Akira woke up the next morning to a heavy, snug pressure all around him.
He slowly opened his eyes.
The first thing he felt was the comfortable fluff covering his body. The second was the warmth pressed tightly against his side.
He was inside his old Pan-chan suit.
Beside him, Erika slept peacefully in her pink pajamas, her arms wrapped tightly around the thick plush body. A small, content smile rested on her face.
Only then did the events of the previous night come back to him.
After everything that had happened, Erika had been genuinely angry. Her only order had been simple: for the next twenty-four hours, he would follow every command she gave.
Her first command had been to put on the Pan-chan costume and become her personal hug pillow.
Akira knew better than to refuse when she was truly upset, so he had gone along with it. But looking at her now—sleeping so peacefully while clinging to him—he wasn't entirely sure this qualified as a punishment.
He glanced at the clock beside the bed.
It was already later than he usually woke up. If they waited any longer, they would be late for school.
Even though part of him wanted to stay like this a little longer, he decided he should do his duty and wake her.
He gently shook her.
"Erika. Erika, wake up."
Erika only shifted in her sleep, hugging the panda body more comfortably.
Akira shook her a little harder.
"Erika, we're going to be late if you don't wake up soon."
Still half-asleep, she leaned in the way she always did and bit down on what should have been his neck.
Instead, her teeth sank into soft, dense fluff.
Her eyes opened slowly. For a second, she simply stared at the round panda face in front of her.
Then full awareness returned.
"…Akira. Why are you wearing that?"
Akira's voice came out slightly muffled from inside the hood.
"You asked me to."
Erika blinked. Then the memory returned.
"…Oh. Right. Punishment."
She sat up lazily and looked at the clock.
"It's already 7:30."
Akira sat up as well, the costume rustling around him.
"Yeah. We need to get up soon, or we'll be late."
Erika didn't answer. She just sat there for a moment, clearly thinking about everything that had happened the day before.
Akira tilted his head.
"Erika?"
She shook her head, then spoke with sudden certainty.
"No. Today we're not going to school. Let's take leave so I can supervise your punishment."
Even from inside the panda suit, Akira's shock was obvious. He immediately reached out and placed a gloved paw on her forehead.
"Are you alright?"
Erika frowned.
"What are you doing?"
Akira answered seriously.
"Checking for a fever."
Erika stared at him.
"…Can you even feel anything while wearing that suit?"
Akira paused.
He realized, a second too late, that he couldn't tell her temperature at all through the thick costume. He tried to pull the gloves off so he could check properly, but for some reason, they refused to come off.
Erika sighed.
"Alright. Just stop joking."
"I'm not joking," Akira said, still struggling with the gloves. "I mean, you never take leave. Aren't you supposed to be some kind of overpowered, overly perfect student council vice president or something?"
"I'm not even in the student council in this world," Erika replied. "And I can afford to take some days off."
She had already picked up her phone and dialed Koro-sensei's number.
"Hello, Koro-sensei. We're taking the day off, so please approve the leave."
Koro-sensei's voice came through the speaker, immediately alarmed.
"Erika-san?! Are you alright?! Did something happen to Akira-kun?! Is this some kind of national emergency?!"
"Koro-sensei, it's nothing," Erika said calmly. "We're just taking a day off because Akira is too tired from yesterday's events. That's all."
There was a short pause on the other end before Koro-sensei answered.
"…Well, whatever it might be, please take care and be safe. And don't blow up the city while you're at it."
Erika smiled.
"Sure. I'll keep him in check."
She ended the call.
Akira stared at her from inside the costume.
"…We're really taking the day off? But doing what?"
Erika stood up and pointed toward the door.
"I'll decide that. Now get out of the room, get ready, and go make breakfast."
She pushed him toward the hallway.
Akira dug his heels in as best he could in the bulky suit.
"Wait—but… it's my room."
The door closed behind him anyway.
Only after the door closed did Erika remember that it was his room.
She stood there for a second, then decided it didn't matter.
"Punishment is punishment."
Selena's voice slipped into her mind, amused.
"Erika-chan. Are you sure this is a punishment?"
Erika answered internally as she headed toward her own room.
