The front door to Fizzy’s Fidgety Widgets opened up with a ringing noise and a humongous cloaked man exited out of the store and into the street. Looking at the sun’s position, it seemed to be late afternoon, maybe 2 or 3 hours from sunset. The Mimic and the gnome had spent most of the day inside Fizzy’s workshop as the hyperactive little mechanic eagerly showed off her skill at construction. As expected of a Level 56 Artificer, her dexterity and precision were the real deal, and Boxxy eagerly soaked up all of her teachings. Of course, it also closely observed her hand movements with its magical perception and made sure to memorize them so that it can replicate them later.

The disguised monster surveyed the street. It would seem foot traffic had died down quite a bit while it was inside, which was good and bad at the same time. Good, because it meant fewer eyes in its immediate vicinity would be on its conspicuous form, and bad because its 220 centimeter high form stood out like a sore thumb and was even more noticeable from a distance. So all things said and done, nothing much changed, did it? Deciding it didn’t want to spend any more time exposed like this, it hoisted the large hemp bag in its hand onto its shoulder and trudged off towards its ‘home base.’

This bag was filled with yet more toolboxes and parts it purchased from Fizzy. The reason it had to carry it around like this instead of sticking in its Storage was that it had to open its maw in order to access that pocket dimensions. It could manage doing so discreetly when it came to small objects like a Bladeblossom or a satchel of gold, but fitting those bulky toolboxes in there would undoubtedly blow its cover.

As for the cost of this new purchase, it came out to a whopping 1,170 GP. A naturally greedy creature like that severely disliked parting with that much shiny gold at once, but it was for the sake of advancing its Artificer Job, so it couldn’t be helped. Besides, it was also a form of investment.

Most Artificer-made devices were difficult to put together since they required specialized parts, tools and know-how, but the final product was extremely simple to use. As a side-effect, the value of such gizmos would go up immensely when compared to the cost of the raw materials to make them.

Take for example the 100 Bladeblossom kit the Mimic had purchased three days ago. The raw materials to produce all those spring-loaded single-use devices only amounted to about 150 GP. Fizzy had then used her workshop to transform the metal ingots into tiny blades, springs, wires and other necessary parts. The final kit she sold Boxxy cost a whopping 650 GP, which consisted of 50 GP worth of tools and 600 GP worth of parts. And yet a single well-made Bladeblossom that Boxxy made could be sold at 15 GP. So wouldn’t it be able to make almost 3 times as much gold as it spent on the parts themselves?

Well no, no it wouldn’t. Reality is not rosy enough to fulfill such wishful thinking.

Of the first 30 devices that Boxxy made, 12 were complete failures, 14 were of poor quality and only 4 were of standard quality. And while the next 70 were at least of standard quality, only 22 of them were high-quality ones like those it sold at the Mercenary Guild. Then there were small things like setting off a bunch of them for testing purposes or setting several of them aside for future use. Even if it did make 100 high-quality Bladeblossoms, it would be hard pressed to find anyone willing to buy so many at once.

Either way, the number of items it actually had when everything was said and done was far from 100. It then started taking them apart and putting them back together in order to get more Levels. However, not all of the components could be retrieved so easily. The sturdy blades were mostly fine, but the more delicate internal parts got dented or broken from the repeated strain and were rendered unusable pretty quickly.

All things said and done, Boxxy had actually assembled a total of 165 Bladeblossoms before it stopped. Right now it only had 21 well-crafted ones and 6 standard ones left in its possession. It was no longer in a position to recoup its losses even if it were to sell all of those, but that was fine. The main purpose spending that much gold, which was to increase its Artificer Level, was already accomplished.

Besides, that money spent would eventually come back to it since it was an investment. Which in Mimicanese meant that when Boxxy was done with this city, it would kill the gnome, absorb her body, steal all her money, take every single ingot, spring, sprocket and nail in her workshop and then have Xera burn down her house for good measure.

The Mimic kept walking through the city streets in the vague direction of the southern gate for about 25 minutes. It then turned off into a less populated side road, then later into a series of alleyways until it reached an old, run-down stone building in the middle of the slums. This place was likely a warehouse at some point, considering how large and spacious it was. Boxxy went inside through what was once its loading bay.

Rotting boxes, bits of rubble, a couple of wrecked carriages and other useless junk was lying strewn about the place. It was also home to a small community of 16 wretched vagrants. They were so pitiful that the only successful Cadaver Absorption one of their bodies yielded gave a boost of just 2 END. Merely a drop in the lake that was the Mimic’s HP at this point.

