Echoes Of The Seven

It wasn’t long before Alex returned with a meek expression.

“Feeling better?” Jaxie chuckled. Alex went red. Thankfully, Jaxie didn’t wait for a response.

“Whatever. While you were taking care of business, Eris and I figured out some of the next details. More specifically, what to do with the built-up Desire.”

Eris nodded. “I have four skills that can be upgraded- Crafting Points, or CP for short, my CP spender for extra Durability, my passive Quality boost, and then Desire’s Reap.”

“If all of your skills are upgraded with the same resource, then the only logical option is to upgrade the skill that gives the resource. If it unlocks more options, then it’s all but guaranteed to also increase the amount of Desire you can gather.”

“Early investment for greater yield,” Alex agreed. Eris let out a breath.

“So that settles it. The first skill I level up is going to be Desire’s Reap.”

“Five points,” Jaxie said. “Go ahead and see how much that accomplishes.”

Eris bit her tongue and closed her eyes. She got the sense it wasn’t needed, but it just felt right. It was easier to focus on what was happening inside when she couldn’t see the world around her.

Eris wasn’t quite sure how to activate things, but she decided to focus on Enhance first. Since that was the skill being used, it only seemed like the right choice. Somewhere else, she became acutely aware of her five points of Desire, buzzing in the back of her head like a cup of water waiting to be poured. Similarly, her four available skills all seemed to call out in response as if they were homeless beggars. Eris willed a portion of the Desire to drip into Desire’s Reap.

Just one point, but that was enough to quickly tell that the ‘cup’ for the skill was much larger than the cup of available Desire. Welp. Nothing to do but go all in. Eris funnelled the remaining four points into Desire’s Reap. When she was done, she opened her eyes.

“A fifth, maybe? Feels like it might be twenty-five points to level up the skill.”

Jaxie raised an eyebrow. “So a few more rounds of kissing should get it.”

Eris and Alex both went red. Jaxie laughed. “All we need now is to figure out how long the cooldown is.”

“There doesn’t seem to be any indication…” Eris offered.

“We don’t need an indication,” Jaxie said. “I’ve already got a plan.”

Alex sounded worried. “A plan?”

“Yep. We’ll all train as normal, but every hour I’ll come back inside so Eris and I can passionately make out. When it finally gives points, we’ll know how long the cooldown is.”

Eris tried not to sound like a chipmunk getting curb stomped. She coughed and turned around.

“Okay, training time! Get out!”

Alex responded in earnest- quickly leaving the distillery to presumably do some exercise around the vineyards. Jaxie took a bit more time with her exit, even going so far as to sway her hips when she walked- something she never did. Gods, her ass looked fantastic in those pants.

Eris didn’t realise she had been staring until Jaxie paused at the doorway, gave a wink, and blew a kiss before closing the door behind her.

Eris tried not to hyperventilate. Obviously, Jaxie was still interested despite what happened last night. Either that, or she was pissed off and decided to get payback by tormenting Eris about her class.

Regardless, Eris’s head was swimming. Kissing Jaxie had been one thing, but having her be right there while Eris made out with Alex was another. That couldn’t have been something Jaxie just ‘brushed off’. If anything, Jaxie had encouraged it. Even if it was for the sake of testing a weird skill, there were many emotions at play and Eris could barely even understand her own- much less those of two other people.

Eris shook her head. Not the time. She needed to focus. Eris got to work.

It was strange. Eris had heard that after a person receives a crafting class, the act of creation becomes second nature. It didn’t matter how much she researched about it- nothing could prepare her for just how literal that statement was.

Previously, Eris held every single step in her head and was aware of each moment while it passed. Now, it was as if she completely turned her brain off. Eris never thought about a single one of her actions- she just did them. Hands moved autonomously to grab tools, move materials, or gently hammer and awl.

Eris knew it was referred to as a ‘crafting trance’, and that was a perfect way to describe it. A trance. The only thing suggesting otherwise is that her mind never slowed down. She remained consciously aware of everything she was doing, but none of it was intentional anymore. All thoughts of the work in front of her had been pushed to background noise.

Even though Eris had been pretty swift at getting things done in the past, she was leaving her old self in the dust. Having a Control stat helped, making her hands move just a bit faster than they should have, but the rest of it was just the crafting trance. All the downtime between actions, all the moments she spent planning her next step- those had vanished. Pauses to make sure she was grabbing the right piece of material? Gone. The squinting while stitching thread through leather to make sure she was staying on the same straight line? Bye-bye. The only thing left behind was flawless work done at the fastest possible speed yet Eris never felt in a rush.

In a matter of five minutes, Eris had measured, cut out, stitched together, laced, and put on a pair of surprisingly comfortable leather shoes with nice thick soles- just the way she liked them. During the process, she cautiously tapped inwards. She could feel her CP practically vibrating at the presence of a craft that was being performed. Since she had nothing else to use it on, Eris focused. It was oddly similar to spending Desire- a cup of energy poured into the respective skills. Or skill, in this case, since Eris only had one. Resilience. Since that was the case, there wasn’t much of a reason not to go all in. Ten points flowed into the shoes while Eris was stitching them together as easily as taking a breath.

