A Summoning, Part XXVIII

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Part XXVIII
~Devil~

Kyle had used this walking trail before. Some of the gym's regulars used it from time to time, too. Out of all of the places to meet Thomas's mysterious benefactor, "the edge of those creepy woods by the trail" hadn't been one of his guesses. He'd thought maybe it was a young warlock messing around or something, and he'd be going to that person's workshop or house or whatever. It wasn't impossible that such a place was, in fact, hidden in the woods, but usually there would be an easier way to get there, like a door somewhere else inconspicuous yet convenient that linked straight to the inside.

He stopped and looked around once he was at the edge of the forest, crossing his arms. There hadn't been any specific instructions beyond waiting at the edge of the woods, which was also pretty strange. It didn't look like there was anyone in the forest, nor near it, watching for him, so he wondered if he was just supposed to keep walking until something obvious presented itself. But, then something obvious did happen: A burst of black, shadowy stuff appeared a few feet in front of him—some flashy teleportation magic through which a tall, semi-demonic-looking woman appeared there.

"Hi there~," she said cheerfully. "Kyle, right?"
"Yep," he nodded. "So you're..?"
"Mm-hm. Name's Zotha," she offered him a hand, and he shook it somewhat hesitantly, tilting his head just slightly at her afterward.

"You're...not a demon," he observed. "I'm no expert, but I don't recognize what kinda power you got, other than there's a ton of it."

"I guess Thomas didn't tell you much," she said.
"Nah. Just said you might be able to help me out, and she'd give you my digits."

"Well, I'm a new goddess," she said.

The pride demon took a moment to stare at her, waiting for some kind of punchline. "...You're for real," he said after she didn't give him one.
"Yep."

Kyle crossed his arms. "Last I heard, there hadn't been any new major gods since the whole..thing with the foxes."

"Well, it was as much a surprise to me as anyone else. Long story short: I was born human, but last Saturday a series of wacky events led to me accidentally getting ascended. Anyway, since my domain is 'change', it should be easy enough for me to help you out."
"Huh. I dunno if I believe you 'bout that, but I guess you feel powerful enough to do whatever you want either way. And, you haven't attacked me or anything yet, and Thomas trusts you I guess."
Zotha nodded. "We were friends before this whole thing happened. So, wanna come with and get it done?" She gestured to one side, forming a sort of shadowy portal there similar to the effect of her initial appearance.
"...Sure."

The goddess nodded, stepping into the portal, and after a brief hesitation he followed. They appeared inside what looked like some sort of lounge, a room with some comfy furniture laying around, a few doors farther in and several windows giving a view of the woods outside. "Welcome to my domain. Or—I guess we're calling it the 'worship center', even though none of that actually goes on here. More like just a few meetings with people. But anyway—it legally belongs to the person responsible for ascending me, who ceded it to be part of my 'territory'. At least, I guess that's how it works?" she shrugged. "For our purposes, it's just somewhere private with chairs."

"Chairs," Kyle repeated, deciding to brush aside the rest of the explanation for now. He'd heard that some of the gods had their own 'realms' of sorts—a bit like how the demons had the demon world to themselves, but for just a single, ultra-powerful being instead of everyone of a particular kind.
"Yes, you ah, might want to be sitting down for getting transformed?" she shrugged. "Either way, I'm ready whenever you are. This shouldn't take too long, and then I can put you back where we just were—or somewhere else if you want."
"...You are stupid casual about all this," he said.

Zotha just shrugged. "This is like the hundredth time I've transformed someone this week."
"..Fair."

Shrugging, Kyle went and took a seat on the nearest couch. "Go ahead, I guess?"
"Alright," the goddess rubbed her hands together briefly, then spread them forward toward him, a sparkly purple light flowing toward him as a visible indicator of a massive amount of magic. No sooner did it make contact and start flowing into him than he shuddered violently, feeling an immediate wave of tingling spreading rapidly out from the area of contact near the center of his torso.