The monster in question proceeded towards a doorway that led further in the back. This appeared to have once been an office at some point. The old desk, wooden cabinet, broken chairs and old, musty bookshelves the Mimic found when it first entered the place suggested as much. All that garbage had been thrown out since then, though. The room was now completely empty except for two dead bodies on the floor, a rusty iron trunk in the corner and a red-skinned, four-armed demon that sat on top of it with a bored expression.

“Oh, hey boss,” said Kora when she noticed her master approach.

She lifted her well-toned ass off of her impromptu chair and stretched her stiff body. The gigantic fiend that towered over even Boxxy’s current form was deemed way to conspicuous to accompany it around town. She was therefore ordered to guard this place and keep out of sight. Well, the former was hardly necessary. This run-down old building held no significance to the Mimic other than being a quiet spot where it could focus on its work.

“We heading out soon?”

“After sunset,” answered Boxxy while setting down the heavy bag it was carrying around.

Now that it was away from prying eyes, it quickly undid its human-like transformation and assumed its favorite spider-chest form. Having to keep its real body tilted on its side all day while masquerading as a person was considerably uncomfortable and slightly disorienting. It had gotten used to it over the last week, but it much preferred its spider legs after all.

“What’s all this?” asked kora while pointing at the sack.

“Parts. Those two the intruders you mentioned?”

“Hm? Ah yeah. Just some pathetically weak bums. One of them keeled over the instant he saw me. No fun at all.”

The fiend pouted slightly as to indicate her displeasure, but her master completely ignored her and skittered over to the bodies. It hadn’t gotten a chance to eat anything worthwhile all day.

*CRUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH*

The dead men were thus quickly devoured and any blood stains were instantly licked up out of habit. These pathetic weaklings were better utilized as food rather than trying to absorb them. Even then they were mostly skin and bones and wouldn’t be nearly enough to satiate Boxxy’s monstrous hunger, but would at least keep its belly from rumbling for the moment.

It then went back to the sack it brought in and opened it. Three metal toolboxes were retrieved from the inside - a gray one, a red one, and a blue one. They were approximately 30 centimeters wide, 20 centimeters long and 15 centimeters tall. These containers looked pretty much like miniature chests, which the Mimic found to be oddly endearing, maybe even a little bit cute. It put the red and blue ones inside its Storage and opened up the gray one using two of its spider legs as elongated fingers. A number of smaller boxes and compartments lined the inside, each holding a number of metallic bits necessary for hand-held Artificer devices.

“Oh!” exclaimed Kora. “You’re building stuff again, huh? Can I watch?”

“Sure.”

Boxxy sat firmly on the ground and narrowed its focus. Its eight arachnid limbs were not retracted inside its body, however, but instead bent forward towards the toolbox. The four at the very front had their pointed tips split in two as if they were organic tweezers. The Mimic then applied Metal Mimicry to the other four and transformed them into a set of miniature steel tools. More specifically, they turned into a hammer, a pair of wire cutters, and two screwdrivers.

Two of the tweezer-like fingers grabbed a part each from the toolbox and held them in place while two of tool-tipped limbs put them together. Then the other set of tools and pincers did the same, then the first repeated their action. The eight stick-like limbs began moving about frantically, gradually picking up in speed, but always moving with the utmost precision.

Those practiced movements almost made the whole thing look too easy, as the monster was simply throwing the bits into a pile that assembled into something all on its own. In truth, this was simply the result of the Mimic’s DEX Attribute and its magical perception working in unison to make sure nothing is out of place.

And it truly did not take long before it accomplished its task.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

“Heh, that’s neat,” commented Kora.

Her boredom from standing guard all day had more or less went away by now. The fiend found watching her master work to be surprisingly fun in and of itself. Even if she had no idea what was going on, it was hard to deny that seeing something assembled before her very eyes at high speeds was quite entertaining.

As for the Mimic, it had already moved onto the next item. The day-long training session with Fizzy led it to learn quite a few things and was eager to become a Level 5 Artificer so it can get started on those properly. Its Artificer Level was very close to that threshold, but it still needed to make 10 or so more of these contraptions before it reached that goal.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

It put it away and immediately started on the next one.

Just like Fizzy had informed it at the beginning, this Job increases in Level much slower than what the Mimic was used to. The reason for this was that Artificer was a type of Production Job, rather than being a Monster one like Mimic or a Caster such as Warlock. This meant that, rather than fighting monsters, it could only gain XP by manufacturing related items and objects. Using said creations in combat simply increased its Mimic Job.

You have created a Bladeblossom.

