Through the eyes of an impatient spider

Lyla lays atop a crudely formed steel pot, which in turn lays atop a lethargic dragon, who in turn lays half-submerged in a pool of boiling water. "I'm boooored..." She murmurs. "You and me both..." The dragon mumbles back. "He said it was a straight shot down, right? Even with how big this place they should be fast enough to get back here in less than a day!" "Maybe they're lost?" "Don't jinx it..." "Could be that all the tunnels are blocked." "Stop..." "Maybe they can't find anything?" "Noooo..." ""..."" "Maybe they're out buying milk?" "Guess they're never coming back then."

Through the eyes of an elated elf

"Gahahaha! And then! And then! They swiped my feet and sent me flying! It felt like I was spinning for days!" "Haahahaa! Glorious! Perhaps I should learn some of your master's teaching methods? Give my son some much needed tutelage when I return!" "Perhaps! Perhaps. Hmm... Why are we here again?" "Hoh... I think... Scales?" "Ah, yes. We wanted some of that divine beast's scales didn't we. Do you think these will do?" The elf scratches at the ground, lifting up a red palm-sized scale for Muscles to see. "It bears much lingering essence. I suspect this to be our target." "Great! With a few of these we can head back up then."

The elf takes a step back, the overwhelmig heat softening as he takes distance from the pool of boiling rock beside him. His eyes scan across the sharp obsidian walls and the torpid rivers of magma, searching for any signs of motion beyond the occasional flicker of tiny critters adapted to the extreme heat. "It feels hard to believe a dragon lives here, after all the times I've passed through." "Perhaps it only bears interest in other divine beasts?" "Could be... Or maybe we don't have enough Mana to interest it?" The pair set off with a shrug, retracing their steps towards the outer wall where they entered from. I hope we haven't kept them waiting. We may have lost track of time a bit...

Through the eyes of a summoner in the making

"Wanna help me prepare the summoning circle?" "I'm not that bored." "You sure? "..." "..." "Fuck it. Why not." "Great!" Aleph bolts up, letting the pot fly into the air, and the spider along with it. Darting over to a nice looking boulder, she flares her Aether, gripping the tough basalt and infusing her tail. Crack! With one swift motion she cleaves the boulder horizontally in half, leaving a near perfectly smooth surface for her to stand on. Okay! Step one is a circle. Doesn't really have to be a circle, but circles are cool! A visible river of Aether bubbles stream forth, condensing into a line and wrapping around to form a ring. Violet bubbles ooze from the ring, dancing around before dissipating into the air.

"This is looking ominous already... So what do you want me to do?" Aleph looks down, taking note of the unsettling liveliness of the bubbling circle surrounding a fairly sizeable, and probably menacing looking, dragon. "Point taken. And for now I need you to just wait. First I need to query this dimension's parameters, then you can help me decide on the circle configurations." "Wait... So is this like a choose your own demon adventure?" "You know what? Now that I think about it, it kinda is. Neat." "Okay, I'm in now. Parameter away! Actually... What even are 'dimensional parameters'?" Hmm... So first I need to grasp some demonic energy. There's actually quite a lot here, so that makes things easier.

The surrounding air turns violet, subtly shifting between darker and lighter hues as Aether wrestles control over demonic energy. Now I just stick it in the circle with intent, and... The ring comes to life, a vibrant spectrum consuming it before settling into a fixed pattern of light. "Neat. You made a rainbow. Does that mean this dimension is progressive?" "This is actually more akin to a written language. Each shift in colour represents a deviation from a standard default. You can actually tell this world is fairly new by the lack colours there are." "If by new you mean at least five-thousand years, then sure." "That's pretty new by demon society standards." "They have a whole society?!" "For someone with so much stigma against demons you sure know very little about them." "Hey. I don't need my hypocrisy called out like this. I'll have you know I was killed by a demon once!"

Makes sense. Now let's see... So demons are actually fairly restricted in this world due to the presence of angels? Has there been some kind of conflict since I last checked? And there's been a few addenda about Aether reducing in quantity, which stabilised a couple thousand years ago. I can't tell if that feels right or wrong, but it at least helps explain the lack of Aether here as something unnatural. What else... Ooh! Fridays are pizza days! What's a Friday though? And why isn't it translating? Oh well. As for the actual parameters that should be enough. The colours dissipate, settling the ring back down to its former violet hue. "Aww, I liked it better before..." "Well now we get to make the actual array."

