So, this was the Northern Snow Region, where snow never stops falling.
The purpose of Elizabeth’s bulky, aesthetically unappealing trench coat and cotton pants was obvious.
When Lega Weilin transmigrated, the sailor uniform + short skirt + black stockings she wore were no different from those in the game… completely vanilla cosmetic gear.
But now that the game had become reality, such an outfit inevitably faced the question of whether it could withstand the cold — even if Weilin was a Lv100 Great Mage. If she had fire magic, any random Fire Shield Spell could easily dispel the cold. But, the once strongest Mage in history now had only a body of sub-classes and life skills? Best not to mention it. It’s truly embarrassing.
“—Achoo~~”
The girl’s body shivered slightly, and she sniffled. Looking down dejectedly at her thighs, exposed to the freezing air beneath her short skirt.
Elizabeth instantly caught this scene, and an uncontrollable excitement surged in her heart… because she knew her chance to curry favor had arrived!
“That—!”
The mouse slightly raised her voice, causing Weilin’s steps to pause. Turning around, she saw Elizabeth behind her hastily taking off her own bulky trench coat, running over to drape it over her.
“I’ve lived in the Snow Domain since birth, so I’ve developed some resistance to the cold. It’s no problem. Big Sister, you wear it.”
“Wait.” Weilin stared at Elizabeth, whose smile was sincere, and asked strangely, “I don’t seem to have refused. What are you explaining for?”
Elizabeth: “awkward”
Once a person becomes wealthy, they often become overthinking and suspicious. Weilin, someone who had gotten filthy rich overnight, was especially so. Although she hadn’t displayed her wealth in front of Elizabeth…
But once Elizabeth found out about it someday, there was no guarantee she wouldn’t cling to Weilin using today’s favor…
Even worse, she might pick up some random little mouse and drag Weilin to court for astronomical alimony. That kind of ridiculous drama appears in the news every day with countless examples.
Wow, so insidious! Good thing I realized it in time. In short, debts of favors are something you absolutely cannot incur.
But refusing outright would make her seem humorless… Most importantly, she desperately needed something to ward off the severe cold.
“Wait for me.”
“Ah…?”
Elizabeth didn’t understand what Weilin was going to do now, but she took the trench coat anyway.
“Life Skill – Item Decomposition.”
In the next second, as the young girl watched in wide-eyed, bewildered disbelief, the bulky trench coat—not exactly precious but more than adequate for warmth—decomposed in Weilin’s hands into cotton threads, fibers, polyester, and other materials wrapped in various colors of light, floating in the air…
“Next, Sub-Class – Divine Artisan!”
(Divine Artisan: Divine Tier Sub-Class, automatically evolved when all your Craftsman-type class levels reach Lv10.)
The ability Weilin wanted to use was “Dyeing” and “Tailoring,” two of the hundred skills of the Divine Artisan.
But Weilin didn’t need to sew the clothes herself. Behind her, a purely mana-constructed black phantom floated, having appeared at some unknown time.
The black phantom stood nearly ten feet tall, with a massive, oval brain like a Tall-nut and a single, huge eye emitting a ghastly glow. Below the brain was not a body, but dozens of tentacles of varying sizes growing directly out—small ones like slender willows in the wind, large ones thick as water pythons… A jellyfish? An octopus? A slime?… A mutated tentacle monster?!
The tentacled shadow was unsightly, but fortunately, it possessed no danger or oppressive pressure. Rather, it was simply a “tool,” a “Substitute.”
Four tentacles simultaneously brandished four gleaming silver needles, while all the other tentacles swept towards the decomposed materials simultaneously.
Sewing clothes is typically the epitome of slow, meticulous work… but Elizabeth only felt her eyes blur. In less than a second, the tentacles’ dance of threading needles, so fast they became a chaotic blur of afterimages, had already ceased!
And two brand-new, lightweight, thin, yet exquisitely cute women’s jackets, wrapped in the glow of mana, were floating in the air.
The material from that adult-sized coat had been perfectly refashioned into little jackets fitting Elizabeth and Weilin?
Excluding the decomposition time, the whole process took… less than a second?
A divine skill!!
But for Weilin, it seemed the process wasn’t over yet. She slowly opened her eyes, a majestic golden light flashing and extinguishing in her gaze.
“Sub-Class – Enchanter.”
A fist-sized, deep crimson crystal was summoned before Weilin. The irregularly shaped crystal made a “crack” sound as it split in two from the center, slowly parting. From within surged a blinding red light like geothermal lava. In an instant, the surroundings shifted from deep winter’s extreme cold to the dog days of summer, countless snowflakes melting into water.
