—--- Hikari —--
Mind :754 -> 755
Martial proficiency : 269 -> 270
Firearms proficiency : 110 -> 112
Dark flames of the RazenHeir house potency : 157 -> 158
Hikari went for a morning run. The area around the estate was beautiful, lush forests teeming with wild life.
She ran along the familiar route. Her footprints from the previous day's run were still visible.
As she ran, a dust storm was created behind her, her earth shaking footsteps causing flocks of birds to fly off.
When she reached her dwelling, she ran into a grizzly bear. It seemed to be enticed by the dried meat she hung from the ceiling which, being at her knee height, stood little chance of reaching it.
After a brief staredown, the bear let out a whimpering cry and scurried into the woods. Hikari looked on as it ran away. Then, her stomach rumbled.
The bear ran as fast as it could. The giant it ran into earlier did not pursue. After running for a while, It laid low, hiding in the bushes to rest.
A ballista bolt whirl through the air and skewered it. Hikari gingerly puts away her bow and grabs one of her daggers.
Shortly after, her breakfast arrived, a full horse cart of mainly grain, whatever vegetables that were available and various herbs to maintain her gigantic body. She skinned and dropped some carts of the bear meat into her cauldron. The skin would make a nice pillow after it returns from the tannery.
While it cooked, she sat down on a boulder. She kicked off her flats. The bottoms and sides were quite muddy. They were quite worn out too from constantly being under her crushing weight.
"Going to need a new pair soon"
She put her feet up on another boulder which she had picked to be of the right size for a foot stool. After her intense morning run, her sweat soaked socks were in dire need of some airing. Especially since this is her last clean pair until another pair dries.
The stench was so strong that even she herself was repulsed by it even though she runs every morning whenever she's not on a mission. It still puzzles her as to how the other RazenHeir knights were able to not only tolerate the smell but seemed to be able to continue their training in their presence.
The cauldron bubbled. Hikari goes into a deep meditation. An important part of any mana user's routine.
It's quiet here.
And peaceful.
As it has been for however long she has lived here.
To her, It does not feel like the calm before a storm but a paradise frozen perpetually in time.
She could hear in the distance the bustling sounds of an increasing number of refugee camps.
It was nothing unusual. The RazenHeir house has for as long as it existed culled the surrounding area of monsters. They made their living by selling off monster parts on mainly the Herdial or MoraDale exchanges while collecting a protection fee from the local populace. Whenever there was a crisis such as a rampaging cult, refugees would come to their territory for safety until the crisis had passed.
The cauldron lid shook, allowing the lovely smell below to escape. Hikari grabbed her ladle, sprinkled a bit of salt and ate.
After breakfast, it was time for a shower.
Her shirt was a series of individual squarish cloth pieces stitched together with weaving runes. On deactivation, the threads between each piece untangled, causing the shirt to break up into its pieces. This was the way the weavers coped with her size which constantly increased over the past few years.
Likewise, she removed her pants and socks and then placed them in a pile on a slanted stone table. She then gently pressed down on the pile to drain the sweat.
She walked into her shower area. It was nothing but a smooth rock floor with a hole in the corner for drainage.
She cranked a level and water flowed into a trough.
It was rain water that passed through a filter that was changed roughly once a month. She never minded it being slightly murky. Dipping her finger in, she cast purify on the whole trough. A basic priest spell that kills common parasites and breaks up low potency poisons.
Then, the water stirred.
It began swirling up her arm, and then gradually around her entire body. It was a nifty way she invented to clean herself using only plain water and her mastery of telekinesis. Pretty effective too. Usable even out in the field.
She was clean now. Reasonably.
She lifted the lid of a crate containing her neatly stacked fresh change of clothes. The sheets of cloth floated to her and assembled themselves on her body.
It was an act that would be fit for the theater. The weaver runes have slightly different variants to mark out which piece belonged where. But Hikari had done this enough times that she could piece together a decent outfit even with a set of completely identical or mismatching pieces.
She hoisted her claymore and bow on her back. Strapped on her belt with her short sword and handcannon and readies herself to report to the scout master as part of her daily routine. If he has no missions for her which happens roughly six days of the week, she would drill for the rest of the day before returning to her dwelling.
Then, she sensed the presence of several horsemen approaching her dwelling. Curious, she wasn't expecting visitors.
She calmly set out to meet them. It would take a full army to make her feel threatened.
It was Ria with her escort of knights.
"Morning, my Lady."
"Good morning Hikari! Shall we walk to the estate?" Ria smiled brightly.
"Its not safe out here."
"It is, with you around. And I have some important news for you."
"Sure"
Half the mounted knights went behind her, sandwiching her and Ria between them. With Hikari around, they widened their formation to give her more room.