An Inspect cast towards the finished product made a grin form on Eris’s face.

Leather Shoes

Durability: 100%

A simple and comfortable pair of leather shoes. Created by Eris Kadell. Made from leather and twine.

Provides a Minor boost to Vitality.

Nothing outstanding, aside from the fact that they now held a legitimate stat bonus. It was impossible for anyone to create an item with such a bonus unless they had a crafting class. Once they got one, though, everything they made consequently had a bit of magic inside of it, granting a bonus of some kind. It didn’t appear that increasing the Durability using Resilience had an immediately noticeable effect on an Inspection, but Eris had a feeling that a stray dog could chew on these shoes for hours without the leather tearing.

It was Eris’s first creation after the Gifting. It may have been a simple pair of shoes, but it proved that despite every other part of her class, she got what she wanted. She was a crafter. Her smile widened even more.

Comfy shoes equipped, Eris upended the duffel bag onto a nearby table and grabbed a flattened length of cord with measurements from a drawer. She went through the process of writing down her new proportions and math-ing out the difference between her old size and new one. Her legs held the biggest changes, growing longer by a noteworthy margin. Outside of that, the proportions didn’t change tremendously. Eris had been a bit more… curvy before the Gifting, so although her body did grow slightly larger, the loss of fat helped to offset that. The only measurement aside from her leg length that changed more than a few inches was Eris’s chest.

Thirty-three inches around turned into thirty-five and a half, which wasn’t a massive increase, but her underbust had slimmed from thirty-two to an even thirty. Eris tentatively cupped a breast. The combination of a slight size increase with a slimmer chest made them feel significantly larger. If Eris had to wager a guess, she jumped straight from an A-cup to C’s. She’d have to start wearing bras.

Actually, now that she thought about it…

Eris walked to the side of the room towards a full-length mirror that she often used when deducing the sizes of outfits. Even before she stopped in front of it, her eyes widened. Back in the chapel, she had batted away the tightness of her shirt around her chest as something she could deal with. Somehow, she failed to acknowledge the aspect of how it might have looked to others.

When it was wrapped snug over her breasts.

And she wasn’t wearing a bra.

Holy fuck, it make her boobs look huge. The shirt all but pushed them upwards and Eris could clearly see the slight protrusions of her nipples. It looked like that one time when she accidentally made Jaxie a shirt that was too small and Eris figured out she was gay.

Eris blushed and stepped back to the work bench. She grabbed the spare shirt she had in the duffel bag, then scanned some shelves for extra fabric that was roughly the same shade of black. She could worry about fully making new clothes when she got to Marrix- for now, she just needed to adjust what she had so that it fit more comfortably during these next few days. That meant cutting the stitches in the seam of her shirt and sewing in a few extra inches to the width of the chest and the length of the hem. With the trance, it barely took any time at all.

Within forty-five-ish minutes, Eris had adjusted both shirts, along with a third that she had been keeping at the lab in case she needed it and the jeans that were now hung up on a line so that they could dry faster from the Gifting waterworks. The trio had been training at the distillery for years- Eris had an entire room full of old clothes she pulled from the trash pile, cleaned, and then set aside so that she could scavenge from them at a moment’s notice. That meant Eris was even able to find a simple cotton bra that kind of fit and tighten up the band so that it was comfortable and snug.

Eris barely managed to begin the process of heating up her improvised forge before the door to the distillery opened with a knock. Jaxie stepped inside. “How’s it going, little Miss Artificer?”

“Fine,” Eris said. “Haven’t had much of a chance to try things out yet. All I’ve done so far is loosen my clothes and make a new pair of shoes. Adjusting something that’s already completed doesn’t let me use any of my new bonuses.”

“Sounds annoying… I think.”

Eris chuckled. “If it didn’t work that way, the Syndicate would have destroyed the Hollow generations ago. All they’d need is a crafter to keep sharpening the same sword over and over again while using their skills and eventually you’d get something capable of cutting a continent in half.”

“Whatcha’ working on now?”

Eris put her hands on her hips. “Now that I’m done with the necessities of clothes and stuff, I can start actually making things and trying out my skills. Not that there’s much to try out. Crafter skills don’t tend to require much practice in order to use effectively, unlike combat classes. Most of the time, it comes down to trial and error of figuring out how to allocate CP between multiple skills in order to maximize potential.”

“-And you only have one skill that uses your CP,” Jaxie summarized, “which effectively makes it a passive bonus until you get something else that uses CP and forces you to choose.”

Eris nodded. “Exactly. I have nothing to practice with, meaning anything I make before we leave for Marrix is nothing but level progression.”

“Speaking of level progression,” Jaxie closed the door. “It’s time.”

