It didn’t take him long to gather a small pile of brown topaz, what a jeweller might refer to as “Imperial” grade due to their clarity. It took just a bit longer for him use [Modify Matter] on them, turning the pile of raw crystals into a pile of finely cut gems.

A quick count gave him over three hundred pear-cut, or rose-cut as he preferred to call it, brown imperial topazes. He’d made them flat on one side, intending for them to easily be added to some form of jewellery so that whoever bought them would be able to carry them about with ease.

Then came the tedious part: enchanting. It wouldn’t have been so bad if he could enchant by the batch. Unfortunately, each gem had to be enchanted by itself. Maybe he could work on a method to enchant by the batch some time in the future, but for now he needed to do it the old-fashioned way.

Even with the tremendous reduction in time needed to enchant when one used Dust Crystals, it still took him one minute per gem. Which, to be fair, was ridiculous in terms of enchanting speed. The customized power he was putting into each topaz would normally require about 2 days to enchant without the use of Dust Crystals.

Was that OP? Surely. Were the Dust Crystals used in this process likely more expensive than the items he made? Yes? If he had been back on Golarion, Dust Crystals would have gone for hundreds of gold pieces per shard. A Shard being defined as the smallest unit that a Dust Crystal would form at, which would reduce the crafting time needed by about 1 hour.

Here? It was probably worth much more.

Except, he was using the Dust Crystals to make items that didn’t exist in this world. Meaning, he would make a fortune, even considering the amount of Dust he was using.

Why go through all this effort when he could easily heal himself without needing to rely on a magic item? Well.

If he wanted to get his hands on the many alchemical ingredients that he needed, then he needed vast sums of money.

He glanced at the clock on the wall and frowned. Time sure passed quickly when one was grinding out life-saving items…

Mind 3 looked over at Joram as he stood up and stretched.

Mind 3: You’re off then?

The corner of Joram’s mouth twitched upwards. “You already know the answer to that,” he said, tone as dry as a desert. “Why do I keep asking myself questions that I already know the answers to?”

“Because you’re bored?”

Touché, he thought, shaking his head. This wasn’t any different from someone talking to themself as they worked on something. Except those people didn’t have their answers come from a hologram imbued with a copy of their own mind, still connected to their own mind…

He looked down at the small pile of completed [Mend Body] gems, twenty-four in total, and smiled. If he considered that a healing pill that could rapidly close wounds was at least Tier 3, then the gems would probably be considered Tier 4. Then, given that they were unique items, they'd likely fall in the range of a Tier 6 item, maybe even Tier 7 since one just needed to have it on their person for it to automatically work. Which meant that each would sell in the range of High-grade, Tier 3 Crystals.

Now, if he could get them to be placed in an auction, then competition might get fierce.

With one of those happy/pleased/ecstatic shivers, he took a step forward, shifting back to Grammy’s cultivation room mid-step. He still needed to keep up appearances after all.

- ­- - - -

Mind 2 was impressed. If anything, the manga, manhwas, and manhuas had undersold just how opulent auction houses were. Or maybe it was just this one, Heaven’s Bounty, that tried to live up to its name. And whoever had made the interior design decisions had decided that the bounty of heaven meant gold. Lots, and lots of gold.

There was gold leaf on everything in sight. Now, he’d never been one for gold, having viewed it as somewhat gaudy, and this auction house cemented that opinion in his mind. He was tempted to quickly whip up a pair of sunglasses to help mitigate the glare, but thought better of it as “sunglasses” didn’t seem to be a thing here.

Well, he and Avi had scoped the joint and those who entered it. To be precise, what those people were wearing. It had then taken them two whole days to program several new outfits into their psicrystals. It was amazingly complicated to make clothing realistic, from how textures interacted with light, wind, and even gravity, to how they felt should someone touch them. Heck, they’d even gone so far as to include scent into the mix. Who knew when you’d run into someone with a crazy sense of smell?

With that tedious task completed, they now had another day and a half to kill before the actual auction. So, why were they there? Well.

Mind 1, Joram Prime, the Head Honcho, etc., had come up with a brilliant idea to keep them from running through their mana crystal supply, which was why Mind 2 and Avi had entered a waiting room for an appraiser to arrive.

