Arriving at the enchanting room, Lilly found it to be just like she left it yesterday. The circular wooden table stood in the center of the room, ready for the task at hand. The surrounding cabinets and bookcases were still rather empty, but some materials and a few books from Eldrin had at least marked the start of the collection.
"Alright, ladies, I imagine you're all eager to witness my craftsmanship once more," Lilly declared, her tone laced with the flair of a showman addressing her audience.
"Hey, remember, we're pitching in too this time, especially with handling the crystals. Don't downplay our role," Mia replied, her words wrapped in a playful tease.
Mia laid out the ten necklaces on the table, while Lilly retrieved the engraving tool and the shimmering steeldrake scales from one of the cabinets. Eolande took out a bag, presumably filled with crystals, and put those on the table as well.
"Sure, but eventually I hope I'll be doing all this by myself. It feels like a one person job." Lilly was thinking about how she would do all this on her own in the future. "Will the crystal part be added before I enchant them in the future?"
Mia and Eolande looked at each other at first, both unsure of what the other was thinking. "Well, I can attach them before handing them over, as long as I have them, and know what type to use," Mia said.
"Yeah, I'll be able to provide crystals more often going forward, especially of the orange type. Even yellow and green should be doable now, but each tier has a significant increase in cost and time required," Eolande explained, clearly showing her value in the current process.
"... I know we haven't talked about it yet, but how would you like to be compensated for those, Elly?" Lilly asked, unsure of what to expect. A fair deal might be at least 20% of the profits, but given the cost of crystal production, it could be higher. Then again, considering Eolande's apparent wealth, how much would monetary compensation matter to her?
"At first I was thinking about making them an incentive for you to practice your normal enchanting, but since the flame made that pretty irrelevant, I guess there's no reason to. So to make it fair to other enchanters, just cover the material cost and I'll be happy."
Lilly's smile broadened, appreciating the fairness in Elly's offer. "Thanks, Elly. So, what's the rough cost for the materials?"
"It's about 100 gold for each orange stone, 400 for yellow, and 1400 for green. Then the price climbs similarly through blue, indigo, and violet," Eolande explained.
"Alright, so for these necklaces, using orange stones, we're looking at 1000 gold. And what about your costs, Mia? For both materials and labor?" Lilly inquired, trying to gauge the total investment for their project.
"I spent 700 on the electrum, and maybe 200 for the work. So, 900 should cover it," Mia calculated, mentally tallying the figures.
"Adding my 340 for the scales and let's say 10 gold for my labor, we need to make 2250 gold to break even. That seems doable, even if we only sell 3 of them." Lilly calculated the total cost, and found that if they sold all the necklaces they would be rich. It was an incredibly lucrative business, at least if her calculations were correct.
"... Won't we be millionaires at this rate, Lilly?" Mia asked, her eyes shining with optimism.
"Don't be too optimistic now girls, the current price is only so high due to the war starting. It's good to consider the current market when making your items, but you'll rarely get opportunities like this in the future." Eolande cautioned, tempering their excitement.
"You're right about that… I guess I don't really need protection, so we can sell mine as well," Lilly pondered, only to be quickly vetoed by Mia and Eolande.
"No way!" and "That's out of the question," they chorused, firmly rejecting her suggestion.
"Okay, okay, we'll stick to the original plan," Lilly conceded, swayed by their adamant responses. "Let's get started."
Lilly began with the first necklace, swiftly carving the runes for 'safe' and 'wearer', which was done in under a minute. Then she focused, thinking about everything she had to keep in mind. The full moon would help with a 20% increase in power, and her emotional state could add more than 100% it seemed, although that had shocked Eldrin.
Then there was the transmutation she hadn't practiced, aligning the forces within the items. 'Could that have to do with the purification Mom mentioned?' Lilly wondered, considering asking the flame to purify one of the scales to see what would happen. A proper transmutation could help at least 20% as well, she remembered Eldrin saying, so not trying would be a shame. But their revenue would fall by one third if she messed up, so it was a risk.
'Better not, I'll test it at another time with some less important stuff,' Lilly resolved. 'I should focus on what I know.'
She was ready to start the first enchantment, but they needed to attach the orange gem somehow first. "Do we do the bezel thing now or after the enchantment?" Lilly asked while looking at the two of them. "I'm pretty sure we're going to need them for this now, so there's no real reason to wait I think."
"Oh, then I guess we should do it now to make sure it doesn't disconnect." Mia said, taking out some electrum from one of her pockets. "Can you… Wait, since you're immune to heat, maybe you can just push it on the necklace while heating your hand or something?" Mia asked, seemingly not entirely sure about how to do this.
