Chapter 34: Enchanting!

I made a second dress over the next week and fixed my imperfections. Looking over the two identical dresses my [Perfectionist's Eye] was unhappily content as if I had done the bare minimum.

It was as good as it was going to get. I simply didn't have any time to make it better. Now for the enchanting process, but how many enchantments can this hold? Dragon silk is a very high-tier material so it should hold a lot.

I focused on the dress with state of focus, my breakthrough on enchanted items suggestions somewhere around seven? Seven enchantments? I don't know what will happen if I try to use too many so a safe five should be more reasonable.

First enchantment. This needed to be durable, an armor to be worn. How should I do this? Make it harder? No, there's something telling me to do something else. But what? Something about deflecting the attack? I can't make it use shield magic without using the wearer's mana.

I paced in contemplation. The solution is right at the tip of my tongue, so close, tauntingly so.

Maybe I should do the other enchantments and maybe the answer will come to me.

This needed to be a dress that can resize itself and change shape, that was the whole reason why it needed to be made entirely out of mana silk and mostly of the water type.

How should I do this though? Where will the mana go?

I sighed. I need the amulets that Mom and Dad made.

I walked out. The house now had several crates of stuff, ready to be moved into the new house in a few days. Mom and Dad were both going through several possessions and talking about them.

"Momara, The dresses are ready, there's just one last thing to do."

Dad sighed. "Enchanting right? We can just go to the enchanter to do it, you don't have to do it yourself." Dad argued

"It only makes sense for me to do it. My cursed skill can't do much more damage anyway. It shouldn't affect pure bond evolutions and classes nor should it affect pure crafting or art classes. I still have options even if it's not the best"

"Very well, but Aly, Don't do any more than is necessary"

Dad went to get the Kyhosa and handed them to me.

Two water gems in the shape of teardrops. They are embedded in gold fully saturated with water mana, no not just saturated there was something more going on. It was saturated but the gold itself seems to be fused with the mana. A fusion of physical material and water mana. I quickly examined my Kyhosa, finding the same thing but with Beauty and Creativity mana.

How had I not noticed this before? A mystery for another day.

The water gem was perfectly shaped and polished, it was pleasing to my [Perfectionist's Eye]. The gold work is likewise perfectly pleasing, with intricate designs of stylized dragons and waves. Even on the delicate gold chains, the designs could barely be made out.

Compared to these my work seems shoddy, how can I give my sisters such poor quality. I slightly drooped my ears and tail.

"What's wrong?" Mom asked.

"Your work is so good but mine just isn't the same" I sniffed trying to keep my feeling in check. "I failed and I can't remake it."

Mom knelt down and hugged me. Patting my head.

"It doesn't have to be good, Aly. It just has to be from you. The fact that you even made them a Kyhosa gift at all is amazing, let alone at your age. It's alright, they'll understand." Mom purred to soothe me.

I couldn't hold back my tears, crying into Mom's bosom, letting out my frustrations. Dad hugged us and joined Mom's purring.

I soon stopped crying and thanked my parents. Before heading into my room.

I focused on the dresses and amulets. Conjuring the image I needed. First, the mana will be stored in the water gems. How to do that? Space, I needed to first enchant the amulets to make a space inside of it. But that is an aspect of dark mana. That'll reject my light aspected beauty mana. Unless I fuse the two. Or maybe there is a workaround? Perhaps I can do a light mana storage? No, there's no other way that I can think of.

In for a penny, in for a pound.

I focus on the enchantment process. A fusion of space essence and conjuration essence. Pain ripped through me as my transformed mana repealed each other. I didn't stop, instead of increasing how much mana I am using and tapping into my Kyhosa reserves.

I gritted my teeth to prevent myself from crying out. Watching as a tiny amount of the essences began to fuse! I clenched my fists and balled up. Not wanting to alarm my parents nor let them know I was doing this.

Minutes went by and I felt light-headed, my heart was pounding and my vision blurred a little but I had the fused mana! Breathing heavily I impressed the mana into the water gems, infusing it as best as I can.

I commanded my familiar to heal me in case I took damage. A gentle soothing washed over me and I felt my muscles unclench. The worst and hardest part was over. I lay there, for several minutes, recovering from the ordeal.

Next, I enchanted the shape-changing onto the dress, with the excess mana silk being stored in the amulets, it had to be one item once all was said and done. Water mana and beauty essence, combined, stuck together but not fused formed within me. There was more to the mana, a sort of identity, the enchantment. I pressed my hand against the dresses and pushed the mana into them, pushing even when all the mana had left. I pushed it until it had fully infused onto the dresses,

Four enchantment slots left. I had a defensive idea. The MM force will attract water mana to the dress and amulet. Maybe I can use that mana for a defensive shield or perhaps something retaliatory. I decided a deflective and retaliatory shield should work. Impressing upon the dress the ideas and infusing the enchanting mana into the dress. The enchanted mana was simple. Water mana with the enchantment identity.

Three left. A damage reduction type defensive enchantment should be what I make, how would that work? Maybe make it harder? What if I'm thinking about this all wrong? Maybe I should think of ways to pierce the defenses and counter that.

This is cloth so blunt force can easily get through it, I could make it more rigid in certain places, so how to get past the rigidness? Even if it's tough it's still cloth so it's still susceptible to needles. How to cancel that then? Solidifying it? A shell of mana? The scales!

I forged a new image in my head, of scales coming to life when willed by the wearer just as its form would change. Beauty essence and Metal essence started to form, mixed, combined yet not fused. Again, there's something more to the mana I infused that enchantment into the dress. Except the enchantment didn't take. The mana fell apart before it could fully enter the dress.

