We picked up our materials and traded with the smiths over the next few hours, this near lawless city was as beautiful as it was ugly. There were no rules, anyone who had the strength could do as they pleased. Even abuse others for who knows what random assed reason.
With our money collected we visited a few more shops to buy any amount of nails or other items that had Moar ore, I disliked the name, they only named it that because there was an abundance of it and they had no clue on what to make of it.
On our way out of the city, Foram said his goodbyes and went back to the guardhouse, we had the splinters pulling the cart until we had moved away from the city. I then placed the entire cart into my spacial storage.
The lamia girl was nonresponsive and I couldn't blame her.
She was in the arms of a splinter as we walked back up the mountain, the trip was relatively peaceful this time around. We had a few splinters hang back just in case we were followed, once we reached the cave entrance I had my spiders weave webs and traps near the entrance.
I felt relief once we made it back to the ship, a place under my control and safe from ridiculous laws that were useful to no one but a few.
We made our way into the depths of the ship until we reached my labs, we placed the girl on a bed and tucked her in. I checked on Indra who floated peacefully in her medical pod, I adjusted a few settings before stepping off into my private room.
Hextia sat on my bed while I played with the purple gem, I had placed two barrels of nails aside for my spiders as they continued to eat happily. Their numbers kept growing and were in the tens of thousands, most of which I kept in my spacial pouch.
The gem was beautiful, the outer layer was light violet but the center was nearly black, I turned it over and something felt right about holding it. If we could harness this gem's power it would be very useful. I examined it for a while longer before summoning a large group of spiders. They melted into a small pool before the metal adapted to me, this time felt different, I didn't feel full like the last time.
A ravenous hunger was churning in the depths of my mind, I had one of the spiders become my mount and it took me to the top of the barrel. The nails had all been eaten and the spiderlings had all turned into liquid, I pulled out an energy crystal I had stolen from the pirates and tossed it in.
Thinking it over I decided to take out the purple gem we had collected from that boy and held it in my hands, it was nearly as big as my head and required both hands to hold, I then jumped into the barrel of metal.
It felt like the most refreshing dip in a cool spring, I felt a pull on my mind and I went with the flow, my sight returned and I was back in my mind space. The altar and the runes were a comforting site, I floated above the altar and noticed the purple gem lodged into the side.
A pulse reverberated through the altar and into the ground, when it passed through me I was forced from the mind space. I jerked as the pulse ejected me, I looked around and the walls of the barrel still surrounded me. I stood and it seemed I had finally gained some height at about half as tall as the barrel so roughly two feet tall.
Hextia leaned over and eclipsed the light, I looked up at her and noticed a smirk on her face. I sighed and asked even though I might never hear the end of it, "Can you get me out of this barrel?" She stifled a giggle and reached into the barrel and picked me out like a toddler.
She put me down in front of a mirror and I was quite shocked at my new appearance. I was a bit taller than an average goblin, I had two pointy horns which was interesting. My skin was matte black and my glowing golden eyes made me seem like a little imp from hell, well I looked somewhere between cute and vicious so I suppose it's an improvement from a child's robot toy.
After examining myself for a few more minutes it was time to get back to work, Hextia was great for most things but her long range capabilities were less than ideal. So we both decided that it was high time I give her a sister, I started by looking through the available AI that we had purchased, once we had picked out a few Hextia told me she wanted to interact with them before we gave it life.
I couldn't disagree but Hextia did surprise me by giving me a design of what the and her sisters' bodies should look like from now on. It was quite impressive though I noticed that Hextia had given herself a bigger bust than the original design. Her sister's design wasn't as tall nor was it built for melee, I got to work on modifying the splinters first before I made Hextia a new body.
We also needed a name for her younger sister as well.
As I worked I had the Moar ore analyzed and put it into the forge to see if we could do anything with it, the initial results were unpleasant as the forge couldn't heat the metal to a high enough point to take away the impurities for it to be molded properly.
I paused my work on the splinters and thought on how to refine the ore, my spiders were entertaining themselves by swinging from metal strings connected to the ceiling. Looking at the threads it clicked, I had the thread tested and it turned out to be pure Moar alloy.
I had the spiders start spinning their silk and placing it into the forge until it was nearly full, the forge took an hour to melt the metal down into a block of red hot metal, it had to be cut before it hardened otherwise it would have to be reheated to finish the cuts.
After the skeleton was finished we loaded it into my crafting station and I got to work on the runes, it was incredibly difficult carving the runes into the metal but in the end, it would be worth it.
Over the next several days I carved runes into two new base bodies, one for Hextia and the other for her sister. Hextia had decided to name her Nerin and I couldn't find a reason to disagree, once I had finished carving the runes Hextia stood beside me looking at her new body. I could tell she was a bit nervous but this was just a test run as we didn't have the means to create a more flesh like body for now.
She crafted another clone of herself and we placed it within its new home, the runes glowed bright purple for a minute before the process was completed. Sitting up was Hextia in her new body, she looked up at me and made a strange request to have one of my spiders merge with her.
Not sure if it would work I had a rather large one sit on her shoulder and watched it as it melted and connected with her new body. I felt our connection strengthen immensely and what came next took me by surprise, her body began to shift slightly it looked like she was converting layers of metal into soft skin.
I watched as she grew hair, her face began to sculpt itself into the shape she had made for her next body while the rest of her offended out. Slightly pointed ears poked out of her platinum blond hair, she had a single horn at the top of her forehead and was black as night.
Her breasts took shape next with two pale pink tips to top the snowy peaks, flat stomach, and long legs. She had even made her womanhood look perfect as if it was created by a god of lust, she opened her eyes and for a brief moment the runes on her horn lit up. She looked at me with a smirk, "Now let's make me a sister!"