Syl

Chapter 161: Hats, Axes, and Claws

We were all staring at the crown-turned-hat in bewilderment. To everyone else, it appeared utterly mundane and only revealed its true nature to me, its apparent new owner. Its abnormal attachment to me and its tendency to return to my head or even sneak into my [Core Storage] was a mystery that kept us all on edge. The latter was extremely alarming, and I couldn't shake the feeling that the crown was playing a prank on me for trying to get rid of it.

Finally, Jet spoke up. "Okay, take everything I say with a mountain of salt because I'm pulling on some utter dregs of secondhand information, but I think it's become soul-bound to you."

"How and why?" I asked with concern.

"I assume because you dealt the final blow on the cat. It's the only thing that makes sense." Jet answered.

"So, is this a good thing or a bad thing?" Eliza asked, her curiosity piqued.

To everyone's surprise, it was Pelopi who answered. "Soul-bound items are unusual but not that rare. I know my family had one; I was supposed to inherit it one day. It just means nobody, but you can use it."

"That's vaguely in line with what I heard," Jet responded, scratching his chin. "I heard a swordsman who was soul-bound to his sword, and only he could unsheathe it. It also apparently couldn't cut him."

"And I got a hat..." I replied with deadpan disappointment.

"A transforming hat," Ian corrected with a cheeky grin. "Although I can sympathize with the disappointment of not getting a cool magic weapon."

We spent some time exploring the limits of the crown's transformations. Anything considered even loosely as headwear and head accessories was up for grabs, including ribbons, hairclips, hoods, helmets, masks, and even bizarrely, a scarf as long as it was one of those large ones that covered one's mouth. Also, nobody was able to remove it from my head except myself, which further added to its mysteries.

I ended up settling for an oversized black witch hat as I recalled Kurt mentioning that any self-respecting mage would have an iconic hat. The Misfits all heartily agreed with the decision and wondered why I didn't have an impressive mage hat sooner. Jet muttered something about stereotypes but otherwise shrugged and said it looked good.

Finally, after our distractions, we looked at our loot chest. The group's disappointment over only one reward chest was greatly diminished when they saw its utter size, which easily dwarfed any of our others.

Ian excitedly clapped his hands together in prayer. "Please give me a new weapon! Please, please, please!"

"You never say wishes out loud," Pelopi scolded him. "Everyone knows that."

"Hush you. I'm begging this wonderful and generous dungeon to give me a new toy." Ian replied. "With your magnificent hallways. I love how you've decorated the place, by the way, and your combinations for this run have been masterfully deceptive."

Eliza leaned over to Jet to whisper into his ear. "Does that work?"

Jet gave a subdued chuckle. "Probably not, but let a man dream."

Even without Ian's unwavering optimism, we were all excited to see what was in the chest. After confirming that it was not trapped, illusion or otherwise, Jet finally opened the chest. Everyone held their breath.

"Yes!" Ian cried out in victory.

Inside the chest was a golden-orange double axe. The entire thing seemed impossibly made from a single material as if carved out rather than forged. It also hummed with a now recognizable combination enchantment of auto-repair and sharpening. Most startling, there were also two mystery enchantments on each axe blade that I wasn't entirely sure what they did. Once again, it was beyond my own [Rune Reading], except I could tell that the enchantments were almost the direct opposite of one another. One axeblade had a reddish glow, while the other had a blueish glow.

'A reversed effect depending on which axeblade you use?' I wondered to myself.

"A bit of an ominous name." Jet said and turned to me. "Your [Appraisal] telling you anything better?"

"It's got repair and sharpening, and each blade is... Different." I replied with uncertainty. "Opposite effects, as far as I can tell."

"Well, there's one way to find out!" Ian declared.

We all looked at him expectantly as he reached towards the axe with zero hesitation and picked it up. Then he ran the back of his free hand along the blueish side, causing Eliza to scream at him. He pulled his hand back and revealed... Nothing? Not a single wound.

"Shit. Don't tell me I finally got a weapon drop, and then it can't actually cut anything!" Ian said with disappointment.

"I told you not to say your wish out loud! You ruined it!" Pelopi replied.

"I can't believe you!" Eliza shouted before punching him in the shoulder.

"What?" Ian said with a playful shrug and grin. "I figured you still had some Holy pool to heal me with. It seemed the quickest way to see what it does."

Jet cleared his throat. "Putting aside superstitions and... Impulsive decisions. Syl said each side was the opposite effect, so..."

"Right!" Ian interrupted with glee as he reached towards the red side.

