Sophia got bored from their travels again because there was nothing out of the ordinary that excited her. Asking the wolves for help, Aura told them that there was a desert not too far away, and the blonde immediately took a liking to that idea. Steph and Chloe weren't that into it at first, because both prefer the cold, but after remembering they could stay in the domain during the day and explore it during the night when it's cold, they also got excited. While they were at it, the group also decided on a rough route to get closer to their goal of going to the demon continent.
“By the way, are there any cities or villages in the desert, or is it just a big box of sand?" A few days had passed since the group had nailed down their itinerary, and Sophia got curious about that part as they were traveling through another forest after her portal stone had landed in it. Having decided to explore it for a few minutes before continuing, the blonde then looked at Anna and Ari as well as Fen and Aura, hoping one of them would know the answer.
“Hmm.” The princess tilted her head. “I know that there are desert villages. Bigger ones, too, but I can’t quite remember if there’s one in this desert.”
“Yes.” The jaguar nodded. “Skipping from place to place and generally zooming around has dealt a blow to the confidence of my geography knowledge. I'm not sure if the place we're headed to has inhabitants or not."
“It’s been a few centuries since the last time I visited that desert, so it’s questionable whether my input is of any value.” Fen didn’t think it would still be relevant after all those years.
“True.” Aura nodded. “There was an oasis with a small village right in the middle of the desert, but after all this time, it might be gone entirely or has grown into a full-fledged city.”
“Only one way to find out!” As Steph loved a good mystery, Steph got excited over this.
“We have to cross a desert to maybe find it, though.” Chloe wasn’t quite as enthusiastic, though.
“Don't worry! Again, the two of us will have our very own night date in the desert! Once the sun comes up, we leave the place to our cats!”
“Right!” The fox cheered up again. “Oh, speaking about hot!” She then looked at Sophia.
“Hey!” The blonde raised her voice. “You’re dating my sister! Thanks, though~.”
“You are quite attractive, true, but I wasn't talking about you. I wanted to talk with you.” Chloe rolled her eyes in return.
“Ehehe~.” Sophia had to smile at that. “What’s up?”
“The everlasting inferno Ari created with Aura’s help. What are you going to do about the byproducts?"
“I helped Aura!” The jaguar glared at her.
“Byproducts?” The short tiger tilted her head. “What do you mean?”
“Smoke and ash, for example.” She added a little more detail to her question. “A constantly burning forest must produce a lot of both, right?"
“Ahh!” Sophia finally understood what she meant. “Yeah, there’s a lot of that! Literal mountains of ash are forming around the forest. It's quite pretty, actually. It almost looks like it’s snowing constantly. Only that the ash is more grey than white, and it’s less deadly.”
“How is ash less deadly than snow?!” Chloe got loud. “Ash and smoke literally kill you when you breathe in too much of it!"
“I’m quite weak to snow, so I take my chances with that.” Sophia smiled at her.
“You’re insufferable.” She had no other words. “Anyway, if it’s constantly burning and thus constantly creating ash, isn’t that going to be a problem eventually?”
“It could be?” She tilted her head. “Although, the next biome that is currently being worked on is multiple thousands of kilometers away. Also, while the fire is creating a massive updraft that is carrying the ash away, once it gets far enough away, there’s absolutely zero wind because it’s just my empty domain. It can’t really travel all that far because of that. It will probably just keep piling up around the forest and create a massive mountain range of ash sooner or later. I mean, it will still spread by collapsing into each other, but I feel like it would be a century or two before becoming a problem. Before that happens, I'm sure someone other than me comes up with a suggestion on what to do with an ash biome.”
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
“I already have like seven ideas!” Aura sounded a little excited.
“See?” The blonde gave Chloe a smug smirk.
“Fair enough.” The fox nodded along.