"Oh, I can try that I guess. How much heat can the crystal handle Elly?" Lilly asked, feeling like that could be a good idea.
"I'm honestly not sure, but it should be a higher temperature than electrum can handle. But you need it to look a bit nice as well, so try not to make a melted mess will you?" Eolande cautioned, equally curious about the outcome.
Feeling a tad uncertain, Lilly wondered how best to heat her hand without causing damage. 'How would I even heat up my hand? Could I ask the flame to warm a small part of the necklace for the setting?'
"I… I'm going to give it a try. Delaying one necklace a bit wouldn't be a disaster after all," Lilly said, more to reassure herself than anything.
She took out one of the orange gems from the small bag. This was her first time actually holding one, so she took a moment to look at it and sense it with her flame. She could clearly feel the capacity of this little thing, a fair bit larger than the bracelets they used earlier. But very soon after she started, she could see the gem start glowing with a faint flame in the middle.
"Oh no, I think it consumed a bit of my flame," Lilly said, a touch of worry in her voice as she looked to Eolande for guidance.
"That's fine, it's supposed to hold mana anyways after the enchantment. You should be able to take it out just as easily as you put it in," Eolande reassured her, unfazed.
Lilly tried to remove the flame by asking it nicely, and it faithfully obeyed. The gem was back to normal as far as she could tell.
Now she held the necklace, and tried to gently inquire on whether the flame could heat up a focused area of it, afraid to melt the entire thing. It didn't take long before she could see the surface of the golden metal change a bit, becoming slightly discolored and smoothing out tiny imperfections. 'Not feeling the heat this should give off still feels weird, but it seems like the flame did a great job,' she thought, hoping the flame would be happy with her compliments. She could sense a smell reminiscent of Mia's forge, like heated metal, so she was hopefully doing something right.
Now was the moment to carefully set the gem into the softened surface of the necklace. Lilly could feel every tiny movement of her hand, her nerves making the task more challenging. She paused briefly to steady herself, then continued. Gently, the gem touched the necklace, sinking smoothly into the warm metal which curled around it just right. When it seemed deep enough, Lilly held it steady, waiting for the metal to cool and set. It didn't take long, and soon she released her hold.
The gem seemed to be sitting nicely in the middle of the necklace, and Lilly was happy with the result. The metal around the gem was nice and smooth, looking like it was holding the gem in place with the protruding parts around it.
"What do you think, Miss smith?" Lilly asked Mia, hoping she would accept the result. She handed the necklace over to her, forgetting the scalding temperature it must have right now. Luckily though, the mistake went unnoticed, since Mia was wearing the flame-resistant bracelet and held it without any issue.
"It worked surprisingly well I'd say. It's almost perfectly in the center, but it's a tiny bit askew compared to the necklace. I'd say you did a great job," Mia commented, her tone both honest and encouraging, as she handed the necklace back.
"Oh, right, I see the mistake now. The pattern on the gem isn't symmetrical with the necklace, I should have noticed." Lilly said, taking the constructive criticism in stride. "But now it's ready for the enchanting," She said, preparing the scale on the table and putting the necklace down again.
Lilly was excited to see the extent of the flame's enchanting compared to doing it with the amulet. It would be hard to compare due to all the other factors, but she felt it would be stronger regardless.
She inserted the flame in the necklace and the scale, and took a moment to sense the energies that were misaligned. It would be stupid to try transmuting it since she hadn't tried since her first time during Eldrin's last lesson. She let it be for now, and focused on the capacity of the necklace combined with the gem instead. It was significant, about double that of the bracelets. But it could very easily be necessary, so she didn't feel like it was a waste.
With her final preparations complete, Lilly thought of the people she wanted to protect. She asked the flame to enchant the necklace as she had with the dagger the day before.
The process was started soon after, pulling the threads from the steeldrake scale and tying them to the runes on the necklace. It was a captivating sight, the delicate threads weaving their way into the runes with a gentle glow.
"Should we get under the table or something? Just to be sure?" Mia asked, clearly thinking back to the iron bracelet that had exploded in front of her.
Lilly thought about the relative power that an iron bracelet could handle compared to an electrum one with an orange crystal. It was probably ten times larger at least. And if that wasn't enough, all that power would go everywhere, unless the table could protect them.
"I think that's a good idea, at least for the first one. Maybe even out of the room," Lilly responded, now a bit nervous as well.
"You don't trust my table, Lilly? But fine, let's leave for a moment," Eolande said, also preferring to be on the safe side.