"Don't!" Eliza shouted in an attempt to stop him. But again, without hesitation, he touched the axeblade.

"Ouch!" Ian said as he immediately pulled his hand back, a rather deep cut on the back of his hand despite a rather gentle touch.

Eliza immediately reached for his hand and spent some of her remaining Holy pool to heal it. Thankfully, it did close up without any concern. However, she still punched him repeatedly in the shoulder for his recklessness.

Jet sighed and walked away, once again reaching for his flask. It had been a rough day for our party. Well, maybe not for me. Today was wonderful for me, thanks to that orange slime.

The axe obviously went to Ian, as he probably would have fought someone over it. Likewise, the crown was now mine since we literally couldn't remove it from my possession. I hoped Thern or perhaps Trixie would know what the crown did and how to remove it if I wanted to. Thankfully, it would happily sit inside my [Core Storage] so I could easily hide it away if I needed to slime out.

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Everyone began setting up tents and a fire at our campsite. Now that we had just the final floor to handle, the Misfits were filled with giddy anticipation. Jet almost immediately started pulling out five crossbows once done and began working on fixing them, a mix of anger and determination in his expression.

"So the next floor is ghosts, huh?" Eliza commented.

"I believe it is actually the Ethereal mutation." Jet spoke up while continuing to fix his crossbows. "This means we can expect a bunch of beings that are either permanently incorporeal, halfway, or can swap between the two states."

"I thought you weren't supposed to help us too much?" I questioned.

"Oh no. As far as I'm concerned, you've all passed already." Jet said before giving a rather wicked smirk. "Now... Now it's personal."

The Misfits were cheering, and I was also quite content; that meant we only had to make it out alive to tell the tale. Jet refrained from the celebrations and continued working on fixing his weapons with a dark glint in his eyes. Occasionally, he would mutter about "five bloody breaks." and "bloody ghost fey." before taking a swig of his flask.

Since Jet was in his own world and I figured I'd rather leave him alone, I hung out with the others. They were trying to figure out how to deal with more ghosts.

"Well. Assuming my axe can't do anything, even with its cool name, I can just keep them taunted, and you guys deal with them." Ian said while polishing his new weapon with great attention.

"I have no problems with ghosts," Eliza replied. "Hell, if the healing required is light enough, I could even throw an offensive Holy spell as crazy as that sounds."

"True. That's assuming that they have the usual ghosts and undead weakness." Ian replied.

"If this floor was anything to go by, I don't think they will be undead..." I said as I joined in on the conversation.

"Yeah. Jet said Ethereal, right?" Eliza commented.

"I just hope that means I can actually sink my claws into something..." Pelopi grumbled; she did not look pleased with the revelation. "Syl was right, damn ghosts."

"Why are you unhappy with ghosts?" Ian asked me. "You have so much magic; you're like an anti-ghost."

"I hate ghosts because they leave nothing behind to harvest..." I replied.

'And thus no profile or even slime mass. If not for the experience, it would be a total loss...' I thought bitterly.

"Ah. That makes sense." Ian nodded. "You probably get a bunch of money from your harvests, not to mention skill levels."

"Never get in the way of a girl and her spending money." Eliza teased.

"As long as I get to keep the axe, you can buy whatever you want." Ian instantly replied.

"So... Any ideas for me?" Pelopi asked, her ears once again drooping.

"Well... [Fire Magic] usually works well against undead." I answered.

"Boo," Pelopi said, sticking out her tongue. "Magic is no fun."

"Even if you tailored it to yourself?" I questioned. "Sure, [Water Orb] and [Flame Arrow] are kinda dull, but couldn't you do something like fire claws or water claws?"

Pelopi's ears perked up at that suggestion. "Huh... Magic can do that?"

Ian burst out laughing. "It's called magic for a reason."

Pelopi punched him in the shoulder, and unlike Eliza's rather playful ones, it nearly sent the man toppling.

"Yeesh! Grumpy wolfcat." Ian chuckled as he rubbed his shoulder.

"Well... Unfortunately, I don't know how much help it will be right now, but assuming you have at least [Water Whip], that's the starting point." I began explaining.

I cast [Water Whip], then began shifting it into different weapons. Pelopi stared unblinkingly.

"Water is the safe option for experimenting with the shape and layout, and when you have confidence, you can start replacing the water mana with the type you want." I continued explaining and turned my impromptu water axe into an ice one.

"I don't have ice..." Pelopi pointed out dejectedly.

"I did that for safety and convenience, but it's certainly possible with Fire," I responded.