"W-whoa..!" Kyle's hair spilled out immediately, a river of bright blue falling across his cheeks and shoulders and sweeping itself halfway down his back. A brief glance downward found the body hair completely gone from most of the surface of his skin, leaving it looking soft and smooth. By now he could feel the self-proclaimed goddess's power overwhelming his own, easily piercing through and undercutting any natural resistance it might be trying to put up.

Her power began to pull and push at his body, shrinking and reshaping it; this came with a physical sensation like a giant fist closing around him, only without any of the pain that would accompany that. "Ah, aa~aahh..!" Kyle's limbs thinned, shoulders narrowed, waist slimmed—and within a matter of one or two seconds he'd lost a foot or so of height and his entire frame had collapsed into a slender, girlish shape, leaving his clothes to billow out awkwardly around him. This was followed immediately by a pressure between his legs that made him flush and murmur, a soft "Ooo~ooh..mmnh—mMMmnh..!" in a rapidly-changing voice as he squirmed around on the couch, feeling his manhood tugging itself smaller and smaller, terminating a high, girly "Aah!" as it was yanked away, out of existence, and the demon became a girl.

"Mm—mmn~nnh..." Her face was alight with a blush as a new kind of pleasure filled the new equipment down there; her voice settled into a lower soprano tone, cute but with some clear maturity. "Nnh, aa~ah, w-wow, d-dude!" That feeling down there continued as her chest and hips sprang to life, the former pressing forward while the latter spilled out in every direction: Hips, butt, and thighs all growing bigger and rounder and pushing into the couch beneath her. "Ooh, mn mn MMN~Nh..!" The initially small breasts in particular gave one hard push after another, each one coming with a brief acceleration in their growth and a simultaneous intensification of girlish pleasure, until finally they swelled out one last time, into a pair of huge, impressive knockers—and a particularly potent hit of girlish pleasure came along with, drawing a high-pitched "AaaAA~AAaAAahh..!" sound from her lips that terminated into a soft, breathy voiced sigh as that sensation finally died down.

"Hff, man..i-is it supposed to be that, uh, intense?" Still blushing brightly enough for anyone to tell the difference between her cheeks and the rest of her bright red skin, the demon-girl turned her head down and tugged at her ill-fitting clothes.
"I don't know whether 'supposed to', but 'tends to be' is accurate," Zotha said. "Oh, yeah, stand up and lemme fix your clothes, too."

"Uh, s-sure." Her legs felt kinda weak right now, but she pushed herself up with an armrest and remained halfway leaning on it while Zotha twirled her index finger and sent a tiny sparkle of light (which Kyle could see still contained way more power than some minor clothing alteration really needed) to spiral around her body, rapidly reshaping her clothes into something that fit. The pants split at the thighs, the top part pulling up into some ultra-short jean-shorts while the rest became tight stockings; the shirt shrank to fit her and somehow spawned a bra out into place around her enormous breasts; and a gold bracelet, a baseball cap, and a pair of lensless glasses spontaneously came into being. Oh—and her underwear was panties now, of course.

"Uh.." Kyle pulled the glasses off and tugged uncomfortably at the thigh-highs. "Some reason for the specs?"

Zotha shrugged. "I just told it to 'make your clothes fit', I dunno where the extra accessories come from. I suppose I could've been more specific."
"Eh, it's fine." She let the glasses back down onto her nose, not really having any pockets to deposit them in right now. "So uh..do I owe ya anything for this, or what?"

"Nope! As long as you're grateful, that's good enough for me," she said, grinning. "Well—it's probably more honest to say that your gratitude literally serves as payment, since I can 'feed' on it? I'm still not really sure how that makes any sense."
"Huh, well—demons have always fed on other people's emotions," Kyle said, shrugging. "So, makes sense enough to me."

The goddess put a finger to her lips. "Interesting. You'll be the first actual demon I've met—nobody else I've changed so far has even awakened as one, despite my appearance. Maybe I have more in common with demons than I thought."

"Anyway—what I did should allow you to change back to being male whenever you want," she said, "but it won't alter your clothes. I..probably should've told you that before making them so tight..."
"Eh, it's fine," Kyle shrugged. "I'd be fine 'stuck' this way, anywho. But—it's gravy, I don't mind." Now that she thought it about it, she could feel it—the wave of overwhelming magic had not only imposed its will onto her body, but reshaped her own magic just slightly—adding on a new 'feature' it hadn't had before. So she knew exactly what to 'flex' to change back, even without a test.

