Rin settled into his new home at the back of the Sonnig’s store, and the days flew by. Every morning, he’d help Mikka open the shop, returning clothes to various racks and ensuring the displays looked their best. Then he’d return to the back room where he’d spend the rest of the day. The air was still cool enough in the mornings that the store didn’t require his efforts. So the first half of his days were dedicated to practicing various mana weaves and pushing the bounds of his Partial Transmutation. At lunchtime, he’d activate Cool Sleeves and change his efforts toward education, reading and memorizing as much as he could from the mammoth encyclopedia.

The Sonnigs leaned on him for general support with their tailoring, teaching him the art of their craft with enduring patience. He was still too inexperienced to trust with altering garments, but he could measure and cut fabric well enough to provide excellent value in a supporting role.

Around the third week, they discovered his unique flair for prototyping was indispensable. A wealthy client would arrive, Mikka would describe what she wanted to Rin, and the boy conjured the clothes into being on the client’s physical body. He could then edit the details by morphing the clothes in real-time before the client’s eyes. When they arrived at a satisfactory combination, Rin would save the garment in his Memorable Outfits list and later conjure it for Mikka and Horace to reproduce permanently to their exacting standards.

There were some tense moments when particularly uppity clients objected to Rin’s Cursed status. The Sonnigs weren’t about to give up on the benefit of Rin’s prototyping, and they rigged up a solution. Rin would work hidden away in the back area until his abilities were required, at which point he would slip behind an enchanted screen of Snow Ferret Fur that camouflaged him from view. Mikka employed a mix of verbal cues and discreet hand signals to communicate the changes she wanted, and the clients were none the wiser.

The fittings had to be done in the morning when Rin wasn’t maxing out his MP with his Cool Sleeves. The scarcity of available fitting times actually increased demand for the service, rather than stifle it. When word got out about the latest fitting experience at Sonnig’s Clothiers, they were catapulted to the top of every noble’s wish list. Their services were unparalleled, and despite repeatedly raising their prices, their backlog of orders grew by the day.

Rin found himself in a fog of happy weariness. The days were long, a proper grind, but he was overjoyed at the progress of his abilities and the materials at his disposal.

He experimented heavily with the Partial Transmutation ability, finding he could transform up to half his body before it counted as full Transmutation and failed in the presence of observers. The ability was still limited to utilizing one monster at a time, but it definitely shored up his defenses, especially against other people, which he considered his biggest weakness. The low MP cost of each ability turned out to be a critical factor since his pathetic level 6 human body had such a low mana pool to begin with.

The boy’s studies yielded more mixed results. The hulking encyclopedia was helpful, but only to a certain point. The materials within its pages were truly bizarre, and he struggled to imagine what they were like, which meant his Infinite Wardrobe ability wouldn’t conjure them. He required a firm grasp of each fabric before the ability would activate, which is what had made the swatch book so valuable. Still, the encyclopedia proved helpful because certain materials were imaginable, especially if he already had an existing frame of reference. For example, he didn’t know what Space Newt skin looked like but knew all about Fire Newt skin. He’d also researched the properties of space material. Putting the two together was a pivotal moment, and he was ecstatic when he imagined the material for the first time. Within minutes, he wrangled the Space Newt skin into the form of a defensive robe unlike anything the Sonnigs had ever seen.

The tailors took one look at it and knew it was something special. Apparently, this particular variety of newt skin was so rare you’d be lucky to find enough to make a coin purse out of it, let alone an entire article of clothing. That’s why it was never listed in his swatch book. These newts were a special kind of magical creature that could withstand attacks from nearly every other branch of magic, often siphoning the mana from an attack to further fuel their own space abilities.

When Horace agreed to test the garment, Rin couldn’t be happier. The boy transformed his underlying skin into the hardened carapace of the Shadow Weaver, just in case something went wrong. Then he stood still as stone while Horace thrust his sword against his arm. Rin saved the outfit with the name Reflection Robe, as it redirected Horace’s attack so perfectly that the sword jabbed out from another part of the robe entirely.

