Saintess Summons Skeletons

The curse flowing everywhere in Sofia’s body immediately dispersed as the paralysis orb left her hand.

The presence of her mana and body, everything came back all at once, and her left arm felt like it grew back with a lightning shock. She jolted on the chair, trying to keep her voice in. It was not too painful but it was certainly a strangely alien and unpleasant sensation. It only lasted a few seconds. Then, finally, everything was back to normal. Finally able to move again, she still did not dare to move her left arm, and simply turned her head to look.

Her arm was a wet-looking mass of blue-gray Lumian mana thread muscles with her signature bloodlight shining around and underneath it.

“I’m like a piece of meat ready to roast,” she commented.

“I shall weep for whoever attempts to eat that,” Leverle deadpanned, standing next to her holding what looked like a very long golden sock. “Can you move properly? Any issues with the mana flow?”

Sofia opened and closed her left hand a few times, before moving the rest of the arm, testing one articulation after the other.

“Moves fine, even if… It feels a bit strange. The mana flow is perfect. Exactly how I remembered…”

“Good. Now let us get this skin back on. Yes, like this, keep your arm straight. Spread your fingers a bit more. Perfect.”

Leverle carefully slid Sofia’s skin onto her arm like a long glove, it naturally fit the curves of her muscles, and looked as soft and springy as natural skin, although with the metallic sheen and color of the silk gold.

Doesn’t feel like anything…

Leverle’s fingers pressed Sofia’s arm, tracing the connections of the muscles, inspecting the looseness around the knuckles, the wrist and the elbow, before stopping at the shoulder where the golden skin slightly overlapped the regular skin. “There is one last choice to make. Purely aesthetic. I can connect the skin cleanly, make it fade into your natural skin tone over a few centimeters, or do something else. What do you want?” he asked.

“Hmm… Do you know the [Crystalized] classless? The kind of jagged-edge lightning-looking way the skin connects… Well I already have it on my chest so if you can replicate that they’ll both look less out of place, probably.”

“That can be done.”

Grabbing a handful of long needles, Lervel resumed his work once again, starting by loosely stitching the golden skin to the real one, then working on the detailing with mana threads and more strange tools. Once that was done, he moved on to slowly connecting the bloodlight and mana circuits that stood outside of the muscles to the skin, working his way down from the shoulder to the fingers. Sofia quickly lost count of the number of needles and hooks that were stabbed into her arm. The next few hours felt a bit like her arm was getting continuously pecked at by a thousand vultures, but now almost everything was in place, and with Leverle pulling the last mana circuit where it belonged, a long spiral of glowing runes carved itself on the golden skin.

[Runeforged Overlord], the last skill that her status showed the ‘/!\ INCOMPLETE CIRCUITS /!\’warning for, was finally back to normal.

“It is done. You should step out, get some fresh air. There should be no mistakes, nonetheless verify the rebuilt skill one by one. I will be here for a few more days, should you need anything.”

“I- I don’t know how to thank you…”

Leverle’s blank mask slightly shook before he turned away and started cleaning up the messy pile of used tools, stakes and needles that had accumulated on the tables behind him. “Paying customers need not thank me. If you want to express gratitude… One could wear proper vestments more often.”

“Sure, I’ll try to wear it more,” Sofia answered, jumping out of the seat, and turning to see Pareth and Bookie both silently reading books, sitting on the floor against the wall. “You guys…”

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Sofia ended up testing her skills just outside of the city. It had to be said that Leverle had done pristine work. Everything worked as expected, and the arm even transformed correctly when she used her demon form, although it kept its golden sheen. The only lost ability, which Leverle had warned her about, was the [Hollow heart] skill that originally only existed in the demon form’s physical left arm. Although the transformation worked now, it was more of an aesthetical change than a functional one, that couldn’t be helped, as the blueprint sourced from her legs to her arm wasn’t as malleable anymore due to the extensive work done on it.

After confirming that there was nothing wrong, she returned to the few actual rooms of the most incomplete building of the city, her ‘palace’ in the city center. It was really just an annex serving as her house, a basement, and a bunch of walls, for now.

She sat down on a bed she didn’t know she owned, observing the details of her new arm, and the realism of her golden skin. The handprints on her palm, the creases of the skin, it all looked perfectly normal, aside from the metalling golden aspect. Leverle had clearly copied the finer details directly from her other arm.

Total losses… [Hollow heart] gone. The demon form’s left arm is now slightly weaker. Two and a half slots of blueprint erased permanently, and another half a slot now used up by the golden skin. Moreover, the mana circuits in my left arm will now be harder to alter. And this all cost me an old stone.

That’s… A lot.

But the gains… Cool-looking golden arm that I can heavily enchant.

Normally enchanting someone doesn’t really work exactly because the blueprint doesn’t take well to it. It only works for Pareth because it’s built into his summoning ritual as well as the bones… Then Zerei found a workaround but it’s limited and I already use it for Sun’s ritual.

The question remains… What do I enchant this with?

Just then she noticed that she wasn’t alone in her ‘home’.

Oh. I forgot all about that… No wonder the bed is different.

The other person’s steps slowed as she entered the room.

“Ah! Finally showing your face again?!” the Skyreach princess said with furrowed brows, she was wearing a long black and white maid outfit, and carrying a vase full of flowers.

“Ahah… Sorry… I was a bit busy.”

“Well you’re the employer now so it’s your problem if I’m sitting here doing nothing. But really what a bore!” Beatrice continued to complain, “I don’t mind decorating but what am I supposed to do with four rooms and a basement?! What palace? Where is it?!”

Sofia chuckled nervously, “I know, I know. I got sidetracked again… I should really get to it… Erm, listen… Pareth?”

Pareth stepped out of Sofia’s storage ring, a random book still in hand.

“I’ll be working on the palace with Bookie for a few days until we receive notifications for the start of Alith and Asty’s trial. Do you mind helping her level up a bit until then? Just quickly take her to level 99.”

“HUH?!”

“Well, what? I said I would help you level up a bit. Since you can’t work for now, let’s take care of that.”

“H- How does one ‘quickly’ get to level ninety nine?!” the bewildered princess asked, almost dropping her flower pot.

“Oh, I’m sure you can guess how. Here, you’ll need this,” Sofia said, grabbing the flower pot and instead giving Beatrice a mithril hatchet. She looked up at Pareth, “Make sure she’s safe, alright?”

With a nod, Pareth grabbed the poor level 28 princess and left the room.

Again alone in her room, Sofia smirked to herself. “Funny how history repeats. I would have given you a dagger but I’m only allowed to own one, so… I wonder how many days it’ll take.”

Sofia didn’t even know what monsters Pareth would go hunt to help Beatrice level up, but she fully trusted that he would easily complete the task. Helping someone level up while protecting them was what he had been doing with her all along, after all.

And now… Let’s have a little chat with Delicate first, then onto the palace.

Sofia pulled out the box containing the sentient engraving pen and unlocked it.

“Are you awake in there?”

Delicate answered from within the box, “I guess so? I do not believe ‘sleep’ is something I can do to begin with.”

Sofia opened the box, “If you say so. My arm is done, can you give me your opinion now?”

“Did it work?! I want to see!”

Sofia grabbed the pen with her right hand, holding it above her left arm. “So, what do you think?”

“Waaaah! It’s just as you said! Yes, it will be great! I say we can easily fit two… No three ultimate enchantments! Maybe more!”