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Title: Of Cats and Magic
Chapter: 10
Author: Riko Gonzalez
The colossal, inflated, plant-like thing loomed before the two magical girls,
its razor sharp thorns glistening in the afternoon light. Then it happened. The
multitude of thorns exploded outward, rocketing through the air, threatening to
turn anything in the immediate area into a pincushion.
Thanks to her previous attack, Ruko was able to exploit the previously shattered
thorns to jump into a safe zone. As for Riko, she quickly ducked behind a
conveniently placed upturned car. Guess it was a good thing that there were so
many upturned cars littering the place.
Riko peaked out from behind the car, glancing at the plant-like monstrosity. It
was just as puffed up as before. However, now it lacked its thorns. Instead, it
was covered in many holes, each hole where a thorn used to be, a putrid green
sap leaking from the holes. If anything, the sap made the thing smell even
worse.
The next moment, a sickening, tearing sound filled the air as the top of the
plant-like creature split into two flaps. A thick, green tendril reached out,
twisting about as if it was sampling the air. The next instant, it locked its
attention on the blonde, whipping towards Ruko. The lithe catgirl sidestepped
the appendage, but that turned out to not be enough. Capitalizing on the
distraction caused by the first tendril, a second swiftly extended from within
the beast, successfully wrapping around Ruko''s waist.
"Oh no you don''t!" Riko remarked defiantly, summoning her staff. Lining up the
shot, she fired a bolt of flame at the offending tendril. The fire sliced
through the thick appendage, freeing her ally.
"Hey! Nothing burst into flame this time! I think I''m finally getting the hang
of this!"
The pink-eyed magical girl stared at the plant-like monster for a moment as
something occurred to her.
"Actually, it would have been useful it that thing had burst into flame. Wonder
if I can one-shot it?"
Riko began lining up her next shot, but she quickly found her action interrupted
by a scream --- the beast''s scream to be exact. Dispelling her staff, she
clasped her hands over her ears --- or tried to at least. As a catgirl, she had
four ears --- two human and two cat-like. The problem was she only had two
hands, so her attempt was awkward to say the least.A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
***
"Why did that thing have to be so smelly?" Flash Fire asked to herself as she
watched the ongoing battle. Sure, she had planted that thing''s seed, but she had
no idea that it would smell like that.
The redheaded assassin sat atop a damaged building, cracks running up along the
sides of said building. She had a good vantage point for the fight playing out
before her. Even from this distance, the scent of that thing was outright
nauseating, though.
However, she couldn''t help but smirk at the sight before her. In essence, she
found the current scene outright hilarious. The monster was currently screaming.
At her distance, it was no big deal. Up close, though, it appeared to be
outright earsplitting. The cyan-haired catgirl was frantically trying and
failing to cover all her ears with her hands. Strangely, the blonde catgirl
maintained a stoic demeanor, unfazed by the sonic assault. Still, the
cyan-haired one''s reaction was priceless. If anything, it so made putting up
with that monstrosity''s disgusting scent worth it.
***
The ground quaked beneath their feet. The two magical girls took defensive
action as a forest of vines exploded upward. Each of these vines were easily
thicker than the torso of the average human adult. As the colossal structures
reached upwards, they began to bend towards the gigantic growth at the center of
the forest.
Riko and Ruko had both been forced back quite a bit by the unexpected event. The
individual vines were no more. Instead, they had wrapped around the bulbous,
green growth that the two magical girls had been fighting. Now, before them, was
an enormous cocoon of vines.
Riko summoned back her staff, pointing it at the creature before unleashing a
powerful attack of flame. A flash of light later, the monstrous cocoon was fully
engulfed in fire. It wasn''t enough, though. In the wake of the inferno, the
beast was left little more than singed. The cocoon''s defensive prowess was quite
formidable.
One by one, giant eyes opened along the surface of the cocoon, the many eyes
turning their attention to the pink-eyed catgirl. Riko shrunk back, disturbed by
the sight. The beast was clearly watching her, likely due to her last attack.
Although her attack obviously wasn''t enough to beat it, it did appear to have
been enough to draw the thing''s attention. Wait, what were those things along
the cocoon''s surface?
A multitude of pods had begun to swell along the creature''s vine-composed shell.
At first, they were the size of marbles, but they swiftly enlarged in size.
Moments later, they were large enough to house people. In turn, each exploded
open, each releasing a giant, wasp-like insect. The coloration of the insects
was orange and black, each insect possessing a stinger that was easily a foot
long.
As the horde of insectoid creatures gathered, Ruko took on a combat stance,
preparing herself for the inevitable clash that was quite clearly about to
occur. Following Ruko''s lead, Riko readied herself as well.
The numbers of the airborne beasts continued to rise as more of the wasps were
birthed from the tangle of vines. Finally, the number of the creatures
stabilized at one hundred. That''s right. Before the two catgirls was an army of
angry wasps waiting to rush the two.
A drop of sweat rolled down Riko''s temple at the sight. She didn''t much like the
thought of being swarmed by a bunch of enraged wasps. Of course, these weren''t
regular wasps. These things were comparable to her in size. That made the
thought of them swarming her even more undesirable.
As for Ruko, she was quite clearly undaunted by the army before her. She coolly
waited, studying the beasts, standing ready to fight them.