"Of course it's a punishment. What else could it be?"
Selena giggled.
"Well… you hugged him to sleep, then took the entire day off just to spend time alone with him. I'm fairly certain my brother thinks of this as a reward."
Erika's expression stiffened.
"I can't think of anything else, okay? I can't really hurt him. And I don't want to make him too sad. So this is all I can do."
Selena's tone softened, though the teasing remained.
"My, my. How cute. I understand how you feel, but you need to punish him properly. If you keep doing it like this, he might start doing even more reckless things just so you'll 'punish' him again."
Erika's face turned red.
"Don't say that… Then how exactly am I supposed to punish him?"
Selena was quiet for a moment.
"How about a few days' ban on anime? Or experiments as well. That should teach him a lesson."
Erika hesitated.
"Isn't that too cruel? He'll be sad."
Selena said flatly,
"That's the point of punishment."
Erika stood in the hallway, thinking it over. After a while, her expression settled into something more resolute.
"…Fine. I'll punish him properly."
"Good." A beat later, Selena added, "By the way—since he couldn't get back into his room, he's now trying to enter yours. I think he needs the bathroom."
Erika blinked.
"WHAT?!"
She yanked her door open.
A full-sized giant panda was halfway through the doorway, its bulky arms struggling to squeeze past the frame without making too much noise.
Erika's eye twitched.
"Get over here."
She grabbed him by the shoulder. With almost no effort at all, she lifted him up and tossed him back into his own room. The door slammed shut behind her a second later, followed by the click of the lock.
Inside his room, Akira sat up on the floor with a rustle of faux fur.
"…Why is it that she can enter my room whenever she wants, but I can't enter hers? That's not fair."
Selena's voice came through, thoroughly unimpressed.
"Brother. When will you learn common sense?"
Akira's muffled protest rose from inside the costume.
"What's so common about this? This is gender inequality!"
Selena sighed.
"You don't enter a girl's room without permission. That's basic common sense."
Akira let out a long sigh. The costume rustled as he slowly climbed to his feet.
"…Whatever. I'm going to take a shower and make something to eat."
He trudged back into his room, looking distinctly miserable.
Selena watched the whole thing through their link and sighed again.
"What will you two do without me?"
---
After they finished breakfast, Erika set her cup down with a decisive click.
"Now, Akira. Seiza."
Akira, still fully trapped inside the Pan-chan costume, obediently lowered himself onto the floor and knelt upright in proper seiza position. The giant panda suit made the formal posture look completely ridiculous.
Erika stood in front of him with her arms crossed.
"So. Do you know what you did wrong?"
Akira thought carefully.
"…Is it about my survey and interviews on girls with F-cups?"
Erika's eyebrow twitched.
"What? Wait—that too, but the other thing."
"Is it about looking at Kayano's chest to measure it accurately?" Akira continued. "I was just checking if she was really 'forever flat.'"
"No! Not about chests—" Erika stopped, visibly restraining herself. "No, wait. We do need to talk about that too. But first."
Her voice turned serious.
"Why did you use that tentacle-connection drug on yourself? Didn't you promise me you wouldn't do anything dangerous?"
Akira's panda head tilted slightly.
"It's not dangerous. I designed it so the risk would be minimal. And we had Koro-sensei on standby. Besides, did you forget? According to Selena, my body is compatible with all types of energies. So it wasn't that dangerous. Believe me."
Erika stared down at him.
"It might not have been. But you still worried me. So you're still guilty. And you will receive punishment."
Akira let out a long sigh from inside the costume, the sound muffled by the hood.
"…Fine. What is my punishment?"
Erika declared it clearly.
"You are banned from watching anime or doing any experiments today."
Inside the suit, Akira's soul screamed.
No. No. No. No. No.
"And," Erika continued, "I will stay with you this entire day and supervise you."
The screaming reversed instantly.
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. YES!
Erika put her hands on her hips.
"Do you understand?"
Akira straightened as best he could in the bulky costume.
"I do. I will accept this punishment."
"Fine." Erika's expression sharpened again. "Now let's go to the next subject. Why are you interested in boobs?"
Akira's panda head jerked up.