"To start with, let's add the basics. We want to summon a demon..." Several more large rings form, a few overlapping and intersecting. "And we need our names... Is Lyla your true name?" "Uh... I'm pretty sure it is, but isn't giving your true name to a demon a bad thing? Can't they get eternal power over you or something?" "Worst case is that they can forcefully summon you. But the effort that would take is such that they would be better off sending an army after you instead." "Oh... Lyla's fine then." "I'll put placeholders for the other two then. I don't think either of us have ever asked their actual names..." Several symbols mark themselves around one of the rings, replacing the lines in some places, and wrapping around them in others. "And then a few other common things like where we are, what we're paying, and the type of contract to expect..." Runes and lines further complicate the array, saturating it in a seemingly chaotic mess of shapes.

"What do any of these even mean?" "A lot of them don't actually mean anything. It's moreso the intent infused into them that matters. For most of them I just picked random symbols from my memories I feel will give us a good first impression." Lyly peers at the mess of nonsense runes and symbols before pointing at a large one sat alone in a circle. "What about this? Looks important." "Hmm... Well I believe it's pronounced ta, but... No, there's more to it. A certain intent that I can't seem to read properly. Must be a memory I shouldn't remember." "I'm starting to have doubts again..."

Through the eyes of a serene monkey

"Haaah, bliss... I was unaware of the blessing of a warmed bath." "We call these hot springs. I once knew a great place up north with the most divine springs to bathe in. Maybe I'll take you there someday if they're still open. I'm good friends with the owners." "A place better than this? I can scarcely imagine..." The warrior of green stands from the spring, streams flowing down his body before being flung off by the flex of his muscles. "We should go now. The break was nice but we've kept the others waiting. Just one more floor to go. Would you mind?" "Of course." Gol Dhee follows suit, pulling the cascading waters from his body as he stands. Lifting the warrior over his shoulder he grips the air and leaps, swiftly pulling himself up the pillar wall as if swimming through the wind. Upon reaching the tunnel above he releases the warrior and they begin the final stretch of their return.

As they surface the layer they spot a glowing array of violet light surrounding a black dragon. "Oh! You're back!" The emissary yells from afar. "Finally! What were you doing down there?! Taking a bath?!" So smart! Have we been caught?! The pair share a glance, nodding together in a silent agreement to say absolutely nothing. "There were some delays. I'll tell you later. What's happening here?" A true master of diversion! I must learn his methods! "We're preparing the array in advance. What are your names by the way?" "I have taken the name Gol Dhee." "Huh... What a coincidence! And you?" Everyone turns to face the warrior who stands in deep contemplation, almost taming his fur with his furious combing. "Your name?" "Yes, yes. Let me think..." One can see the visible steam erupting from his head as his eyes narrow to a line in abyssally deep focus. Actually, that might just be lingering steam from the bath. "You have a name, right?" "I may have forgotten it." "Hey, don't worry about it. I forgot my true name too. I'll just put in an alias instead."

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A few symbols flicker within the circle before the entire array intensifies into a blinding light then fades into nothing. Left behind are grooves carved into the stone, matching the array formerly formed with light. "We can carve the rest out later. Did you get the stuff?" "We got the stuff. You got the pot?" "We got the... Where did I put them... Oh, there! Cool, let's get started. I'll leave you in charge of ambrosia brewing." The warrior nods, walking over to a pile of crude pots where he begins placing small samples of each ingredient and mixing them together. "First step is to freeze it solid. Lil' Blue, you're an expert caster right? Would you do the honours?" "Well I was going to complain, but when you put it like that..."

The bright one skitters to the pot, her essence pooling in front of her and forming a flame of ice. "Behold! Fire so hot it's actually cold!" That's possible?! "That's not possible..." It's not?! "You think I am bound by the mere mortal confines of the laws of physics? I'm an expert caster, fuck that!" So it is! Logic aside the pot does in fact freeze solid within a small inferno of white and blue fire, a cold mist emanating from the frozen metal as frost builds up within the grooves. As fast as it froze, the bright one collapses, her body bereft of essence. "Uuuugh... Worth it..." Was she simply showing off?

"Now we need to cook it. My master always described it as burning the ever loving shit out of it, so I think we just hit it with as much heat as we can until it's finished." "I can handle that part." The emissary declares, stepping up towards the pot and opening her maw wide. A small flicker of light forms within her mouth before bursting out into flames which coat the pot. "You're a fire dragon?" The warrior asks, seemingly perplexed. "No, but I'm really good with Aether." "I see why you took charge of this task." Gol Dhee remarks. "I can scarcely match the intensity of those flames with my own. It would seem my training is indeed lacking." "The best thing you can do with Mana is probably to get a wide array of perspectives. I don't use it myself but I know that it's heavily influenced by your understanding of yourself and the world." "Hoh..."

