Alter Returns

It seems my wielder won't be able to return anytime soon.

Did you think Chacha would just be all, "Oh, okay" and leave!? Chacha wants her Little Okita back already!

Um, may I ask where exactly we are right now?

I don't even... How did we get here?

Honestly, it would be way too much trouble to explain. Just think of this as my wielder's mindscape.

So why can't Little Okita come back, anyway? Where did she even go!?

She's inside that giant boulder thing.

It looks like she's trapped deep within her own mind, probably thanks to the Holy Teacup.

Man, it's still really weird hearing a man's voice coming out of someone with my face... Anyway, is there anything we can do to help her?

Honestly, and it may sound a bit like I'm tooting my own horn here, but Wielder's defenses are pretty impressive.

There's nothing we can do to reach her from the outside. Our only hope is for her to awaken and free herself from the inside.

Awaken... As in, to her true power or something?

What? No. Nothing so hard-core.

We just need to get her attention.

？！

Come on, Little Okita!Wake up! It's time to eat! We might even be having hamburger steak with fried egg!

...

Doesn't look like it's working...

Maybe we just need to act like we're having the time of our lives out here to get her interested. I think there's even a story about something like that.

Do you mean the story of Amano-Iwato?

Right. We've got the best damn band in the world now! Even the gods themselves would be fans!

On guitar, the irreplaceable, incomparable ME!

On bass, give it up for Komahime!

This is a biwa, not a bass.

And our dancer!

Hello. I'm Iyo, the second queen of Yamataikoku.

Wooo! I can't wait to see you dance again, Iyo! It's been too long!

You can do this, Komahime! Good luck!

All right, here we gooo! We are "Koma Iyo Be Helped!" And a one! And a two! And a one, two, three, four!

Th-that sounds horrible!

Why are you shredding on your guitar, Auntie? You're clearly making things worse!

Huh!? But, this is a dream collaboration between Sengoku and Yamataikoku!

Shall Komahime and I try on our own?

Creative differences can be difficult to sort out.

But the guitar is the beating heart of any good band!

？！

Huh!? Wielder! She's coming out...

Huh!? That actually worked!?

...!

Oh, thank goodneWait. Why are there so many of her!?

Ah. I see. That "music" was so awful it must have kicked her automated defenses into overdrive.

This reminds me a bit of white blood cells attacking pathogens.

Who're you calling pathogens!?

Now what do we do!?

Okay, new plan: we whittle away at Wielder's magical energy and drag her out by force if we have to!

The rest of you, keep that weird collaboration...thing going!

We'll handle the duplicates as they come! If we're lucky, we might just wake Wielder up!

They may all seem the same at a glance, but perhaps there are slight differences between them which are only noticeable upon closer inspection.

Make sure to use your best judgment, Master.

Should we really be letting things play out like this?

Oh, yeah. I think Himiko told me about these kinds of situations once...

Oh! I know! This is one of those situations they call GUDAGUDA!

GUDAGUDA!