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

— Kat —

“How is that wood chopping going?” asked Lily.

Kat brushed off her hands and looked over her work. The fallen trees had all been broken up into planks. Most of them anyway. “Eh… it’s going alright. I’m trying to work out how large an area I want to cover and if I want to add in a floor or not. As for the specifics well…” Kat glanced over at a tree that had been reduced to splinters.

“It turns out that even with super strength? You can still have your knife catch on things and cause issues,”

“What do you mean?” asked Lily.

“Did you not hear the crash earlier?” asked Kat.

Lily shrugged, “I mean I did but I just assumed you’d knocked over a few more trees,”

“Oh… well no I didn’t. See… I cut the first tree with my fans but that turned out to be a terrible idea. The blades aren’t level leaving a large number of bumps in the plank… and that’s on top of them getting caught regularly. So I swapped over to this sword I have had in my ring. It’s not as strong as my fans, at least I don’t think it is… but it’s pretty good.

“The problem is that you can still get it caught on things. I’m not trying to peel away layers of bark or like… skin a fruit. I’m trying to chop through wood and if you apply pressure in the wrong way but in sufficient amounts? It sort of just shatters. I don’t know why… but it just does. So I have to go about it pretty slowly.

I can still chop a lot more than a normal person but unless I find a particularly good tree I have to chop into it carefully,” explained Kat.

“At least you’ve made some progress. I’m still not feeling any sort of space mana and my attempts to connect to the mist have fallen flat. I can move it with my shadows, but that’s definitely cheating,” explained Lily.

Kat shrugged, “Perhaps it is missing the point a bit. Now, floor or no floor?”

“How long do you think it’s going to take you to build? Because I’m fine either way, we’re sleeping in the tent. If you want to make more work for yourself that’s fine I’m not going to stop you… but it’s best to work it out now I’d say,” answered Lily.

“Hmm… I think I’ll make it so that I CAN add a floor but that it’s not necessary. The floor can be a problem for tomorrows me, or whenever it is I actually get around to making it. I’m… not quite sure how many planks I need. I’m thinking of making the whole thing roughly two wingspans long. Though perhaps I need to add an extra support in the middle? One moment,” said Kat.

Kat went over to one of the planks she had cut up and tried bending it. It flexed with the pressure she applied… but it was very hard to tell how much that was. Kat clicked her tongue and dropped that piece, it was one of the better ones by chance. Instead she picked up one of the earlier attempts that weren’t all that nice to look at.

Kat started to bend it in her hands and just kept going, waiting for any sign of strain from her muscles. She could hear the creaking and groaning of the wood and Kat closed her eyes while walking away from Lily until, CRACK.

“Hmm… that told me a whole lot of nothing,” grumbled Kat.

“What was the point there?” asked Lily. “It was rather loud and now you’ve got woodchips all over you,”

Kat brushed off said woodchips as she explained, “Well I wanted to know how tough the wooden planks I’d just cut up were. Get an idea of what sort of force they can take and how likely they are to bend in the middle… but I don’t have any good reference for my strength. I was able to snap that plank without trying… but does that mean it’s weak?

I wasn’t using ‘human’ levels of strength and that seems to be the setting, either ‘safe for children’ or ‘super strong’ with no middle ground. Still.”

“Do you think that’s actually what it’s for?” asked Lily.

“What what’s for?” asked Kat.

“For kids? Like… demons, and maybe other species, all developed a sort of ‘child friendly’ mode. I can easily imagine that being a great evolutionary adaptation. I mean… accidentally killing your children because you sneezed or twitched wrong while holding one is… pretty grisly and not at all ideal,” explained Lily.

“Huh… I mean… maybe? Though it makes me wonder if different species have different levels of ‘kid friendly’ because surely human babies, succubus babies and say… golem babies all have different thresholds for what can hurt them,” said Kat.

“Hmm… no idea and it’s really not something I’d want to test,” said Lily.

“Why not? Just have two people stick to ‘safe’ strength and then push against each other and see who is stronger?” offered Kat.

Lily shook her head, “That’s not how it works. Or… I don’t think it is? I imagine that weight would still play a factor, maybe how tall they are as well? It’s not something you can easily control the variables for,”

Kat just gave a shrug, “Fair enough. I’m going to get back to this hut,” Lily gave her girlfriend a quick kiss and then went back to practicing. It seemed she was wasting time with spatial magic so she was back to playing with shadows.

Kat on the other hand was gathering up all of the wood she’d chopped up and laying it longways to see how well it fit her ideas for the huts dimension. Kat had made planks out of the entire tree… which sounded nice but it meant that in actual fact she had a bunch of differently sized planks because not only were the trees different but they got smaller as you reached upwards to the canopy.

*Do I want to go for the same length as my larger pieces and just… glue them together? I think there’s some wood glue in the ring, or at least glue that can work as a substitute. Alternatively I could go for the smaller planks and try to base things around that? Just… they’re a fair bit smaller then I’d want really. There only about one and a half wingspans long if that.

Hmm… might need those support poles in the middle to join two separate planks of wood. Don’t love it… but I think I can accept it.*

With that decided Kat started on the outline of the hut’s roof. With her strength it was much easier to just plan and build it along the ground and then lift it into position after the support poles had been put up. Not that Kat had any of those right now, she’d been too focused on making planks apparently. With a nod of acceptance Kat got to laying things out.

It was simple just trim down the planks until they all lined up, sand them down a bit, especially around the edges and then move onto the next one. Kat knew she’d need a central pillar to join them all to but that could come later.

Kat glanced up at the sky, it was already starting to get dark. Granted with the mist that still meant it was only around four o’clock, perhaps three thirty… but that didn’t change the fact it was getting late. Lily would want to sleep before it got too late, especially after focusing all day. Which meant dinner would need to be done as well.

“I can make my own food Kat,” said Lily.

“Oh… I didn’t realise I’d sent anything your way,” answered Kart.

“Not in particularly, but I was paying attention and I could see where your thoughts were going. I mean, I love your cooking so if you want to cook I’m not going to stop you but your nowhere near done with the shelter and that was occupying your time,” said Lily.

“Well… it’s been an interesting challenge. I was mostly doing it for fun but it turns out it’s good for practicing with my increased strength. Um… I don’t mind cooking or stopping now the dark isn’t going to be a major concern. How hungry ARE you?” asked Kat.

“I had a snack not too long ago so I can wait for food. Though… you’re probably right about me wanting to head to bed early. It’s sweet that you noticed… but like, I AM part cat so like, if I get tired and fall asleep before you finish cooking you can just wake me up.

I might not be a morning person but I can go from ‘asleep’ to ‘awake’ pretty quickly if like, danger or food is on the table,” answered Lily.

Kat snickered at the mental image that generated, “Ok Lily, I’ll keep it in mind. I’ll look over what I’ve done and… think about it,”