely not that kind of casual, smutty person. But if absolutely nothing happens after this buildup, angry readers will definitely call me a eunuch. It's quite a massive, literary dilemma.
"You... what exactly are you going to do to me?! I'm loudly telling you, I'm Ran's supreme Master! She'll kill you!"
Yukari Yakumo was truly, completely panicked now, absolutely not even daring to loudly call for help in the crowded bathhouse. If absolutely anyone from Gensokyo walked in and saw this humiliating position, she'd have to permanently, silently move to entirely another dimension to live down the shame. Regarding him touching her feet earlier at the shrine, she could desperately comfort herself by saying they were simply gnawed by a stray dog, but in this specific, naked scenario, it absolutely wasn't completely impossible for the starving little brother to completely, violently gnaw her whole!
"Mom."
...???
The massive hot spring scene fell completely, deafeningly silent for a long moment, leaving absolutely only the gentle, bubbling sound of the hot spring water flowing over the rocks.
Yukari Yakumo's terrified, racing emotions were completely, violently derailed and disrupted by that one single, absurd word: 'Mom.'
In this incredibly compromising, terrifying current situation, she had even mentally prepared herself completely for the absolute worst-case scenario; there were incredibly similar, highly explicit scenes exactly like this in Hatate Himekaidou's illegal, confiscated doujinshi stash!
Terrifying, explicit scenarios exactly like 'Enduring massive humiliation for a greater political cause,' 'Not daring to make a single sound across a thin door while someone is outside,' or the classic, terrifying 'Ma'am, you absolutely wouldn't want Ran to aggressively find out about us, would you?' all flashed violently and rapidly through her ancient mind.
She had literally just resigned herself to being completely, humiliatingly gnawed twice by this perverted dog.
"Alright, let's aggressively go out right now. Any single second later and there absolutely won't even be a speck of charcoal left to eat in the barbecue grill!"
This was exactly the brutal fifth option Leo had thought of to destroy her. Isn't it completely, perfectly normal for a tiny child to innocently bathe in the public bath with their mother? He was biologically only in his early twenties, while Yukari Yakumo was a terrifying hag who was thousands of years old. Technically, mathematically speaking, it could definitely be considered her finally having a late-in-life son in her old age!
"You! I... I!"
Yukari Yakumo instantly, violently overheated, steam practically shooting out of her ears. Absolutely no matter how much she had been aggressively verbally mocked or physically beaten before in her long life, she had absolutely never emotionally overheated exactly like this!
But Leo's terrifying series of psychological maneuvers was exactly like a relentless, brutal pursuit combo: first aggressively mocking her flat figure, then violently attacking her feminine charm, and finally, brutally attacking her ancient age!
He aggressively, violently stepped on absolutely all three massive land mines a young girl deeply cares about most all at once, and even maliciously poured wet concrete completely over them so she couldn't escape the blast! Absolutely anyone would violently overheat!