Sam cheered, “Thank goodness! Not my problem anymore. Now, I can show you both my Big surprise!”

Jen giggled, “That’s NOT what she said!”

To Jen’s frustration, Sam joined in with her and Tamako’s laughter, and said, “Good one millennial. You’re learning!”

Tamako then deadpanned, “O.K. Enough with all this laughter. I want your big surprise.”

Sam didn’t mind being alone, but he’d missed Jen and Tamako being around over the last two weeks, and a few minutes later, after he and Jen stopped laughing, he grabbed Jen in a side hug, and he felt a little awkward, but thought, To hell with it. Then Sam pulled Tamako into the hug with them.

Tamako felt a little odd when Sam pulled her into the hug. She was obviously aware Sam’s hug wasn’t of a sexual nature, but outside of her relationship with Jen, physical affection wasn’t really something she cared for. However, she greatly enjoyed the feeling of family, and returned his hug politely.

After only about a second, as Sam was releasing them from the hug, and saying, “Dam, I’m glad you’re both back and safe! That’s why I made…”

They were interrupted, when Dropshot stepped into view outside of his lab door. Dropshot turned red in embarrassment, and said, “Oh my! I’m Sooo sorry for interrupting. It’s nothing important,” as she ran out of view.

Sam called out, “It’s O.K. You’re not interrupt…”

Jen touched his arm with a smirk, and said, “She can’t hear you with the silencing rods activated. I’ll just explain it to her later that you’re a Player with two sexy wives!”

Sam gave a smirk with one eyebrow raised, and said, “If it wasn’t for Kelly, I might have an entire harem on wives on this world. You’ve seen how the women here are all after me.”

Tamako nodded seriously, “That is true. Even with the way you look, they would still mate you for your money and enchantments.”

“That’s why no one in their right mind would want more than one spouse. You’d always get ganged up on! Anyway, back on topic.”

Jen watched as Sam handed Tamako a device that looked like the Bluetooth hearing buds that people would loop around their ears on earth, and she asked, “Are those for looping into your ear? Have you broken the code for the soundwaves?”

Sam shook his head, “Uhhhh… No. We should probably start on that project at some point. When I took a preliminary look at its’ code, I got the feeling it would take months of us working together on it, before we could start testing alternatives. However, space rings are my jam!”

Tamako asked, “So, why would I want to loop a storage device around, and into my ear?”

Sam was grinning internally with anticipation, and said, “Link your AI with Jens, then activate the storage device and tell me what you see.”

Tamako waited for Jen’s nod to make sure their AI’s were linked, then she activated the storage device, and replied, “Interesting. There are three doors, similar to how you placed two doors on Lady Domino’s storage ring. One door is labeled stuff, the second is labeled incoming, and the third is labeled outgoing.”

Sam nodded, and explained, “Great. I could only partially test this without anyone else here. Open the door that says incoming, and keep it open. Don’t worry, keeping it open barely costs any mana. You’re just opening a door, and this door will stay open unless you shut it. Now, you two just stay here for a few minutes.”

Jen and Tamako watched with curiosity as Sam picked up one of his small enchanting chisels, and then ran out the lab door.

Sam ran all the way outside of the cave, and pulled another Ear-loop storage device out of his pocket and placed it in his ear. Before he did anything else, he linked to Jen and Tamako’s AIs, and pulled up picture in picture videos of them looking at each other. I can’t wait to see their expressions, he thought to himself.

Their AI’s were close enough to communicate, and Jen said, “Give us access to your view so we can see what’s going on.”

Sam grinned to himself, and replied, “Not a chance. It would ruin the surprise. You’ll understand in just a minute.”

Jen grunted, rolled her eyes, and shrugged, in agreement with the look Tamako was giving her.

Sam activated his Ear-loop and opened the doors for incoming and outgoing sound, and spoke, “Tamako, can you hear me?”

Sam chuckled manically when he watched Tamako’s and Jen’s reaction to hearing his voice through the Ear-loop, then he said, “Tamako, leave the incoming sound door open, and also open the outgoing sound door, and say something.”

A moment later, Sam heard Tamako say, “You’re ridiculous old man.”

Sam pumped his fist in excitement, as he was now positive his Ear-loops worked, and cheered, “It works perfect! Now, one more thing.”

Tamako mouthed in shock to Jen, “One MORE thing?”

Then she heard Sam say, “Take the Ear-loop off, open the stuff door, and remove what’s inside.”

Tamako quickly took off the Ear-loop, and removed from the ring the small enchanting chisel that Sam had taken with him outside.

Sam was already coming back through his lab door and watched as Tamako and Jen looked at each other in stunned silence.

Jen noticed Sam was carrying an identical Ear-loop to the one he’d given Tamako. She suspected she knew the answer from the goofy grin on his face, but she still asked, “How far apart will these work?”

Sam’s face became serious for a moment, and he replied, “Optimistically… I think they may work across multiple Decks.”

Tamako and Jen just looked at each other for a second, and then Jen commented, “Something you just whipped up in a couple of weeks, in a dingy cave, can literally change The Entirety of the Seven Decks as it is known.”

