Episode 6.1 - What a Beach Episode?! Now, here, of all places? With a Demon Girl! - Part 1/2

Who is Mistress Lila to me? When I sit here looking at Sek and Eshu teasing her, feeding her sandwiches, messing about - is she just one of our ‘gang’ as it were? Do I Lo– like her in the same way I do my girlfriend and boyfriend? Do I respect her for being strong, for climbing out of her weakness to be so powerful? Do I just have Stockholm syndrome for the first adult who’s ever been kind and caring about me?

"Mhmmmm, these are real good!" the demon in question says, breaking my thoughts.
"Ya, I guess," Sek replies, focusing intently on the food and only the food. Eshu and Lila grin somewhat shrewdly.

"Alright fine, I admit a picnic was an ok idea," Sek adds, relenting on much grumbling about the idea this morning.

"And?" Eshu pokes him in the cheek.

"And nothing. What is this, a game to see how long I take to acknowledge it?"

Lila scoffs, "Buddy, you might not have vocalised it yet, but every other part of you has looooooong since acknowledged it."

"Bwah!?" Sek meeps. It is a bit mean, I know, but a little teasing is good now and then. He gets too grumpy in his 'manliness' otherwise.
   We're in swimsuits. It all started when an anime we've been following had a beach episode. After Eshu and I explained the concept of such fan service episodes to Lila, a seed was planted.

So here we are, on a little picnic blanket, in swimsuits under a lovely blue sky in front of our fort. Below us, the Estolpfo are hard at work. They finished the first of their 'anti-radiation' windmills just yesterday. They spin gently in the wind, their stubby little blades supposedly warding off radiation in the wind. Lila says if they work, we could expand our land outwards, have room for a proper pool next time.
    We also bought some radiation medicine from the system menu, but it was expensive, so Eshu, Major Tom and I have been tending a herb garden, to try and get some of the ingredients manually. Sek was too Tsundere to help out, sadly; another reason for today's teasing.

"Seriously, though, I can't believe you even went and got sand," Sek mutters.

"Eh," Lila shrugs, "The Estolpfo’s queries and mines had plenty to make a little patch." Sek is still lost with where to look, and I don't blame him, we're quite the sight. Using the menu like never before, we tried on a whole shop's worth of swimsuits. Mistress eventually settled on a sleek and rather elegant one-piece. All black and skin tight like her normal attire, it has two straps over the shoulder and then meets below. A little cut out over the stomach affords a rare view of the paler grey skin she usually has covered. Her thighs and flanks, and so on are all exposed, too. Unlike her standard clothes, which have an odd mist effect, this black swimsuit allows you to really appreciate her curves and that pretty skin beneath.

Eshu, on the other hand, was a menace to say the least, haha… She kept gravitating towards the most utterly scandalous things, outfits that covered so outrageously little you might as well be naked. Honestly, if there were a world without clothes, I doubt it would faze her in the slightest to live there. Me and Lila slowly curbed her extremism, going from little more than sticking plasters to something resembling actual swimwear. If you can imagine it, Eshu tried it on.

Her final choice is a crimson two-piece that contrasts with her magenta hair nicely. It is still very light on material, but it at least has a little fluffiness with frills that pad out its mass a bit. I won't deny it's very appealing on her, but all the exhaustion of getting her to be even remotely sensible has somewhat zapped my enthusiasm for seeing my girlfriend in costume...

In the end, I chose a white and sea-blue combo for myself with one of those sarongs (like a blanket around the waist over the under-piece) and a fairly plain swimtop.
     I imagine Sek must be massively overwhelmed. Heh, mission accomplished, I say. I do feel a little bad that he doesn't get to join in. He's a hunk of a man, and he might well want to show off too, but his reaction is just too priceless.

Once we're done with lunch, the real fun begins. Sure, this might not be an actual beach, but that needn't stop us from making our own entertainment.
     
Ever split a watermelon with a demon girl before? Probably not, but if you ever do, be prepared. Turns out Lady Lila can seriously shout! Swinging the stick around while blindfolded, I think we all fear for our lives, hehe.

 Then we made good use of the sand, I mean it's not a beach episode if the grumpy one doesn't get buried up to their neck, right?

"Here!"

"I got it, I got it. ...I don't got it," Sek mumbles as he trips and hits the thin layer of sand, a volleyball bouncing sadly next to his head.

"Mugooooooooo, it's no fair!" Eshu grumbles, "These teams are way lopsided.”

"Fine, fine, swap with me," Lila sighs. She and Eshu swap sides, and our game of volleyball starts again.
    "There we go, score!" Lila cheers.

"This is no fair either! You can't just fly around!"

"Heh-heh, I'm just making up for the shortfall of my dog."

"That really stings ya know," Sek frowns, throwing the ball up for his serve only to tragically miss hitting it entirely.

Eventually, we run through all the games we can think of without the sea, and return to the picnic blanket, showing Lila the wonders of ice cream.
     "Shame about not having water," Eshu says as she hands me my cone, the soft serve vanilla looking very appetising indeed.

"Ya, well if the windmills and other menu items actually work to repel contaminants, I plan to expand our domain in time; so maybe next time will have all the water we could desire," Lila replies, staring warily at her ice cream.

"Really Mistress!!!"
     "Is it that exciting, Eshu?" Sek asks.

"Of course," she nods sagely, "I can't come up with a comical excuse to lose my top without water being involved."

"E-Eshu!" This girl! But when she grins like that, it’s rather hard to stay mad.

Sek, clearly just as embarrassed, turns to Lila to hide it, "You're meant to take one big chomp of that, ya know."

"Sek!" I interrupt, but I'm too late.

Chomp
     "GAH! What is this? A mental attack!" Lady Lila shrieks as brain freeze takes a merciless hold of our poor mistress.

"Heh-heh-heh," Sek laughs darkly and wholly misses a gremlin sneaking up beside him and–
      "Ahhh, stop, don't shove it in my face, eh, Eshu! Ahhhhhhh." Covered in ice cream, Sek too, succumbs to brain freeze.

"Eshu -,-" I bonk her lightly on the head.

"Eh-he, now it's even," she smiles at me. I sigh, but I find it pretty funny seeing Lila and Sek matching in their frozen torment, rolling around the ground, gripping their heads.

"Gorak," a raspy voice calls. I see its humorous small top hat appear over the crest of the hill before the skeleton warrior appears, running up to us: "What's up Tom, you wanna' join in?"
     He shakes his head at me almost apologetically. Of all the Estolpfo, his ability for expression is honestly quite impressive, I mean he is literally a skull with a top hat on.
    "Grok, Rak, Graak!"

"Tch, already huh?" Lila replies, her brain freeze seemingly gone in an instant. "Although, I guess it's almost been a week, maybe we're lucky it took this long."

"Trouble?" I ask.

"A nuisance more like; visitors."