15 Soapstones and bonfires

"Damn, what happened to your face?" The Lizardman Xenos asked me while I was frozen in place. I had fucked up big time. I quickly pulled out a humanity sprite and crushed it, returning myself to humanity. I spoke before they could question me again, "Merely a curse I am shackled with. If I do not consume those black sprites I look like that."

The Xenos seemed to accept that at face value and even apologized for reacting as they did. I have to say, they were growing on me, they were almost like children. When the Vouivre was no longer in her shocked silence, I apologized for trying to kidnap her and she easily forgave me and even apologized for blanching at my face.

I wouldn't have minded continuing to converse with the Xenos, but I had a party to get back to. So after meeting with the three 'Leaders', more like elders, in this case. I showed them a soapstone and how it worked and left my summon sign next to a bonfire I created in the village's fire pit, in case they needed help fighting off the Ishtar and Ikelos Familia when they came to raid. After a few goodbyes and more apologies, I left once again through the ponds tunnel, not bothering to go hollow since I knew the quickest route. All in all, it took only 30 minutes from when I left, to when I set out to return.

With how easily they came to trust me, I was quite worried the Xenos would be taken advantage of.

[5 Mins later]

I took a gasp of air as I breached the water where Tsubaki, Ais, and Riveria were all sitting. "Oh, your back. Did you not find it?" Tsubaki greeted me before inquiring on the absence of a certain Vouivre. I shook my helmeted head and explained, "There were 5 different paths down there, I nearly drowned, thankfully there were pockets of air. By the time I found the right path, it was long gone." Rivieria and Tsubaki groaned, that was a lot of Valis down the drain, so to say. Ais didn't have much emotion at all on her face as usual.

I took off my helmet to shake out the water from my hair, for Riveria, this was the first time seeing my face, and I noted with no small amount of surprise, that her gaze lingered on me much longer than normal. "Well, I wonder what we should do now, we've got around 10 hours before the expedition moves out, so should we return or just set up camp here?" Tsubaki asked the group. Ais just gave her head a tilt while looking at Riveria. Riviera gave a disinterested "It doesn't matter to me," before she returned to a book I hadn't seen her pull out. My answer was, "I'm fine with waiting here, I wanted to discuss some modifications to my armor with you anyway." Tsubaki nodded at this and we started to set up the two tent kits we brought along with us. Rivieria meanwhile set up a line of wire attached to bells around the perimeter so we wouldn't be caught unawares by the monsters of the floor.

A few minutes later and the tents were set up, Ais and Riveria went off to their tent to talk and Tsubaki and I went over to a large root to take a seat before discussing armor. "So, whats the ideas you've got in that big head of yours?~" She asked me after flicking the side of my helmet she was holding. "Well, I've actually been considering switching from this set. It's good, well-rounded armor, but it's also one of my first, and I have many I'd like to use, but they need to be modified first. This is where you come in." Tsubaki gave a nod of understanding, "Alright, pull out the armor you've got your eye on and tell me what you had in mind while I take notes." She pulled out a Hephaestus Familia special, it's called a notebook, and another unique invention, a pencil.

(Believe it or not, paper books and such didn't really become popular until the late 1500s with the advent of the printing press. If you wanted to publish a book back then it could cost the equivalent of millions of dollars. Pencils and good quality paper are quite impressive given the assumed tech level of the Danmachi world.)

When she was ready with her notes, I pulled out two sets of armor from my box, The Artorias set and Paladin set. You could easily tell that both armors were in a state of disrepair, but still gave off a feeling of strength that was absent in most brand new armors. Indeed, these two had seen many battles and not wavered once. "Damn, those are some high-quality armors...."

I couldn't help but smile at this. "This armor was worn by a Knight of great renown, Artorias the Abysswalker, while the other was the armor of a stalwart Paladin of the Way of White, Paladin Leeroy. Both were men I respected, and both were men I was forced to fight." Tsubaki gave a shallow bow to the two armors, which I copied, it was the least respect you could give to the two men that used to don these armors.

"So, what is it your trying to decide here? Which one to choose and then modify?" I nodded at her words and she put on a look of deep thought before saying, "Alistair the Abysswalker.....Paladin Alistair. The Paladin...Abysswalker...Hmmm, do you want to know what I would pick?" I nodded, this was after all that I asked for help with.

"Artorias's armor is much lighter than Paladin Leeroys appears to be, but I honestly can't see you wearing that bright yellow armor with a built-in dress. Are you familiar with Scale armor?" I thought for a moment before nodding,

Scale armor was similar to chainmail since it wasn't one solid piece but instead many layers of small pieces of metal attached to chainmail.

Tsubaki continued after my confirmation, "Now you are quite simply, extremely strong, so I wouldn't have to worry about the weight. Plate armor is after all much lighter than scale armor and some chain mail. But anyway, adding some..." After around 30 minutes of discussion, we were finally done with the rough outline.

The helmet would be modified to have an interior mounted visor, meaning instead of sliding ontop of your head it would slide into the helmet itself, thus preserving the bird-likebeak. The gauntlets and greaves would have more titanite added to them to add a bit more bulk and protection, while the chest and back would have a layer of scale armor behind the plate. For a normal man, this would be much too heavy, but for me, it would just be 'Above Average'

Once that was done I talked with her about Artorias and our fight and my fight against Sif. When she heard about a giant wolf wielding a sword she didn't believe me, but when I pulled Artorias's Greatsword that Sif had wielded, nearly three times my size, she was shocked, to say the least. When she learned that Artorias was only a few feet taller than me, around 10 feet tall, she was even more shocked. "Just how strong are the people from Lordran?!" She was only slightly appeased when I could just barely lift the giant blade.

"Wait, I just remembered something. You said that Sif was a great wolf, right?" I nodded while I used a whetstone on my Zweihanders blade. "You know, there is a pack of those in the forest outside of Orario they are protected by the guild, it's very illegal to kill them... I remember I saw one of them take down a bloodsaurus, it was incredible." At this, my hand stopped and I glanced up at her, "You are sure? Are they sentient?"

She thought about it for a moment before explaining, "Well, I don't actually know if they are sentient, but they don't go out of their way to attack humans unless provoked. There is even a story of a kid getting rescued by the pack in the forest and they brought the kid back to the city. Though it was hundreds of years ago and no one knows if it's true. Most people don't go near their territory, a kind of live and let live agreement." I nodded at this and pushed it to the back of my mind for later.

I heard Tsubaki yawn from beside me, "You tired?" I asked while getting back to sharpening the blade. "Yeah, I think I'm going to turn in for the night." She leaned over and we shared a kiss before she went towards our tent and went inside. I heard a *Pompf* as she jumped onto the bedroll. I just shook my head and went back to maintaining before I heard footsteps and looked up to see Ais staring at me.

"Are you busy?" She asked softly.