Part 1"Er... Miss... What exactly are you planning on doing...?"
Lilith was guiding Evlin to the location of the nest of monsters she had discovered.
"Depending on the results... It might be the best idea I ever had or the dumbest move in the history of dumb moves..."
"... That... Doesn"t answer my question..."
"Can"t you just use future sight to find out?"
"Very well... Oh... Oh!!"
"So... Does it work...?"
"I... "
"Wait... Never mind... I want to figure it out by myself..."
"I- If you say so..."
The two women finally reached the nest. A small group of monsters was resting on top of an open rocky formation without a care in the world. Large beast-like creatures who looked like mixed parts of different animals stuck together.
"Ok... Time to test my theory... Let"s go Sphinx!"
Evlin used her magic and combined with Sphinx to change into her winged form.
"Wish me luck Lilith."
She started to walk towards the area of sleeping beasts and tried to gently wake one up. A large ox monster with six horns on top of his head and a snake for a tail. He sensed Evlin"s smell and begun to approach her.
"..."
The ox monster started to sniff Evlin"s golden fur and began to circle around her. She had her hand close to her crossbow in case she needed to engage in battle, but the ox suddenly lost interest and left. Evlin released a deep breath she was holding in and returned to Lilith"s side.
"Looks like it worked!"
Lilith was unsure as to what just happened.
"Miss, I think I might need a little bit of explanation."
"Lilith, we need the monsters to be on our side right?"
"Yes..."
"But they will never join forces with humans, correct?"
"Correct..."
"So... We need to find out if we can trick them into thinking we are not humans!"
"What...? So your plan is..."
"I need to find out if we can trick them with this appearance... If we do, we can just change everyone else"s images with my recreation magic."
"So... Your plan is to disguise all seven of us as monsters?"
"Six actually... Recreation magic doesn"t work on shape-s.h.i.+fters like Daren, I tested it on Marcus and he just returned to normal after a few seconds... Give me a piece of silver metal."
"Ah... Here... What are you going to do with it...?"
"I need to know if monsters can sense this thing since we will be carrying a lot of it..."
Evlin returned to the nest, and once again, slowly walked into the middle of a group of monsters. Many were starting to wake up right now thanks to the sun starting to s.h.i.+ne in the sky and eliminating the night.
She tried to observe if any of the creatures around her could smell the scent of blessed metal, but it seemed like she would be safe. Nothing was approaching her with any signs of aggressiveness.
"Looks like I have nothing to worry about..."
Evlin left the nest and met with Lilith once again.
"All right Lilith, now it"s your turn"
"Ehhh???"
"Don"t "Ehhh" me. This is an experiment, we need to find out what works and what doesn"t. They didn"t react to someone disguised as a monster or to someone carrying a silver metal. The only thing left is to see if they react to someone with a blessing."
"O- Ok... But how are we going to do this...? Are you going to combine me with Sphinx?"
"I rather not... Sphinx may gain a lot of stress if he keeps being recreated with different people... I don"t want my memories and yours start mixing up inside his head..."
"I see..."
"That means we will need to find another monster for you!"
Evlin grabbed Lilith and pushed her to stand in front of the nest.
"Go ahead and pick one!"
"Eh...?"
Lilith was face to face with the nest and staring at all the monsters inside of it. Ria would probably be jumping of joy from the idea of fusing with a monster but Lilith just couldn"t help but feel repulsed by it.
Ever since she and her parents were attacked by a demon monkey that stole their food one day after they returned from a trip to the church, she began to despise demons with a pa.s.sion. She still found trouble swinging her sword to cut humans due to her personal trauma, but she had absolutely no problem attacking monsters.
She was trying really hard to not show any expression of disgust on her face after hearing Evlin"s request.
"Do I really have to do this...?"
"Unless you have a better way to get these guys on our side..."
Lilith didn"t want to become a monster. She hated monsters almost as much as she hated the G.o.ddess of the east. She tried to focus on one target of her hate to help her calm down her other target of hate. She kept telling herself that this was something she needed to do in order to get revenge against East.
She tried to look around the area, but none of the creatures in it seemed to appeal to her. All the monsters looked either ugly, disgusting, or scary in her eyes. She didn"t want to combine with them, she wanted to take out her sword and start slas.h.i.+ng every single one of them.
She continued to see if there was another griffin since she too began to get real close to Sphinx as time went on. She kept looking around and didn"t found any but managed to encounter something similar.
"That one!"
She started to point in a direction and guided Evlin"s eyes to the monster she had chosen. A humanoid female figure covered in red feathers with a pair of wings where her arms should be and bird legs on her lower half. Her feet were ma.s.sive talons that looked like it could tear a tree in half like a chopstick. Strangely enough, her face looked rather human-like. Evlin tried to recognize the monster.
"Is that... A harpy?"
"Half-human, half-bird... It would mix well with your griffin disguise right?"
"Very well, one harpy coming up!!"