"Things are not looking good for us. It seems that the entire neighboring territory has fallen to the cultists right under our noses. We are building fortifications around the estate and we are going to move you behind them. Besides, it's long overdue that we build you a proper house."
"War?"
"Sadly, it is. But not to worry, thanks to you taking that outpost, our scouts had reported that the cultists had completely abandoned the area. Although we still haven't figured out their intentions, it looks like we can catch a break for now. Still need to train some more troops though. Scouts especially, hard to train and die at very high rates. We need to send my father some reinforcements as well. The orcs are really chewing through his ranks."
As they walked along the path. Refugees showed up and gathered on either side. The knights closed up formation around Ria.
Hikari stopped as the refugees crowded around her. They threw flowers at her feet, placed their hands and foreheads in the dirt before her. An old woman crawled up to her, kissed her dirty running flats and tried to clean it with her hair.
A surge of blood flowed to Ria's head as she watched.
"Could you make way please?"
The refugees obeyed and returned to the sides of the road, where they kneeled and continued to pray to her.
"Let us go."
They passed the outskirts of the estate. A mote and a series of wooden spikes were being constructed. Men and women were drilling with dummy muskets and spears.
Then, they arrived. A rectangular stone structure comparable in size to the RazenHeir drill hall or the cathedral of light over at Moradale.
Hikari studied the structure. She could see the seams between each block. They were not dissimilar to how her clothing was assembled.
"You can see it can't you. It does cost a tad bit more to build initially, but it is more sturdy and costs way less to resize than a normal stone building."
Hikari walked through the curtained doorway. It felt a bit odd that she could go through without having to bend over.
She was pleasantly surprised by what she saw.
A pristine bright yellow stone interior decor. It was already furnished, albeit rudimentary, with all of the essentials.
At the top left corner from where she's standing, a flat stone bed made large enough for her to stretch her arms a little. Stacks of bedding nearby ready for her to move in.
At the top right corner, the shower area, indented into the ground with a steel drain cover. A wash basin around her hip height, a pipe opening at the top of a pillar and a tank of nice smelling vicious liquid.
On the left wall, her wardrobe, a box shelf containing stacks of cloth pieces including a pair of fresh socks.
Hikari gingerly kicked off her dirty flats just in front of the door and made her way to the wardrobe. The top half of her knee socks came off. The bottom part was essentially a ped sock which she peeled off with her fingers.
She held up the fresh socks and examined them. Fresh cotton. A truly new set of socks, unlike her old ones that were made of a lot of recycled clothes to make them thick enough.
As she was about to put them on, she noticed Ria catching up to her. She was breathing heavily as she had to jog to keep up with her stride.
"My lady, my feet stink."
"Oh, that's fine. You are so big that there's no avoiding that anyways. I'm quite used to it already actually. In fact, I think your feet smell nice."
"Oh?" Hikari tilts her head slightly.
Ria covers her mouth with both hands, embarrassed at her tongue slip.
"Oh, I mean I really appreciate the hard work that you put in to become such a powerful knight. It would be unbecoming of me to complain about such a trivial matter."
"Hmm really?"
Hikari placed the new fresh pair of socks back onto the shelf. Then, she reassembled her old pair that was reeking of sweat onto her feet.
"I'll save it for later then."
"Umm…! Good choice! Umm .. yeah!"
"Let's continue."
Hikari turned to the weapons and armour area which was just beside her wardrobe. An entire two sections of the wall was filled with hooks for her weapons. On the ground were stacks of wyvern skin armour. She unloaded all of her weapons.
"Follow." Ria ran after her.
In the middle of the house, there was a ritual circle. It was the most state of the art circle Hikari has seen. The runes were inscribed onto removable blocks of stone. Chambers for inserting mana crystals surround the circle. The mana channels could be opened or blocked at will. This is where she would meditate from now on.
In the last corner, a stove under the ground, with a lid to put coal in. Along the wall, box shelves, only the bottom ones being filled up with ingredients for her stew. There's also a lever connected to a pipe end for her to collect fresh water.
"It's nice in here. Thank you my lady." Hikari turned to face Ria.
"I'm so glad you liked it. It's a bit simple for now, but I'm sure once the war is over, we could afford to fill this place."
"What's this?" Hikari saw a mattress on the ground the size of an entire room for a normal person. And a bottle around Ria's height beside it.
"Ah! That's your exercise mat. There's a drain below it to collect your sweat. And since foot rationing has begun, there aren't many body builders, so I went ahead and bought up all of the body builder's herb mix for cheap."Hikari picked up a bottle and shook it for a bit.
"Let's share it."