Best of all, the effect worked against everything they tried, from fireballs to lightning attacks. Trixie even joined in the attacks and discovered the same thing: Her phantasmal sword thrusts were redirected outward to a random location.

A few days later, Rin experienced a second breakthrough related to the first. He discovered a rare mana weave that interacted with the space material, controlling where the attack was redirected to. Applying the mana weave indiscriminately to the fabric meant the redirected attack was expelled in the same direction as the incoming attack. An attack from Horace’s sword bent the laws of the universe so that the man’s blade was sent flying at his own face. Luckily, he dodged in time to avoid being seriously hurt. From then on, Horace took to carefully prodding his sword into the robe before it would lash out and slice his hand.

The effect was perfect. It was the ultimate defense, and precisely what Rin needed when fighting people rather than monsters. Those were the times he couldn’t fully transform and was stuck with his weak level 6 body. He sincerely doubted the robe would block a higher-level magical attack, like a Grade D fireball. Such an attack would likely overload the mana weave’s delicate circuitry, leaving him exposed. Fortunately, his Infinite Wardrobe ability made it a non-issue, and he could always conjure a new one.

“You’d better use that outfit with extreme discretion, boy,” said Mikka. “One of our higher-end clients is a level 90 wizard. He’d declare war to get his hands on something like that.”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Rin shrugged off the advice. “I’ll be careful.”

“I don’t think you understand,” said Horace grimly. “A wizard like Archibald Sheenhammer isn’t used to being told ‘no.’ He’d sooner murder you and turn you into an undead minion if it served his goals.”

The boy froze as the gravity of the man’s words sunk in.

Yikes.

Truthfully, Rin had no idea how ruthless people could be in their search for power. The tailors had repeatedly warned him, but their stories seemed so outlandish, they couldn’t possibly be true.

Could they?

Rin kept the warning in mind and continued experimenting with different fabric combinations daily. Another week passed and he had his third breakthrough, this time with a phantom-compatible fabric to boost Trixie’s defense. “Barnaby’s Encyclopedia of Magical Materials” described a bizarre weave that made physical materials incorporeal, so much so that they affected the spiritual plane where Trixie existed. Rin could only unlock the weave after extensive practice alone at night in his Shadow Weaver form. He worked with Trixie and tried dozens of variants until they created what the book described: a layered weave with each layer interlocking with the others in perfect harmony. The book did its best to describe the weave using words and pictures, but it was no substitute for seeing it in person. On the contrary, it was only when Rin mastered the multi-layered technique that the book’s explanations made sense, a twist of irony that instantly rendered its instructions obsolete.

He practiced the technique in Shadow Weaver form and again in human form until he was sure the knowledge had transferred. Only then did he apply it to physical materials, beginning with cheap scraps they could throw away if accidentally ruined. After several more nights of practice, he spent three gold coins purchasing a set of lightweight leather armor from the Sonnigs. The armor was designed for a rogue build and was perfect for Trixie. He could have conjured the armor himself, of course, but Trixie would be wearing it indefinitely, and he didn’t want to reserve a constant portion of his MP for its ongoing cost.

Applying the new weave made the armor turn incorporeal, a trick that made the Sonnigs’ eyes boggle, to Rin’s smug satisfaction. Trixie donned the outfit without fanfare, giving an exemplary twirl.

“Oh, Rin, it’s perfect!”

“Not a bad fit either, if I do say so myself,” said Horace, scratching his beard. “I’ve never sized armor for a ghost before. I got a full level in tailoring out of that.”

“Now all we need to get you is an upgraded sword,” said Rin. “There’s another material in the encyclopedia that I think will work, but as usual, I’m struggling to imagine what it looks like.” He turned to Mikka. “Do you happen to have any samples of Phantom’s Bane available?”