Well, it made sense in a way. It’s not like a villager would become a better farmer if he went about hitting people over the head with his radishes. He had to work the fields, care for livestock and churn butter. Blacksmiths had to make, maintain and improve weapons and armor and Alchemists had to make lots of elixirs and brews. What happened with said items or whether anyone would eat that food did not matter as far as the Job was concerned. And an Artificer was no different.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

Therefore, raising a Production Job was a naturally slow, arduous process. The only upside was that the relative speed of creation stayed mostly constant. In other words, it took roughly the same amount of time to get from Level 1 to Level 5 as it did to get from Level 50 to Level 55. That is, provided one had the right materials and schematics with which to work with. The relatively simplistic Bladeblossoms, for example, would stop providing XP once Boxxy’s Artificer Job hit Level 5 and it would need to move onto something more advanced. Much like how combat-oriented Jobs would not grow properly if one only fought the same type of low-Level enemy, so did Production Jobs require their own set of Level-appropriate challenged in order to improve.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

Well, all things said and done, this monster’s crafting speed truly was something else. The reason Cornie Fizzlesprocket was so shocked at her student’s growth earlier was because she still thought of it as a human. While it wasn’t exactly unheard of for geniuses in certain fields to appear from time to time, seeing one right before her very eyes was something she never thought would happen. In fact, her initial conclusion about how her student progressed so quickly was that it was somehow cheating.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

Which wasn’t far from the truth considering the Mimic’s multiple tooled limbs, its extremely detailed magical perception and rather impressive DEX Attribute. It could assemble a Bladeblossom in under 3 minutes, which was nearly 8 times faster than what its gnomish teacher was capable of. Any other rookie Artificer who was just starting out would probably take about 2 hours of slow, meticulous work to make a single one of those. And even then whether it would actually result in a satisfactory product was highly questionable.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

Physical capabilities were hardly the entire reason for this level of efficiency, however. It was also a matter of the Mimic’s mindset. It quite honestly equated the work of Artificers to be shapeshifting applied to an object. Both practices boiled down to combining basic elements into something that was greater than the sum of its parts. It’s just that one used flesh and bone while the other relied on springs and sprockets.

You have created a Bladeblossom of superior quality.

In fact, from Boxxy’s perspective, the act of assembly was actually much, much simpler than shapeshifting its body around. Growing a working human eyeball for the first time or creating an organic wheel from scratch were, objectively speaking, already far more complex than something straightforward like a spring-loaded blade dispenser. And once it had the proper process down, its excellent muscle memory could reconstruct its creations with ease. Even those problematic wheels took less than 2 seconds to form after enough practice. Therefore, assembling a contraption of this small scale was, honestly put, a trifling task. Another thing that spoke volumes of its ability was that its creations were of a higher quality than normal.

You have created a Bladeblossom.

Well, most of the time anyway. It was only natural that handmade items would come out with some variations between them. An errant twitch from the craftsman, some misstep in the timing or an unseen flaw in the components and materials could all cause the quality to deteriorate. Conversely, performing the right motions with high-grade materials would result in a fittingly superior product.

It was around the time that Boxxy was on its 10th creation of the afternoon that its missing familiar reappeared.

“I have returned,” reported Xera as she walked into the old office.

The succubus was still disguised as a nun in service so Teresa, the Goddess of justice and truth. The delicious irony of that form was the main reason she chose to use it. The secondary reason was that it seemed to entice her demonic lover to perform far more brutal acts of sex upon her person. The tertiary, and actually practical reason, was that people treated her with far less suspicion than they should have.

“Oh, hey cum-bucket,” said Kora when she saw the succubus arrive.

“Hey. What’s our master doing?” asked Xera, pointing at her Master.

“The boss is building more of those metal flowers.”

You have created a Bladeblossom of inferior quality.

“Huck!” cursed the Mimic. It got a bit over-eager and its product suffered for it. Still, these things were just a matter of course so it quickly moved onto the next one.

“Ah, I see,” said the succubus.

She walked closer and looked curiously at its tooled limbs. They moved around almost like a blur. It was as if the Mimic had become a machine itself.

“Heh, that’s neat,” commented Xera with a curious face.

“I know, right?”

“Hmm…. I really hope that it finishes its business with the gnome soon, though. My Dreamweaver Skill is bound to mess something up if I have to keep using it on the same target.”

Best case scenario, the gnome would become a complete amnesiac or fall into a coma. Worst case scenario, all the memories that were locked away would come crashing back and the monstrous trio’s cover would be blown wide open.

“What’s that gnome like, anyway? Haven’t seen anything but dark alleys and homeless bums for the past week.”

