Chapter 3 - Mochi vs. the Maid

Milly felt hope for the first time since meeting Mochi, and cooed over her accomplishment of standing like a mother would to a child.

“Good girl, Mochi! Wow! Amazing!”

She tried to clap with her paws but they just made a pomf sound and clicked when her nails hit each other.

“He he he! Yes, praise me more!”

Milly complied and showered Mochi with compliments for being so good. Surely she could segway this into another bribing moment, she thought. She crossed her paws and tilted her head to the side, and tried to float in a way she hoped was nonchalant.

“I bet you'd be great at walking too... You know, since you’re so good at everything.”

“Of course! Mama took me on walks every day, I’m great at walking!”

“I’m sure you are… but can you walk while standing like that? It might be too hard…”

“Shut up! I can do anything! It’s not too hard! I’ll kill you!”

Now that Milly was giving her full attention to Mochi, she noticed for the first that time when Mochi threatened to kill her, her mouth widened into an awkward looking grin where her tongue poked out and you could see all her teeth. While she couldn't be sure, she was almost 100% positive her body didn't have such sharp looking teeth before she died. Or pointy fangs.

I guess it's a good thing she can't bite me, she thought.

Mochi wobbled again and slowly removed her hands from the door, sticking them out in a jerking motion to keep her balance. She maintained uncomfortable eye contact with Milly and narrowed her glare as if to challenge her to keep watching while she did a great job. She lifted a foot briefly from the floor and-

“GRRRAAAH”

-Promptly fell on her face. Milly’s ray of hope turned quickly into dread as she thought about how long this was going to take, and how much longer still she’d be stuck as a dog. She tugged on her ears and groaned.

“Maybe I should just accept my fate... I’m doomed no matter what… I’ll be a dog ghost forever… Maybe I can haunt the library and someday someone might possibly start reading a book that would help me… by chance… uuuughhhhh…”

As Milly lamented, Mochi continued clawing her way up the door, trying to stand without holding on and taking a step. Each time she fell and got angrier.

“This is stupid! I don’t want to do this! I’ll kill you!”

“Uuuuughhhhh…”

While the two of them went back and forth like this for a minute, Milly’s worst case scenario arrived.

*knock knock knock*

“BARK BARK BARK BARK”

Someone had knocked on the door, sending Mochi into a frenzy of barking. Milly frantically zoomed between Mochi and the door and tried her best to hush her.

“Miss? Are you awake? The other maids are very worried. They say last night you locked yourself in and skipped one of the parties held for you, and with your coronation later today…”

Milly’s brain froze. She had completely forgotten about the coronation taking place today. With everything else on her plate there was no way she was going to be able to manage it all on her own. But what could she do? Mochi was in her body, still naked, there was a maid at the door, and Milly was a ghost. Overwhelmed by information, Milly started to feel faint and her eyes spun. In her moment of thought paralysis, she accidentally called out;

“Come in…”

Realizing a moment too late what she had just said, the door clicked and began to open. Behind it stood an older traditional looking castle maid, with hair tied neatly in a bun. The maid’s eyes darted quickly to Mochi.

“Miss! My goodness! You aren’t even dressed! I won’t even begin to ask what you’ve done to this room. My my my, this peculiar child, let’s get you sorted for the ceremony.”

The maid began to fuss over Mochi, pulling her along to the wardrobe. Mochi managed to stumble along being held up by the maid, but as usual her anger grew with the new and unexpected situation.

“Who are you! Don’t touch me! I’ll kill you!”

“My goodness, such attitude this morning.”

Mochi’s protests went ignored by the middle-aged maid, who had likely fought battles much more arduous than a princess throwing a tantrum. With expert like skill she pulled a simple white ruffled dress over Mochi's head, and wrapped her arm around her shoulders to stop her from escaping while she grabbed another fancier dress to put on top of the first one.

Maid vs Mochi!
Maid: 1
Mochi: 0

“Milky help! Who is this! I’m gonna kill her!”

Milly snapped to attention and did her best to mentally catch up to the situation at hand, but saw Mochi opening her mouth and rearing back to chomp down on the maids arm. Once again she was unable to stop herself from calling out;

“MOCHI NO! BAD!”

The maid stopped in her tracks at the addition of a new voice in the room, and turned to look where it had come from. She locked eyes with Milly who she had previously not noticed and stared for a moment at this apparition of a dog who was floating in her employer’s room, her face turning pale as her eyes widened.

“A-a-a-”

Milly waved her paws around and tried to calm the terrified woman, but was met with a piercing shriek instead.

“AEEEEEEE!”

The maid clutched her arm tighter around Mochi, causing her anger to finally explode.

“Get off me! I'll kill you!”

She chomped down with her sharp teeth and fangs directly into the maids arm, and as Mochi had indirectly promised, the maid died.

The older woman shrieked again and her body pixelated away, leaving Mochi to fall on her behind having lost her support to stand.

“I killed her. Hehehe.”

Mochi: 1
Maid: 1

Mochi wins by technical knockout!