The MM force! Metal is earth aligned, this is a water-aligned dress, they repel!

With that realization, I had to think of another way to deal with defenses. Deflection? Already got that and it's not a guarantee, just the first layer of defense. Make it harder? That'll be earth-aligned and wouldn't stop the force anyway. Wait, that's along the lines of what I needed to know, force. What about the force? Why do more rigid things help against damage?

This was so frustrating! I almost have it! It's like trying to wake up knowledge within me. If I move a solid object the whole thing moves but in non-rigid things you move one part and the other doesn't move unless pulled by the moving material. Why?

It suddenly clicked. Like a door had opened a wave of new knowledge flooded my mind.

It was so simple, how did I not figure it out? I never needed to make it more rigid, never needed a shell. A needle only works because the force is focused. But if that force was transferred, spread throughout the whole dress you do the opposite of the needle.

I smiled, having my answer. The perfect physical defense. Unfortunately, I couldn't undo my previous enchantment but I now have a better idea of how many enchantments this can take. At first, it was like looking at an empty container and taking a guess at how much it can hold. But I've now been slowly filling it up. I now know it can safely hold six enchantments. Not all enchantments were equal, some use more space than others.

I began the new enchantment, watching more water mana form as the base of the enchantment. With it successfully infused there were still three more slots to fill. Just two more types of defenses to consider. The next was easy. A boost to speed and reflexes. Speed essence was the base for that enchantment. The last would be the hardest to make work. Magic resistance.

Magic resistance would be tricky. Due to the MM force If I use water to resist fire then it'd attract water. Meaning that it's a trade-off. To get resistance in one magic you must gain a vulnerability to its opposites. This makes the earth element very useful as it's opposite to three elements water, lightning, and wind. It doesn't attract anything except for more earth. A three-for-one deal is great, but seeing as how the dress is heavily water aligned no fire or earth-aligned enchantment will take.

There is a lot more to enchanting than I was briefly taught. The MM force makes it a messy affair. Earth would be hard to enchant because it doesn't attract anything else. Water on the other hand attracts lightning and ice. Making speed and slow enchantments work easily.

Theoretically, nexus mana should make you resist all mana, but the MM forces would kind of cancel out. Normally the nexus mana both attracts and rejects mana, creating the storm but that's because of imbalances within the nexus mana cores. Even in my Kyhosa I can see the mana swirling unevenly resulting in fields of attraction and repulsion, it is this movement of the mana that causes the MM force in mana nexuses. A perfect mana nexus would have no MM force, which would still be bad for defenses as it still wouldn't repel anything. In other words, a perfect mana nexus would do nothing, it's perfectly neutral.

So what kind of magical defense should I add? Fire and earth resistance? Hmmm, wind attracts fire, which is countered but water's rejection, a wind-based earth resistance would reject earth, and the weakness to that would be countered by the water mana. That would leave me with one more enchantment.

I add the earth resistance to the dress. Now, Maybe I can redirect the attracted mana, Ice and lightning. If that can be redirected into the amulet for safe storage and discharged later that's both a defense and offense enchantment. It's perfect!

With a combination of lightning and ice mana as a base, I look over the now enchanted dress and amulet combination. The water gem could only hold the one enchantment with some spare. It had been a large enchantment so the normal two enchantment slots were mostly filled. I guess the enchantment was worth one and a seventh, but it was worth it for a storage device. With the conjuration essence canceling out the spaces' MM force I could not fit as much space essence inside it.

Ting! Manipulate Mana has met requirements for a breakthrough. Manipulate Mana will now continue leveling past level 210!

21st Breakthrough: You've managed to infuse mana. This will better your infusions.

Ting! Manipulate Mana has obtained level 130!
…
Ting! Manipulate Mana has obtained level 135!

That was to be expected. I've learned a lot about the intricacies of enchanting so I am going to at least attribute one point to knowledge. And my infusions from enchanting were bound to give me the breakthrough.

With my sisters Kyhosa did I breathed a sigh of relief. But now I kind of want to make a storage ring for myself. I'd want a dark-aligned metal so I can store more and I wouldn't be able to store anything light aligned but I can deal with that.

Actually, this brings up a question, if all you need is space essence for a storage item, and good enchantable material is abundant here, why doesn't everyone have one? I should ask the enchanter.

I step out of my room. Although it's against tradition to show others my work we have been breaking tradition a lot lately. So much so that the poor thing has been reduced to dust.

"This is really good Aly!" Mom and Dad complimented me on the dress.

I timidly fidgeted. I still don't think it's as good as it needs to be but we've already had that conversation.

"I'm going to the enchanters. I have a question to ask."

"Hmm? What question?" Mom asked.

"I wanted to know why storage items aren't more commonplace"

"It cheapens life, Aly. We do use them in certain situations like transporting bulk materials but we have to learn to appreciate life. Always relying on enchanted items gives us a false view on the world." Dad said

"It's also expensive for maintenance," Mom added. "If the enchantment wears off while you are wearing or carrying a storage item it could be deadly"

Dad nodded "It also destroys whatever is inside. Materializing all the materials at once will cause some to appear in the same location and cause an explosion. Storage items are exclusively used during transport and when not in use it is emptied"

I see, because of the amount of mana wearing away at the enchantments here storage items don't last long and must be maintained or reapplied. I can't imagine most people being able to infuse enchantments. Still, it sounds like it could be weaponized. Stuff a ton of rocks in storage and do something to the enchantment and cause an explosion.

I guess I didn't need to go to the enchanter's after all.