A Wolf's Howl, A Fairy's Wing

Chapter 295: Chapter 295 - Reconciliation and testing

She turned her gaze back to Erik with a frown, "But how is this going to work in the future? You say we'll go find my Mistress, but you seem unwilling to actually talk to her. So what happens when we find her?"

Erik shrugged with a slight smirk, "Who knows? Let's find her first, and worry about the rest later. When we have access to the entrance of her dimension we'll also have more options."

He didn't say it outright, but the fact was, that right now, there were only two options for contacting Audumla, assuming Elora hadn't permanently severed any chance of making a connection. Option one was to put Eira back in control of the structure, and option two was for Elora to do it herself.

However, the first option was a concern for the exact same reasons they transfered Eira to a new medium in the first place, and the second option was way to dangerous, based on their first encounter with Audumla.

Seeing that Eira still wasn't entirely convinced, Erik grinned at her and stuck out his hand, "Come on, Eira. Nothing has really changed, right? Adventuring together? Punching some bad guys? Finding your mistress? I understand that you're angry for the missed opportunity to talk to her again, but at least you know she's alive now.

So let's get back to working as a team!"

Eira seemed to contemplate his words while her lips were pursed into a pout. Erik could feel the desire to take his hand through their link, but her loyalty to Audumla seemed to be the main obstacle.

Still, Erik waited patiently. There was nothing he could say or do now that would lower Eira's loyalty to Audumla, after all.

Finally, Eira sighed and took his hand. "Fine… you can be my master again…" Before she let go of his hand, however, she narrowed her eyes, "But I won't forgive that fairy so easily! And if you stop looking for Mistress, I won't forgive you…"

"Deal," Erik smiled softly.

With an agreement reached, Eira seemed to regain her cheerful personality almost immediately as a wide smile broke out on her face while releasing a tense breath of air. "Phew! I really didn't like being angry at you!"

"And I didn't like having you angry at me," Erik chuckled.

With their relationship restored, Erik quickly gained an eager shine in his eyes as he began asking her questions about the armor, "So why don't you tell me how your new medium feels? Does everything work as it should? Do we need to make any changes? We haven't really been able to talk about it yet."

"It feels a little strange," Eira pondered. "I have far fewer connection than before, I can see less, do less, feel less… and yet I've never felt freer! Living in an entire structure anchored inside a dimension can feel… cumbersome, I guess," she shrugged at the end.

"Glad to hear that," Erik chuckled, even though it wasn't exactly what he wanted to know. "But what about the technical aspects? Can you access everything you're supposed to access? Have you tested if all the sigils and runes work as intended?"

"I think so," Eira nodded, before getting excited. "But we should have a battle to be sure!"

Erik was about to agree, when he suddenly felt Elora stir in his soul. It seems his beloved partner was finally waking up.

A loud yawn echoed through Erik's head, before a sleep Elora mumbled right after it, "I guess we're not dead… that's good."

"Good morning, sleepyhead," Erik chuckled through their link. "And yes, as you can see, it doesn't seem like Audumla saw enough reason to come here. I guess her reasons to stay in that dimension are still more important than Eira."

"Well, that's not unexpected," Elora shrugged. "She's just a sigil construct, after all."

"Actually, she may be a little more than that…" Erik responded thoughtfully, before sharing his memories of Eira's confused ramblings when Elora was removing her core from its fitting.

After receiving Erik's memories, Elora became thoughtful for a moment. Soon enough, however, she still shook her head. "I doubt it means anything, to be honest. Since she didn't remember afterwards, the confusion of getting disconnected was probably interfering with her memories."

"Perhaps you're right," Erik nodded. "Although I guess it doesn't really matter much right now either way. I'm guessing you agree with my assessment regarding future contact with Audumla?"

Elora immediately snorted in response, "Hpmf, you got that right. I did indeed already sever the connection in a way that is unrecoverable with our resources. And even if I didn't, now that Eira is finally disconnected I'm not putting her back. And I'm definitely not contacting Audumla myself!"

A mental shiver went through Elora's soul, "Feeling such a powerful mind worm their way into mine is not something I ever want to experience again!"

"Fair enough," Erik chuckled. "Are you alright, though? Got enough sleep, finally?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Elora sighed. "It just hurt a lot, and I'm not sure how much information she managed to dig out of my head, but there shouldn't be any lasting effects."