Eris raised an eyebrow. “Huh? What are you-... oh.”

Her cheeks darkened as Jaxie walked closer. “Yeah. Time to see if the cooldown is an hour, Ell.”

A moment of silence passed before Eris found her lips moving against her will. “Is it weird?”

“What?” Jaxie paused just a foot and a half away from Eris, sensing a shift. Eris internally swore at her stupidity. Still, she dug the grave and now she had to lie in it.

“This. Us. Is it weird?”

An eyebrow raised. “Because of last night?”

Eris gave a shallow nod. Jaxie held still for a moment, then sighed. She stepped forward- but this time it was at an angle so she could lean her elbows on the table beside Eris.

“Well, let’s recap. We’ve been dating for about six months, and last night I said that I loved you for the first time. You responded by vomiting all over the bed, then slept in the kitchen.”

Eris’s face felt like it was being jabbed full of red-hot needles. She could only look at the floor. Meanwhile, Jaxie continued.

“This morning, you got a class that requires you to have sex in order to become more powerful. You let me kiss you without throwing up, and then I watched while you tongue-fucked our mutual friend Alex.”

Eris felt her heart shrivel in her chest. This was terrible- she was ruining everything.

“In conclusion,” Jaxie pushed up from her elbows, placing her hands flat on the table. She sighed. “Yeah, it’s pretty fuckin’ weird.”

That was extremely like her. Jaxie never beat around the bush. She went in, dropped all the facts out in the open, and then started the conversation.

Eris wanted to cry. “It’s just…Last night I panicked. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

Jaxie shook her head. “It’s not your fault. I was the one that decided the perfect time to hit you with the L-word was the night before the single most important day of your life and when stress would be at an all-time high. Dropping that on you last night was a dick move.”

Silence lasted for several moments. Jaxie was the one who broke it.

“Look, I get it. We’re in this relationship together, but I’m moving a few paces faster than you. I can slow down. I’m happy to slow down. We’ll go as slow as you want.”

Eris took a shaky breath.

“I love you, too.”

“What?” Jaxie raised an eyebrow.

“I love you, Jaxie,” Eris said. “More than anything. I want to be with you so badly, but…” Eris trailed off. One of Jaxie’s hands found Eris’s.

“But it’s not the right time?” Jaxie offered. Eris nodded.

“With the Gifting, and the Syndicate, and the training, and the missions, and all of that, there’s just so much going on or will be going on soon. I’m freaked out, especially since I’m supposedly the last Gifted and the first Echo that anyone’s seen in four hundred years, and now I have to embrace lust and have sex with lots of people but I want to be with you and everything is so weird and fucked up and I’m confused because I liked kissing Alex and-”

Eris’s panicked rambles were cut short when Jaxie pulled the shorter girl in for a deep, powerful hug. Eris didn’t realise she had been tearing up until she sniffled and choked into Jaxie’s chest. Jaxie rested her chin atop Eris’s head and gently rubbed her back.

“Shh… it’s okay.”

“No ishnot!” Eris sobbed. “Yoosedd iluboo en I areddy-”

Jaxie abruptly pulled away with a small smile. She leaned down so that their faces were even. Eris could feel her nose leaking.

“Eris, sweetie, you’re ugly crying again. I need you to speak clearly because I can’t understand you.”

Eris sniffled and wiped her face with the back of a hand. When she spoke, her words were still accompanied by sobs but were at least comprehensible. “It’s not okay! You said you loved me and I already cheated on you by kissing Alex! And I liked it!”

“Oh, you’re adorable. Eris, you didn’t cheat on me.”

“Yesh I did!”

“Eris! Remember that I was the one who suggested that you kiss Alex?”

“Wha…?” Eris blinked through teary eyes. Jaxie nodded

“Yeah. I didn’t just tell you two to kiss, I told you to make out with each other. You did that, and you know what I think?”

Eris didn’t even form a word to ask- she just made a teary noise that sounded vaguely like a question. Jaxie dragged a thumb over one cheek to wipe away tears.

“I thought it was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Huh?”

Jaxie rested both hands on either one of Eris’s shoulders and stared her deep in the eyes.

“Eris, darling, I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. But I have no problem with you shagging your way through the population, especially if it makes you more powerful. If you ever want to make out with Alex, or any other girl, you have my permission. Better yet, you have my blessing. Go nuts.”

“Are you sure?”

Eris knew she was gross- she’d just been ugly crying (which she had an unfortunate tendency to do). The kind that made snot and drool drip just as much as her tears. She was a mess. Jaxie gave an adorable smile, lifted a scrap piece of fabric from the table beside them, and used it to gently wipe down Eris’s face. She even held it over Eris’s nose.

“Blow.”

Eris did. Jaxie folded her impromptu tissue, wiped Eris’s nose again, then discarded the fabric onto the table. She leaned in close.

“Eris Limeen Kadell, I am absolutely, one hundred-percent positive.”