“Are you sure about that, though, sis?” Steph looked at her with a questioning expression. “If the fire is constantly burning, it’s also constantly generating heat. That will spread and continue to heat up the surroundings of the forest. It will slow down considerably the further it gets away from it, but it’s energy, and it doesn’t suddenly stop at a certain distance and disappear. The difference in temperature could be enough to create low- and high-pressure zones that generate wind. Ari might’ve actually taken the first step in introducing a weather system into your domain.”
“Why are you overtaking me in my own domain?!” The blonde stared at the jaguar.
“How about you try a little harder?” Having had enough of that topic, Ari stared back at her.
“Well, Anna and I created a sky over our savannah biome, so it’s not like I’m slacking, okay?”
“You have?!” As this was news to the others, they got loud.
"Yeah." She nodded. "Okay, it's a fake sky. We basically just painted the ceiling blue with magic, but it looks great!"
“It really does!” Anna agreed with her. “So much easier on the eyes, too.”
“I can imagine!” Chloe had the strongest reaction. “How does that work? The cozy winter holiday retreat of Fenfen and I is about to be finished with the general design, but the all-white sky is ruining it! We need an eternal night sky with stars! A fake one would be perfectly fine with me for now!”
“Anything that doesn’t sear my eyes when looking up is greatly appreciated.” The wolf in question felt similarly.
“Three weeks’ worth of magic. Anna dumped all of her magic into the area once she had recovered, and I kept pouring mine into it day in and out for those three weeks. That’s the reason I had attached the portal to my tail during our travels. When sleeping in the cottage, I actually had the tip of my tail sticking into the regular world to keep going when asleep.”
“Wow!" Chloe seemed impressed. "Wait a moment!” She then raised her voice. “I’ve been doing the same ever since you taught me the portal trick inside my tail to transfer magic. I’ve been using some of it to create more snow and trees, but most is still unused in our valley! My magic regeneration also is faster than yours, so I might’ve enough to do so already!”
“Mhmm, it’s hard to tell how much you really need because Anna and I didn’t do it all at once. Your plan could also need more magic because we only created a blue sky. If you want it to be night, you have to block out all the light from my domain. Having stars could also make things more complicated.”
“It’s definitely worth a try!” The fox wasn’t going to stop just because of that.
“Absolutely!” Sophia nodded.
“Also, I actually have to get rid of the ambient magic in the valley.” Chloe awkwardly scratched her cheek. “It has become so much that I can barely see anything anymore. Just pink and purple particles everywhere!”
“It’s quite distracting, isn’t it?” The blonde had also run into that issue before.
“Very!” She nodded. “Fenfen, should we give it a try later?”
“I wouldn’t mind.” The wolf in question seemed okay with the plan. “The place for the log cabin is still snow-free, right?”
“Yes, you can go there without any issue.” The fox lightly rolled her eyes.
“You should totally do that around the cottage, too!” Maya looked at Chloe. “The night sky, I mean! The jungle canopy blocks most of the glaring light, but it’s still kinda bright through the trees. As we go there mostly in the evening to sleep, it always feels a little weird having to close the curtains really tightly to make it dark enough in our rooms.”
“True!” Most of them agreed with her.
“I think we could come up with an easier solution for the cottage, now that I think about it.” Sophia was the one who answered her. “Thanks to the jungle having grown even over the cottage, we don’t actually see the sky or the lack of it. It’s just the ceiling of my domain shining through. It would probably work just fine if I simply made a platform out of something right above the jungle trees near the cottage to block out the remaining light. That’s just a few minutes of work rather than some weeks.”
“If it’s that easy, why haven’t you done that months ago?!” The cat-girl got a little upset with her.
“I might’ve not thought about it before.” Sophia had nothing to say in her defense. “I’ll get right to it once we’re done here for the day.”
“Thank you!” She smiled at her.
“Speaking of, should we try to get out of here?” The blonde gestured at the forest all around them, which they had been traveling through all the time while having their chat.
“Sure.” The others also had enough of it.
Afterward, the group picked up their pace to get out of the forest and into yet another green plain. From there, Sophia took another of her portal stones and threw it south-east from them with quite a bit of force so they could skip another part of their travels.