Evlin started to climb the rock the harpy was resting on and managed to capture her by modeling a pile of rocks into handcuffs.
"I"m really sorry about this! I"ll promise to let you go once this is all over."
She knocked out the bird-woman and brought her towards Lilith"s side. The monsters seem to have noticed her action but didn"t look like they really cared.
"Ok Lilith... Try using your future sight to see if it"s safe to do this."
"Understood. ... ... ..."
"Well?"
"It seems like I will receive a small shock due to our memories merging together... But nothing I can"t handle..."
"Very well, get ready to start wanting to eat worms!"
"Wait, what?"
Evlin covered Lilith and the bird monster with recreation magic and focused on combining the two beings into one, trying to make sure the mind in charge belonged to Lilith.
After she was done, Lilith found herself covered in red feathers. Her body had become taller and larger and her arms and legs were replaced by wings and talons, just like a harpy. Her hair was also red and it had gotten much longer than before.
"How do you feel?"
"Strange... Very, very strange... Oh my... She... She ate a lot of people..."
Lilith fell on her bird-like knees and started to throw up a little. Good thing they haven"t eaten breakfast yet.
"Oh... I"m so sorry!!"
"It"s fine... My head was filled with painful images already... A few more won"t make a difference..."
"Riiiight... We need to find you a therapist once this is all over... Come on! Let"s test your disguise!"
Lilith approached the nest just like Evlin commanded and tried to observe if she raised any attention from the beasts inside of it. Just like Evlin, not reaction from any of them.
"Looks like we will be ok..."
"Nice! Let"s regroup with everyone else and continue with our Halloween party!"
Part 2
The rest of the group was having a hard time taking Evlin"s plan seriously, but they finally gave in after seeing that both her and Lilith were doing ok even while entering the monster"s nest.
"You never cease to surprise me sis..."
"Thanks As.h.!.+ So, what are you going to pick?"
"Huh..."
"Ah!!! I want to be a dragon!! Please, please, please!!!"
Ashley seemed completely uninterested in going ahead with this idea, while Ria acted like she just had won the lottery.
"All right... Does anyone see any dragons around here?"
Daren started to s.h.i.+ver towards the word "Dragon". Maybe he had some bad experience with them? Gustav managed to spot one sleeping on a tree nearby. It didn"t have wings and it"s appearance held a strong color of green. One could mistake it for a large snake if it wasn"t for its arms and legs.
Evlin repeated her capture process and brought the creature handcuffed. She released some magic towards Ria and the reptile monster and fused them together. Ria was now possessing a green skin covered in scales and was much taller than before. She had claws on her hands and a ma.s.sive tail behind her back.
"Gurahhh!!! I"m the dragon lady!!! Feed me your hearts if you don"t want to die!!"
"... I"m pretty sure we will die if we give you our hearts..."
"Ah, Evlin you are no fun..."
"Ok, whos next? Daren you already have your curse so no monsters for you."
"... Oh no... What a nightmare... I"m so sad..."
"Haha... Very funny... Auren, want to try going next?"
"Mmmm... What monster would match with me...? Oh! How about that one?"
He pointed at a humanoid creature that looked like a mix of a man and a bull. It possessed bull legs and an angry-looking bull-head while the rest of the body looked like it was from a very muscular human. A minotaur.
"All right, just one second."
Evlin captured the next monster and fused it with Auren. He looked pretty much like the minotaur from before except his eyes were holding very little ferocity.
"Gustav, your turn!"
"Mmmm... That one, the white horse with wings..."
"Oh, a pegasus! Nice one!"
Same process as before, Gustav was now covered in white with a much longer string of hair behind him falling all the way to his shoulders. Two ma.s.sive white wings were behind him and his two human legs were replaced by four horse legs. He was looking less like a pegasus and more like a centaur with wings.
"You"re the last one As.h.!.+ Pick a good one!"
"... I don"t know..."
"Come on sis, you just need to become a monster for a while... It"s not that big a deal!"
"... Ok... How about that one? The plant girl?"
Ashley spotted at a green creature that looked like a young girl covered in green with roots instead of legs attached to the ground bathing under the morning sun on top of a large boulder covered in moss.
"Oh! A dryad! Nice!"
Evlin approached the female plant monster and started the same procedure from before, but something went different this time. As soon as Evlin tried to capture her, the girl slapped her hand with one of her vines.
"Excuse me?? Do you mind?? I"m trying to enjoy the sunlight!"
"Oh!! Sorry... I didn"t mean to bother you..."
The dryad actually talked back at Evlin, much to her surprise.
"Wait... You can talk...?"
"Yes... Yes, I can... I can also sing and recite poetry... Now go away!"
"S- Sorry it"s just... I never saw a monster that could speak before..."
"What? I"m not a monster, I"m a demon..."
"I... See..."
"..."
"Huh..."
"You have no idea what the difference is, do you...?"
"None at all... Sorry..."
The dryad extended her arms and launched a barrage of vines towards Evlin that made her fall from the boulder all tied up.