"What? No, I'm not. I was just curious."
Erika's eyes narrowed.
"Then what is this survey on girls with F-cups?"
Akira waved his hands defensively.
"It was to help Koro-sensei clear his name. That's all. I'm innocent."
Erika's eyes narrowed further.
"Do you like big boobs?"
Akira answered without the slightest hesitation, his voice completely sincere.
"No. I have no interest in anyone else's boobs. The only boobs I love are your boobs."
Absolute silence.
The air in the room seemed to freeze.
Erika's face went from normal to deep red in less than a second.
"…You absolute idiot."
She grabbed the front of the Pan-chan suit with one hand and, with the full strength of a dhampir who was thoroughly done, hurled him straight out the open window.
The defenestrated Akira shot through the open air like a fluffy black-and-white missile and vanished into the sky.
That day, several government agencies recorded an unidentified panda crossing Japanese airspace at supersonic speed. According to one particularly confused report, it was moving faster than Koro-sensei.
Whenever anyone later asked Akira about the incident, he refused to comment.
---
After Akira somehow made it back home—still inside the Pan-chan costume—he spent the rest of the day obediently following every instruction Erika gave him.
First, she ordered him to cook. Whatever she wanted, he made. That part was easy enough.
Then she built a blanket fortress in the living room, dragged him inside, and used him as a full-body hug pillow while she watched several extremely boring soap operas in a row. Akira almost fell asleep twice. He survived only through sheer willpower and the faint hope that the day would eventually end.
After that came games—not video games, but board games.
Something Akira wasn't very familiar with.
Despite that, he won every single game anyway.
Erika's eye twitched harder with each victory. By the fourth game, she declared a new punishment: he would remain her hug pillow while they watched a sad movie.
That one actually hurt.
The combination of tragic background music, slow-motion rain scenes, and being slowly crushed inside a giant panda suit while Erika sniffled against his shoulder felt like genuine psychological warfare. Akira was beginning to wonder whether he would make it to evening when, mercifully, Ritsu's call came in after school hours.
He accepted it instantly.
Ritsu's face appeared on the screen—and immediately froze.
"Akira-kun…? Is that you in the panda costume?"
"Yes," Akira said urgently. "Ritsu, you have to save me."
Erika reached over, grabbed the back of the costume, and pulled him firmly back into her lap, wrapping her arms around the fluffy torso once more.
"Ritsu, what is it?"
Ritsu recovered quickly and smiled.
"I'm here to give you today's homework and inform you of everything that happened in class."
Akira seized the opening.
"What happened?"
Ritsu looked thoughtful.
"Well, first of all—the air conditioner you asked for as part of your bet with Asano Gakushuu-kun was finally approved and installed."
Akira let out a long breath of relief.
"Finally. I thought they forgot about it."
Erika frowned.
"Wait. What about Itona-kun? Isn't that more important?"
"Oh, yes," Ritsu replied. "Itona-kun is fine. His vitals are completely normal. Terasaka-kun said he will take care of him after hearing his backstory."
Erika relaxed slightly.
"…I see. That's good."
Akira nodded.
"So he joined the Terasaka gang, as expected."
Ritsu tilted her head.
"How did you expect that?"
Akira coughed and immediately tried to change the subject.
"Character analysis and other stuff… Anyway, Ritsu, let's talk about your new body. That's important, right?"
Ritsu gave him a suspicious look.
"Hmm… suspicious."
Akira pressed on.
"I'm not dodging anything. About your old body—are you sure you still want to go with that idea? Even though I was the one who suggested it, do you really want that?"
Ritsu sighed, then nodded.
"I know. But I really like that idea of yours, so I'm okay with it."
Akira smiled, already shifting into planning mode.
"Good. Then we can use that as—"
Erika's arms tightened around him like a vice.
"What did I tell you about experiments today?"
Akira's voice came out slightly strangled.
"Wait—it's not an experiment! We're just talking!"
"That's not allowed either," Erika said calmly. "Since you're being disobedient… more punishment for you. More sad movies."
Akira's scream of pure despair echoed through the living room.
"Noooooooo!"
On that day, Akira learned what emotional damage really was.