A few minutes later, the two of them arrived in a small clearing in the forest, the sharp dirt cliff at one end of it showing how someone had carved of part of the mountain to increase the available space. Leaning against this artificial drop was a small wooden hut, just big enough to contain a room just a bit bigger than the one Laura had in the university's dormitory.
"Wait here for a moment." Inuka said as she stepped into the hut, carrying a pair of simple chairs out a few seconds later. Sitting down on one of them she gestured for the Kitsune to sit down on the other before she spoke up again. "So, Takeko told me about the day you had. Is there anything I can do to help you?"
"I mean you already did a lot by helping me get out of there, thank you very much for that by the way." Laura began before a pair of her tails wrapped themselves around her. As she continued, she slowly began to pet them. "Unless you can also turn me back, the only thing I could ask of you would be to help me get back to my world." Letting out a deep sigh, Laura talked on before giving the wolf eared spirit a chance to respond. "but not now, I mean what if people found out about all this." She finally finished with a wave towards her tails, most of which were nervously hanging down stiffly.
"So what if they find out?" Inuka retorted, before quickly realizing by the way two of the Kitsune's tail flicked up that this had been the wrong thing to say. "I mean it, it's their loss in the end. But if you are so worried about it all, why not use illusions to hide them? After all you are a Kitsune now."
"I already tried that after Takeko mentioned it." Laura replied, before focusing on camouflaging her ears and tails, resulting in the same graphic bug like effect of whatever had been behind them being twisted with each of their moves.
"I see." the white haired spirit said as she took an aprizing look at the tails. "Have you tried simply trying to make the air around them not show them? Like with the flame, picture the air behind you without your tails in it."
"I can try." Laura replied with a shrug as she focused just like she had when conjuring a flame, only this time, the tingling seemed to come from the back of her head as slowly the air around her tails began to shimer, and soon was emptied of all the tails. That is until a couple of them began to swish from side to side excitedly, revealing bits and pieces of themselves with a rather strange ripple in the air around them.
"See this should work better, just need to keep your tails under control"
"That's much easier said than done, but yes it should work for now. Thank you, again." Laura replied as she applied the same illusion to her ears, which led to her dropping the one hiding her tails. After a few more minutes though, Laura had managed to keep up both illusions at the same time.
"That leaves only your eyes, but there's no easy work around for those I can think of." Inuka said, to which the Kitsune before her shrugged as she blinked a couple times, revealing the same human eyes staring dead ahead she managed earlier.
"It's not perfect, but I hope being seen as staring all the time will be less of an issue than having to explain everything." She offered, having relaxed a bit more. "And even then, if I can get a pair of sunglasses to stay in place without normal ears, the eyes should be easy enough to hide till I get the hang of all this."
"Well I don't know what sunglasses are, but if you say they would help." Inuka commented as she leaned back a bit. "Anyways, would you mind overly if I sent Takeko with you? He's not the most well read spirit, but he knows the basics about a lot of things, not to mention having someone to look out for your illusions slipping should be really helpful."
"You think so?" Laura asks, before noticing her tails being back to visible once again. "Okay, point taken."
"Great, know let's get you some practice with that pyromancy of yours, just give me a moment to get my kettle and some water." The wolf eared spirit said as she ducked back into her hut. A few moments later Inuka emerged with an earthen kettle full of water and two cups with a green powder in them.
Putting the kettle on the ground before Laura she began her instructions. "Now carefully make a small ring of fire around where the kettle touches the ground, and try to heat the water as evenly as possible."
After giving a short nod the Kitsune did as told, creating a ring of light blue flames licking at the kettle. It took a few more minutes, but soon enough the water started to boil and Inuka asked her to stop the fire. After she waited a moment for the water to cool down a bit again the white haired spirit poured some of the water into each cup, and stirred them up, before handing one to Laura.
"Here, let's enjoy a cup of tea until Takeko arrives."
"Thank you" the former human said as she carefully took the cup held out to her.
Just as the two of them had finished their tea, Takeko crawled into the clearing, dragging Laura's backpack behind himself. "Uf what did you put in there, stones?" He asked Laura before panting for breath as the Kitsune walked over and picked up both him and the pack.
"No, but there might have been a litre of water left in the second bottle, not to mention this not being sized for you at all." She explained as she walked back over to Inuka. "So how will you send me back?"
"Well more or less the same way you got here I assume. Once you and Takeko are in my hut, I can connect the door to one hidden in the same place in the human world."
Nodding to show she understood, Laura stepped inside the small hut, which contained nothing beyond a simple bed and stove. Outside it sounded as if a blizzard had suddenly arrived at the mountain, but as it died down as quickly as it had started, the woman pushed open the door, revealing a rather narrow tunnel leading to the outside, and at the end of it they could just make out the orange and red sky.