‘So, how much do you think they’ll sell for?’ he sent to Avi, tearing his eyes away from the overabundance of gold.

‘Oh, at least one hundred high-grade Tier 3 Crystals or so,’ Avi sent thoughtfully as she idly played with her crystal goblet of water. It seemed that this auction house took prospective sellers seriously, especially ones dressed as nicely as them.

Mind 2 nodded, playing it cool. Since he was still Joram, he failed to keep the glint out of his eyes. That was a lot of Crystals. He idly played with his collar, not used to having something rubbing his neck. It was purely psychological, as he didn’t have any feeling in his “skin”. Instead, they relied on [Touchsight] to keep track of where their hands contacted another object or person, nevermind how they sat, walked, and generally interacted with their environment.

He was very glad that they didn’t have to actively keep [Holographic Image] going, manually tweaking it as they went. It would have taken much more concentration to do so than would seem “natural” to any observer. Instead, they’d used their psicrystals to house the “programming”, keying it to react to their thoughts, following the same signals one used to move a physical body.

Mind 2 looked up when the door opened, revealing a short’ish balding man who appeared to be middle-aged as well as a female attendant, dressed in what he would call a red traditional Chinese dress, with gold scrollwork along the hems and across the bust. Well, one of the less conservative ones with the slits halfway up the thighs and showed a sizable amount of cleavage. Her hair was even tied up in twin buns, a la Sailor Moon, though this girl had black hair. Maybe she was closer to Chun-Li, though without the cloth covering the buns.

His mind was wandering.

“Greetings esteemed guests, I am Seth Rose, senior appraiser of the Heavan’s Bounty Auction House,” he said as way of greetings and introduction, though he ignored the attendant.

His name, however, caused Mind 2 to quirk an eyebrow. His name sounded distinctly… North American. Maybe it was just the auto-translation doing it, but it still threw him for a bit of a loop.

“A pleasure,” Avi saved his bacon.

“So, what would you like to have appraised today?” Mr Rose asked politely from across the small round table they were sitting at.

‘I got this,’ Mind 2 sent to Avi, confident as could be.

“We came across this unusual gem recently and suspect that it might be a Relic grade artifact,” he said, retrieving one of the topazes from an inner breast pocket, then placing it on the table between them.

Seth regarded the clear brown gem for a moment before once again looking up at them. “What do you suspect it does?”

“I am proficient in Mental Strength, you see, and I get a very strong impression from it,” Mind 2 said, causing both Mr Rose and the attendant to raise their eyebrows. “I am unfamiliar with the exact enchantment used, but I feel it has to do with… healing,” he said, pausing at the end for dramatic effect.

That sure got Mr Rose’s attention. His eyes locked onto the glittery brown gem as he pulled out the chair opposite and sat down. He then pulled out what looked like a jeweler’s loupe and leaned forwards to better inspect the object of his curiosity.

Mind 2, or M2 as he now thought of himself, was interested to see that Mr Rose was very careful not to actually touch the topaz. Instead, he used what looked like padded tweezers to move it this way and that to catch the light.

“This is a magnificent specimen…” he said, still inspecting the gem. “I would say that it is at least a grade 4 gem, with impeccable workmanship.”

M2 nodded along, guessing that this was one of those cases where the higher the grade, the better, unlike other grading systems. Avi was also nodding along, a faint smile on her face. She likely knew all about that with how much time she’d spent researching in the Library.

“That said, I cannot speak to the enchantment in the gem, as I am not proficient in Mental Strength,” he said, finally looking at them. “What I can do is call for another appraiser to inspect this.”

“We would appreciate that,” Avi said with a slight nod of her head.

“Also, if it does indeed turn out to be a healing-type artifact, we would need to test it out to know just how effective it is,” Mr Rose said as he motioned to the attendant, who then slipped out the door, quiet as a mouse.

“That is understandable,” Avi said with another slight nod. “But, what happens if it turns out to be a single-use item? How would we be compensated for that?”

“Good question. If the gem’s enchantment does get used up in the testing, we would recompense you the value of an equivalent healing pill.”

‘Not bad,’ M2 sent to Avi as turned slightly to look directly at him.

‘Yes, that would still give us a net profit,’ she confirmed, then nodded to him.

“Yes, that would be acceptable,” M2 said once he’d turned back to Mr Rose.

