Dressed to kill 9 (Patreon)

A\N: Edited for continuity (Thanks Apoca!)

“It’s full of fucking monsters. Sandy said. “Changes every few weeks. But its always fuckin’ bugs.”

She lurched forward and finished another wolf off. Its mewls were pitiful, echoing in the dark.

“Bugs.” I said, nodding. “I can work with bugs. Chitin armor… giant silkworms.”

“You better not make me any clothes out of bugs.” Sandy said, stepping forward into the dungeon.

We cleared out the last of the wolves, standing in the large open chamber that was open to the moon’s light.

“There.” Sandy grunted, half pointing to indicate the ground.

“What’s there?” I asked.

“’S where the entrance to the next floor would open if the dungeon was clear.” Sandy said, wiping her blade with a cloth from her apron.

We dragged the wolves back and got to work, life falling into a sublime and dangerous routine.

Piece by piece, I worked on completing the hunter set, excited to raise my stats and gain a Stealth Skill. Something completely outside of my class.

By day, through the week, I worked with my mom to complete the work order. Even without the use of mana, I was slowly becoming more proficient at the pattern. On the third day, we completed six pieces of the outfit, leaving me just shy of a level.

At night, after killing the wolves, I cleared another piece of the hunter pattern. Without mom to finish most of the work using her enhanced skills, it took me much longer to make each piece, though I approached the most difficult one first.

The outer piece of the top for the hunter outfit came together. Sandy’s dad bought the butchered wolf meat. The money circled right back to fabric used to continue making the Hunter Pattern outfit.

I finished the top.

[+2 XP] [Level up] [Excess Discarded]

“Done?” Sandy asked, leaning over my shoulder.

“Yes.” I said. Then I groaned. “Discarded an XP.”

“Just one?” Sandy asked.

“Hours of effort. Gone. Poof.” I complained, gesturing with my hands as if I was blowing away dust.

“Don’t be so dramatic. The next floor of the dungeon should be opening soon.”

[Skill Shop]

►Cross Stitching I

[COMMON] Enables system assistance with a new stitch type. Additional levels increase proficency.

►Quick Change I

[UNCOMMON] Allows user to instantly exchange a piece of clothing with any article they are in physical contact with, or is stored in their Inventory. Additional levels allow changing up to an entire outfit. [Seamstress inventory skill: Warddrobe]

►Pattern Projection I

[Common] Seamstress vision skill. Grants user access to a pattern overlay on fabric.

Pattern projection sounded similar to Sandy’s butcher vision; I wondered how many equivalent skills there were across classes. It would be useless for teaching me to cut the pattern; that was already deeply ingrained in my mind. However, it could let me tell whether or not there was enough fabric for a pattern with nothing more than a glance.

I grabbed quick change and activated it. The pattern in my hand disappeared in a flash of a hundred thousand motes of rainbow colored immaterial light, reappearing over me.

[Gwendolyn Tailor][Human, Lv5][Seamstress]

[Health: 10/10][Mana: 0/10][XP: 0/10]

[ATTRIBUTES]

►SPD: 10 ►WIL: 5

►STR: 5 ►DEX: 14

►CON: 5 ►PER: 9

[SKILLS]

►Crafting I ►Running Stitch I

►Hand Spinning I ►Thread Mastery I

►Warddrobe I ►Quick Change I

[PATTERNS]

►[Hunter Pattern]

[RESISTANCES]

►Shadow: 2

I continued trudging through the week, each day much the same, pushing me to the breach of what I could tolerate in exhaustion. We had more than enough material from killing the wolves, but we still couldn’t take a break; the next floor of the dungeon wouldn’t open.

The finished clothing did nothing to help me craft during the day, but my increasing skill meant we had almost caught up with the full work order. There were two sets left to craft friday night, the sunlight shifting from daylight white to a burnished orange where it filtered through the warped glass windows of the workshop. The noble would arrive tomorrow.

I sighed as I finished another pattern. The sets had grown routine, mundane. At first they presented a few challenges in learning each individual cut and how it was sewed back together.

“Will I stop getting experience for this eventually?” I asked mom.

“Yes.” She said with a frown, looking over at me. “But you can take your time. There’s no rush, my dear. If you start making your own pattern, you’ll probably get more experience for each piece.” She said.

“How does it work? Do you stop getting experience when it stops challenging you?”

“I’m unsure.” Mom shrugged. “I have plenty of patterns that give me no experience despite still being a pain in the neck. Perhaps its simply when you craft something new.”

I nodded at that, setting down the piece of fabric I was working with.

“At this rate, we won’t be done by tomorrow morning.” I frowned.

“It’s alright.” Mom waved it off. “Valjean will be here all tomorrow. We can finish in the morning.”

I frowned at that, but kept working. By the end of the night, there were two unfinished sets.

But I didn’t have the time or mana to spare. That night, I finished the complete wolf set. It hung heavily on me, layers of leather and fur and cloth all at once. Despite being four or even five layers thick in some places, it felt abnormally cool. I stood after equipping the last piece. Sandy sat on her bed, looking up at me.

[Hunter Pattern][Ragged(0%)][100% complete]

[Tacca I]

►[Cloak: 100%][75% Shadow Aspect][+2 skill shard]

►[Outer Shirt: 100%][95% Shadow Aspect][+2 skill shard]

►[Inner Shirt: 100%][98% Shadow Aspect][+2 skill shard]

►[Pants: 100%][98% Shadow Aspect][+2 skill shard]

►[Shoes: 100%][70% Shadow Aspect][+2 skill shard]

[Generating Skills…][10 Skill Shards 

►[Shadow Cloak I] ►[Bow Proficiency I]

I did a twirl in the cloak.

