“How did she like it?” asked Sam.

Jen laughed, “Ranger Vicki was so happy, she wanted to come over here and bed you!”

“It’s not her fault I’m so irresistible! If I were only single.”

Jen barked out a laugh, and said, “you keep telling yourself that.”

“Did she say anything else?”

“Yes, she loved that you moved the enchantments to the inside of the armor, and she was through the roof when I told her about the weight reduction enchantment you added. I told you to come with me to drop it off. You could have listened to her praise your skill yourself!”

“I told you. I’ve just got too much work to catch up on after focusing on that armor for the last three weeks.”

Jen had found a high-level leather technique scroll in the shop for 7 gold, but she added 3 of their own gold to purchase a technique scroll that covered multiple types of materials in addition to mana-infused leather-working in order to expand Sam’s ability.

Sam spent two weeks practicing his leather-working almost non-stop on different hides, before he felt he could take the chance to modify and fix the enchantments on the mana-imbued leather. It took him nearly another full week, but he decided that it made more sense to replicate the enchantments on the inside of the armor to help protect them from future damage. He also felt a little guilty about how long it was taking, so he added a weight reduction enchantment like the one he copied from Gango’s armor.

While decrypting the strength enhancing enchantments on Ranger Vicki’s armor, Sam learned they required massive amounts of mana to be stored in the mana-imbued leather of the armor, but for the short 10-minute fight or battle a hunter was typically in, the advantage would be significant.

Since she didn’t mention it, Sam believed that neither Duke Card nor Ranger Vicki realized that the enchantment also contained some runes that gathered and purified mana around the person wearing the armor. Unfortunately, even with these mana gathering runes, it would likely take a week of charging if all the mana were drained out of the armor in a battle.

“Do you think they will tell anyone that I was able to fix the armor without a confidentiality contract?” asked Sam.

Jen rolled her eyes at Sam, and replied, “Like I told you before, Tamako trusts almost no one in this City, but she said Duke Card’s and Ranger Vicki’s word was reliable. Everyone else on their staff think I delivered some of your healing charms for Ranger Vicki to use in emergencies.”

“Okay, okay, you know I get worried. Earlier, after you left, I was in my workshop when I heard the back door’s enchanted alarm go off.”

“What happened?”

“Not sure, by the time I was able to get back there, they had already set off the trap. There was quite a bit of blood on the floor, but they must have been carried off by an accomplice.”

Jen’s eyes tightened with anger at the thought of someone trying to break in, and she said, “Damnit, do you think it was a gambler? Or maybe someone with the farmer’s guild? Is there anything you think we should do?”

“Without being sure who it was, I think all we can do is stay alert and keep up our guard. I am going to make some more security enchantments to place around the store and warehouse, but then I have to get caught up with this backlog of charms and enchantments that I need to craft and fix.”

Jen replied, “O.K. you do that, and I’m going to start investigating the Farmer’s Guild just in case it was them.”

After spending the next week getting caught up with his work, Sam was giddy with ideas as he sat in his workshop preparing to turn the mana-gathering runes he copied from Ranger Vicki’s armor into enchanted mana gathering rods. He experimented with the code of the mana-gathering enchantments until he was finally able to get them to pull and condense the ambient mana around wherever the rods were placed, while also absorbing just enough of the mana to keep the enchantments continually powered. Sam then placed these rods around his workshop to artificially increase his mana regen ability.

Jen was in the kitchen when Sam hollered from his workshop, “I need some money for a hardened steel rod.”

“I’m sure you do at your age boomer!” replied Jen.

She heard Sam laugh at himself, and reply, “Yea, I walked into that one, but seriously, I need some money for a new experiment.”

“How much?”

Jen ran into Sam’s workshop and pretended to have a heart attack after hearing Sam say they would cost 2 gold, “You’ve got an expensive enchanting habit! I hate to tell you this, but you and your habit are going to have to wait a few weeks until we receive the gold from the auction of Gango’s armor.”

Jen didn’t mind spending their gold on Sam’s enchanting, but she was frustrated that the cheapest anything on a psych skill was over 500 gold at the System Shop.