Sophia had finished her morning run and came back to the inn. Maya suspiciously eyed her for a while but said nothing. She was pretty sure that the tiger went shopping instead. After all, the blonde's terrible at keeping a secret, but she decided against making a comment. Once they ate something, the couple left the city around noon.

"Any idea where we're going?" The cat-girl eventually addressed her partner while walking on a path that led them away from the city.

"Hmm... I want a place away from possible onlookers so I can experiment freely. Oh, how about that forest over there?" She pointed to her right at a vast group of trees. "We should find a nice place in there." Saying so, the two did just that and looked around in there.

"This seems nice." Maya found a small clearing and took a liking to it. "It even has a little river flowing through it."

"Yeah, it's perfect." They went closer to it and sat down on the lush, green grass near the riverbed. The couple looked at the scenery for a while before Maya shifted her attention to the tiger-girl.

"Do you remember what you promised me with your experiments?"

"Yes, ma'am! I won't do anything dangerous!"

"Good. Do you need any help?"

"Not yet, I guess. I have to change the space of my storage first before I can put an animal inside to find out if living beings can survive in there and, even more so, can get out again... Right now, they would most likely end up wanting to live there because all of our proviant is in it."

"Yeah, if you want to find out if living beings can get out on their own, this wouldn't be helpful." She understood the problem.

"But... to do that, I have to take a look inside..."

"You want to stick your head inside again, don't you?"

"Yes... I already did it before, and the only dangerous part was the lack of air inside the storage... but I fixed that since then."

"It sure looked scary, though..." Maya didn't like it. At the same time, she wanted to support her, though. "Be careful, okay...?"

"Of course!" Having gotten the permission, Sophia wasted no time. She created something that looked like a purple portal and slowly put her head inside.

"Ugh... it's already freaky when she only uses her hands, but this..." The portal was rather two-dimensional, so looking from the side, it seemed like Sophia had no head anymore.

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"Wow, it's gotten so messy in there!" About five minutes later, the tiger-girl's body was complete again. "Well, we bought a ton of stuff and just shoved it in there..."

"W-Welcome back..." Maya looked visibly relieved.

"Hehe."

"But, yeah, we did go kinda wild with shopping..."

"All the money from the golem eyes... and unlimited place to put stuff... In retrospect, that's a very dangerous combination."

"Y-Yes..." She felt a little guilty.

"I regret nothing." Sophia didn't.

"By the way, I've been wondering... Normally, you simply put your hand inside the portal thingy and pull out whatever we want. How do you even know where to get it if it's so messy inside?"

"No idea." Sophia just shook her head.

"Ehh...?"

"I just think about what I want to get, and I, uhh, get it..."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah... Like, if I want a fishing rod," After saying it, Sophia put her hand inside the portal and brought out a pole. "See?"

"Yes, I see that this magic might be too much for me to understand..."

"By the way, why do we have that?" The tiger looked at the fishing rod she pulled out of the storage.

"Because you saw that in a store in the capital and wanted it. No reason was provided by you."

"Sounds like something I would do." Sophia didn't doubt her explanation

"Can I have that rod? Watching you messing with the portal makes me kinda nervous... Trying to fish traditionally, without any magic, could be a fun distraction."

"Oh, I want fish for dinner!"

"I'll see what I can do."

Maya took the fishing rod and went closer to the river while Sophia got back to reorganizing her storage dimension. Almost an hour passed before the tiger-girl took another break because she noticed something rather interesting.

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"You know... now that I shoved all of our stuff into a corner, it kinda looks like the place where I always meet Canir."

"Eh...?"

"I wanted it to look like a warehouse... but it's actually just an all-white place that seemingly goes on forever. I'll never forget the first time I was teleported somewhere with absolutely nothing existing as far the eye could see..."

"Scary." Maya only needed one word.

"A little, but after seeing it so many times... It's more boring than anything else if you ask me."

"Still, being able to create the same space… thing as a god... You won't get in trouble because of that, right...?" She got worried again.

"Oh, I actually asked Canir about my magic. He said that I should try not to destroy the world, but other than that, I can go wild."

"I'm not sure if I feel any better now." Maya had very mixed feelings.

"I wonder if I can change the design... If we use that place to travel, I want it to look nice and cute."

"Sophia, before you think about the design, it should work first."

"R-Right..." She noticed that she was getting carried away again. "How's the fishing going?"

"Not very good. I saw some fish, but they're not biting at all. Well, I guess I need some bait. I'll look for some insects or worms later."

"..." The tiger-girl went silent and looked away with a complicated expression.

"Seriously...?"

"..."

"How can a girl who started a war against an entire race be scared of bugs and the likes...?"

"I-I'm not scared! I just don't like their wiggling or all those extra legs many of them have... brr..." Her entire body shivered.

"Really now...? Those spyders in the dungeon back then made you freak out a lot, though." She remembered the joke dungeon Canir made when the group traveled to the capital.

"S-Spyders don't count! They're the spawns from hell! Especially if they're half my size! Nope, just nope!"

"Doesn't sound very convincing~." Maya looked like she wanted to tease her some more.

