"Jaji-boy, stop bothering me," Epagogia complained.
She loved being around him, but if there were one thing he became intolerable around, that would be Inscription Patterns.
"I said there's a smudge there, look!" her future boyfriend and father of her children pointed at a perfectly fine pattern.
"Jaji-boy, you are seeing things. The Inscription Pattern can be a bit wider over there, you don't need it as tight like the ones you are drawing."
She saw his beloved looked closely at the work she had been doing on the Formation in the Alchemical Garden. They needed to transplant a very complicated formation from here to St. Peter, a feat that shouldn't normally be possible.
"Well, maybe it's fine here," Jacob relented a bit, "but it is good practice to avoid drawing sloppy runes, you know?"
"Jaji-boy, I swear, if you don't shut up…" the Devil was hard at work on the Inscription Patterns. Messing with ancient Formations was not a breeze, even with their proficiency.
They needed to keep the pattern intact if they wanted to transplant the formation. And to do that, they first needed to lay down an entire stack of formations on top of that.
"Eppy, I'm just saying," Jacob softened his tone.
"Oh~ you are so cute when you call me that," Epagogia beamed.
"Well, it's just that this Formation is crucial for St. Peter's development. With an Alchemical Garden, we can cultivate endless supplies of lower-leveled Spiritual Herbs and use them to feed people. Plus, the lower-leveled Spiritual Herbs will create the right environment to cultivate higher-leveled ones later on."
The Devil woman gave him an icy stare.
"Jaji, you know I don't do sloppy work. But, at the same time, I don't do unnecessary work. Just focus on laying down the Formations instead of nagging at me. You would be far ahead if you didn't stop every thirty seconds to remind me just how important this thing is."
She loved him so dearly, but, oh boy, could he become a pain in the ass.
"Okay, okay," he said in his condescending tone.
Epagogia considered putting her Soul Contract with him to use for the first time ever for a second there. It would definitely be a way to relieve all the stress she was collecting while working with him.
"Oh, right, Jaji-boy, I forgot to tell you something," she smiled, knowing how angry this would make the little human. "I found a guy in Blacksoil with a 9th level talent for both Qi and Mana. I gave him the strongest Cultivation Techniques, Martial Style, Spells and Martial Techniques that fit his Affinity and talent."
Sadly, Epagogia didn't get the reaction she had been fishing for. No, she got no reaction.
"Nothing, not even a little shouting? A bit of spanking?" she was so disappointed.
"If you gave him that stuff, it means that he couldn't spread them or that you had him sign a Soul Contract. You a Devil, Eppy, not a good Samaritan."
"Is that term from the religious book? I remember you saying something like this in the past, but I can't seem to be able to place it."
"Yep, religious book. It means that you are not a person who does well just because. There's always a catch."
Epagogia faked taking offense from those words in a theatrical way.
"That's not true! I do bloody good actions all the time!" she added a devilish grin, "it's just that I prefer doing good actions for myself; isn't that the same?"
Jacob kept working on the Formation, ignoring the woman.
"There is a hidden layer to prevent the transplant," Jacob groaned after discovering more and more problems. Taking away a Formation shouldn't be a problem for him and Epagogia, but this one was a tough nut to crack. Formations, in general, were meant to be stationary. This one was somehow based on the position and arrangement through the cave.
"Also, we'll have to recreate the right environment for this Formation even if we take it away, it's going to be a massive pain," Jacob got up and stared at the work they had been doing for the past six hours with a grimace.
"I mean, this garden is close enough to St. Peter, and instead of taking it away, we could expand the cave in the future. It would be much easier than trying this colossal work. Colossal work which, by the way, is going to take at least a week from the look of it."
Epagogia looked at all the patterns they had laid down and the ones they had uncovered.
"This is no common Formation, too, Jaji-boy. You know it, I know it. We know it. Shouldn't we spend this time rekindling the flame of our love instead of working on this stupid endeavor?"
"With 'rekindling the flame of our love,' I imagine you mean 'having mindless sex until dawn', right?" Jacob wasn't that disgusted by the idea, but he didn't want to mess up any romantic relationship before understanding what he was after.
"Oh, Jaji-boy, you know me so well," Eudokia let one shoulder strap of her long dress fall off and looked at him seductively.
Jacob sighed and gestured toward the formation.
"This is an Ancient grade Formation. We can upgrade it in time, but it's going to cost us a pretty penny. We'll need to run multiple analyses on it in the future, but I agree with you for now. We can't take this away without pouring a lot of time into it. And it might take us even more than a week if we find there are other parts we haven't uncovered yet."
"Is it sex, then?" Epagogia smiled.
"No, it's packing and going back to St. Peter, then. We have a mass extermination to plan."
"Oh, Jaji-boy, you get me so hot when you talk dirty."