"Okay then. So, I'll just put you a portal back where we met—unless you want to go somewhere else?"
"Nah, that's good," Kyle nodded.

---

After Rachel left for school, Graham headed out to look for potential jobs. Maybe physically going places in search of help wanted signs was pretty old-fashioned, but...well, she couldn't help still being old in some ways. For now, she just wanted something part-time to occupy a little bit of certain days and earn some extra money.

The store she'd gotten new clothes from was hiring. She pulled up and parked, hopping out of her pickup and standing leaning against the door for a moment. This was where she'd seen that werewolf girl, Damon...

It was strange; she'd not really even met that person, but looking at the store, the mental image of that brief sight of her was the first thing that sprang to Graham's mind. Some irrational part of the catgirl's brain imagined that, if she was here often enough, Damon would be back and they could properly meet...but she quickly shut her eyes and shook her head hard enough to make her feline ears flap, dispelling the notion. For one thing, Damon was going through some real trouble right now, and for another, she was here for a job, nothing else.

She headed inside, asked at the front counter about the sign, and was directed to the manager's office in the back. So the Neko made her way there, carefully opening the door and then knocking on it on her way in. "Hello?"
"Aah!" The manager looked...well, 'demonic' was probably the only reasonable word for it. She had bright blue skin, red eyes with black sclera, pointy ears and—maybe most importantly for this impression—big bull-like horns and a long, slim black tail flicking around behind her. She'd been staring hard down at some paperwork on her desk, and the catgirl's knock on the door had startled her. "Oh. Who're you?"
"Pardon me, miss," Graham said, stepping in and letting the door shut behind her. "Name's Graham. I'm here to inquire about the job opening? If it's still open, that is."

"Oh, well—aren't you the sweetest li'l graham cracker?" she said, her expression warming up almost instantly. "And a Neko too, by the looks of it?"
"True.." Graham nodded, feeling a faint blush on her cheeks from that first statement.

"Well! We are still looking for someone to help out. I have a small problem here, y'see. About half of our customers are magic folk, with unusual appendages such as tails to accommodate for—but nearly all of my workers are under the veil! We have clothes that fit tails and wings and ears and horns better than the 'human-tailored' ones, but I can't exactly be telling humans to offer them to people who they think are fellow humans too!"

"That..does seem like somethin' of a problem." Graham's head tilted with one of her ears sideways; she wasn't really sure what to make of the store manager suddenly venting at her like this.
"Oh, excuse me. I probably should introduce myself first. Please, come closer," the demon-woman beckoned, and Graham came up in front of the desk. "Valoz, but humans think it's Valerie, so—everyone calls me Val," she said, offering the catgirl a handshake. "Hmm. Firmer grip than I'd expect for someone your size," she commented.

"I'm not near as young as I look," Graham said. "Pretty recently someone did some magic to make me physically young again, and it 'awoke' the cat parts, more 'r less." The detail of her having been male before didn't seem relevant enough to bring up.

"Ah, I see," she nodded, getting what might be best described as the expression of someone plotting something. "That's excellent, someone cute enough to look good in our threads but mature enough to have a proper work ethic...

"Tell you what—I get a good vibe off of you, miss graham cracker~. If you'd like a job helping me out with that issue I just outlined, you've got it. Ten—no, fifteen dollars an hour sound good?"

"Just like that?" The catgirl headtilted again. "No application form, background check, or anything? I could just as easy be lying to you, after all."
"Nah," Val gave a curt, dismissive wave. "I mean—we'll have to do all that stuff for corporate and all, but I know it won't be an issue." She leaned in slightly, grinning widely enough to show a few sharp teeth; her tail could be seen whipping around up above and behind her head. "I'm a Mammon, you know, so I can tell whether or not something will be profitable at a glance."
"Hmm. Well now, I'm retired, and only looking to work part time. That a problem?" Graham said.

