After much trial and effort, Mia had successfully managed to work out the kinks to her design. This had involved testing, waiting around for her mana to regenerate, saving and loading when one idea failed followed my more testing.

First, the movement in water.

Her solution was to simply not deal with it. Not to say she didn’t try, but any idea she had just ended up more and more ridiculous. From changing the shape to an impractical degree, to standing on stilts, none of it made it any easier to move…at first.

It was only when she succeeded at the second problem did she find a solution.

Fact was, her feet clattering around inside of a boot made of solid ice did not feel well in the slightest, so she tried out a few ideas to fix it. On her first attempt she perfectly fitted the boot to her entire leg, leaving no room for it to slip and slide inside, firmly keeping it in place. This appeared to have worked, even helped her move quicker in the water with how much of a perfect fit it was.

She was cheerful, it had worked, but after walking for a bit her feet started to throb in pain, ignoring it she continued to test, then quickly found herself unable to walk from the pain, tripping and breaking her ankle.

Learning from her mistake she fitted the boot better, filling the space between with snow. This worked as well at first, the cushion allowing her to walk without issue with the added benefits of the better fit, until the snow melted and she was back at square one.

This left her stumped, she was out of ideas. She sat there mulling it over, she needed something between the two, or she could just keep cooling the snow padding… in her pursuit to not give up and get stuck with cleaning blood suckers off of her every few minutes she placed several piles of snow in different states in front of her, seeing how long it would take to melt and how she could manipulate it to keep it from melting in the first place.

Then she hit an epiphany.

When she was bored watching snow melt, she accidentally squished some of it when falling asleep, in her panic she tried to fix it but used too much force, freezing the slushy mixture. “hnn” disappointed she had to create more snow and start over, she picked up the bumpy ice plate, her ears perking up in surprise at how weird it felt “oh?”

She took it in both hands, squeezing it down and was surprised to find it was quite mailable while still being solid, pouring mana into it also let her shape it easier. “This could work!”

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Excitedly she tried to make more of the stuff, now knowing the texture she fiddled around with summoning different piles of snow and ice till she finally got it, a decent mess of snow, ice, and slush surrounding her. She restarted, loading her save, then took what she had learned and made a pair of boots, fitting it to her liking.

[…]

“One, two…” She stood, and after a tiny moment of uncomfortable molding to her feet she took her first step, her ears standing straight up along with her tail “Oh?” she took another step “oh oh?!” she leaped from one side of her small ice platform to the next “hehe….” Her eyes shifted to the water, jumping in and moving about “Ah, it’s easier” It wasn’t like she was walking on land, but she wasn’t trudging through it anymore.

[…]

She admired her work, with these she wouldn’t have to worry about the blood suckers, and moving was now easier. With her weapon in hand she was finally, truly finally ready to set forth, further into the dungeon.

[…]

Right after she dealt with whatever Ami was getting on about.

“Ami?”

[Yes, how can I be of assistance?]

“Need to say anything?” Mia asked, wrapping her tail around her in preparation.

[No, nothing, nothing at all. I am left speechless at your… resourcefulness… I am left to wonder if you realize what you have done.]

“eh? What do you mean?” She looked down at her boots, she was proud of them, even giving a little motion to show them off and inspect them from side to side, looked plain…sure… but she really wanted to move on “the boots? They work right?”

[Never mind then.]

Mia shrugged, assuming it had to do with her go to excuse of not being able to tell her things she didn’t already know, not leaving much room to talk…

[If I may make a suggestion.]

“Hmn, what?”

[An inspection of your status would be beneficial.]

“Sure.” She couldn’t see why not. As far as her status goes she was back up to 122 health, still hungry, and her mana was 400. Other than that, nothing else had cha- oh magic craftsmen went up a level, bringing it to 3 and…

“new skill? [Mana Manipulation]? “ she read the skill…

[Skill: Mana Manipulation. LVL 1: You have become familiar with bending mana to your will. Using magic in any capacity will become easier, reducing the cost.]

“Oh I like this.” She smiled, now her larger mana pool will go further than it already had… not that she was going to stop pointing it. She briefly questioned when she got this skill, but based on her mana being higher than it normally was, probably during her crafting. She briefly wondered why Ami would bring this up in such a roundabout way, surely, she would have noticed eventually.

Well regardless, with a shrug she started her way down deeper into the dungeon.

Her increased pace quickly paid off, making the trip down this never-ending hallway all the quicker. It also made dispatching these small toothy fish all the easier, and her aim was improving with this long weapon, it just felt a lot nicer all around.

Now she was just left wanting for either more of a challenge, or for a stinking change of scenery “Why!” she yelled out in vain, only to be attacked by a few fish. “But, this fish are coming from somewhere, so, has to be something!” and with that, she hurried ahead.