“She looks like a little kid, with a large head and pink pigtails.”

“A kid huh? How tall are we talking?”

“About… this big,” answered the succubus while indicating the small gnome only went up to her upper thigh.

“Hmm… Say, do you think that if I stuck my dick in her pussy all the way it would come out of her throat?”

“... That’s not how anatomy works, you moron.”

“It isn’t?”

“Of course not! Mortals have all those mushy organs in their torsos, you know!”

“Oh, right. I can just push past those with enough force though, right?”

“Whuh? But- Oh! I see. Well, um, hnnn, I guess that could work.”

“You just got turned on at the thought of being speared all the way through by a massive dick, didn’t you?”

“No! … Well, maybe a little.”

“Uh-huh?” questioned Kora while raising an eyebrow.

“Okay, a lot.”

“You really want to be dicked to death, huh?”

“Like you wouldn’t believe. You really should look into growing a bigger-”

“Quiet!” commanded the Mimic, causing both demons to shut up instantly.

Their constant prattling was easy to ignore normally, but what Boxxy wanted to do right now was concentrate and listening to those two flirting was really not helping in that regard.

“...”

The two demons then silently watched it work for a few more minutes.

You have created a Bladeblossom.

Level up!

Congratulations, you are now a level 5 Artificer! DEX +2. WIS +2. PER +2.

Proficiency level increased. Clockwork Expertise is now Level 1. DEX +2. PER +2.

Knowledge of gears, cogs, sprockets and springs poured into the Mimic’s mind. Now it could finally build something other than those entry-level Bladeblossoms.

Clockwork Expertise

Description: A measure of an Artificer’s ability to handle and construct clockwork-based gadgets and gizmos

Requirements: Level 5 Artificer

Type: Passive

Activation Time: N/A

Cost: N/A

Range: Self

Effects: Grants knowledge of clockwork-based creations.

Increases the effectiveness of clockwork-based creations by 5% per Level of this Skill.

As for the Skill itself, the reason it appeared immediately was because that’s how Production Jobs differed from combat-oriented ones. They had a linear progression path as opposed to the more branching structure Boxxy was used to. At least until Level 50, at which point Boxxy would be able to evolve the Artificer Job into one that was better suited towards its needs.

Another quirk the Mimic learned about Jobs during its stay here was that apparently none of them granted additional Skills at the so-called threshold Levels of 25, 50 and 75. Reaching the absolute highest Level of 100, however, would unlock a superbly powerful Ultimate Skill that was completely unique to the individual. That sounded so incredibly tasty that it caused Boxxy to salivate like crazy every time it remembered that piece of trivia.

As for exactly why Skills were limited at those 3 specific Levels, it was unknown. The information Xera had dug up suggested this was simply the way of things and Boxxy was willingly to accept that. Technically speaking, neither its Mimic nor its Warlock Job offered a new Skill choice at Level 25, and the same would happen again once Artificer reached that stage.

Now that its immediate objective was complete, the Mimic turned its attention to Xera.

“Snack, what did you find?”

The demonesses was under orders to keep looking for information or items that the Mimic deemed necessary. The fact she had returned meant she must have found something.

“I have… acquired one of the materials you required for your ritual, Master.”

Boxxy’s mood immediately shot up upon hearing those words. It did indeed tell the demoness to immediately return to it should she find any of those items.

“Give it to me!”

“Yes, Master.”

The succubus that was still masquerading as a nun stood in front of the Mimic and lifted up the hem of her habit. She rolled it up past her knees, up her thighs and all the way to the hips. It should come as no surprise that the perverted demon was not wearing anything under it. Her vagina was on full display, and a trickle of clear liquid was dripping down her thigh.

“Mmmm…” she moaned. “Haah, haah, haah! Hnnnngg!”

Her abdominal muscles tightened, and then-

*Pop*

-a small black sphere that was about 5 centimeters in diameter came out of her exposed genitalia. It bounced twice along the filthy wooden floor and rolled slowly towards the Mimic, stopping only a few centimeters from where it was sitting. The gem-like ball was oddly shiny, and not just because it was covered in Xera’s juices.

The fake nun straightened out her habit and looked at her Master with slightly glazed eyes.

“One contaminated Holy Pearl as requested, Master.”

“Very good!” exclaimed Boxxy.

If sentient chests could smile, then that’s undoubtedly what Boxxy was trying to do with that toothy look it had. This was very good indeed. All that was left was to obtain a Midnight Ruby, an Elixir of Avarice and then wait for a night where all three moons were in the sky and it could finally perform the Ritual of Unholy Wealth.