Anime Girls are Moist

The afternoon sunlight had baked the beach until it was scorching; fine grains of sand slid in rustling streams around Toyohama Nodoka's feet.

She was standing there, head tipped back, eyes fixed on the volleyball flashing between Tohru and Kanna.

That ball moved far beyond the range the human eye could normally follow. Each time it sliced through the air it triggered a sonic boom; sand was sucked up into spiralling vortices that burst into white clouds between the two teams.

Nodoka's mouth had been hanging open for quite a while.

As a high‑school girl who had only recently come into contact with the supernatural, what she was seeing now overturned her world‑view even more violently than any case of Puberty Syndrome she had run into so far.

"Hey, have you stared long enough?"

The voice of Mai Sakurajima drifted over from behind her, cool and clear like the sea breeze.

Nodoka spun round and found herself looking straight into those familiar amber eyes — eyes that at this moment sat in her own slightly baby‑fat face.

The tall, willowy figure that should have belonged to Mai was currently wrapped in the pink one‑piece swimsuit with the logo that Nodoka normally wore. Crystal sand still clung to the tips of her hair, yet the whole person somehow radiated an effortless star‑quality.

"Aren't you going for a swim?"

Almost without thinking, Nodoka reached up to touch her own cheeks; the skin felt so smooth it hardly seemed to belong to her at all. The soul inside the body had changed, and so had the aura that body gave off.

Mai did not answer. She merely lifted her chin towards the quieter stretch of rocks.

"Come with me. We need to talk."

Puzzled, Nodoka followed her.

They walked side by side past the bustling crowd.

Sora was waving his arms, excitedly breaking down volleyball trajectories for Ilia.

Kaguya Shinomiya was still pestering Ai Hayasaka with the question, "Do dragons even need to breathe?"

In the distance Megumi Katō was settling a sun‑hat onto Eriri's head, their laughter shredded into pieces by the surf.

Nodoka couldn't resist looking back once more at Tohru and the others — Kanna had just unleashed a spike that drove the ball straight into the sea, the resulting jet of water shooting higher than a person.

"Quit staring."

Mai stopped in the shadow of the rocks, and when she turned round her expression had darkened a little.

"How long are you planning to drag out this body‑swap business? Haven't you untied your 'heart knot' yet?"

Nodoka's fingers twisted in the ties of the swimsuit; her toes traced crooked arcs in the sand. Ever since the sudden body swap with Mai she had been drowning in unprecedented confusion: first sheer panic, then curiosity, then the shock of watching Mai, in Nodoka's body, deal calmly with fans and even face Rei Ao without blinking.

But the moment Mai mentioned a "heart knot", her shoulders sagged.

"I… I don't know how to change back…"

Her voice was as soft as a mosquito's hum.

"And… what do you mean by 'heart knot'? I don't have any heart knot."

"Don't you?"

Mai arched an eyebrow, lifting wind‑tossed hair with a hand that was Nodoka's in appearance yet moved with Mai's unmistakable grace.

"You think Puberty Syndrome just pops up out of thin air? Isn't it because you once wished, 'If only I could be as dazzling as Sakurajima Mai.'?"

Nodoka jerked her head up, panic flashing in her eyes — Rei Ao and the others had already explained this to her.

"I… even if that's true, I still don't know how to untie it! And… right now you're in my body and I'm in yours; everyone knows. It's mortifying…"

"Mortifying?"

Mai suddenly leaned in, her warm breath skimming Nodoka's ear.

"Compared with mortification, I'm worried about something else."

Her gaze turned earnest, even carrying a faint, hard‑to‑detect edge of annoyance.

"I haven't been intimate with Rei Ao for days!"

"In… intimate?"

Nodoka froze; her brain stalled. In her mind, intimate meant at most holding hands or hugging, like fa—

Until Mai's next sentence detonated in her head like thunder.

"Exactly what you're thinking."

A faint flush crept over Mai's cheeks too, but her tone remained forthright.

"We're a couple. Of course showing affection includes that."

"But right now I'm wearing your body…"

She let the sentence trail off, giving Nodoka a meaningful look.

Boom—

Nodoka's mind went blank white.

Suddenly she remembered the scene on the very day of the swap: waking in the library, finding herself in a strange bedroom while a dark‑haired boy was—

That tableau replayed in slow motion: Rei Ao's profile, breaths that were not her own growing ragged— So that was what Mai meant by being intimate!

"Y‑y‑you…"

Heat flooded Nodoka's face from cheeks to ears; even her neck turned pink.

"Is that… really something you have to do?"

"Of course." Mai sounded as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, though her eyes drifted toward the farther rocks — the direction in which Rei Ao had just disappeared with Miyuki Yukinoshita and Yui Yuigahama.

"I'm his girlfriend; naturally I want to be close to him. Or would you prefer I used your body to do it?"

The words slipped through like thin needles, popping the bubble of Nodoka's hesitation. She looked at this face that should have been hers yet now shone with Mai's brilliance, and realised she was occupying not just a body but someone else's life, someone else's love. Guilt rose like a tide and almost robbed her of breath.

"I…" She twisted her fingers, heart pounding. "If—if I say yes and let you use it?"

Her head was spinning from everything she had already experienced in Mai's body; resistance collapsed.

"What?!"

Mai's amber eyes flew wide, as if she had heard something unbelievable. She stared at Nodoka for several seconds, making sure it wasn't a joke, before she finally spoke, voice trembling slightly with incredulity:

"You're serious?"

Nodoka drew a long, shaky breath and nodded as if it took all the strength she had.

"I'm not joking. I just… I just don't see another way. Isn't this the only way I can make it up to you? I don't want to owe you anything!"

At those words Mai's whole expression relaxed; she even let out a tiny, relieved laugh. She raised a hand as if to give Nodoka a friendly pat on the shoulder, then hesitated—after all, that shoulder was Nodoka's own. Retracting her hand, she looked at her softly.

"The core of Puberty Syndrome is the heart knot. Since the cause was you wanting to become me, maybe the key to untying it is… to accept yourself and go back to being you again."

~~~

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