After the three of them exchanged another round of minimal nods, they sat back to wait.

Not long.

The door opened much faster than it had when Mr Rose and the attendant had entered, admitting an older man in expensive coral and saffron coloured silk robes… and with Doc Brown hair. Yup, that ruined the image slightly.

“Seth, move over so I can see!” The man almost shouted as he practically flew to the table.

‘OK, we’ve got a lively one here,’ M2 sent to Avi.

‘No kidding… The man seriously looks like Christopher Lloyd cosplaying in a Chinese period drama,’ she sent right back, amusement coming through heavily.

M2 had to stifle a laugh, not wanting to ruin their impression of him.

“This would be our chief Mental Energy consultant, Evan Zimmer,” Mr Rose said as he quickly got out of the way. “He has been with Heaven’s Bounty for over thirty years and has had many great accomplishments in his tenure here.”

“Most impressive,” M2 said, successfully managing to not channel his inner James Earl Jones.

“Yes, he has reached Tier 4 and is also one of our prized artifact refiners,” Mr Rose said, talking Evan Zimmer up, trying to impress them.

M2 smiled and tried to look impressed. Over the course of his studies, he’d found out that even though Joram’s psionic reserves would have him at only later Tier 1, his/their control and versatility were likely Tier 9 or so.

So, M2 and Avi watched as ‘Doc Brown’ took his time investigating the topaz. It was actually fun to watch as the man became increasingly more agitated as the inspection continued, up until he shot to his feet and yelled.

“Where did you get this!” He then stared at them like his eyes could bore through their skulls and find the answers in their non-existent grey matter.

*Cough*

Everyone turned to Mr Rose, who didn’t seem bothered by every eye landing on him.

“As glad as Heaven’s Bounty is to purchase such information, it is against policy to demand such from our clientele,” he explained, a pleasant smile pasted to his face.

*Cough-grumble-mumble-cough*

“Yes, please forgive my outburst,” Mr Zimmer said around the fist he’d placed in front of his mouth when he’d been… composing himself. “I grew a bit too excited.”

“No need for apologies,” Avi said, a reassuring smile on her face. “We, too, grew very excited when we found them.”

“So, yes, I am willing to pay handsomely for the location of where you found this gem,” Mr Zimmer said, still managing to stare intently enough to make most people squirm.

Some people just weren’t people-people… People-persons? New languages suck, especially when trying to translate colloquial terms… M2 grumbled inwardly.

“We’re sorry, but we’re not in a position to do that,” Avi said with an apologetic smile. “But should we find more than what we have, we’d be happy to bring them by.”

All three employees zeroed in on Avi like a ravenous wolf on an injured bunny.

“You’ve found more?” Mr Rose asked, all too casually.

“That depends on how much this one will fetch at auction,” Avi replied with a bright smile.

Damn, she’s good, M2 thought as he was nearly caught in the overwhelming radiance of her smile.

Unfortunately for them, Mr Rose and Mr Zimmer had no such resistance to said smile from years of exposure to it, so they practically fell over each other assuring her that it would indeed sell for a fortune!

Even the attendant seemed transfixed by Avi’s smile for a moment before she was able to turn away, a blush colouring her cheeks.

“Our monthly auction takes place the day after tomorrow, and we’d be honoured to feature it there,” Mr Rose said with his best deal-closer smile. “I will have to speak with the coordinator, but I am sure that this will be, at the very least, one of the top three best items.”

‘Hook, line, and sinker,’ Avi sent to M2, gratification coming through clear as day.

‘Indeed,’ he sent with an image of himself nodding sagely.

“Then, shall we?” M2 asked as he stood up, motioning to the topaz.

“Yes, yes, of course!”

It took another hour to go through registering with the auction house, but in the end they each received a VIP token, allowing them to get a premium box whenever they stopped by. Well, it was the lowest rank of VIP tokens, the Bronze Token. Above that, there was the Silver Token, Gold Token, then the Platinum Token.

“When you’ve done enough business here, your VIP status will naturally be upgraded. It all depends on the level of business that you provide, be it buying or selling,” Mr Rose explained as M2 turned his token over in his hands. It really was made of bronze, though there was an interesting enchantment included in its make. Likely just a verification-type enchantment.