The dryad stood up form her sunbath spot and started to descend from the boulder on her vines as if she was an octopus.
"You are not a demon are you...? All demons know that monsters can"t talk..."
"Oh... So that"s the difference... I see..."
The dryad started to convert her left arm into a huge spike and prepared to stab Evlin"s heart.
"I don"t know who you are, but you are not welcome here. Farewell..."
As the plant girl moved her arm to piece the tied up Evlin, a transparent s.h.i.+eld appeared to protect her much to the dryad"s surprise.
"What the...?"
The moment her spike collided with the s.h.i.+eld her arm started to burn with immense pain.
"Aaaaarghhh!!! What is this!!!??"
Evlin used her magic to sharpen her armor and proceeded to cut off the vines that were locking her.
"Sorry about that... My friends are overprotective..."
"Friends...?"
The dryad turned around and noticed the rest of Evlin"s friends approaching to aid her. She was surprised to see what she a.s.sumed were so many demons working together to save her.
"What"s going on here?? Who are you all?"
She also noticed Daren and Ashley and made a sour expression.
"You traitors!! You are working with humans!!! Just wait until I tell my superiors!! They all will- Blarghh!!"
Evlin knocked the plant girl out with her wooden fist to make her stop screaming in case monsters would start gathering towards the noise.
"Sorry... She was being really loud..."
Evlin began to look for another monster to fuse with Ashley and started to walk towards a deeper part of the nest, much to her sister"s confusion.
"Evie? Where are you going?"
"What do you mean? I"m going to look for a monster for you..."
"But we already have this dryad."
"You want to fuse with her...?? But... You heard what she said, she"s not a monster she"s a demon..."
"Yes... And that might be just what we need... If we fuse and I can look into her memories we can gather some useful information about the current state of the kingdom! She was saying something about her superiors..."
"I don"t know if this is a good idea... It might not be safe to mix your mind with the mind of something capable of rational thinking..."
"But this might be our best chance!! We can use her to discover secrets from the enemy!"
Evlin still wasn"t convinced. Fusing two bodies together was a much more delicate process than Ashley could imagine. Evlin never had too much trouble fusing with Sphinx since the griffin was just like an animal that acted on instinct. Even if they combined, Evlin was still in control due to her more evolved brain. But fusing two beings whose brains were able to act on reason and logic? She didn"t know what could happen. Worst case scenario, Ashley"s mind could be taken over by the dryad.
"Come on sis!! Let"s just give it a try! I trust your magic!"
Evlin hated this line so much. For some reason Ashley always a.s.sumed that when it comes to magic, Evlin can do no wrong. She had no idea how hard it was to perform each of her spells on a daily basis to work exactly as she wanted. She really wished Ashley would stop putting so much faith in Evlin"s magic all the time.
"Lilith, can you see if anything goes wrong?"
Harpy Lilith proceeded to use her ability to confirm if there was any danger in allowing Ashley to combine with a demon. She tried to observe for as long as she could but could find nothing too out of the ordinary.
"Can"t see anything wrong... It seems like she will be ok as well."
"Can you check if there will be some kind of danger once I return her to normal?"
"I can"t sadly... I tried looking further into the future but my power stops working after some time... We will probably run into Marcus at some point... I can"t see the future if he is part of it..."
Ria raised a confused look.
"Wait Lilith, me and Auren are also beings of divine energy now... Won"t we interfere with your power too?"
"Doesn"t seems like it... Maybe its because my power comes from West as well... If anything, I kinda feel stronger when I"m closer to you two."
"Oh... That"s interesting to know!!"
Ashley directed her eyes towards Evlin trying to return to the original conversation.
"So, can we do this now sis?"
"I still don"t feel safe about this... Maybe I should do it."
"No way, I"m the best option for combining with her. If something goes wrong and she tries to take over my mind, you will be the only one capable of bringing me back. Besides, I"m the only one here who has no power, how much damage can she do with my body?"
"You really won"t give up this idea, will you...?"
"Trust me, I know what I"m doing."
"Ugh... You better..."
Evlin aimed her crossbow at Ashley who was closing her eyes as if she was about to jump into a pool while holding the knocked out dryad and showered the two with recreation magic.
After she was done, she noticed Ashley was now green with several leaves coming out of her clothes. Her red hair had been replaced with vines but her legs still remained the same.
"Sis...? Everything ok?"
Dryad-Ashley opened her eyes and started to check her own body. She moved her hand across her arm, then her legs and finally her hair.
"Still feels like me... But for some reason I have this weird desire to take sunbaths and eat people..."
"The sunbath thing must be your dryad half speaking... The eating humans part must be just your usual weirdness..."
"Thanks sis..."
Daren came closer to Ashley. He looked really out of place being the only humanoid individual among so many monsters right now.
"So did it work? Did she had any information about the demon kingdom?"
Ashley closed her eyes and tried to focus and look inside the memories of the dryad.
"Yes!! In fact, I think I just found a shortcut for us!!"