Boosted Continuation

Sophia made a full recovery from her sudden and unexpected magic gain and urged everyone to continue their exploration of the monster country, as staying in bed for around a week had given her an incredible itch to move around. While exploring, she offered everyone a part of her newfound powers for a bit of a boost. Fen immediately jumped at the chance, and everyone else was grateful for it, as well.

"Is it just me, or is this place getting warmer again?" While they were walking through the barren and dry steppe, Steph started complaining again. “Still not a fan!”

“I agree.” Chloe nodded a few times. “This also isn’t helping the situation.” She then pointed up at the cloudless sky where the sun was burning right above them.

“So much complaining around here.” Sophia slowly shook her head. “That’s usually my job, so please stop that.”

“Then stop the sun from being so hot!” Steph only raised her voice. “The only thing I accept being hot are girls!”

“If you can handle all of us, the sun should be cooling you down instead.” Maya smirked at her. “Or, are you implying that Chloe and the rest of us aren’t at least as hot as the sun?”

“This and that are different!” The dog-girl didn’t take the bait. “You aren’t getting me with that.”

“Just use some magic to make the air around you cooler.” The blonde rolled her eyes.

“I’m already doing it for the two of us.” Chloe smiled at her. “The burning sun above makes you feel hot no matter, though.”

“What she said!”

“So fussy…” Completely ignoring that she’s the exact same when it gets cold, Sophia closed her eyes for a moment. Then, a small white cloud suddenly formed a few meters above her sister and the fox, providing them with some shade. That wasn't all, though, as snowflakes began to fall on them immediately after. "Here, your personal snow cloud. I hope that helps."

"Woah!" The two had the same reaction after they noticed the sudden shade and the snow slowly landing on them. “THANK YOU!”

“You really are something else." Ari was also amazed by it. So amazed that she changed her position in the group as they were walking, so she got as far away from the cloud as she could. She wasn’t going to have any of that, after all.

“You can create clouds and snow just like that?!” The princess raised her voice. “That would totally mean you can create a sky for the biomes now, right?!”

"A small cloud like this doesn’t take any effort whatsoever.” The blonde just shrugged. “You could easily do it, too. The issue is with keeping it going when I’m not actively supplying it with magic. I need to find a way to make it self-sufficient. Although, now that I think about it, hmm… I think I have to do some experimenting soon to test some things.”

“Please let me help with whatever you just thought of!" Anna's eyes started sparkling. “I’ll do everything to get some clouds on our savanna as it’ll likely lead to a working sky!”

“I like the motivation~.” Sophia gave her a thumbs-up. “I probably need to do some stuff alone at first, but once I figure out some things, you can definitely tag along with the testing. You often have some very interesting and good ideas." As she likely planned to have a talk with Blu, Lime, and the remaining magic particles, she couldn’t take her with her from the get-go.

“Thank you!” That was more than good enough for her.

Once that was taken care of, the group finally focused on exploring again and started walking. Steph and Chloe were quite pleased that Sophia's cloud was following their every step, too.

----------------

“Things are slowly starting to turn into a desert, huh?” The group kept walking across the dry plain for most of the day when Sophia eventually noticed that the prickly bushes were slowly disappearing, along with the remains of grass and other plants. Not only that, but the ground below them got more and more sandy with each passing hour. Soon enough, there was only orange sand all around the group.

"Not again!" Chloe and Steph weren't fans and made absolutely sure to stay under their snow cloud.

“Let’s go!” Maya, on the other hand, got rather excited about the sight. Her kinship to the sand cats, which she was sure was hidden somewhere in her lineage, flared up again.

“Most of the middle layer of the monster country is desert, yes.” Aura nodded a few times while looking around. “Most of this side of the monster country’s middle layer is a desert, so this will be our view for the next week or so.”

"A week of nothing but desert?!” Steph didn’t like the sound of that. Not even a little. “You better make sure that this cloud never leaves us, sis!” She pointed above her before looking at the blonde.

