Chapter 19 - lesson 019: balling

Approaching them I got to really assess them as the surrounding witches did. I had watched as the weight rolled on gradually, and when stacked on top of one another the pounds had somehow seemed less dramatic. I had acclimatized to the sight of a paunch, or an ass spilling over the sides of a chair. However, it felt like the witch's ball gave me a proper window into the true nature of the sheer scale they had acquired. I felt as though I was seeing their bulging, dress straining guts for the first time their fat rears wobbling in their evening dresses as they greedily brought the next morsels to their mouths. They truly were more comparable to overfed livestock than the noble and sensual profession they had once embodied. I could just about imagine a slender Trishula, the way she had looked when we met in the tavern. Her toned and sharp midriff and tightly clad bottom. It was an insulting contrast to the butt wobbling glutton eating her feelings at the dining table. Try as I might, the only way I could remember Emerith was when I had met her at the tavern, slightly out of shape, doughy but at least trying to pretend she wasn’t a total pig.

I had figured they would indulge a bit. It was why I had sent them to the bar. But I had underestimated how far their table manners and self-awareness had fallen. They were messily slurping and gulping down food en mass only letting out the occasional grunt of pleasure. In fact, it seemed as though they were the only ones even partaking in the offerings at all. The others watching around them were so put off by their bovine behaviour they seemed ill inclined to even approach the table. I doubted the two fatties would really mind all that much, it was more food for them to eat. The spectating witches seemed worried it might be contagious. And it struck me that if our history was anything to go off it probably was. Though I was absolutely certain in my mind that they’d never see me looking the way they did. With their wobbling guts, plump cheeks and grasping gluttonous hands. I was sure I was incapable of falling so far myself. I was just mildly hampered. Or so I told myself.

“Would you stop that?” I asked them, feeling my hands sinking slightly into the soft flab of their shoulders. “Were just eating is all!” Emerith explained with her mouthful of pastry. Her cheeks burning red. “Umhm, I’m still a little peckish” Trishula objected with a dismissive hand wave. I blinked and gazed at their flabby guts. That was probably actually true. The portion sizes were much more reasonable though the food was tastier. They were so used to eating and drinking till they couldn’t stand. In turn, they had probably completely adapted to stuffing themselves silly constantly. Even my own tummy let out a slight growl. That was going to be a big problem, I was sure. “Well uh..” I started to say. I didn't really have the time to come up with a counter. They certainly weren’t going to stop eating while I came up with one. They were just going to keep on eating and drinking trying to sate the ridiculous appetites their overindulgence had wrought for them. “Fine but at least...try and keep a little decorum” I explained folding.

Even though I said it, I knew it was a foolish request. Emerith was common born. I could recall the many hours I spent drilling etiquette into her mind. But I had always gotten the feeling the importance of it wasn’t quite sticking with my then young apprentice. Countless years later that was no longer a question it was a certainty. She’d grab as much as she could of what was served on the plates, the decadent pastries and biscuits, and cram them into her greedy maw. Gobbling down them down and greedily licking her lips. Completely uncaring for etiquette as crumbs rained down into her over plump cleavage. Trickling further down onto her swelling lardy gut. Even in spite of the small portion sizes of the place. The amount she was eating was as immense as she was relative to the other witches. So slowly but surely, I could see the familiar sight of her middle beginning to expand and swell with calories and pastries. She had seemingly depleted every glass of wine with the reach of her flabby arms so she was left with just solids and sugars to devour. Given her size and experience I doubted every drop of wine in the building would’ve been enough to get her buzzed.

