Winter's Break had arrived. And with it, snow, shoveling, and his girlfriend returning from overseas for the holidays. Luke could hardly contain his excitement as he cleaned up their small house on the edge of Kindall. Wanting to help out his childhood friend at his dad's repair shop, he moved from the big city to the small town. He's learned a lot, but compared to his girlfriend, who was helping out at a relief camp in the Hidean Outskirts, he still felt a bit dull. He sometimes wondered why someone like her saw in him? He liked hugging her and being around her...was it his tenderness and compassion for her? He didn't know. All he knew was that he needed to get this house cleaned up. And then wrap up her gift-

He stopped vacuuming. His present for her! How could he have forgotten! He was so caught up in cleaning the house up and busy at the garage that he completely forgot to actually get a present for her! He instantly turned the vacuum cleaner off. He paced back and forth, hand over his mouth, back slightly hunched, eventually falling onto his couch, trying to come up with something. Her plane was going to land in the capital this evening, and her friend would drive her out to their house the next day. How was he supposed to get an awesome gift in less than twenty-four hours?

Just then, someone knocked on the door, startling Luke. He rushed over and opened it. A tall woman with a dark trench coat, neck-length purple hair and orange eyes stood before him. She apologized for overhearing his dilemma, but said that she had an idea as to how to help him. Luke looked at the woman bewildered, taking a few seconds to ask for the woman to continue. Strangely, she asked him if he really did want to know just what gift he could give to his girlfriend. He nodded quickly, confused by the confirmation. The woman's eyes flashed, seemingly burning with energy. Recognizing her hair and eyes, it clicked in Luke's head far too late who this woman was.

A wave of invisible energy swept through Luke, pushing him far from the doorway. The woman stepped inside, and as she did, two ram horns curled from her head around her ears, and her nose became a large dark rhinarium nose, similar to what Tierans have. She flashed a grin filled with sharp teeth, as Luke started to feel his arms growing numb. He looked at his left hand, tingling sensations spreading throughout it, and his face soon twisted in horror. The arm started to cave in on itself, as if his bones no longer existed, and his body was now sucking up all the flesh and blood that composed his arm. Luke screamed, but then groaned in discomfort as he felt his spine shoot out, destroying his pants and taking his legs with it. The vast extension thickened with flesh and muscle, while Luke's left arm continued to shrink. Soon, he felt his other arms start to feel very weird. He looked at it. It too was collapsing upon itself, fingers becoming tiny stubs, the palm just a lump of flesh, his lower arm slowly disappearing.

Then he felt his ears and nose twitch. His ears tugged at the skin, growing longer, while his nose seemed to become bigger. He couldn't quite see, but his nose now resembled the nose of the woman who stood before him. He looked up at her, tears filling his eyes. What did he do to deserve this? But she just stood there, letting out a sinister chuckle, while his shirt suddenly ripped apart. A tingling sensation erupted over his serpentine lower half and his head, as sienna coloured fur grew all over. As his arms finished shrinking into his body, the fur soon spread over his torso as well. A fine, thick layer of greyish red fur developed along his underside in one long band spanning his body. Soon, he felt numbness and tingling cease all over his body. It was finally done. But now, as he looked himself over, he was far from what he was a few seconds ago. He resembled an armless Tieran, with a serpentine lower body, all covered in fur.

The woman, the demon, Velirai, bent down to look into Luke's shiny, tearful eyes.

"Didn't you know? The best gift for your girlfriend was you. Her coming back home to see YOU! What more could she want? But YOU wanted more. So I did what I do best, and gave you more. You like to hug her? Be around her? Well, now you can do both of those at the same time!"

Velirai let out a vicious guffaw, piercing into Luke's ears. She turned around and walked out the front door, which closed on its own behind her. Luke just laid there on the floor, a few tears trickling down his face, as he thought about what she had said. As well as how he was going to explain this to his girlfriend. Nevermind finishing vacuuming the house.

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This was supposed to be a simple, quick picture, but they never go quite like that, do they?

I ended up using this to practice getting better at shading in Manga Studio, as well as trying out several different ways to add the highlights to the hair. At first, I was going to use the method I had been using for the past few pictures, a sort of solid, area of highlight roughly designed to flow with the hair. But that wasn't working quite right. After looking at various other pictures and seeing how others did it, I decided to try this stroke method, and I'm actually quite pleased with the end result! Overall, it's an okay picture. Could be better in some parts, but I had already spent long enough fixing it up as is. And this was supposed to be a quickie! XD