“I look forward to doing much more business with Heaven’s Bounty,” Avi replied graciously, a small smile on her face. “Then we shall return on the day of the auction.”

With that said, Avi took the lead in leaving the meeting room where they’d done their paperwork. It was a short walk back outside where the sun told them that they’d actually spent a few hours in the auction house.

‘I hate paperwork,’ M2 groused to Avi.

‘Well, get used to it!’ Avi sent back cheerily.

And here I thought that I’d get some slack for not being the prime, he thought ruefully as he followed Avi.

* * * * *

Ah, this is bliss, Joram thought as the was engulfed in a hug from Tillia, enjoying the soft-yet-firm feeling on his face. He’d been enjoying the sensation for a good ten minutes but decided that he should probably start listening to what she was saying.

“… and that’s when I finally kicked that jerk across the yard!” Tilla said, pride coming through at the end of her annoyed rant.

Going back a moment, Joram realized that Tillia had literally kicked someone across one of the training yards for bad-mouthing him.

“Weren’t you the one who admonished me saying that it was always better to talk things out?” He asked, leaving out the “if possible” part at the end, suspecting that it hadn’t quite been possible… from her perspective.

Joram smiled at the indignant look that appeared on her face, then pouted when Tillia released him from her sweet embrace to look at him from arms’ length.

“That was when I thought you were still a child!” She said, then her battle intent flared up. “Hamon deserved it! He wouldn’t stop insulting you and insisting that I should instead go ‘serve’ him instead of you, a ‘useless cripple’. Eventually I had enough, so I challenged him…” she trailed off, finally realizing how that might sound to someone.

“Thank you for defending my honour,” he said with a smile, then dove back in for another hug. It was easy, as he’d been sitting on her lap the entire time.

He couldn’t catch the colour of her cheeks through [Touchsight], but from the flustered look on her face, he was sure that she was indeed blushing.

“So, what’s your cultivation now?” He asked from his now-favourite cuddle spot.

“Hah!” She said, puffing out her chest and placing her hands on her hips, which did wonderful things for him. “I’m now at the peak of Tier 1!”

Joram sat back, eyes wide. She’d made incredible progress with her cultivation. He felt a bit bad that he hadn’t managed to find her a cultivation method that was perfectly suited for her, but also very proud of her dedication.

“That’s amazing,” he said, a huge smile replacing the shocked expression from a moment before. “Are you close to being able to break through?”

She looked at him with a glint in her eye. “I was planning on going into seclusion after your birthday party to try to break through,” she said, proud as could be, chin raised high.

He chuckled a bit then, for his imagination added a bit of something to that moment. Every time a character in a manhwa or manhua bragged too much, overly proud of something, they’d be drawn with an incredibly long nose. Yes, Tillia’s nose had done just such a thing in his overactive imagination.

“Well, let me know if I can do anything to help make the process as seamless as possible for you,” he said, still smiling.

“Well…” she said, now unable to look at him in the eye. “The Matriarch gave me permission to collect your weekly cultivation resources, so I did…”

“OK…?”

“She also gave me permission to use whatever I needed from it since you weren’t using any…”

“Tillia?”

“Yes, Joram?”

“I’m glad you used what you needed to. This is what allowed you to fuel your progress, and I couldn’t be happier for you,” he said, looking her straight in the eye.

Tillia looked like she was about to say something, then coughed and looked away.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, uncharacteristically embarrassed, and shy.

“Then shall we meet Grammy?” He asked, poking her in the belly.

She jumped, nearly knocking him out of her lap. “Don’t do that!” She exclaimed, eyes nearly bugging out as she tried to give him her most serious look.

“No belly pokes; gotcha!” He said with a grin, then hopped down.

- - - - -

“It is good to see you, Joram,” Grammy said with a smile as they entered the sitting room they’d used for his third birthday. Though, this time it was only the three of them; him, Tillia, and Grammy.

“I missed you too,” he said, going in for a hug and was pleased that it was freely given.

“So, tell me of your progress,” Grammy said, picked up Joram, then strolled over to the round table they’d used before.

“Hmmm, there wasn’t much progress in my cultivation, but I believe that I might see results soon with how much I’ve learned about my body and pathways,” he said as she placed him in a chair, then sat to his left while Tillia took the seat to his right.