“Scarlet Dragon Crystal…?!!!” Elizabeth seemed utterly terrified, uttering the name in shock. Her gaze was fixed, her lips trembling.
“Crack!”
In the moment Elizabeth was distracted, another deep blue crystal appeared and cracked open in response. A dreamlike blue light flowed out, forcefully canceling the Scarlet Dragon Crystal’s effect, pulling the surrounding temperature back to its normal chill.
This couldn’t possibly be… ‘Lake Heart Ore’…?!
From the Scarlet Dragon Crystal and the Lake Heart Ore, two streams of red and two streams of blue light flew out respectively, one after another, towards the two new garments. Using enchantment patterns Weilin casually drew in the air, these two fundamentally conflicting forces were inscribed and anchored within.
【Successfully crafted 4th-Tier Enchanted Equipment ‘Ice-Fire Coat (Couple Style)’. Achievement Points +100】
【Enchantment Effect: ① Can automatically adjust heating/cooling mode based on the wearer’s body temperature. ② This equipment cannot be damaged by water or fire elements, and increases the wearer’s water and fire element resistance by 10%.】
What are these Achievement Points for… Wait, Ice-Fire Coat!?!
Mother clucker, fine, you don’t let me name it, but you even arbitrarily assigned such a silly name?
Fortunately, Elizabeth was a “Game Resident” and not a Player, so she couldn’t see this ludicrous equipment name.
However, the power of enchanted equipment, including its ability to boost dual element resistance, was easily perceptible even to someone as weak as Elizabemouse.
Incidentally, since she didn’t want them to be identical, Weilin used the Divine Artisan skill to reorganize the raw material pigments, creating two garments of the same style but with primary colors of red and blue respectively.
The remaining Scarlet Dragon Crystal and Lake Heart Ore were withdrawn, and the tentacled shadow behind her vanished abruptly.
Weilin put on the red jacket. The enchantment lines on the inside of the coat glowed faintly, and the fire elemental aura generated immediately dispelled the cold. Though standing in a world of snow, her whole body felt as comfortable as soaking in a hot spring.
“Here.”
When she handed the blue jacket to Elizabeth, the dumbfounded little creature still hadn’t recovered from her shock. Weilin had to walk behind her and personally drape it over her shoulders, asking with a pout, “Satisfied now?”
No, this wasn’t a matter of being satisfied or not at all!
She was supposed to be the one currying favor after Weilin found the Ten-Thousand-Year Cold Sand for her…! Instead, she was the one who inexplicably incurred a huge favor!
Elizabeth stroked the fabric of this garment, which had skyrocketed from street-stall goods to 4th-Tier Enchanted Equipment. Her heart was filled with a mix of emotions: excitement, cherishment, and the disappointment of her failed attempt to curry favor.
“Tha—”
“Stop!” As if knowing the White Mouse would thank her, Weilin didn’t give her the chance to speak, stating flatly, “The raw materials for the clothes were provided by you. I only did a bit of processing. Our contributions were equal, so why the need for thanks?”
A bit… of processing? Contributions equal? Not even mentioning the two pieces of Scarlet Dragon Crystal and Lake Heart Ore, rarer and more precious than even the Ten-Thousand-Year Cold Sand, just Weilin’s ‘Enchantment’ craftsmanship alone was worth ten thousand times that trench coat… They were utterly incomparable.
But Elizabeth wisely chose to remain silent and engrave the gratitude in her heart.
“Big Sister, I have one thing I don’t understand. That tentacle-monster-like black shadow… is that Big Sister’s true form?”
“?” Weilin was startled, loudly defending herself, “I am not, I don’t have one! I’m a genuine Human! As for why it’s a tentacle monster… because this is the most efficient!”
Dozens of tentacles, retractable, immensely strong, paired with a massive brain equivalent to an intelligent central processor—perhaps aesthetically unappealing, but its efficiency was definitively the most powerful form Weilin could conceive.
“…So, that underground tunnel, and those manga too…?!” Elizabeth suddenly understood, asking hastily.
“Yes.” Weilin sighed. “After all, there is a limit to human capability. In two minutes, no one could finish drawing a 119-page full-color doujinshi and still have time to dig an 836-meter underground tunnel and install a lift platform.”
“Then, what exactly is that black shadow…?”
“A Stand!”
——————
‘Magic Substitute’: Life Skill, Non-combat type. Perfectly inherits all of the user’s sub-classes and life skills, performing all labor tasks in their place. Requires continuous mana consumption.
(Magic Substitute: Divine-tier Life Skill. Obtainable only when you possess all sub-classes, have learned all life skills, and have a Mage Rank > 70.)
(Note: This skill benefits from the mana amplification of “Home Has a Mine,” increasing efficiency to 10,000%.)
