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The little house stood on the tip of the bucolic hill like a homely wooden fortress, the sunlight glinting off its windows, ready to resist all assaults on its owner’s wholesome, pleasant life.  Assaults such as those performed by, say, questing adventurers looking for an easy reward after a streak of tough bosses, no matter whose peace and quiet they had to interrupt to get it…

“Well, here we are,” said Homare, studying the quest sheet. “The witch’s hut. Strange. The quest made it sound a lot less… impressive than this.” 

“Who cares how impressive it is?!” cried Kaya. “Let’s go and pound this stupid witch and her house into dust!” 

“W-wait!” cried Inori. “Wh-what if she knows we’re coming?!” 

Kaya laughed. “I hope she knows! The more time she’s had to prepare, the better the fight will be!” And with that, she rushed off, charging straight for the front door. 

“K-Kaya! Kaya, wait!” cried Inori, hurrying after her. “Kaya, stoooop!” 

With a little laugh, Homare followed as well, striding swiftly after the two of them. 

Reaching the house, Kaya raised her gauntleted fist and knocked so hard she almost broke the door down. The whole building shook, spilling dust from the tiles, but it remained standing, if only barely. A Kaya drew back for another swing, footsteps sounded inside, approaching fast. Angry footsteps. 

Inori and Homare caught up just as the door flew open. “What?!” cried the woman on the other side, who couldn’t have looked more like a witch if she’d had green skin and a crooked nose. “Oh, it’s just more adventurers. Ugh, I guess you’re here to defeat me, aren’t you?” 

“That’s right!” cried Kaya. “Come on, let’s fi–” 

The witch flicked her wand, and without fanfare, the three of them found themselves frozen. Inori squealed, struggling to move, but it was like she’d been turned to stone. She couldn’t even wiggle her finger.

“Sorry,” said the witch, “but I’ve had enough of dealing with adventurers. That said, I’m glad you came. You see, I’ve been meaning to add another extension to my house…” 

A-another extension? Wh-what do you mean? Inori’s heart pounded in her chest. Please! Let us go! 

Raising her wand, the witch lifted them from the ground and carried them around the perimeter of the house to the rear. Planting Kaya and Inori on the grass beside her, she floated Homare over to the very edge of the building, placed her by the rear door, and with a brief incantation and a twist of her wand–

Homare gasped as the witch’s curse broke, freeing her to move again. Not that she had long to enjoy this freedom before a second curse slammed into her back, forcing her to her knees with her chin on her hands. She squirmed, eyes wide in panic, but it didn’t matter–the witch’s magic was simply too strong to escape. 

As Inori stared in terror, Homare’s body rippled like a sheet in the wind and started to change: first it tightened till it was sharp-edged and rigid, cubic as a cardboard box, and then it started to grow: in seconds, Homare was twice her former size, then three times, and then four, and the larger she grew, the louder she screamed in delight. “Nnnnn~! Ah! Ah! Ooooooh!” 

Her skin crinkled and cracked, hardening and breaking, like mud drying in the face of a scorching sun. Most of her broke into planks of stacked wood, though her eyes turned to glass and fused into a pane, and her hair became tiles, roof tiles, aligned at a jaunty angle with the house. Finally, her teeth joined together and hardened into a door, and with that, the sound of her screams cut off entirely. 

It took Inori a second to realize what she was looking at. 

“Perfect,” said the witch. “You make a wonderful extension.” Opening the door, she stepped inside and, with a flick of her wand, hauled Kaya and Inori in after her. “Hmm,” she added, placing a hand on the exposed wood of the wall and tapping the floorboards with her foot. “It’s a little barren though. Well, that’s easily solved.” With a laugh, she turned back to Kaya, aimed her wand at her chest, and with a sharp flick–

Kaya shot to the side with a scream. On impact with the wall, she popped like a water balloon, spraying a thick red-black liquid everywhere. Inori squealed as it sailed over her head, coating the walls from the ceiling to the floor. As she watched it shock, it shivered one last time and hardened, and all that remained was a deep red wallpaper decorated with a black dragon head pattern. Inori whimpered. K-Kaya! 

“Now for the floor…” said the witch, turning to her. 

In her head, Inori screamed. W-wait! No! Please! Have mercy! Have mercy! Have…! 

The witch lowered her wand. 

It was like someone had dropped a boulder on her head. With a silent scream, she dropped, crushed flat, and as she struck the ground, her body spread to cover the floor, as if she were cement being poured into a mold. As it flowed, the liquid of her body rippled and changed again, sprouting thousands of thin fibers and leaving her furry as a cat, while at the same time turning green, as green as her pants, with an elaborate golden filigree and a few pink, jewel-shaped accents. 

In seconds, she’d covered the entire floor, from one wall to the next. It felt as if she were lying on her back looking up at the ceiling, her entire body spread so thin she wanted to scream. She could feel the weight of the witch’s feet on her, and it was like being crushed under a mountain. St-stop! she cried, wanting to burst into tears. G-get off me! Get off! 

Looking down at her, the witch smirked. “Well, you three came out perfectly,” she said with a smile. “Hmm, this room is still a little bare though. Hopefully it won’t be too long till the next group of adventurers shows up.” And with that, she turned to go. 

Inori could only lie there in despair, pleading for her to come back.