No one deserves to be turned into an absolute powerhouse more than the smartest apothecary in China.
—
Maomao had learned long ago to distrust anything that arrived without explanation.
The bottle sat on her worktable, small and unassuming, sealed with pale wax and wrapped in plain paper. No crest. No signature. Just a neatly folded slip tied around its neck. She had already checked the glass for residues, sniffed the contents twice, and held it up to the light with a frown.
The slip was blank.
No warnings. No dosage. No effects.
“That’s new,” Maomao muttered.
Most potions came with at least something—a rushed note from a palace physician, a sloppy list of symptoms, or a half-hearted do not ingest written by someone who absolutely expected her to do exactly that. An empty list was worse than a dangerous one. It meant either supreme confidence… or a joke.
She hesitated only briefly.
Curiosity won, as it always did.
Maomao uncorked the bottle and took a careful sip.
She waited.
Nothing burned. Nothing tingled. Her pulse stayed steady, her vision clear, her stomach calm. No heat, no chill, no itching, no sudden enlightenment or regrettable paralysis. She clicked her tongue in mild disappointment and set the bottle down.
“Well. Either it’s water, or someone wasted very good glass.”
A soft knock sounded at the door.
Maomao turned just in time to see it open on its own.
A woman stepped inside as if she belonged there—orange hair, an amused smile, and eyes that gleamed with unmistakable mischief. The air itself seemed to lean toward her presence.
Nagisa, the dark goddess, looked at the bottle, then at the blank slip, and laughed quietly.
“Of course nothing happened,” she said lightly. “I told them the list would be empty.”
Maomao’s eyes narrowed. “You’re admitting responsibility?”
Nagisa nodded, delighted. “After all, that potion doesn’t have any effects… yet.”
She reached into her sleeve and produced a pen, twirling it between her fingers as her smile widened.
“The list is empty,” Nagisa continued, leaning closer. “Which means I can still write on it.”
The pen hovered over the blank paper.
And Maomao suddenly had the uncomfortable feeling that her body was about to become the ink.
Nagisa pressed the pen to the paper.
Maomao felt it before she saw it.
A faint warmth spread through her limbs—not the sharp sting of a reaction, but a deep, creeping heat, like blood rushing after prolonged exertion. She stiffened, eyes snapping down to her hands as Nagisa began to write.
“The potion stimulates the muscles of the body a lot, making them slowly grow as if the drinker had done nothing but train for the last year or two straight.”
The moment the pen finished the sentence, the warmth intensified.
Maomao sucked in a sharp breath and flexed her fingers. The motion felt… wrong. Not painful, not stiff—stronger. Her grip tightened without effort, knuckles whitening as unfamiliar tension coiled beneath her skin.
She rolled her shoulders experimentally.
Muscle shifted.
Not suddenly, not grotesquely, but unmistakably. Her arms felt heavier, fuller, the sensation of constant exertion settling into her bones as if she had just come back from weeks of manual labor. Her posture straightened on instinct, back pulling itself into alignment.
“…That’s fascinating,” Maomao murmured, even as her pulse quickened.
Nagisa watched with open delight, chin resting in her palm. “Isn’t it? No soreness, no exhaustion. Just the results.”
Maomao slid off her stool, legs bracing her weight differently than before. There was a subtle resistance when she moved, like taut cords responding instead of soft flesh. She lifted her sleeve and stared.
Her arm wasn’t bulky—but it was defined. Lines where there had been none. Strength sitting quietly beneath the skin, earned without sweat.
“Equivalent to one to two years of continuous training,” Maomao said, half to herself. “No calorie loss, no muscle fatigue, no damage to joints… absurdly efficient.”
She clenched her fist again, eyes gleaming with clinical interest despite herself.
“Does it stop?” she asked.
Nagisa’s smile widened.
“Oh, it’s very well-behaved,” she said sweetly. “Slow. Gradual. Your body will keep adjusting until it matches what I wrote.”
Maomao exhaled slowly.
“…You know,” she said, tone dry, “most people would panic about suddenly gaining muscle mass.”