"Good," Erik nodded, before moving on to the next topic. "Anyway, I guess you'll need some time to familiarize yourself with the structure's systems, before I can start integrating the dimension?"

"You guessed right," Elora nodded. "I'll let you know when I'm good to go. Oh, and Erik?"

"Uh huh?"

"When the dimension is absorbed and nothing urgent is going on anymore, I'll be taking a week long break, and you'll be fucking me senseless for the entirety of it. Understood?" she said in a tone that would brook no refusals.

Naturally, Erik could only chuckle and agree, "Ma'am, yes ma'am!"

Having gotten Erik's agreement, Elora connected to the artificial core now controlling the structure they were living in, and began exploring its exact capabilities.

Meanwhile, Erik focused back on Eira, who was looking a little confused, since Erik had been sitting still and not saying anything for the last seconds.

"Master? Are you alright?" she asked, with a little worry in her voice.

Erik pretended to be a little startled, before smiling at the cute minotaur girl, "Yeah, I'm fine. Was just lost in thought for a moment. You suggested a battle?"

Quickly regaining her previous enthusiasm, Eira nodded excitedly, "Yeah! The armor seems to work fine, but we should test it first!"

"Alright than," Erik chuckled. "Let's go find Astrid. No way would she refuse a spar, let alone if she gets to test herself against this armor she helped create."

Eira quickly agreed, and so did Astrid after they found her. The construct didn't participate directly in the fight herself, however, and stayed in the armor to test the various sigils and runes, while Erik tested its durability and reach.

In the middle of their sparring and testing, Alice also showed up, expecting to continue her week long training with Erik. Seeing what they were doing, however, she quickly requested to be allowed to join the testing instead.

Not long after, a small wereverine was standing opposite of Erik, who was armored up, but in his human form.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Erik grinned playfully at the young wereverine-human hybrid.

"Yes, Teacher!" Alice responded, full of vim and vigor, ready to take on Erik's armor with the destructive claws of her hybrid form.

Erik sighed inwardly, as there was no way her first-rank claws would damage his third-rank armor. 'I just hope she doesn't hurt herself,' he thought.

Alice charged at Erik's armor with an excited and even confident grin, causing Erik wonder where she got that confidence from.

He didn't have to guess for long, however, when, less than a second before she hit him, her entire body suddenly lit up in a sapphire blue blaze, including her claws.

'Ha! She did it!,' Erik chuckled inwardly as he watched her approach.

Clang!

Alice's claws his his armor and, unsurprisingly, failed to do any damage, causing Alice to stumble back and moan painfully as she shook her clawed hand in an effort to get rid of the pain.

"I thought for sure that was going to work!" she pouted slightly, disappointed in her own skill.

As it turned out, Alice's first skill was very similar to the skill that Viljar showed when he changed his claws and fur into a magma-like substance. Only in Alice's case, she could change it to something that carried the powerful thermal shock attribute of her frostfire, something that would easily shatter most armors.

Of course, only so long as it remained in more or less the same power range.

"I think you're underestimating how impressive it is that you managed to uncover your first skill in the first place," Erik chuckled. "You know how many people have to wait years for that? When did you manage to use it?"

'I'm sure I had something to do with this as well, but this also proves that she's plenty talented,' Erik mused to himself.

"Last night!" Alice beamed, happy to be praised by him.

"Does that mean you continued when I told you to go to sleep?" Erik asked, suddenly growing sterner.

Alice quickly paled, remembering Erik's threat about dropping her as a student the moment she went on for longer than he allowed. Her young voice was laced with panic as she pleaded for mercy "I— I j— just felt so c— close to a breakthrough…! I couldn't stop! P— Please don't stop teaching me!"

Erik's expression remained angry as he closed the distance and towered over her in his menacing black armor.

Seeing how upset Alice was getting, he quickly mellowed, however. It was good to instill a little fear in your students, but not too much.

Losing his angry expression, Erik chuckled. "It's fine, Alice. When inspiration strikes and a breakthrough is close, you should always continue training. But next time, tell me about it, alright? Don't simply continue in secret." Find adventures at ???

Alice heaved a sigh of relief, and quickly nodded, "Y— Yes teacher! Thank you teacher!"

With that, their training week came to an end, and it was time for Erik to focus on something else.

Absorbing the dimension.