"Hmm... Well, the only thing I still really remember from the dungeon is the graveyard area where a certain cat-girl almost wet herself from seeing some ghosts. "

"I-I am very sorry!" Her expression immediately changed. "Forget I ever said anything!"

Without another word on the topic, the girls went back to their tasks. Maya searched for bait she could use for fishing. At the same time, Sophia continued to sort all the stuff inside her storage dimension.

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"Alright, I think I'm done!" Another hour went by before the tiger-girl got her head out of the portal again. "I've created an actual room with walls where I put all of our stuff. Then, I made something like a hallway with visible corners. If I put a portal at each end, even the most mindless monster should get out again. Chances are that even a human could make it with enough tries."

"Wow, you really put in a lot of effort!" Maya played along. "Are you going to test it now?"

"Hmm... Yeah, that's the plan. I'm just wondering how I can, uhh, convince an animal to get in the portal... Just grab one and throw it in?"

"I don't think there's a living being that would say no to you. By that, I mean could."

"I kinda don't like the sound of that..." Sophia wasn't a fan of the implications that entailed.

"Does it even need to be a living being for a first test? If you made a corridor, can't you just throw a stone into one portal and see if it comes out the other? You know, to see if it works, like, at all?"

"We need to work on magic together more often! You always give such great tips that I somehow never manage to think of!"

"Because you tend to overcomplicate things."

"Don't hit me with facts out of nowhere!" The blonde didn't like being called out.

"Ehehe." Maya chuckled at her reaction. "But, I would love to do more magic with you, rather than just learning from you. Though the gap between us could be making it complicated."

"It's not like I only do things that are so over the top that I only I understand... Not implying that I actually understand what I'm doing."

"..." She didn't answer.

"..." The tiger-girl also paused for a moment. "Could you please think of something we can do together?"

"Okay!"

"Alright, let's try the stone idea. It won't answer the question if living beings can move inside, but it's a start, I guess." Saying so, she created two door-sized portals around 10m apart from each other that connected to her storage space.

"W-Wow... So freaky..." Maya stared at the portals. They looked like purplish-violet distortions floating in the air, forming a semi-translucent wall. "Later, you actually want us to walk through that...?"

"Only if it works, obviously. But then, yeah, sure."

"Hrmm..." She eyed the portals some more with a skeptical yet curious expression. "I don't know if I want it to work or not..."

"Alright, let's give it a try!" Ignoring her, Sophia grabbed a fist-sized rock from the ground and threw it into one of the portals with all her might. It successfully disappeared inside, but nothing else ever happened. "Why?!"

"Guess it wasn't that easy, huh?" The cat-girl was a little curious, picked up a small pebble near her feet, and lightly flicked it into the portal. Around two seconds later, it suddenly hopped out of the second portal. "E-Eh...?"

"Why?!" Sophia complained even louder this time.

"Even if you ask me..." She was the most surprised one.

"You did it, but I don't... how's that even possible?! Okay, I'll take a look inside!" Clearly confused, the tiger-girl walked up to the portal she threw the stone into and peeked inside. "..." A minute later, she pulled her head out again while having a slight blush on her face together with an awkward expression.

"What's wrong?"

"I, uhh, err... Anyway, it seems like it's working!"

"What did you do?" Maya wasn't fooled by her shoddy acting.

"W-Well, I might have thrown the rock at a slight angle... Instead of reaching the second portal... I slammed it into the wall next to it instead..." She looked very embarrassed.

"Wow... just wow."

"Y-Yes..." She hung her head in shame.

"Wanna eat something? I caught a couple of fish earlier." The cat-girl had the feeling that it was time for a break.

"Please..."

While preparing the fish, Sophia quickly started a campfire. Maya gutted and impaled the grilled fish with a stick before placing them over the fire. It didn't take much time or effort before the two could eat.

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"Better now?"

"Yeah... Food always helps. Still, why am I so good at messing up in the most stupid ways possible?" Sophia couldn't believe herself.

"Well, everyone needs a talent."

"H-Hey!"

"Hehe~." The cat-girl enjoyed teasing her. "So, what now?"

"Hmm... Alright, we know that it's possible to cross the storage dimension with portals. Now we must find out if living beings can do the same, preferably doing so without dying."

"That part is very important if you ask me..."

"I saw a deer in the corner of my eyes earlier..." Sophia looked at the forest, and her feline eyes turned bigger as she focused on something there. "Yeah, it's still there... I didn't even need my detection magic. Wait, it's called teer here, isn't it?" She vaguely remembered Fen using this as their name. "I… could catch it and use it to… experiment." Her tail already started twitching in anticipation.

"Sure, go for it~." Maya could easily see that she just wanted to hunt it for fun.

"Alright!" The tiger's ears perked up, seemingly in full attention mode already, and her pupils looked even larger now. Using her tail to balance, she sprinted into the forest while keeping a low profile. Without making a single sound, she quickly advanced towards the teer she made out with her sharp eyes a while ago while disappearing into the forest.

"If I wouldn't know better and someone told me she wasn't born as a feline, I would call them crazy... She's more cat than any cat I ever met, myself included." The actual cat-girl watched after her with a warm expression. "God, I love that dork."