Nagisa tapped the pen against the paper. “And yet you’re already calculating applications.”
Maomao didn’t deny it.
Her muscles shifted again—subtle, steady, as if an invisible regimen had begun ticking forward inside her body, hour by hour.
And the list was no longer empty.
“The potion is also spiced with incredibly potent male hormones, causing everyone who drinks it to grow a larger than average manhood. Especially women are affected, becoming very well equipped futa girls.“
Maomao paused, the words echoing inside her skull with disorienting clarity. She knew, in some remote, detached sense, that her mind should be blank with horror—or at least outrage—but the rational part had taken over. She pressed her palm to her abdomen and waited, pulse racing.
Nagisa watched her like an artist awaiting a splash of new color.
Almost immediately, a dense, radiating warmth suffused Maomao’s groin, so localized and urgent she gasped through her teeth. It was as if her nerves were being untangled, their pathways stitched anew. She pressed her free hand deeper, feeling the heat pool, harden, then twist into an alien kind of pressure.
Her modest skirt did nothing to hide the swelling mass she could feel, rigid and heavy and terrifyingly insistent against the fabric. She bit her lip, daring herself to look down, but kept her eyes on Nagisa instead.
The goddess’s smile never wavered. “Fascinating, isn’t it?” she said, her voice silk laced with radioactivity.
“You could have warned me,” Maomao managed, voice thin with equal parts mortification and awe.
“But then it wouldn’t be a demonstration,” Nagisa hummed, stepping around the worktable to appraise Maomao more closely.
Maomao’s legs trembled—she could feel every strand of muscle in her thighs, every contracting fiber, all flushed with aggressive strength. But it was her groin that demanded her attention: the sensation of fullness, the new organ pulsing with unspent power, so sensitive that even fabric grazing against it sent shivers up her spine.
“The muscle mass inside the body increases dramatically. Especially the drinkers' stomachs, abs and arm thickness are affected.“ Nagisa wrote next.
The effects shot through Maomao’s core. She doubled over, arms braced on the table. Beneath her clothing, new abs pressed outward, popping into sharp relief beneath her trembling fingertips. She lifted her shirt, helplessly analytical, and traced pale lines running from her ribs to her pelvis—six, no, eight segmented bricks of muscle, contracting with every shallow breath. They flexed when she laughed, which she did, despite herself.
Her forearms thickened, veins rising beneath the skin. Every knuckle, once slender and unassuming, now carried the suggestion of a fighter’s calluses. If not for the skirt and the girlish curve of her hips, she could have been mistaken for an acrobat or some back-alley pit brawler.
Yet the bulge distending her skirt seemed to pull all the focus. It throbbed, insistent and pulsing, with needy reminders that it was a muscle too, one newly awakened and eager for appraisal.
Nagisa leaned in, voice pitched low. “You’re still remarkably calm.”
Maomao blinked. “If I were in the Inner Court, I’d have to catalog this for at least three separate registries.”
Nagisa laughed, delighted—Maomao’s favorite sound, if she were being honest.
But the goddess continued to write. “Drinkers become partially cats, with their ears moving to the top of their heads and becoming catlike triangular. And long catlike tails sprouting just above her behind.”
The words came true before Maomao could even read them. Her scalp buzzed as cartilage and tendon shifted. Her ears migrated up, dragging through her hair with a low, excruciating tickle. In the space of a heartbeat, the soft, human lobes sharpened and unfurled at her crown, lined outside with fine velvet. Maomao winced; the new nerves sang at every passing draft. She twitched the ears experimentally, and—good gods—they responded, flickering at the merest sound like sensitive weather vanes.
But that was nothing next to the tail. It shoved forth from her lower back, a thick, tactile cable that wriggled beneath her waistband until it found freedom, swatting at the air with instinctual agitation. Maomao clapped a hand to her new appendage, stunned at the wild flexibility and the way it broadcast every tremor of her mood.