The woman snorted in disbelief. “You have no idea what you’re asking. Materials like that don’t just grow on trees!” Horace glared at her for several seconds until she finally caved. “FINE. We have one sample. One, you hear me? It’s ludicrously expensive and we keep it in our personal storage rings, not out here with the rest of our normal stock.”

She gestured with her ring, and a meager patch of fabric appeared on the countertop, barely six inches square. “Don’t let it touch your skin. It’s one of the few known materials that cause soul damage.”

Her gaze turned to Trixie. The ghost was hovering anxiously nearby with barely contained excitement. “You’d best avoid it also. I have no idea how the fabric will react. With a name like Phantom’s Bane, it wouldn’t be good. One touch might even prove fatal. I honestly don’t know.”

Using a pair of metal tongs, Rin lifted the square of fabric to the light. It was semi-transparent and flimsy, a wafer-thin slice of sheer that reflected a pretty rainbow spectrum, flashing with iridescence. The fabric’s delicate nature made it challenging to work with. It wouldn't be worth the effort if not for its unique magical properties, and most ordinary tailors would avoid it entirely. Fortunately, the Sonnigs were not ordinary tailors, but masters of their craft, which was likely the only reason Mikka possessed the material in the first place.

After studying the fabric intensely, he conjured his copy, layering his imitation over the original and tweaking it until he got it right. Once finished, his version was indiscernible from the real thing, and he even confused himself with which was which for a moment.

“Your sword?” he asked Trixie, keeping his concentration on the fabric. She held the blade out before him and rotated it carefully as he worked his magic. He first wrapped the blade with the conjured version of Phantom’s Bane, before binding his new layered weave technique on top. The lines of essence outlining the mana weave shone brightly for a twinkling second before sinking into the blade.

A quick check of his MP found that although the operation cost him a whopping 80 points of his measly level 6 mana, it was gradually ticking upward. It confirmed his working theory that if he bound temporary conjured resources to an existing physical item with an advanced mana weave, the effect could be made permanent. Even though it wouldn’t incur an ongoing drain on his mana pool, it did incur a significant one-time MP cost.

He supposed he could have used the level 49 Shadow Weaver to apply the weave. With its larger MP pool of 990, the mana cost would have felt like a drop in a bucket. But then he would need to perform the task in secret and would have missed the awestruck expressions on the Sonnigs’ faces.

“You’re not supposed to be able to do that,” said Mikka, gaping.

Horace huffed in agreement. “Bleedin’ savant, that’s what you are.”

“Remember, I had to be Cursed to get these abilities,” deflected Rin. “The price was high.”

Trixie hadn’t moved an inch, her gaze still fixed on the blade in her hands. The lines of the mana weave were still glowing a faint cerulean blue along its wickedly sharp edge. She gave it a few experimental swings in the air. “It’s beautiful, thank you, Rin. I can’t wait to try it out.”

“That’s what you get when you stick with me,” said the boy, puffing out his chest. “Nothing but awesomeness. Just make sure you give it a few hours for the weave to bind properly.” His face turned serious and he lowered his voice to a whisper. “Now that I’ve upgraded your stuff, our deal is done. You weren’t thinking of leaving, were you?”

“Ha! No, you’re stuck with me. I like it here.” She glanced at the tailors who were doing a terrible impression of tidying their work areas when they were actually listening intently.

Rin eased into a chair, leaning back with his hands behind his head. “I like it here too. If we keep making breakthroughs at this rate, there are all sorts of crazy things we could make!”

“You know you’re welcome to stay as long as you like,” said Mikka, abandoning her pretenses.

“Yeah, you’re making us rich!” said Horace, laughing aloud and clapping him on the shoulder. “Seriously though, we appreciate all your hard work. Like Mikka said, stay as long as you want.”

“That settles it,” said Rin. “We’ll stay here a few weeks, working on our abilities and making super strong armor. All while keeping out of harm’s way.”

He couldn’t have been more wrong.