Sam looked offended, and replied, “My dear millennial, I didn’t just whip this up. It’s built off of the thousands of hours of both failed and successful experiments I’ve had with space rings since we arrived in The Seven Decks. The AI you created for me has also been instrumental in accelerating my progress, but even your AI is overwhelmed with some of the code correlations and computations I use in creating storage devices. That doesn’t even include some of the breakthroughs I’ve obtained from successful gambling quests related to my storage devices. Last, we don’t know if others in the higher decks haven’t already created similar devices with the same capability.”

Jen understood that Sam was right, and that she’d dismissed the amount of effort he put into his storage devices, but she couldn’t let this opportunity go, and said, “Master Sam pardon my disrespect! I have insulted you, and I don’t deserve to live. Tamako, please administer 40 lashes to my bare back in recompense for my lack of …”

She cut off her mockery as Sam started chasing her, and yelling, “I’m going to put you over my knee and teach you some respect millennial!” and she ran out of his lab and left the cave. Sam stopped at the cave door, with a grin on his face as he watched Jen reach the bottom of the mountain, turn around and give him the finger.

Tamako walked past Sam, and said, “Jen and I will head out and keep the Ear-loop open, and test its ability to talk with you beyond the range of our soundwaves. Oh, and take this storage ring, it has the supplies and the ballista bolts we picked up for you in Crossroads.”

“Finally, I can’t wait to get them loaded up! O.K. be safe, and I’ll be waiting to hear from you.” replied Sam as he was looking in the storage device and already planning his next experiment.

Sam had set his AI to constantly toggle on/off the senses from the different races, and as he was heading back to his lab, his AI happened to toggle on his Elf hearing and he heard Dropshot whisper, “Did you hear that. He likes to put those ladies over his knee, and play some sort of master game with them! Are you sure I’m going to be O.K. here?” Sam then heard Melvin whisper back, “They were just joking around… probably. Anyway, they’ve sworn a gambling quest to do no harm, and to protect you and the kids. You don’t have anything to worry about.” Sam could tell Melvin lowered his voice even further, when he whispered very softly to Dropshot, “And once the kids fall asleep tonight in the living room, we can play a little master game of our own!” Before Sam could stop listening in any further, he heard a light slap and giggle from Dropshot.

===

Jen and Tamako were not trackers or rangers, but Jen could sense the emotions created by animals around them. Jen had released her bird from her psych skill when they’d entered crossroads a couple of weeks ago. They were now hunting by acting like prey, and waiting for predators to ambush them. They really weren’t finding any predators that had much value, but when they were finally beyond soundwave range, Jen called Sam, “You there? Can you still hear us?”

A few moments later, Sam replied, “Loud and clear. I’m writing a quick note…I’ve just placed it in the Ear-loop. Now, confirm you can remove and read it.”

Jen removed the note from the Ear-loop storage device, and Jen read aloud to Tamako and Sam, “A cow says what?” Jen confused by the stupid note, immediately replied, “What???”

As Sam and Tamako laughed at the stupid joke, Jen just rolled her eyes, but then she had a thought, “Sam, if my incoming sound door was closed. And you tried to call me, but I didn’t answer because my door was shut, when I open the incoming sound door later, would I hear that you tried to call me? Kind of like a voicemail.”

Sam was already shaking his head to himself as Jen was asking the question, and replied, “The shortest answer to your question is No. Do you want the simplified, but not perfectly accurate answer why, or do you want the long explanation that explains as much of the correct answer as I currently understand it?”

Jen didn’t really want either. Sam’s understanding of storage spaces, or more like a space wormhole now, was simply beyond her, but she could tell by his question, that he really wanted to explain his passion. She replied, “I’ll take the 60 second or less simple answer.”

Sam smiled, and replied, “The space is created to allow air and soundwaves to pass through the storage device without actually being stored. If the door is shut, the soundwaves are actually stored instead of passing through in real time. When you open the door, you have an option to remove the soundwaves, but you don’t know which part of the soundwaves make up which part of the words or sentence. As a result, you an get all the sounds jumbled together at once, or get parts of the sounds, but they will be out of order.”

“Wow, I think I might have actually understood your explanation that time.” Jen said with a laugh.

Sam heard Tamako say, “We’ll head back now. We need to get some rest tonight, before heading back with Melvin first thing tomorrow morning.”

Sam didn’t like them being so far away, where he couldn’t get to them quickly, and replied, “I need your help with an experiment I’ve been wanting to do before you leave tomorrow, so I’m putting some speed enchantments on boot covers for Melvin to use. This will allow you to get to Crossroads more quickly, and give you the time to help me in the morning. Is that O.K.?

Tamako shrugged at Jen, and Jen replied, “Works for us. What is it?”

Sam would only reply, “You’ll have to see it, to understand it.” No matter how much Jen tried to get it out of him.

====

Captain Crane Claw was stunned to see his leadership intimidation skill increase as he took control of Domino Hill. He'd notice his mana was much less powerful as a result of using the mana filtering rods, but he'd also noticed that several of his long-stagnant skills started to improve, and with an actual increase in his intimidation skill, he was sure they were the reason for his skill growth. He momentarily thought about taking the rods to an enchanter to see if he could have more made, but decided this was the kind of secret he better keep to himself.