D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad - Chapter 1886 Suddenly, a Spine

Chapter 1886: Chapter 1886 Suddenly, a Spine

— Lily —

Hedera started to shift and Lily pulled her attention away from Kat’s walk around the woods. She still had half a mind focusing on it, she just wasn’t directly connected to Kat’s eyes anymore. Lily watched for a few moments as Hedera yawned and sat up before glancing around a bit until her eyes landed on Lily. Seeing this, Lily transformed, and waved “Good morning,”

“Wait you’re real?!” hissed Hedera.

“Ok first off…” Lily started to raise her voice before pausing and glancing over at Weaver. “First off we should move outside, wouldn’t want to wake our host,” Hedera noticed where Lily was nodding and agreed. Lily moved off the spot she’d commandeered on the table while Hedera managed to get out of the hammock without falling over. How she managed to wake up without issue was more of a mystery so Lily didn’t say anything.

Just as they were opening the door a bunch of threads caught them, wrapping them up lightly and then pulling them back inside. Lily was panicking slightly at this and got ready to transform… only for the door to be shut by a second set of threads and the original to let them go as Weaver mumbled something incomprehensible in her sleep.

“Um…” Lily glanced over at Weaver.

“I guess she’s lonely?” offered Hedera uncertain. “She seems to still be asleep… so can we get back to you being real?”

Lily massaged the side of her head. “You think I’m… not real?”

“Look, yesterday was a blur of stress and heart palpitations. I can hardly believe I got such a good deal in the team-up and Weaver was nice to talk to. The fact that a beastkin willingly slaved themselves to a demon wasn’t something I cared to think about much,” said Hedera.

“Excuse me?” growled Lily.

“What? Is that not what this is?” asked Hedera.

“It’s a familiar bond you idiot,” hissed Lily.

“Yeah… and that’s hardly normal. I didn’t even know that beastkin could be bound like that. Though… what did she catch you out or something? You enjoy being a pet?” asked Hedera.

Lily wanted to be angry. Well, she WAS angry but Hedera just seemed… genuinely curious. She also had gained a spine somewhere between now and yesterday. Lily was fighting with her desire to claw out the elf’s throat for even suggesting such a thing or answering properly because she didn’t seem to mean anything bad by it.

Lily sucked in a deep breath before letting it go. “Ok, so… you’re lucky Kat isn’t here because she would’ve been quite mad at you. I’m quite mad at you… but I can see that somehow you didn’t mean anything by it.

“So… to avoid giving my entire backstory? I have major abandonment issues and I’ve been in love with Kat for years so… magically binding is together was a great way to solve that problem. The fact she actually likes me romantically has been a great bonus, especially as she’s asexual so there was a chance I just got friendzoned for all eternity… but still it would’ve been worth it,” explained Lily.

Hedera raised an eyebrow. “Really? Binding yourself to someone else for that? I mean… seems like it’s a bit much,” fr eewe(b)nove.l.co\m

Lily retracted the claws she’d just realised that she’d manifested on her hands. “Look… I don’t want to get too into my backstory. I don’t feel all that inclined to share my heart with you after those questions but… to give you some context? My original best friend and first crush obliterated my socially and emotionally after I asked her out. Basically ran me out of town.

“When I got to a new school I was clearly… bulliable or something because I attracted the attention of the popular girls in school. Kat defended me from them for years and of course I fell in love with her. I was too worried about a similar situation to let that show… and well things came to a head later and I had the choice to get a new body. I chose Memphis beastkin specifically because they need a familiar bond with a demon to be stable… and that’s how we ended up here.”

“Wait… so why pick that if you were going to be forcefully bound to Kat the entire time? It sounds like you had options?” asked Hedera.

Lily was close to screaming. Only the fact Weaver was still asleep nearby let her bite back her first response. “Hedera… the bond WAS THE POINT,”

“Yeah but…” Hedera glanced around awkwardly for a few moments. “If Kat wasn’t supportive or eventually turned on you wouldn’t… well wouldn’t you be stuck together forever with no way to change that?”

Lily let out a long sigh. “I didn’t say I was totally thinking it through at the time and we did have this big heart to heart about things before the final decision was made… but honestly, Kat perfectly matches my preferences on a physical side in every way, and in the rare few instances that isn’t the case… they probably are now. I don’t remember a time when she wasn’t ’perfect’ but that’s honestly ridiculous. Not only did she get a makeover transforming into a demon but nobody’s perfect. I know that…

“But I was a bit of a disaster afterwards. I just… I don’t know how to properly explain to you just how amazing it was for Kat to rescue me. Not once or twice from various physical things but mentally and… sort of socially? The last one neither of us are that good at but… yeah I just struggle to find the words for it.

“It’s… well it’s probably co-dependency to an extreme an unhealthy degree in normal individuals but considering we’re magically bound together we’ve… ’fixed’ that issue in an unconventional way,” Lily shook her head. “Look I’m happy to extol my girlfriend’s virtues for as long as you want…

“But the main point I was trying to make is that it was the best choice I could make in the moment and I didn’t want to believe it would backfire horribly on me. I was right, and I technically learnt that before the decision was made… but even that was more because I didn’t want to make Kat uncomfortable and I was pretty sure she’d find out once we DID have that bond so…” Lily shrugged. “I don’t know what else to tell you,”

“Ha, ha,” Hedera ’laughed’ awkwardly as she poked at her ear with a finger. “Yeah I’ve woken up a bit now so I realise that I was really poking the bear with that question… but I guess… I just can’t really understand it? I mean, I’ve met attractive people, and I’m bisexual so like… a LOT of attractive people but I’ve never once ever considered binding myself to someone like that.

“It… I guess it just seems so contrary to what I want to do with my life? Or maybe it’s my upbringing as an elf? We’re taught that most of the other races don’t put in enough effort to live forever like we do. Which… a bit snobbish considering we don’t NEED to put in that effort but that’s something I only recognised later in life,”

“You do realise that was one of my considerations right?” asked Lily. “The familiar bond means I’ll only die when Kat does and her regeneration means she’s got a lot more time to reach the ’turning point’ where she just IS immortal than other demons. We might already be at that point honestly,”

“Right… but if she dies so do you right?” asked Hedera.

Lily shrugged. “I think so but I don’t consider that a problem,”

Hedera shook her head. “Yeah I can’t… I just can’t imagine living like that. Having my life in someone else’s hands quite so literally or having my immortality contingent on something like that,”

Lily raised an eyebrow. “Kat is a demon with absurd regeneration. There are plenty of things in place to keep her alive and immortality is probably going to be a side effect. If something CAN kill Kat I have much bigger worries if I somehow managed to survive… and I probably wouldn’t,”

“That’s not the point,” Hedera stated firmly. “It’s just the whole setup. Even if it’s unlikely there’s still a chance right?”

Lily shrugged. “Sure but there’s a much higher chance that something happens to me, and from what our doctor has said it’s likely my soul would stick around long enough to be revived through the connection so… only upsides for me I think,”

Hedera winced. “I just can’t… I can’t wrap my head around something like that. Maybe it’ll change when I find somebody I truly love but… it just seems wrong to me on a fundamental level. Sorry that I was rude earlier… and that I’m maybe being rude again but I just… don’t get it.”

*Honestly… that’s kind of said.* “Well… I guess I don’t understand you either. A world without Kat isn’t a world I’d want to live in and she’s given me the chance at and endless life together. Something I treasure deeply. For me, it’s only been upsides,” stated Lily firmly.