“I didn’t specify the tail length, so… the potion seems to have taken some creative license,” Nagisa mused, pen hovering thoughtfully.
Maomao’s tail arched high, bristling, a banner of semi-involuntary pride. “Unnecessary,” she grunted, voice lower now, the words vibrating from somewhere deeper under her ribs.
“You’re a catgirl now,” Nagisa teased, circling her like a proud patron of the arts. “And a very robust one. How does it feel?”
Maomao flexed her thickened fingers, ears flattening at the question. “I’ll require a new uniform,” she said, pushing her tail aside before it could sweep bottles off the shelves.
“The drinker's dick is even longer than before, and their balls are very heavy and extremely full. The drinker isn't necessarily horny, but just looking at their equipment would tell anyone that it is fully locked and loaded.“ Nagisa wrote.
Maomao’s knees buckled. She grabbed the tabletop for support, refusing to give Nagisa the satisfaction of collapsing. The sensation was not entirely physical; some ancient part of her lizard brain, unused to sporting such equipment, flared and pulsed with pride and the sheer novelty of it.
She glanced sidelong, fighting resignation, and lifted her skirt an inch. The bulge was vast, grotesque in scale, threatening the buttons and seams designed for a much more modest form. Anything less than a circus tent would have failed to cage it.
Nagisa had the gall to whistle, low and appreciative.
“Well, I did say very well equipped,” she commented, twirling the pen above her shoulder, then tucking it behind her ear with a flourish. “That will be… interesting for the registry.”
Maomao let the skirt fall. It did nothing to disguise the new proportions. She lifted her chin, ready to counter, but the words curdled in her throat. Instead she found herself huffing, more animal than human, as her new tail lashed behind her in irritation and confusion.
“I suppose that’s the demonstration?” she said finally.
Nagisa’s eyes went bright. “Not unless you want more.”
“Absolutely not,” Maomao said, and immediately regretted it. The goddess would never have suggested more unless she knew Maomao would start wondering exactly what “more” could mean.
But she did want to know. She didn’t even have the excuse of scientific curiosity; it was base, animal. Hungry.
She ran her hand along the new definition at her side, feeling every individual ridge and valley like braille, the dense network of nerves tuned to a different kind of vigilance. Her hand reached her lower stomach and paused, curious, hovering over the jeans' bulge as if she could will it away by sheer force of embarrassment. Of course it did nothing. If anything, the touch seemed to embolden it. The new weight throbbed against her palm, a full, anticipatory pulse, the kind of hunger that refused to be reasoned with.
Nagisa arched an eyebrow, leaning in as if to catch a secret. "You're not even going to inspect it properly?"
"I'm a professional," Maomao snapped, and then, dismayingly, the ears on her head flattened even further, betraying her real mood.
"All the more reason," Nagisa whispered. "For science."
"For science," Maomao echoed in a bleak monotone, but her hand was already at the waistband, knuckles working to undo the top two buttons. Just enough to peer inside, she promised herself. Just enough for an anatomical note, to jot a number, to verify a cause for complaint. She eased the fabric downward, hesitating at the last, then—there it was, almost springing free with its urgency: thick, ruddy, veined, and far too alive. It bobbed in the air, heavy and haughty, its length more than enough to banish any hope for plausible deniability.
Her balls hung like lead shot, the skin drawn taut with promise. Each pulse radiated a soft, liquid ache, the promise of impossible stores. Maomao swallowed.
“You seem to be enjoying yourself.” Nagisa giggled and said “Alright, then lets continue then~“
“After a few short moments, a second burst of power courses through the drinker. This one is different though, mainly targeting the legs and arms. The legs grow thicker and longer, becoming more defined. But the arms become absurd. The muscles inflate so much that the entire arm grows to almost three times the previous thickness.“
The transformation hit Maomao like a clap of thunder. Her legs buckled as the familiar warmth detonated through her thighs and calves, packing them with layer upon layer of coiled muscle. She braced herself on the table, but her grip faltered this time—the hands at the end of her arms no longer matched the scale of her memory.
