Seth's Notebook

Alesha shifted, quickly realizing as she woke that something was very uncomfortable. Namely, her face, flat on the floor. As she moved, head muddled and throbbing, dozens of sensations fought for her attention. The scent of slightly damp stone. The sticky sensation of sweat, which had fused her clothing to her body. Crackling vines which crumbled to dust and cascaded around her as she moved, caking her in their powdery residue. The sight of her too-detailed surroundings, the pores and grains of the stone bricks clearer in her eyes than they'd ever been. Distant whispers and mutters overlapped each other as they gossiped. She caught only bits and pieces of their conversations.

"One of the instructors…" ""...split personality?" "My pencil is broken" "First time in over 20 years!" "... special examination" "It's just a rumor!" "Yuppiter should have won, he's way more skilled than…" "Are you serious?" "I'm really going to retire after this…"

Alesha grit her teeth and rolled onto her left side, taking the pressure off her front and covering her ears. As she did, she dimly noticed a few other confusing sensations. Something thumped against her calves during the partial roll, startling her, so she jerked, yet that same something stretched to balance her as she did so. Something else lightly brushed against her legs through her jeans but that sensation was too subtle to pay attention to at the moment. What took mental precedence over that was the uncomfortable position of… a new pair of arms? They were stuck, cramped and folded against her back. Her shirt was too tight and the arms too weak to make a difference as they tried to stretch in order to release their tension. 

Her mind still distant (otherwise she would probably be panicking about her new arms), Alesha absentmindedly grabbed at the back of her shirt with her right hand, instinctively transforming her fingers into claws. This action tore her shirt. Continuing as if half-asleep, she grabbed at the rest of the shirt and tore it free.

Seth, who was watching from above, blushed slightly but didn't move to look away or cover his eyes. He was far too fascinated with her physical changes to care about anything else at the moment.

He had initially been quietly disappointed with his summoned demon. At first, she had appeared almost entirely human, except for her eyes. Yet, the more he had learned about her, the more fascinated he had become. Her ties to the powers of Chaos, her strange "pink panther" form, and now this? Demonic "evolution?" For a fantastical beasts enthusiast such as himself, his summoned demon was simply a dream come true. Never in all his wildest dreams had he imagined he'd be able to come across such a unique specimen while still a student at the Academy! 

After ensuring Alesha wasn't paying him any attention, he took out a notebook he'd been secretly keeping. He'd entitled it, "Seth Kayson's First Demon Summon: Study Log." The title was, perhaps, somewhat lackluster, but as a scholar, he refused to name it anything inaccurate. Until he knew for sure what kind of demon his summon was, he wouldn't dare to name the journal after it. 

He opened the journal's pages and released the book, leaving it to hover amidst swirling patterns of greenish light. His right hand lifted in a purposeful gesture and held still. As this happened, words began appearing on the pages, recorded (and edited) as he willed them onto the paper. This particular method of writing was his favorite, since it was the easiest method to transcribe one's observations in a thorough and clear manner. The words wouldn't be obscured behind bad handwriting (unless the caster was woefully inept at magic), and any mistakes could be easily fixed. 

He took note of each and every physical change that he noticed, recording this in his notebook:

"After approximately 7 hours and 21 minutes (regrettably, I missed the precise moment Alesha's evolution began), the lightshow of her evolution stopped. The surroundings -- or rather, my perception of them -- returned to normal, all distortions lifted. Shortly afterwards, the once-pulsating network of rootlike structures (which had made up the demon's evolutionary cocoon) quickly shriveled up and dried. Not 10 seconds later, Alesha began to move...

"After carefully maneuvering the Observer's Eye all around the demon Alesha, the physical changes I could perceive are as follows:

- Snakelike scales have appeared in several locations on her body. Sky-blue scales scattered around her eyes, purple scales on the backs of her hands, pale yellow ones along her forearms.

- Black, inverted triangles appeared beneath her eyes, on her upper cheeks; one triangle per cheek. This pattern disregards the barrier of skin and scales, appearing unbroken unlike in other species with patterned scales.

- Twin red feathers coming from her temples, extending almost ⅔ of a meter in length.

- Small, delicate, likely useless wings. When folded, they (uncomfortably) fit within Alesha's shirt. Their dorsal side is purple with hollow black triangle patterns, while the ventral side has a pale yellow -> sky blue gradient pattern. Curiously, these wings appear to lack any skeletal structure and may instead be supported solely by cartilage and magic, despite being similar to a bat's wing in appearance. Further investigation is required.

- Alesha has also grown a nearly 1.5-meter-long tail, with alternating sky blue and purple and black stripes; favoring thick blue stripes towards the base, purple ones towards the end and ending with a black tip. The tail has two short red feathers by the base. The vanes of these feathers do not start until halfway down the shaft. The tail has an additional four red feathers, which start about ⅔ down the tail and extend past the tip of the tail.

- I am uncertain as to whether this was present before, but Alesha has a tattoo on her back which seems reminiscent of her new physical changes, although stylized and proportionally incorrect. I will ask her about this later.

"Having observed the wonders of her evolution as intently as I could, I am even more uncertain as to what kind of demon Alesha might be; and the thought of that leaves me more excited than ever. What are you, Alesha? And what secrets can I discover about demons by studying you? I wish I could study you forever."

Seth closed the notebook, dispelling the greenish magic and putting the book in his satchel with a satisfied glint in his eye. Alesha had fallen back asleep while he recorded his observations of her. Was evolution tiring? Did the process consume large quantities of energy, thereby necessitating sleep even though she spent the process unconscious? The question made his fingers twitch and he almost got the journal out again. 

Shaking his head, he activated the magic that would summon a ladder down into the testing area. Before anyone else noticed she was awake and came to question her, he wanted to cover her up; a demon as shy as she was would certainly not wish to be seen half-naked, even if she had disrobed by accident.

He took his outermost robe off and draped it over her, then crouched by her head and placed a hand on her shoulder, shaking gently and wondering how she would react to all the changes.

For a demon who was convinced she was human, this was going to be a lot to take in.