They all walked out of the room and waited for a couple of minutes in excited silence. Lilly could feel the mana in the room slowly drain, signaling the completion of the enchantment, and walked back into the room.
"Oooh, now I'm excited!" Lilly stepped up to the table and tried sensing the capacity it had used. She inserted the flame, and quickly noticed the capacity remaining was quite small.
"It's a success! I think I used about three quarters of the total capacity, so the crystal was absolutely necessary." Lilly told them, with a wide smile on her face. She felt so good about making a proper enchantment again, and one better than ever before even.
"That's great Lilly!" Mia exclaimed, with Eolande smiling at her side. "Can we test it somehow?" She asked while looking at Eolande, since she was the only one capable of judging the level of protection.
"I'm not sure how to do that, you two can't attack me with enough control to test it and I'm not sure I can attack you two without hurting you. Since it only hardens your skin I could maybe try using a needle to lessen the damage, but I don't really want to…" She looked hesitant to hurt either of them, but Lilly felt it was an acceptable price.
"I'll do it." Mia said, foiling Lilly's plan and making her a bit upset. If anyone should suffer for the sake of testing, it should be her.
"No, I'll do it Mia." Lilly said, making Mia upset.
"No, it's better if I do it. I'm bigger, a needle won't do much." Mia argued back, still trying to be logical about it.
"Oh, I can't handle a needle since I'm so small?" Lilly shot back, now even more upset.
Eolande stepped in, her tone soothing yet firm. "Girls, you're both sweet for trying to take on such a great burden for your loved one, but I don't think this is something to argue about," she said, gently chiding them. Lilly and Mia, both slightly embarrassed by Eolande's 'loved one' remark, fell silent. "Considering Lilly has more enchanting to do, Mia should be the one to test it," Eolande concluded logically.
Lilly had to admit that she was right. "Fine, go ahead Mia…" Nothing said she had to be happy about it though, and she made sure they knew.
"Good, I'll go get a needle then," Eolande said, leaving the two of them alone.
"Don't be so stubborn sweetie, you look better with a smile on your face." Mia said, demonstrating with her own face. It did look good, Lilly thought.
Mia reached for the necklace resting on the table and gingerly placed it around her neck. Although there was no discernible change in appearance, an unusual sensation seemed to ripple across her, etching itself onto her facial expression.
"This feels strange, my clothes feel so weightless, and I can barely feel the ground beneath my feet." Mia looked a bit uncomfortable, which wasn't good considering the necklace was constantly on.
"Is it something you can get used to? It would be a problem if they're too uncomfortable," Lilly said nervously, hoping it was only the initial change that was causing discomfort.
"Well, it should be fine. Not feeling my clothes can get problematic though. But it feels better already." Mia said, probably attempting to ease Lilly's worries.
Relieved by Mia's response, Lilly nodded and was about to continue when Eolande reappeared, holding a needle in her hand.
"Are you ready, Mia? Place your hand on the table, please," Eolande instructed after Mia gave her a nod.
Mia obediently positioned her hand on the table with her palm upturned. Eolande gently grasped her hand and brought the needle into contact with Mia's palm.
"I'll apply pressure between your bones, so at worst, you might get a minor puncture wound. I'll begin now," Eolande reassured Mia.
Eolande clearly started putting some pressure on the needle, but Mia didn't even seem to notice. Lilly wondered if she could feel some mana being drained to the necklace, but if there was it was very slight at the moment.
Eolande put more force in the needle now, and now Lilly felt the necklace working. "Do you feel anything Mia?" she asked, both nervous and curious about Mia's experience.
"I feel a pressure spread over my entire arm somehow, like it's been covered in plate mail I guess." Mia replied, a hint of unease in her voice.
"I wonder if the enchantment presses directly against the needle with mana or if it uses the other side of your hand to support itself… Probably the latter, the former would be quite advanced I think." Lilly pondered out loud, distracting herself with technical questions. She might be more nervous than Mia at this point.
Eolande paused briefly, slipping her hand under Mia's and then applying pressure once more. "You're correct; it's the second type. The first would essentially be a force field, offering superior protection but demanding more mana for the same level of defense. The advantage of a force field is that you wouldn't feel the impact at all, while this type could still tip you over if someone were to ram into you," Eolande clarified, providing insight to Lilly's query.
She started trying to pierce Mia's skin again, but she seemed surprised at this point. "This is some serious protection Lilly, the needle might break before the skin does at this rate."
"Really? How would you rate it compared to other protective enchantments you've seen?"
