Another evening in Gensokyo, the mystical land of youkai eager to feast on the humans who have mistakenly found themselves there. But for a land where most would find their imminent end encountering some kind of creature in the bamboo forests, I find myself sitting criss-cross-applesauce across from a youkai in a warm, pleasant Japanese home.

Chen and I play, giggling and wrestling like a pair of kittens while a bigger yaokai, Ran, watched us with a gentle smile as she sat herself on a couch nearby. In our wrestling, I managed to get a pin. "Got you!" I cheer, excitedly pouncing on my foe.

Chen squirms a bit, testing if she could weasel out of her position. After a bit of struggling, she gave up and submitted gracefully. "Okay! Okay... you win!" she giggled as I clambered off of her back.

Ran watches with amusement before responding, "Look at you two go, how cute. Ah, but..." she stands and looks over to the window, which has transitioned from a summery orange into a dark violet, "It's getting late, is it not? Already time for you to be in bed."

Chen immediately protests, crossing her arms behind her head defiantly. "Nah! I'm having fun with the human, and we're not going to bed!"

The big, gentle looking kitsune shakes her head with a sigh. "Now listen here, little Chen," Ran says in her soft voice, her tone serious, but with a hint of a caring mother-like quality underneath it all. "It's already been settled. This is your bedtime, and so you should be getting to sleep!"

"Aw..."

Chen gives a lip-quivering moue at this interruption. She glances my way, considering her options, and then dejectedly shuffles past me to retreat to her room. I also stand up, and start walking to my own room when...

"Ah, human, please, wait a second," Ran calls out, interrupting my departure as she closes the door to Chen's room, turning back to face me. "I think there's something we need to discuss before your bedtime, yeah?"

She steps away from the door, turning back to face me fully as I stand there in the living room, a bit confused. The large kitsune regards me with her amber eyes, careful and analyzing, and many yellow tails swaying back and forth behind her. She's much bigger than me, and when she's just standing there before me in her white dress adorned with a indigo blue tabbard, it can feel a bit like a motherly gaze that's watching me closely. I can feel her eyes piercing into me as I stand there, waiting for her to continue. Her calmness, though, is oddly reassuring, which makes the feeling of being profoundly observed a little less terrifying. A little.

"Don't look so tense," Ran chuckles gently, reaching out and lightly petting the top of my head. It's kind of like... warm, safe petting from your mom. She furrows her brow for a moment before finally speaking up once again. "Chen's been acting a bit... out of character recently."

"What do you mean?"

"Well..." Ran frowns, her hands falling to her sides, her voice dropping an octave as she leans forward. "Chen is my shikigami. I know her well, better than any normal human being could ever hope to know another. And she likes you. More than just like, you understand?"

I freeze, my heart skipping a beat as I realize where this conversation — turning interrogation — would be going. Chen likes me? "Yeah," I say, nodding slowly, and then swallowing anxiously.

"That's unacceptable," Ran states, her tone serious, tails lowering behind her as she leans into my face. "She is mine, so I need to intervene before you two get too attached."

"...Okay?" I nervously respond. In the moment, the vast difference in power between us becomes clear to me. She may look partially human, but I'm well aware of her knowledge in sorcery. If she wanted, she could easily incinerate me with a blast of magic. "I won't, uh, try to do anything if that's what you're worried about."

Ran immediately recedes, her intense glares gone as quick as they had appeared, her tails once again swishing like tall grass in the wind. "Good! Of course you wouldn't, you're a good human boy, right?" I bob my head quickly with obvious anxiousness as she relaxes visibly. "I know you humans are controlled by your lustful desires, don't worry. You might not have Chen, but I'm ready to help."

With the scary part of the conversation seemingly over, confusion still fills me, making it hard to respond. "What? Help me with... my..." I look up at her. "...lustful desires?"

Ran doesn't respond, but pinches her dress at both sides, lifting it slightly to expose her blue undergarments, and curvy, plump thighs. Her underwear is a lacy affair of dark blue, with little decorations of lighter colored ribbon around the top. But more than that: the smell! It came as soon as she lifted her heavy dress, a wall of pheromones like a flowery perfume bottle was dumped on me. Ran's scent was intoxicating, every moment, every whiff weakening my control. For her mostly calm and gentle demeanor she upheld, it amazed me how she never let it slip, the fact her underwear was a sticky mess of juices soaked through with her potent fragrance. Had she been like this all day?

I instantly felt my body react, my manhood spring to attention, throbbing wildly, causing me to break eye contact and sheepishly cover my groin with my hand. But Ran looked down on me like an indulgent parent towards a child, pleased with her success. "There's nothing to be embarrassed about. It's my mating season, and so... I'm quite a mess down there. No surprise it made your member hard, right?"

I could only stammer, my dick pressing against my pants as I tried to formulate a response. "Don't worry," she replied, waving my concerns away as she let her dress fall back down, pushing me down onto the couch. "We can just scratch your itch right here on the couch. And you can relieve me of mine." She sat on the floor beside the couch I laid on, working on my pants to get them off. "It's nice to have such a young male for mating this time... but perhaps my needs outweigh my good sense."

With that comment, and my dick exposed to the hungry, foxy eyes of the kitsune, she