Among the significative amount of hoops contained within the box, one does indeed catch your eyes.
It's another hoop, but seemingly looking (and feeling) like it was part of a carpet, before being cut off from it and repurposed into another shape. There's also claw marks on it, though you are unsure whether this means it has already been used once, or simply part of this peculiar design.
On a whim, you decide to buy the whole box. It would certainly be quite the expense, considering that only one hoop seems interesting to you, but you figure it'd look less silly than just walking out of the store with a single hoop in your arms.
You face the shopkeeper and put down the box. He glances at its contents, then back at you.
" It's been quite some time since someone bought me those ", he says. " That'll be... 14 dollars and 99 cents. "
You hand over a 10$ bill and another 5$ one. He swiftly snatches them from your hand, and the cashing machine's sound dings before you can even process what just happened.
" Would you be perhaps interested in learning more about those hoops ? " he asks you. " Some of those articles can be quite impractical sometimes, as we have experienced in the past with former customers. .. "
" No thanks ", you promptly reply. " I'll figure it out on my own. Spoiling things ain't my thing, in general. "
The shopkeeper rolls over his eyes.
" Sure, I guess. Just remember, though : no matter what happens, you only need to go through the same hoop again to undo the magic. "
Confused by those words, you nod nonetheless, and leave the building with the box in your possession.
Back at home, you quickly lock the door shut, drop the box in your living room, and contemplate the fact that you seemingly bought a whole box of fancy gym hoops for no certain reason.
That thought quickly washes away, however, as you trim the contents, pulling away the very sole hoop that interests you at the moment.
Examining it doesn't reveal any sort of particular mechanism or anything. At first, you figure it's only cosmetic hoops, and feel almost stupid for following your instinct over quite an obvious scam.
You then decide to put the hoop down, and stand on top of it. At that moment, though, something was a bit off.
You aren't dreaming it. You are fully awake and lucid, and there's definitely a tingling at the palm of your feet.
You look over, but nothing seems out of the ordinary. Curiously, you take off your socks, and repeat the same actions.
The tingling is showing again, only perhaps slightly stronger. But again, nothing to be seen.
Unless...
You sit and stretch your legs on the carpet, before taking the hoop in your hands and bringing it closer to you. When your feet go through, you gasp at the sight.
You no longer have human toes or nails, nor feet for that matter. You are looking at a perfectly reproduced set of paws, complete with fur, claws, lack of big toes (or perhaps they are dewclaws, now), and what you assume are paw pads at the end of them.
A perfect pair of brown, black and grey cat paws.
You rub your eyes with one hand, still holding the hoop with the other one. It's not a dream.
While admiring your set of cat paws, you are taken aback by a wild though, and decide to strip completely naked. You momentarily take your feet off the hoop, get undressed and throw your clothes in a corner of the room, and go back at it.
Surprisingly enough, the paws have changed : they are no longer shades of brown, black and grey, but orange and white. You figure this must signify that the hoop is not limited to one king of feline, and while this makes it even more interesting, you'd rather finish the experiment before trying something else.
Bringing the hoop even closer now, you watch as the changes pleasantly pass on to your body, your legs slowly getting shorter and furrier, still with a orange and white pattern to it.
You attempt to stand up. And while you succeed nonetheless, it feels definitely weird to you standing on digitigrade hind legs.
But certainly not as weird as the sensation in your tailbone, as you keep on bringing the hoop closer. The sensation erupts into a whole new appendage swishing back and forth, and you realize that you are granted a fluffy, long tail. You wag it experimentally, and notice its maneuverability.
On the other side, you also notice your genitals hidden away by a large amount of fur and hair. This feels way less embarrassing this way, now that you think about it.
It's now time for your chest to change : the hoop makes it barreled and streamlined, while taking on the ideal proportions for a cat. No excess fat as well.
This unfortunately has the effect of making you fall back on the ground. While you still haven't got to the part of your arms and hands becoming front paws and legs, you figure it doesn't matter since you're about to stand on all fours from now on, and the changes on your shoulders only confirms it.
Hesitant as to what to do now, you slowly pull an arm inside the hoop, keeping it raised with the other one. You watch it become a smaller, furrier front leg, and your hand simplifying into a cat's front paw. It takes quite a while to put it back on the hoop, but it eventually clicks for you. You then do it again with your remaining human arm, and before you know it, you are a orange and white-furred cat from the neck down.
This feels quite silly, especially with your still-human head, and you decide to remedy to that problem immedialety.
You place yourself on a four-footed stance, careful as to not release accidentally the hoop, before gently dropping it in front of you.
The moment your head passes through the hoop and concludes your journey down this magical item, you feel it readjusting, becoming furrier and drastically non-human, while your ears move upwards and extend, your nose and jawline push forward, your canines grow sharper and stronger, and whiskers grow out of your now feline muzzle.
In an instant, you've become a cat, with orange and white fur, standing on all four paws in a decidedly taller and bigger living room than before. The sensations you are experiencing inside your body are intense, to say the least.