“Is that it?” Sandy asked.

I pressed a hand under my chin, tilting my head and opening the system.

[Gwendolyn Tailor][Human, Lv6][Seamstress]

[Health: 10/10][Mana: 1/10][XP: 2/10]

[ATTRIBUTES]

►SPD: 10 ►WIL: 5

►STR: 5 ►DEX: 22

►CON: 5 ►PER: 16

[SKILLS]

►Crafting I ►Running Stitch I

►Hand Spinning I ►Thread Mastery I

►Warddrobe II ►Quick Change I

[PATTERNS]

►[Hunter Pattern]

[RESISTANCES]

►Shadow: 5

[TEMPORARY SKILLS]

►[Bow Profiency I] ►[Shadow Cloak I]

With a satisfied smile, I mentally reached out and activated the Shadow Cloak skill. The lamps in the room guttered, their flames blowing in an invisible wind as the rooms shadows stretched out from the wall to creep up me, blanketing me in a sticky cloak of black.

Sandy blinked for a second, then squinted, like she couldn’t quite see me. She tried to look directly at me, but her eyes passed over me.

“Gwen?” Sandy asked, leaning up out of the bed.

I waved a hand in front of her face, not replying. She blinked when my hand came close, then stepped forward, stretching out an arm to where I had been.

I dodged behind her, smiling all the while. Gwen turned around, looking between her bed and the door. With a grin, I dismissed the skill, feeling my last drop of mana dissipate. The shadows vanished with an audible pop.

“Woah.” Sandy said. “And you got that from clothes? That’s almost, like, a Noble skill.”

“I think it’s because the materials are from that particular wolf.” I said. The wolf itself had a stealth skill; I was just borrowing it.

Sandy contemplated it for a second before stepping forward and falling back onto her bed.

“Makes enough sense. Wonder if my dad can make invisible food out of it.”

“I’ve got to go for tonight.” I said seriously. Sandy shrugged.

I crept back to the house, entering through the side to the workshop before stuffing my backpack away in my favorite hiding cabinet. I sparked an oil lamp on, bringing it to the desk, still wearing the complete wolf outfit. With my dexterity all the way at twenty, it was a completely different world of skill.

During the day, I felt like a fumbling child trying to work with just my baseline stats. With a dex of twenty, it was like my hands could perfectly match my thoughts. I fell into a fugue as I worked, stitching together the last pieces of the two sets. The final stitch would still have to be done by mom; I didn’t have the pattern unlocked. But she could do it in seconds now instead of hours. I smiled as I finished another piece.

Then the door creaked open.

I panicked, standing, then sitting, then throwing myself under the desk.

“Gwen?” Mom asked, holding out a lamp to see.

I was still wearing my wolf cloak and monster killing clothes! I panicked, grabbing at the cloak before realizing how stupid I was being and using Warddrobe to store it.

Standing up, I looked nervously at my mom, then I smiled. I was trying my best to hide the worry in my eyes.

“Is this what you’ve been up to late at night?” Mom said, walking over to me.

“Ye — yes!” I said. “I want to get all the patterns done. For our work order.

“Oh?” Mom blinked, looking between me and the desk. Stupid. She wasn’t talking about me staying up and doing the work order. I was still wearing the rest of the wolf pelt outfit. “So that’s the pattern you picked?” She said, gesturing at me.

“I… yes.”

“Where’d you get the materials for it?” She asked. Her voice was soft, not accusatory.

“Sandy gave them to me.” I said. It was technically true. Not even a lie. Mom put a hand on my shoulder.

“No work for you tomorrow. You need to go get some sleep.” She said, then smiled. “Come on.”

I sighed in relief. How would mom react if she knew I was spending the night killing monsters? Sewing clothes was much more reasonable. It was an alright cover.

Sleep took me instantly; I all but collapsed into bed. Without anything to work on the next morning, I did feel a little lost. I joined Terry after breakfast.

One of the houses bedrooms had been converted into her workshop. She was an alchemist whose class specialized in healing potions; something extremely expensive to cultivate levels in. Out here in the sticks, she could hardly gain any resources to help her progress in levels; the healing herbs simply couldn’t create anything to help her level.

Normally, if you had a more rare or better specialized class, a company might hire and raise your levels to make you a talent for them. Terry had no such luck.

The shelves of her room were covered in containers full of plants; metal tins, glass jars, and wooden barrels. She mixed flowers in an mortar and pestle right now. None of those were the reason I enjoyed spending time with her.

She ground the flowers down into a purple powder, picking up a pinch between her fingers and rubbing it on a canvas.

“How’s that?” She asked.

“It’s a good purple.” I said.

The other wall of Terry’s room was lined with paintings, tinctures of pigments and colors. She made some healing pastes for the village, but most of her time was spent painting. Paintings of beautiful, surreal landscapes, warred for my attention against paintings of glowing potions and city skylines.

“It’s too dark.” Terry said, grabbing some other pigment and mixing it into the powder.

I turned around, working on a painting of my own. It was crude, no where near Terry’s, but I had years to practice it in this world. There were no cellphones or civilization, so not much else to do.

The door to Terry’s painting room swung open.

“Noble’s here.” Meredith said.