Trishula had been much better when she was a younger apprentice. As a noble born, manners had been instilled in her from a far earlier age than when I had met her. Under normal circumstances she was the absolute picture of decorum. That evening at the witch's ball she was much more a picture of hedonism. Though while Emerith’s mess was created by the sheer speed at which she was devouring her side of the dining tables offerings. Trishula’s was more a matter of volume. It was clear she had given up on trying to just have one thing at once. Or perhaps she was too hungry to care. Both hands were always shovelling in one thing after another. Stacking biscuits together until they were so tall, she could barely fit them in her mouth and performing similar gluttonous deeds to increase her intake. I doubted she even realized she was doing it. But it was clear to me on some level she was trying to compete with Emerith. Her subconscious instinct to compete so ridiculous as to have her wanting to cram more food into herself than her supposed rival. With such absurd intake her pale sphere of a gut rounded and swelled at a rapid pace. In the process it actually pulled the lower hem of her dress higher. Inching up and revealing more of her fat ass. Though the noble was too busy eating to notice.

They had eaten more of the served food than there was left off the table. No other self-respecting witch would’ve dained to touch the stuff for fear of being assumed to be in their company. Which meant their fat guts were stuffed with enough food to feed half of the witches' ball attendance. At this point the discourse of those spectators watching had changed from one of farcical comedy to genuine concern. They had both been rather well respected before this event. So, for them to make hogs of themselves to such an extent on a public scale was outside of the question. I knew the truth of the matter of course, they had both been derailed by little more than human nature. “Perhaps their paying the price for some magical effect, a curse?” Esmerelda suggested from behind me. Startling me. She seemed to be watching the gluttonous feast of the duo in a mix of hypnotized reverie and horror. I didn't bother to correct her. I had of course confirmed they weren’t cursed. But as far as I was concerned, they might as well have been. It was a more flattering explanation than the truth.

“Hey, it’s mine!” Emerith said and I realized the two women had gone for the same pastry. Having depleted what was close to them. They were moving onto the area they could both reach. Though their were difficulties given their bloated guts were pushing against the table. “Get your own, pig!” Trishula said scoffing it down for herself and pausing to belch daintily into her hand. Emerith argued something in response but her mouth was too full of another pastry for any of it to be intelligible. Soon Trishula’s was as well so the argument died down. They seemed to come to unspoken terms about how to divide what was left, and who would get to cram what into their overstuffed guts. I briefly wondered If they were going to clear the entire table. But then discarded the notion. They were both already full enough for it to be an obstruction. They were struggling to even reach the food let alone find space for it in their overcrammed stomachs. But I watched in the same mesmerized horror as Esmerelda as they just seemed to keep on going. More and more they just kept eating and gorging themselves utterly round. It was the most I had ever seen them eat but they seemed to be finding new levels of capacity.

By the end of it they were both left panting and sweating, fuller than I had ever seen anything in my entire life. The two hogs were utterly covered in food and sweat created by the sheer exertion of being so full. Stuffed couldn’t have begun to classify the sheer fulness of their middles, they almost looked like they had doubled in size from sheer fullness. Their bloated swelling having left the two witches in varying states of undress. At some point Emerith’s fat tits had popped free from the top of her dress, drooping out for all to see. But she had been too busy eating to care. Trishula’s dome of a gut was so oversized it stretched her dress all the way up, leaving her fat blubbery bottom completely bare, thankfully she had worn panties, unlike the older apprentice. Both women were utterly silent beyond panting for breath, and the occasional belch or hiccup brought on by such an immense gorging. I held my hands over my face unable to even watch. The night had been a disaster. Yet unbeknownst to me. It still had worse lows to sink to. On the table there was a single pastry left uneaten. To my horror my two apprentices, bloated and practically bending their chairs into breaking, still reached toward it. Not that they could actually reach it they were too full and lazy for that. Instead, the green aura of Trishula’s magic surrounded it, followed by Emerith’s gold aura. “It’s mine!” both said in greedy unison. Their powers began to surge and spark against one another, growing in size much as they had during their feast. “Hold on!” I said realizing what was about to happen. I foolishly and instinctually drew my own magic to stop it, only succeeding in adding my own more powerful aura to the arcane friction. The three of us pulled, and then, there was a loud evening ruining boom. As our magics mixed and consequentially, detonated.