Eolande contemplated for a moment before responding, "It might be one of the best of this type I've seen. Getting so much protection from this simple material is incredible. But of course, I've seen enchantments that could withstand several of my strongest attacks, so this really is far from the pinnacle. Sorry, Lilly." She looked rather apologetic about that, maybe a bit afraid to hurt Lilly's pride.
"Oh, that's exactly what I wanted to hear honestly. It would be super boring if this was the best enchanting could do. You've just made me more excited for my future," Lilly responded, thinking about all the crazy materials that could be out there.
She could absolutely feel the necklace drain at full speed now, higher than the bracelet had been capable of. Much higher actually, which didn't make much sense to Lilly.
"I think the draining power of this enchantment is higher than usual…" Lilly said, while pondering the reasons. 'The power of an enchantment comes from the stored mana and the capacity for draining mana. The most an enchantment can handle at once is decided by the capacity, while the sustained power is decided by the rate of draining mana from the environment. The capacity depends on the materials and crystals, but what decides the drain rate? And why is it much higher now than with the bracelets? Is it the crystal? Or the flame? Or the full moon?'
While Lilly was busy pondering, Mia suddenly let out a whelp of pain. Eolande hurriedly stopped the needle when she noticed it give in, but it reached a centimeter deep before she managed to halt it.
"I'm so sorry, Mia!" Eolande exclaimed, quickly removing the needle from her palm. "But that's incredible. I expected the enchantment to focus on a larger area since it was made from scales, but this one seems to focus on smaller areas at a time, making it capable of withstanding sharp attacks a lot better. This is beyond my expectations, Lilly. I was getting scared for the needle at the end there." Eolande summarized the experiment, her astonishment evident.
Mia took her hand off the table, looking relieved to be finished. She studied her hand for a second, seeing a bit of blood coming from the tiny wound. "What do you think this would be worth then?" Mia asked, clearly still thinking about that first date.
"It can withstand any arrow or sword slash by an average adventurer I'd say, probably even quite a few considering the capacity of about 4 reds. And for a long time even since the drain was so high. So given the circumstances and the simple usage, I'd say you could get 1600 to 2000 for each. Or, the store could sell for that, you could get 1100 to 1400 for each I think." Eolande surmised, based on her knowledge and the war that just started.
"That's great then! Worst case would still give us 1000 gold left over." Lilly quickly calculated. She still had a bit over 300 gold left from earlier deals, so she could buy some materials for future enhancements as well when she sold these.
"... Do you know what a night at the Skyview restaurant costs, Lilly?" Mia asked tentatively.
"Not exactly, but I think it's in the ballpark of 700 gold for two people. Which I guess we could afford, as long as Elly's estimate is correct. We would have 1150 gold each in the worst case, but if you want to spend 350 on a date you wouldn't break even." Lilly told her, matter of factly. She felt it would be a bit wasteful to spend so much on a date, but if Mia still wanted to then she would be fine with it. Lilly had enough gold on her end after all.
"Oh… I… I'll have to talk to Dad then maybe." Mia said, looking disappointed.
Lilly really hated to see her like that, and considered their options. 'I guess I could cover what she would need to break even, since I'm good on money at the moment. Yeah, that's fine. I do also want that fancy date.'
"Let's do it Mia, I'll pay whatever you need to break even with this deal," Lilly told her, trying to sound encouraging.
"Really? But, that doesn't feel right. It's an even partnership." Mia said, hesitating to accept.
"We're in two partnerships Mia, and in one of them it's fine to spoil the other a bit. Even encouraged, on occasion." Lilly reassured her, hoping Mia wouldn't feel guilty about it.
"Fine then, I'll accept your money. Just… don't be too rough when the night is ending." Mia accepted the offer, but couldn't help making a joke at the end.
"Hah, for that price you'll have to play nice, girl." Lilly responded to the joke, but felt dirty doing so. "Please don't continue the joke Mia, I'm out of my depth here."
Mia laughed at that. "I won't. But thank you, Lilly."
They shared a tender look, and they both wondered about going in for another kiss. But the presence of a certain elf made it harder.
"Oh, young love is just so sweet. Do you want me to leave the room, girls?" Eolande asked, teasing them.
Lilly wouldn't mind if she did leave the room, but she couldn't say that unfortunately. She sighed, letting the moment pass.
"I've got another 9 necklaces to enchant, so I should get back to it," she said, walking over to the table and picking up another necklace.
She spent most of the time left thinking about the date with Mia, and pondering the war, which had now started for real.
The steel drums of Dortfell were approaching the borders of Eldoria at this very moment.