"Not a bit—as long as you work hard when you're here. You want to start training now?"
"...Sure?" The Neko shrugged. This wasn't how she'd pictured the morning going, but the pay she'd just been quoted was decidedly more than expected. Anyway, if it didn't work out, she could always just quit.

---

"Here we go again..." Anika sighed, standing in the middle of the worship center. She'd changed into the outfit she'd been 'given' the last time the Ruler of foxes inhabited her body, figuring that was better than having more of her clothes changed into something identical-looking or worse. It was a minor inconvenience for Zotha to replace clothes, but it was also easy to imagine 'Fox' gifting her increasingly feminine and embarrassing clothing for each new appearance, too.

"I'd apologize for making you do this again so soon, but we all know whose fault it is," Zotha said, crossing her arms.
"Yeah, yeah." The fox-girl nodded, took a deep breath in through her nose, and evidently let the goddess in. The shift was more rapid than before, and without the accompanying smoke—but there was no less of a pressure from the immense power of the being now inhabiting Anika's body.

"Good afternoon, godling~." Fox gave the goddess and her priestess a mischievous grin. "I take it you enjoyed my gift?"

"Your 'gift'." Zotha deadpanned.
The Kitsune god chuckled. "Excuse me—or is it that you were annoyed by my prank? It is relatively recently that human society came up with April Fool's day, but my people warmed up to the idea very quickly. It's been a special day to all of us ever since. And with a few of them putting on such an impressive display this morning, how could I possibly resist joining in?"

"Yeah, uh...altering people's lives drastically, maybe forever, against their will is a...greeaat prank."
"Pffheheheh~!" Fox giggled, obviously only amused by the sarcasm. "Really, I ought to be thanking you, or perhaps even Jess in particular for bringing you into being. I felt much more free to do something like that, knowing there was some willing 'damage control' on hand."

"So you wouldn't have done it if I wasn't around?"
"I would have come up with something different for the rain to do." The Ruler paused, tapping one of her ears with an index finger. "No, scratch that—I wouldn't have had the opportunity in the first place without you. After all, little Anika was instrumental in bringing the rain," she said, placing a hand against her own chest for a moment.

"So—either way—you knew that I'd go out of my way to help people who'd been unwillingly transformed, and decided to take advantage of that, for a prank."
"That's certainly one perspective on it," Fox said, nodding. "I won't insult your intelligence by spelling it out for you, but perhaps you'd like a hint?"
It sounded like she'd just suddenly decided to change the subject. "A hint about what!?" Jess said, getting annoyed herself. They were both getting used to feeling the fox god's immense power around them; since they knew she had no intention of actually using it on them, they no longer felt any apprehension or fear from it, which left room for more normal emotions like irritation. Judging by the way that she continued to smile, maybe this was what she wanted.

"I certainly hope I don't underestimate your collective intellect, so—I'll give it, and that ought to be sufficient. I told you before that I am on your side."
"Yes..?" Zotha said.
"And that, for political reasons, none of us can act directly—either for or against you. As much as I'd like to share some of my own power with you to force the issue, I'd only wind up getting myself demoted, and possibly worse."

"..Oh."
"'Oh' what?" Jess said.
"You can't give me help, but you can cause trouble."
Fox nodded, putting on a satisfied grin. "It is in my nature, after all."
Since Jess still didn't seem to understand, Zotha spoke some of her own logic aloud: "I gain power from gratitude."
"Ohhh!" the priestess got it now. "And—who's more grateful than someone who was just in distress?"

"Precisely."
Zotha sighed. "I guess I should thank you, then—even if I'm not feeling very grateful right now."
"You're certainly not under any obligation to," Fox said. "I was only doing what foxes always do."

"I just would've liked some advance warning that we'd all be so busy today," the goddess of change said. "But I guess that's 'not in your nature', huh?"
"If I tell you that I'm planning a prank, then it's part of the prank," Fox said cheerfully.