Despite Dewi's initial suggestion to create a flame whip, I hadn't explored making any fire weapons. Still, with the ease thanks to my Elementalist class and the plethora of experience I had gained in customizing spells and replacing mana, it was relatively easy to do on the fly for such a basic spell. Especially since I brought in all my helpers to speed up the task. After letting the frozen axe disappear, I replaced it with one made out of Fire.

Ian whistled. "Maybe I should explore my Fire affinity more..."

"You just got a new axe," Eliza said, poking him in the ribs.

"I'm just thinking of the future!" Ian defended himself. "That's also only assuming Ghostflesh here can't deal with them."

Pelopi reached out to touch the axe handle and winced in pain as she retreated her hand. "Hot!"

"Oh... Well, it is literally a flaming axe." I responded sheepishly.

In curiosity, Ian also touched the handle but shrugged as it didn't seem to harm him. It was a low-level spell cast at the bare minimum; after all, no need to bring out the blue flames for a demonstration.

"Glad I'm not the only one with [Fire Resistance]," Ian chuckled.

"One of my original magic teachers would point-blank cast [Fireball] on himself," I explained.

"Good old Pyromancers sharing the love of [Fireball] with the world." Ian gave a toothy grin.

I then tried to give Pelopi a crash course in basic spell modification. Unfortunately, her skill levels in magic were rather lackluster, and she only had [Water Magic LV 3] and [Fire Magic LV 2] for our anti-ghost options. She had [Nature Magic LV 5] and [Earth Magic LV 2], but it sounded like none had anything to deal with ghostly entities since they were extremely physical despite being magic.

I possibly needed to apologize to Trixie for criticizing her teaching talents as I struggled to explain things properly just as much, if not worse than she did. Pelopi was growing increasingly frustrated when her attempts to reshape [Water Whip] failed.

"Is it because claws aren't a weapon?" Ian asked.

I shook my head and cast my own version of the watery claws. "No. It just requires a lot of trial and error and practice. I usually spend all my free time tinkering with spells; my [Mana Manipulation] is level six through proficiency alone."

"Bloody hell." Ian shook his head. "No purchases at all?"

"I've been... Reluctant to spend my points..." I admitted.

Eliza snapped her fingers. "I have an idea! Pelopi, how fuzzy can you make your bear claws?"

Pelopi shifted her arms in response, showing full fur, paws, and claws with no hint of her human appendage remaining.

"Okay. What if Syl ice claws for you?" Eliza said. "Assuming they aren't too cold for you to handle."

"Huh... That's not a bad idea." I responded.

'Especially if I just move the anchor point to Pelopi's hand, I could just have one of my [Sub-Cores] maintain it for me and forget about it.'

"Isn't Ice too physical?" Ian asked.

"True... But if I added [Frostbite] to the tips of the claws, perhaps..." I started responding, then paused to begin my spell work. Inspiration had struck!

I started shaping my water claws to fit over her paws and extend like a giant clawed gauntlet. Once I was happy with the design, I started replacing the Water Mana with Ice; thanks to the frozen sharpness, they looked quite savage.

Then I started experimenting with [Frostbite] to see if it could be kept contained only to the claw portion of the icy gauntlet. Strangely enough, this partial modification of an existing spell seemed remarkably easy. Perhaps this was due to just slightly limiting an existing effect rather than trying to add a brand-new one? Either way, I was happy the gauntlet portion wouldn't be giving Pelopi an affliction.

Happy with the result, I cast the spell by maneuvering the anchor point and situating it onto her arm. Pelopi shifted uncomfortably, perhaps feeling the subconscious effect of a spell within her personal aura. I was about to finally cast the spell when a sudden prompt appeared rather unexpectedly.

I paused as a smile began rapidly forming on my face.

'Oh! So your stupid little create spells never got to claws, huh?'

"What's got you so happy?" Eliza asked.

"Apparently, the spell is entirely new. So, I get to name it." I replied.

"That's so cool!" Pelopi replied. "Okay, you've convinced me to work more on my magic! I had no idea you get to name spells!"

"What are you going to name it?" Ian asked curiously.

"For simplicity, I was thinking something like ice claw, but giving it something more impactful could be fun," I replied.

"Well... You have Frostbite already, so what about Frostclaw?" Eliza suggested.

"That sounds like a dad joke..." Ian chuckled. "I love it."

"Frostclaw sounds awesome!" Pelopi cheered.

I had to agree; it was a great-sounding name. Much better than [Create: Ice Claw] or whatever other garbage that other mage had created.

"Frostclaw," I answered to the system message.

I couldn't hide my victorious smirk.