Cobalt snapped back with a quick shout that sounded halfway between a roar and a bleat. As his fingers began to fuse to each other, he threw his hands to his head. His reaction seemed spurred on by the pain of his transformation, but in truth it had more to do with surprise at the sudden barrage of sensations in his scalp. It wasn't enough that two ivory horns were pulling their way out of his skull, that his jawline was cracking and thinning, his fangs were shrinking back into his gums, and that his ears were lengthening, but every hair follicle on his head and at his chin were churning out pale blue strands at a dizzying rate.

He was so awash in these changes that he hardly noticed the ones occurring below his neck. His fur began to pale as his black tiger stripes thinned to nothing. The fur on the upper portions of his arms and legs darkened and thickened into a soft fleece, rubbing uncomfortably against his sleeves and shorts. The tuft of fur on the tip of his lion tail gained thickness and fullness. The muscles of the tail, which had before allowed great arcs of movement befitting a cat, themselves started to weaken and caused the heavier rope to droop.

The changes to his face continued as the shuddering half-lion traded one style of mane for another. Thick blue tufts shed quickly from his cheeks and fell past the ever-lengthening blue-white beard, which now split into three segments and began to twist upon itself.

As his legs changed in configuration, he instinctively shifted on his feet again and again, leaving only one paw on the ground at a time as the other, while hovering, changed little by little. As one paw was lowered to the ground and the other raised, the transformation's progress switched as well, such that each time a paw was set on the ground, it looked more like a cloven hoof than before it was lifted.

The entire transformation couldn't have lasted more than thirty seconds, but the intensity of the changes was so great Cobalt staggered and gasped from what felt like a half hour of exertion. Slowly, very slowly, he opened his eyes to behold his new self.

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