Gol Dhee sits in contemplation, her words ringing within his mind. Crack! "Ah... It broke." "That's fine, just keep going. The pot breaking was probably to be expected. I doubt my master wanted us to use a pot made of adamant." The mixture glows red, then white, the entire mixture melting into a puddle and even mixing with some of the floor. "Keep going?" "Keep going. I think..." The light grows more intense, the heat building up to a peak as even the bright one looks away. The entire group step back, the emissary grabbing the bright one as she retreats. "Is this supposed to happen?" "I think so. Either that, or we used too much bone powder." "What happens if you do that?" "Small-scale nuclear explosion." Everyone turns to glare at the warrior, the bright one mumbling incoherently from the dragon's mouth. "What? I said small scale. I'm sure it's fine."

The light grows, forming a bubble of pure white and saturating the cavern in a uniformly bright light before... Pop! The light vanishes, leaving behind a small puddle of liquid emitting luminant rays of spectral light. "See? Everything worked fine. Now we just need to put it in a vial before it evaporates." Swiftly dashing over, the emissary grips the liquid with her violet essence and pours it into four vials held out by the warrior. "Huh. I guess my opinions on proper vial size carry over. I was kind-of expecting it to only fill one of these tiny things." "Yea, Mana tends to make things weird like that. Guess this means we don't need this many extra pots."

The pots in question lay scattered around the nearby pool of boiling water, already weeping tears of rust in their abandonment. "I suppose not. Then that leaves us with just the summoning, right?" "Yep, we can finish off setting the parameters now. Goldy, could you hold Lyly for me?" Gol Dhee hesitantly takes hold of the sticky arachnid form the dragon's mouth. "Don't you dare complain." She chitters. "I shan't." Vocally... The group gather around the array, the emissary once again filling it with violet light.

"So how strong are we thinking?" "I'm saying this now. We are not summoning anything stronger than us. That's just asking for the 'enslaved by demons' ending. Or the 'end of the world' ending. Or the backstory to an evil demonic cult." "Fair enough. Fluffy, you're the strongest of us right now. What would you say your limit is?" "By what metric?" "Hmm... Could you destroy a city? Or a mountain? Or a planet?" "Barring outliers like powerful guardians, I think could take down a city, or maybe a small mountain if I really tried. Hard to say really, since I don't usually go out of my way to do that." "I'd put you at about... the lower bound of rank four then." "Not this trope..." "Hey, the demonic power ranking is actually quite practical you know. Does get a bit confusing because they measure demons differently though... Anyway, I'll put in a preference for rank three."

"Okay, next... Do we care about hair colour?" "Why would we care about hair colour? How specific is this?" "As specific as we want. So hair colour can be anything... Do we want hands?" "No, why does it matter?" "No hands then." "That's not what I..." "Oh right! Does anyone have any religious objections to demonic summoning rituals?" "You ask this now?!" "Well I know you aren't religious Lyly. I was moreso asking the others." "I know of the existence of gods. I don't worship though." "I do not know what a demon is. Are they... objectionable?" "Nope!" "Sufficient enough for me."

"Okay, last stretch. Temperament?" "Something interesting!" The warrior declares. "Someone warlike!" Gol Dhee asserts. "Can't we just have someone friendly?" The bright one pleads. "Weird but motivated, and wants friends. Got it. I think that's everything. The payment is pretty good so we can probably do a re-summon if need be." The emissary steps away from the array, the glow once again fading to reveal a far more intricate engraving, speckled with tremendously precise runes and patterns.

"Goldy, could you do me a favour?" Hoh? Has my time come? I have use in this operation? "Anything!" "We need to instil this thing with a ton of energy and mine doesn't exactly regenerate. I'll handle the intent, but can you fill it with your Mana?" "With pleasure!" He asserts, thumping his chest with confidence. The emissary nods and places one vial of ambrosia in the centre of the circle before stepping to the side and gesturing for Gol Dhee to begin.

Placing his palms to the earth, Gol Dhee pushes his essence forth, directing it to flow within the grooves of the array. A subtle gold glow begins to emanate from each rune, steadily covering the entire array in violet as the emissary instils her own energy over top.

After a short delay another will takes over the array, pushing away that of Gol Dhee and the emissary. Essence is absorbed into nothingness and replaced with a deep red substance, bereft of flaw. Not quite solid, not quite liquid. Not glowing or reflecting light, yet persisting with an unwavering vibrancy as it encompasses the array. As if the world had declared this point in space to simply be red, and nothing more. And then it explodes.

A wild tapestry of fire bursts forth from the array, prompting the group to step back and watch as a spiral of multi-coloured flames dances in front of them. The flames linger, never allowing the same colour to grace a single spot twice. Like the red substance before they seem to emit no light, no heat, only the intense song of roaring fire. And then as quickly as they appeared, the flames vanish, leaving behind gently flickering embers wrapped around a small figure.

Crystal skin wrapped in a silken dress, limbs narrowing into points like that of a doll, and quartz hair which seems to invert the light around it. Two horizontal lines on the figure's face widen into circles. Gleaming red eyes open themselves to the world.