Her forearms shot outward, cords of new strength bunching and writhing beneath her skin. The fabric of her sleeve didn’t stand a chance: stitches popped, seams split, and before she could react, the entire length ripped away from wrist to shoulder. Her bicep followed, swelling with such relentless force that the skin looked painted on, and the already exaggerated curve of her upper arm became a deep, ridged arch.
Her hands grew too, wide and dexterous, the fingers lengthening and palms flattening out with padded, catlike heft. The claws at each fingertip extended before retracting, a new suite of fine motor control that would have delighted her, if not for the overwhelming tightness in her chest. She flexed, and the bulging mass shot forward, tripling itself in an instant. Her old blouse, robust but no match for this, shredded at the shoulders, the remains fluttering to the ground like feathers.
Maomao gasped, twisting to assess the weird new girth of her arms. Both were enormous—definitely not decorative, and terrifyingly solid. She tried to wrap her fingers around her own bicep, and found she needed two hands to even get a grip. Her tail thrashed in surprise; her ears were plastered flat, then standing straight up, then twisting side to side as if conducting an orchestra of emergency signals.
Nagisa clapped in delight. "Stunning! You look marvelous. How do you feel?"
Maomao blinked, dazed, and rolled her shoulders. The motion had gained a weight, a presence, that she couldn't ignore. Digits thick as sausage, splayed in front of her, could have snapped a man's neck with one absent gesture. She imagined picking up a teacup and shattered the image with a nervous laugh.
"My heart rate is higher than I prefer," Maomao deadpanned. "And I believe I'll have trouble with the finer points of calligraphy."
Nagisa licked her lips. "But the broader strokes will be a delight."
She crossed the distance between them so smoothly Maomao barely noticed until the goddess's hand was cupping her jaw, thumb stroking the new hard line of her cheek. The touch was electric, and Maomao shivered. The urge to purr was overwhelming.
Before she could resist, Nagisa leaned forward and grazed her teeth along the edge of Maomao's new, exaggerated, feline ear. The sensation was raw, a hot wire from scalp to pelvis, and the catgirl's knees wobbled in shock. She heard a guttural, unfamiliar noise escape her throat.
Nagisa's hand slid down Maomao's neck, across the iron bands of her trapezius, and paused over the chiseled plane of her chest. Her palm traced the subtle rise of pectorals, then looked her right in the eyes, before pulling out the note again.
“Women drinkers can find themself in a situation where their boobs and their abs almost look like they are growing in competition, growing and growing. In that case, this will stop when their tits reach about the size of their heads and their abs are still visible through any clothes they wear.“
Maomao barely finished processing the words before her chest squeezed with a brief, intense pressure, like hands kneading her breastbone from inside out. The muscle beneath her pectorals clenched hard, shoving everything up and forward. In seconds, she felt her already impressive bust balloon outward, the flesh taut and blushing, then yielding as it surged to match the new ratio.
She reeled as her nipples erupted into aching prominence, broad and pink and almost comically sensitive against the ruined blouse. The fabric, which had barely survived the arm explosion, split clean down the middle, baring everything to Nagisa’s greedy gaze. For a moment, Maomao was almost grateful for the stacked racks of perfect abs running from sternum to pelvis—her tits were so heavy they used the mountains of muscle as a shelf.
Her ears twitched in mortification. But the ache in her chest was eclipsed by the sight: her breasts, massive and round, drawn tight by the band of furiously defined muscle beneath, pointed squarely at Nagisa like a double-barreled threat. Her nipples jutted out, so hard she thought they’d slice right through the air.
Nagisa gave an appreciative hum. “I see the potion intends to set records.”
Maomao’s face burned. She tried to cross her arms, out of some vestigial modesty, but found any attempt to corral the sheer volume only made the situation more embarrassing. Her new arms were so thick the gesture exaggerated the drama, shoving her tits in opposite directions, the mounds bouncing with slapstick elasticity.
Nagisa stepped in, and wrote one last thing just to make her masterwork complete.
