D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad Chapter 2342 Rain Coating

--- Lily ---

The potion was active but it was very, very strange to experience. It also had a few little bits and pieces that were not ideal. The first thing to note was that you could feel it, sort of. It was a thick coating of air that made your movements just a bit harder. It wasn't a real impediment, but it was almost like wearing a second layer of clothes over everything. Noticeable but not a major problem. Neither was her transformation. The bubble thing dealt with that easily. Swapping forms didn't disrupt it at all.

The issue came when she tried to use her shadows. That was a much more mixed bag. It was wrong to say she couldn't use her shadows at all, and in fact, after a quick test where she formed her shadow into a few odd shapes off to the side and even stretched it out extra far just to prove that the bubble wouldn't cause issues nothing happened. It was all fine…

And then the first time she launched herself and her shadows at a monster it popped. Leaving her soaking in the rain for a bit as the coating was reapplied. This of course warranted more testing. Though that did bring to notice, another issue. The potion provided that extra layer, and caught the rain on said layer. This meant it did nothing for the rain already soaking into your clothes and fur. It also meant that you could see the rain hitting the film.

Lily had been able to ignore it before but now she was noticing. It was like looking through a windscreen on a rainy day, and with no wipers either. The non-uniform shape of it and the rain couldn't really cling to it helped a bunch… but not really enough depending on how hard the rain wanted to come down at any given moment. It made testing the other issues a lot harder because once you notice it your eyes kept focusing on the droplets instead of the tests.

Still, Lily managed to work out what was going on… while wasting a good deal of potion in the process. Though Appoline did insist that it was fine and she'd made plenty just in case. It was good info to have, just felt bad testing it because you needed a full coat of the potion for it to be active, so ever coat wasted was a few hours' worth of potion. Annoying.

Now the reason for the issue was actually in how she tested things earlier. Lily had assumed that the potion would break at longer range, failing to properly stretch over her shadows and popping. That was in fact, not at all how it worked. In fact, it was basically the opposite. The film let her shadows seep out without too much trouble, and didn't even bother trying to contain it after a certain distance.

This was especially true if she left her shadows intangible and snaking across the ground for a while before they popped up. She could do that all day and not a single crack in the potion would occur. The problem was actually in the shorter range, when she was using her shadows of an extension of herself.

If she formed up a shadow claw around her front paw and swiped, it would shatter the potion, as if she was swiping at the layer itself. It was sort of weird. She could shift and move the potion layer by pressing her shadow against it, but if she sharpened those same shadows they'd pop the bubble. Which seemed weird to her because as long as she stretched the shadow out far enough, she could do whatever she wanted.

"Ok so why does it work this way?" asked Lily.

"I have no idea," admitted Appoline. "I knew you could cast spells while using it, as that's basically a requirement… so it was never going to inhibit mana flow. On the other hand it ALSO doesn't break when you use melee weapons. As an example," Appoline pulled out a dagger and swiped at the air in front of her. Notably, she didn't get rained on. "So I'm not sure why specifically shadowy claws CAN damage it."

"That's so weird. Is it just the magic?" asked Lily.

Appoline shrugged, "To my understanding enchanted weaponry shouldn't… wait no what am I saying? My dagger is enchanted." Appoline chucked the dagger away and then a few moments later it returned to her hand. "So clearly it also doesn't fail with enchanted weapons… I don't know if it's JUST shadows or if I'm missing something… fascinating."

"Why would it being just shadows matter?" asked Lily.

"Poor interactions with the ingredients perhaps?" Appoline answered with a shrug. "If say, it was all made out of light based, or adjacent ingredients and you used a shadow spell it would destabilise… though in this case I have no idea at all. It's mostly water based, with the idea that it repels more of itself. A little bit of air, and a few other things sure, but mostly water."

"Hmmm, alright then," sighed Lily. "Let's continue on then I guess. Not sure what else there is to say…" Wiggles thumped his foot loudly and pointed off to the side. "Guess we're being watched, one moment."

Lily stretched her shadow out and then created several spears she 'threw' into the area Wiggles had marked. When Lily let her shadow retract she found another monster corpse floating to the surface. "Are these things even worth anything at this point?"

"Not really. I've got what stock I want from them. They're only Rank 1," sniffed Appoline. Lily nodded and began to move on, simply leaving the corpse where it was as they continued to make their way through the mist.

It wasn't too long before they managed to find something interesting. It looked like the ruins of a house that had been here at one point. It also notably, contained a portal in what might have been the backyard. That was harder to tell as it was mostly the stone walls and foundation that survived but any indication of where the front or the back of the house had once been was lost. So perhaps the portal was in the front yard.

That was all academic though, as it didn't really matter. No, it was something Lily was thinking about to distract herself from the absolutely titanic snake that apparently decided the portal was an egg or something. Lily didn't even know how many metres long the damned thing was, but wrapped up as it was, each coil stood almost as tall as Lily herself IN HUMAN FORM.

The only reason they could even see the portal was the cracks in the air around the snake, the portal itself was almost entirely covered with only a tiny bit peaking up over the top. The snake had muddy coloured scales that were perhaps meant to help keep it hidden amongst the dirt or something… but when you're larger then a semi-truck then what's even the point? Lily swiftly found her enthusiasm for testing out that portal dropping.

"Do… do we even want to try that?" asked Lily hesitantly. "We don't NEED to go anywhere…"

"Hmm… I wonder if I can poison it," mumbled Appoline.

Lily bit her lip. She… ultimately wasn't Kat. It was a stupid question. It was a silly idea. It was risky, and really not something they should be trying… but Lily wouldn't deny that she too, was curious if it could be done. "Alright… what would we need to do?"

Appoline turned to her with a grin that Lily couldn't quite match in intensity. Before they could get into it though, Wiggles made an indignant squeak and looked away. "Um… are you saying don't?" asked Lily after a few seconds. Wiggles nodded. "Why not? We want to go through the portal, snake is in the way, this seems like a safe way to get rid of the snake."

Wiggles gestured off into the distance, indicating that there were probably other portals… before letting his head and ears hang low as if he knew it wasn't going to convince the pair of them. Another little noise that sounded like a sigh.

"Look," Lily said firmly. "If it sounds too dangerous we won't, and in fact, if you're really worried we can make sure that you're quite far away from the snake before we actually do anything and then if it's just us getting hurt, you'll still be fine." Wiggles shook his head. "Really? You're willing to help even though you think it's a bad idea and we're sort of enemies?"

Wiggles nodded firmly and Lily reached down to pat him on the head… before pausing, but Wiggles noticed this and moved closer. "You're a very good rabbit aren't you. Thanks for this… though if you could talk I'd probably ask why you weren't in a hurry to get back to Souris considering you're meant to be helping her."

Wiggles placed a paw over his nose. "Wait what? She's stinky? Hahahaha, there's no way…" laughed Lily.