Chapter 20 (Patreon)

Sandy grunted as she swung her blade. The wolf landed in two pieces.

“Easy.” Sandy said, letting the blade drop. The metal clinked against the stone floor.

“Easy for you.” I said, lifting my sewing needle and creeping around the dungeonheart. Sandy would have no problem killing the monsters without skills. “Not fair. You have a sword.”

“You’ve got… needles.” Sandy said.

“I need a proper weapon. A giant pair of scissors or something.” I said as we rounded on the next wolf. It was my turn.

I swallowed hard as I approached. Killing a wolf shouldn’t be a problem. I had super human dexterity. Dozens of them died at the end of my needle. It would be easy.

The wolf scratched against the wall, sniffing the dirt as if it were actually alive. But every time the dungeon reset, this same wolf would be here, scratching away at the stone.

When I stepped into arm’s length, it stopped, looking up at me. I forced myself through the motion, the superhuman dexterity assisted me as I stabbed forward as if under the mechanical control of [Running Stitch.]

Flesh parted under the force of my needle until I hit something solid. The needle was rough against my hand as I scraped along the wolf’s skull, blood pouring out of the open wound as it howled and jumped backward.

I staggered forward. I hadn’t taken the time to aim. Without the mechanical strength of the magical sewing technique, my strength wasn’t enough to punch directly through bone.

Moving with the fall, I stabbed forward, aiming for the creatures eye instead this time. The needle stuck hard into the wolf’s head as it went limp, falling to the floor.

“Easy.” I said, grabbing the needle with both hands to try to free it. I failed. It was stuck in the bone, blood seeping around the edge of the needle.

Doing the work without the use of magic was messier. More brutal. [Running Stitch] made killing monsters so clean and efficient.

I pressed a boot to the wolf’s head, pushing it into the floor until I could feel it deform against me, and pulled. The needle came free with enough force that I staggered backwards.

“Let’s go.” Sandy said, patting my shoulder and stepping in-front of me. She dispatched the next two wolves with ease.  Even the wolf that hid in the shadow was an easy kill for her. She approached it so casually that I didn’t realize it was happening; I wasn’t holding a knife to see its outline the dark.

Sandy just walked forward in the room and then swung, seemingly without reason. The blood was visible first, a line gushing up into the air where she cut it. Then the wolf became visible as it died, its [Shadow Cloak] dissipating.

“Good to let loose now?” Sandy asked as she rolled her shoulders, stretching out.

“No.” I replied, stepping up and looking over the wolf.

“We killed them all.” She said.

“We should conserve every mana we can get.” I replied.

Sandy shrugged and stepped through the portal.

Mid day light greeted us, filtering through the canopy of leaves above. Sandy tested the weight of her blade in her hand. We dove into the shadows of the trees without another word between us.

The first spider came after only a few minutes. We were ready this time, jumping back as soon as it began its dive, Sandy already mid swing.

The chop sent legs flying, the spider’s body tumbling end over end with a hissing noise. Then it retracted its web, shooting back up the tree. I ran forward to stab it, but it was already gone, back up into the dark.

“Shit.” Sandy said.

The spider dove again.

[Running Stitch I] [Mana: 9/10] [Cancel]

[+3 XP] 

This time it was instantly impaled on my needle, splitting chitin and spilling hot spider blood onto my hands.

“Gross.” I said, kicking the spider off the needle. The cleaner cut provided by the magic made it easy.

“I thought we were practicing?” Sandy said.

“There’s a place for practice.” I replied, looking up at the canopy, then back down at the corpse.

The spider was covered in segmented plates of chitin. There were sections where the plates disconnected, soft sinew binding the body parts together where the armor parted.

I pushed my needle into one, releasing gore down the side of the spider’s leg.

“Going to be less to use if you keep that up.”

I waved Sandy away, experimenting with my dexterity. With a flick, I aimed at a joint along the spider’s body and stabbed, instantly cutting into the spider corpse, and started to smile.

“Gwen? You’re weirding me out.”

“I can kill the spiders.” I said.

“Uh yes, you can.” Sandy replied.

“No I mean — without skills. Next one — you cut the string! I got this. You can kill the wolves and I can kill the spiders.”

“Oh.” Sandy said, still staring down at my hands. I ripped the needle out of the spider.

We continued through the forest, ready and waiting for the next ambush. When it came, Sandy jumped out of the way, the spider landing on the ground. She swung to cut the rope.

The web bent, not splitting as it grew taught.