“In rare cases, the potion drinkers can also grow a second pair of equally overtuned arms just below their original pair. And while rare usually, should a dark goddess be present, this rarity becomes all but guaranteed. So drinkers beware.“
The ink was barely dry before a splitting ache cleaved Maomao’s flanks. She yanked her arms out to the sides, bracing, as flesh and bone boiled beneath her skin. The agony was total—a twisting, wrenching, inside-out torment—but short-lived. In a blink, new arms punched from her obliques, just below her ribcage, two perfectly articulated limbs unfolding in a rush of velvet, sinew, and claw.
The new hands flexed. Even before she could process their arrival, they moved in perfect harmony with her intent—scraping across her abs, clutching at the shattered remnants of her uniform, instinctively seeking leverage for escape or attack or, more likely, self-soothing. They were as thick as—no, thicker than—the originals, each digit ending in a razor-curved claw that retracted with a satisfying click.
Maomao rocked on her heels, staring down at her mutated torso, brain refusing to parse the new arrangement of mass and muscle. She should have screamed. She should have raged. Instead, the rational part of her hummed with frantic math. Extra arms, she thought, means double the fine motor capacity—quadruple, perhaps, with training. The implications for laboratory work, for tea service, for… well.
Her tail whipped, sweeping glass from the table, and her ears snapped upright at Nagisa’s laughter.
“Ohhh, now that is a masterpiece,” the goddess purred, circling her creation with predatory satisfaction.
“Are you done?” Maomao croaked, voice raw and animal.
Nagisa clicked her tongue and then laughed—a noise like shattering glass, all delight and sharp edges.
"Oh, I think I've had my fun." She circled Maomao, pausing every so often to prod a bicep, pat her cat-eared head, or tap the tip of Maomao's new, twitching tail. "But I'm sure you'll find plenty of uses for those. Don't let me limit your imagination."
She then flicked the slip of pater into the air, snatched it again, folded it with a magician's flourish, and tucked it into her sleeve. "If you want a reversal, you'll have to catch me," Nagisa said, and with a last, lingering look, she vanished—one moment present, the next gone, leaving only a faint trace of sulfur and a lingering echo of laughter.
Maomao stood alone in the ruin of her workroom, tail lashing in astonished agitation. The sensation of four arms—two massive, two simply enormous—was disorienting, like being duplicated down the midline. Each limb wanted its own task; they fought and fumbled, then fell into reluctant coordination. She tried to cross her main arms and ended up wrapping herself in a bear hug, the secondary set folding below to cradle her chest in a way that both shielded and displayed her new proportions.
She could feel her cock—there was no other word for it—almost thrumming against her skirt. The weight and heat of it made every movement an act of negotiation. Her balls dragged heavily with every step, so taut and swollen she could almost hear them slosh. The absurd size of her breasts and the granite wall of her abs were no slouch either. She honestly didn't even know where to start looking at her body.
She barely had a chance to squeeze her extra arms together and gather the scraps of herself before the sliding door banged wide.
"Apothecary, I had a question about—" Jinshi's voice cut mid-word, as if someone had replaced his soul with frozen air. He stood in the frame, half turned, one hand poised with the habitual fan. His eyes locked on her. In silence, he assessed: the twin towers of vein-lashed breasts, the boulderwork anatomy straining every stitch, the four arms (one still groping a tit in confused panic), the cock so massive the skirt flared like a sail, and the tail, which now battered the floor in a Morse code of distress.
Maomao stared back. Her ears trembled. All four hands froze.
Jinshi's mouth worked twice. Once. Again. He closed his fan with a snap, then opened it, then closed it again. Maomao detected the faintest shimmer of sweat at his hairline. "I… see you are busy."
"I can explain," Maomao said.
"You can?" His voice cracked, fanning upward into a register reserved for royal emergencies.
"No," Maomao said, scratching behind her new ear. The gesture was unexpectedly soothing, and she kept at it, working the base with the first set of fingers while the lower pair made vague, helpless signs. "No, I can't. I don't even know where to begin."
This sure would take a long time to get used to…