“It would be a disaster if it were to disappear!” Chloe nodded a few times.

“As I said, you can just do it yourself. It takes barely any effort.” Sophia rolled her eyes. “If you want to, you could even create a localized permanent blizzard that follows you around.”

“Ohh!” The eyes of the cold-loving couple started sparkling.

“I wouldn’t recommend that, though.” Ari stared right at them. “Because if I accidentally get hit by it, I’ll light both of you on fire.” Judging by her expression, she was just saying it as a warning.

“You better listen to her.” Aura also faced Steph and Chloe. “You know our Ari doesn’t joke around when it comes to fire.”

“Please don’t!” Steph raised her voice once more. “You being a pyromaniac puts quite the strain on my love for you! Even though I’m fireproof!”

“You know, just to spite all of you, I’m going to create a volcano biome in the domain with Sophia’s magic gift.” Ari started pouting. “Right next to the ice kingdom of whatever that you’re working on and keep mentioning.”

“Noooo!”

“And just like that, Ari will get the biggest boost from me.” Sophia was a big fan of her idea.

"Do you think our kingdom can fight a super volcano?” The dog-girl looked at Chloe with a questioning expression.

“If we try really hard!” The fox reacted with a big nod. “We have the advantage of our massive head-start! If we keep going, there’s no way she could overwhelm our kingdom! Not even with a massive power-up.”

“Do your best, Ari~.” Sophia rooted for the jaguar.

“That’s what I always do!”

“Is it really a good idea to instigate a war between the fire nation and the ice nation?” Anna wasn’t sure if Sophia was aware of what was going on.

“Sounds fun, doesn’t it~?” She just smiled at her fellow tiger.

“Fair enough.” There was nothing the princess could say there. “In fact, true.” Thinking about it some more, she felt inclined to agree with her.

“Aura, you’re also a fellow cold enjoyer, right?!” The dog-girl looked at the wolf. "Please help us defend from the fire nation! Why does that scenario feel familiar to something…?” She looked confused for a moment. “Please!”

“Sorry, no can do.” The female wolf shook her head. “While I am a fan of frozen wastelands, I like volcanoes just as much. It would be unfair for me to help either side here."

“Luckily, I have no such morality issues.” Fen’s voice turned smug. "I hate frozen wastelands, and I love volcanoes. Ari, do you mind if I help you out a little? We need to make sure to melt every single bit of ice in the area.”

“Ohh!” The jaguar clapped her hands. “I had a lot of fun making the relaxation forest with you, so I’d be happy to have you.”

“Why is it already decided?!” Steph got louder again. “It was just a threat if we create a blizzard that goes wrong, right?!”

“Tehe~.” Ari and Fen didn't care.

“I see a massive steam explosion in the future.” Anna, seemingly knowing how ice and fire would react, rolled her eyes while leaning over to Sophia.

“I see a never-ending supply of clouds generated for free without us needing to do anything~.” The blonde let out a chuckle while whispering back to her.

“Wow.” The princess paused for a moment. “You’re already five steps ahead, huh?”

“Always~.” She replied with a cheeky thumbs-up.

“Sophia, would you mind borrowing some of this desert for me, too?” Maya suddenly completely changed the topic as she was energetically looking around while her tail twitched in excitement every now and then. “I still want to make a desert in your biome, and I somehow like this orange sand here a lot more than the light yellow one from back when we visited the oasis.”

"Yup, orange is better than blonde," Anna smirked at her as the sand around them was rather close to the color of her hair, while the one from before somewhat matched Sophia's.

“This and that are unrelated.” The cat-girl shook her head.

“I disagree~.” The princess was feeling playful.

“I’ll borrow as much as you want~.” Sophia ignored the tall tiger and smiled at her girlfriend instead. “Though, I guess we should head in a bit deeper into the desert first to get the best piece of it?”

“Thank you!”

Having decided on that, the group headed further into the desert to find the best area to rescue for Sophia’s domain so the cat-girl could play with it later on before continuing their search for griffins.