“Oh? Do tell,” Grammy said, then rang a bell, calling the servants in to set the table and load it up with plenty of food that soon had him salivating. As much as he’d claimed back on Earth that he wouldn’t mind giving up food if he ever got something like a Ring of Sustenance, well, maybe that had been an exaggeration. The sentiment had come when he’d gotten tired of constantly having to prepare food, buy food, plan out meals, etc.. Nevermind having to go shopping and spending all that money…

Yes, he’d been a rather… frugal, person.

As soon as the servants were gone, he began explaining his findings and how he was working on a device that would help map out a person's body and energy pathways.

Grammy just stared at him, eyes nearly popping out of her sockets. Joram noticed that Tillia was in a slightly better state, but shock was still written all over her face.

Ah, there’s that. Is Grammy wondering where it is? Or how I’d come across the materials needed for development and crafting? Well, crap. We both know that I don’t have enough space in my storage ring.

Joram sighed.

“You know how, when a cultivator develops far enough that they can store bound items in their Knowledge Sea?” He asked, then continued when Grammy nodded ever-so-slightly. “Well, I can do something like that too,” he said, not quite looking at his beloved Grammy.

For her part, she took it reasonably well. And by reasonably well, he meant that he wasn’t immediately punted out the window, nor did he have his ear nearly twisted off. No, instead she went into full research mode.

“Have you always been able to do this? Are the things you store away actually in your Knowledge Sea, erm, Knowledge Star? What’s the volume you’re able to store? Or is it by weight? What are the limitations? Can you only store away inanimate objects? Or can you put things like plants in there? Would an insect/animal/person survive there? How-“

Joram cut her off, not wanting to let her keep going as it would likely take him all night to just briefly cover what she wanted to know.

“No, no, not sure, nope, many?, no, yes, and yes x3. That said, there are a few things that we’ll need to go over once mom and dad return for a visit.”

Grammy looked like she’d tried to swallow a watermelon instead of her questions. She then took a moment to compose herself, then took a tangent by starting to serve up some food for him and herself.

Once his plate had been piled high, and Tillia had done the same for herself, Grammy nibbled on a lumpia before she finally asked another question, which caught him with a full mouth.

“Anything else you’d like to share with us?” Grammy asked in a soft voice, eyes glinting.

“Well, there might be a few things I’ve not shared about myself…” he hedged, looking out the window.

“Anything that might… make things easier?”

Easier for whom?! Joram shouted in his head.

“I might have an item that could be useful to the clan,” he said absently, admiring the beautiful sky outside. It was truly a fantastic day for the middle of “winter. Hah, winter. He’d compare the winters here to those one would find in the lower-mainland of B.C. back on Earth…

“… and that would be…?”

Joram cleared his throat, looked over to Tillia, whose eyes were locked onto him, not unlike someone seeing a strange and fantastical beast for the first time, then shifted a topaz from his realm onto the table in front of him.

Grammy glanced at it, a confused look on her face until she examined it with her Mental Strength. It was then that she realized what was sitting in front of her, or at least the complexity of it.

She looked at him, asking silent permission to touch it, so he nodded and watched as she reached out and gingerly picked it, awe evident in her body language.

It only took her a few moments to finish examining it, probably due to her low attainments in Mental Strength. She looked back to Joram; shocked disbelief written all over her face.

“You made this?”

“Yup.”

*Pause*

“I feel that it has to do with the body, but it is much too complex for me to decipher,” Grammy said, respect heavy in her voice.

“Hah! You got that right,” he said with a grin, also catching Tillia’s confused expression behind him. “Once you’ve attuned yourself to it by touching it with your Mental Strength, it can be used at any time. It even has an automatic function that will activate should you suffer mortal wounds.”

Grammy paused a moment to let that sink it, then to suss-out the implied meaning behind his words.

“This is a healing item,” she said, pure shock suffusing her words.

“Why are you so surprised?” Joram asked with a quirked eyebrow for emphasis. “I’ve told you that I can do as much by myself.”

“But to be able to make an artifact that can do the same…” she trailed off, not quite sure how to put the myriad of swirling thoughts in her head into words.

“Ah, I guess magic items here aren’t as advanced,” Joram said, nodding sagely.

“Joram?”

“Yes, Grammy.”

“You’re a monster.”

“That hurts.”