“Gwen!” Sandy said, voice rising in pitch.

I stabbed down between the spider’s plates, goring it into. It hissed, spinning towards me, the needle ripping free by the motion. Sandy brought down her blade in a chop that cut through the first layer of the monster’s exoskeleton before bouncing against the second.

The monster staggered forward toward me. I deftly stabbed into its face, finally killing it

[+3 XP] 

“Four more.”

“Easy.” Sandy said.

“Not good enough. I need to kill them in one hit.” I said, looking down at the mutilated spider corpse. We were wasting good resources.

We got better with each kill. I practiced stabbing down into the segmented bodies of the spiders, succeeding in quick kills on two of them. Their eyes weren’t empty sockets that allowed easy access to the brain; there was no fast and easy kill.

Sandy proved unable to cut the web threads that the spiders propelled on. We worked on comboing our attacks to kill them quickly, accruing a total of eighteen experience points. The last two spiders dove together again, the pseudo boss of the second floor being the monster’s teamwork instead of another ability.

We were ready this time. Sandty used a skill to cut one of them into pieces that silently rolled across the forest floor, while I used the momentum of the other ambusher to stab deep into it, tearing apart its flesh.

I left the dungoen with nine mana; more than I ever had before. We even managed to carry out more of the spider bodies, jumping right to work in Sandy’s workshop.

“We need to get another table in here.” I said I as leaned over Sandy’s workbench, using running stitch to feed scales onto the leather bodice of the Scale Dress.

“You really think we can fit more furniture in here?” Sandy asked.

I often had to turn my shoulders sideways to step between the hanging corpses, and now, the buckets that collected pigmented spider blood. I still hadn’t asked if Terry wanted it — but it was messy to let it pool on the floor.

“No.” I said, grabbing and holding up one of the glass bottles of green spider blood. It was viscous, sticking to the walls of the glass bottle as I shifted it back and forth. I sighed and set it down, turning back to my dress.

One of the scales had cracked.

I squinted, leaning forward to examine it. The crack had spread from where I had pierced the needle through it. Though the cut was clean, the dress was already wearing down. 

[Cleome I]

►[Earrings: 0%][+2 skill shard]

►[Dress: 21%%][15% Light Aspecft][+4 skill shard]

►[Bracelets: 0%][][+2 skill shard]

►[Boots: 0%][][+2 skill shard]

[Projected Skills]

►[Blue Skill II]

I turned the scales over in my hand, looking for some better way to stitch them together and not finding one. In my system imprinted memories, the seamstresses and tailors who worked on these pieces were able to stitch them on without them falling apart. I sighed and resolved to ask my mom tomorrow.

Instead, I applied my mana to beginning the workings of the set’s boots. The pattern called for leather boots covered in sweeping plates of chitin. I made the boots out of the ivory-white chitin of the spiders. The boots had to be constructed of several different plates; they rose so high they went above my knee, which meant they needed to bend.

I packed a bottle of spider blood into my backpack and headed home, my mana exhausted for the night. Shoving my backpack into a disused, cabinet, I headed to bed. Breakfast was calm. No one was even talking about Valjean anymore, the event little more than another passing oddity to occupy the townsfolk’s time.

I rushed into the workshop and pulled the spider blood from the cabinet, bring it to Terry who was already setting up in her workshop. In a pestle, she was making a poultice from leaves. She smiled at me as I stepped into her work room, holding the glass bottle behind her back.

“Whatcha making?” I asked, leaning near her.

“Something for pains.” She said before pouring the leaves into an open, ceramic jar and shoving it to the shelves that surrounded the room. I had no idea how she remembered what was what; probably a system generated skill. There were hundreds of bottles of different shapes and sizes along every wall except the one that hosted easels for painting.

“Brought you a present.” I said, still holding the jar behind her back.

“Plants?” She guessed, leaning her head to the side as if she could see behind me.

“Nope. Try again?” I said, stepping slightly to the right to conceal the jar behind my back.

“A painting.”

“It would have to be a small one for me to carry it here.” I said.

“Good point.” She hummed as she slid the mortar to the side. “Food.” She guessed again.

“Nope.” I said, putting the bottle down between us. Even with the yellow and brown staining of the glass, the green inside was such a vibrant, lively color.

Teretha lifted it without comment, holding it up into the beam of sunlight that crossed through the window and lit up the bottle.

“Pigment.” She said, still holding the bottle up in the light. “Where did this come from?”