---

After supper, Onida sat on the couch to watch TV. It felt like forever since she had the time and was in the mood to just lie back and relax like this. Sam changed back into a guy and went to do his streaming, and Damon elected to curl up on the rest of the couch, eyes toward the tube, and watch it with her. "Uh...is that really more comfortable than sitting?" she asked her sister after watching her for a moment.
"Mm-hm! Sometimes, anyway."
"All right then..."

A few hours later, Sam came back out—a girl in an oversized shirt again. "How'd the streaming go?" Onida asked. She was sort of used to asking Damon a question like this in the morning, when they'd sometimes eat breakfast together—or, failing that, at supper the following evening.
"Aah, pretty well," she said. "I wanted to introduce the new space before I, aah..anyway. Mind if I join you?"
"Oh, not at all." The werewolf girl came and sat down in a free chair, leaning back to relax.

Over the next fifteen minutes or so, Onida caught herself sneaking glances at Sam—the motion of those ears or that tail catching her peripheral vision, and her eyes wanting to keep watching the furry appendages move for just slightly longer than a brief glance to confirm the origin of the motion would allow. Unfortunately, it seemed that she noticed—in the next commercial break, she turned Onida's way.

"Hey, aah...do my, you know, fuzzy parts..bug you?"
"Er..not, particularly. Why do you ask?"

"It just seems like you've been looking at 'em some. I mean, it's no big deal, really—I get they're a reminder I'm not totally 'human'. I guess it might even stray a little toward the uncanny valley for someone used to only ever seeing humans."
"It's..not that. I'm very sorry if I gave you that impression. But...I admit, I have been staring some. I'm also sorry about that; I know it's rude, and I usually have much better self-control."
"Well.." Sam tilted her head adorably. "I guess it's fine, if you're not too uncomfortable. A little staring doesn't hurt anyway. Aah, guess I am still curious what it's about, though."
Onida blushed slightly, putting her hands together and playing her fingers across each other nervously. "It's, a little hard to explain..."
"That's okay," Sam said. But it only made her want to explain herself even more—worrying about what kind of conclusions the werewolf might be drawing.

"Look, th-the best I can do is tell you that there is a very primitive, stupid part of my brain that sees those ears a-and thinks, 'oh, a cute puppy, let's pet that!' Even though I know you're not a dog."
"You've got that right—I'm a wolf," Sam said, grinning wide enough to show off her fangs. "Pretty important distinction there."
"But, uh—first and foremost, you're a person. Right?"
"Aah, sure." She shrugged. "I'm a human, but also a wolf.

"One of the things born werewolves just sorta understand is that we've all got a 'wild side'—maybe a little more wild than other kinds of, like, animal-people." Damon picked her head up slightly at this point, watching the conversation with a sudden, keen interest. "We're just as much wolves as people, in a lot of ways, and..living normally as a werewolf is more about accepting and working with those instincts than trying to fight against or suppress them. If that makes any sense."

"I..suppose so," Onida said.

"Anyway, petting is pretty much accepted behavior among family, close friends, and stuff. I guess you're way more likely to see it between girls or, like, romantic partners, though."

"Uh...r-really?!" She could feel herself blushing again.

"Well—sure. Hey, if you just want to know what they feel like...aah, I wouldn't mind you touching the ears," she said, gesturing to one of them with a finger. "Just be gentle and don't pull on the fur—they're pretty sensitive, and that stuff hurts."

"Erm..sure. I'll be careful."

Onida hesitantly leaned up close enough and ran a hand along one of Sam's ears, then the other, ruffling and stroking them. "Hmmnnh." They were soft and warm between her fingers, and the wolf-girl murmured softly under her touch briefly before letting out a few adorable barks. "Rrf~! Y-yip!" Already starting to feel even more embarrassed than before, she let go and fell back into her seat.

"Uh—did uh, was that wrong?"
"Not at all!" Sam said, grinning brightly (and cutely blushing a little bit, too). "Felt pretty good, actually. Maybe you're a natural at it."
"Er...m-maybe. Anyway, uh, thanks."
"Likewise~." The little werewolf's adorable grin, complete with the slightly red cheeks, was making Onida blush again...she forcibly glued her eyes on the TV when she realized she'd been staring at Sam's face.