DEMON'S VIRTUE

Eiro looked at his slightly glittering right hand. The light that was created through Lognir's magic to keep the place lit up, as well as the flames from Armodeus' forge, were reflecting off of the metal insets that were placed into Eiro's prosthetic.

Right now, he was trying to test out the full 'Frost' set that was created with the metal that Armodeus pulled out of the Frost Dragon child's egg.

Switching out part of his index finger was already potent enough, but with his whole hand, the effect was at a whole other level. The power of other sorts of magic were considerably weakened, while ice magic was strengthened by quite a bit. And of course, Eiro was mainly testing this out through freezing water and lowering the temperature of the air, since casting full-on magic would be a bit reckless in a cave such as this.

There was only one main issue with all of this. It was hard for Eiro to take his hand apart properly every time, and it would take him quite a while to do so. Sure, with his <Ultimate Domain of Truth> card, Eiro would be able to analyze a situation properly and prepare for it if he had time to think about it, but there were plenty of situations where Eiro simply didn't have that time. Especially in the middle of a fight, it would be impossible to switch if Eiro made the wrong choice.

Considering the enemies where the improved prosthetics would end up being useful or even necessary that Eiro might face in the future, he wouldn't have the opportunity to switch out parts in his prosthetic. Which is why Eiro had to make a few changes to his current prosthetic.

For the most part, the most important one was that Eiro needed to be able to switch out his prosthetics whole. For that, Eiro had to change the structure of his prosthetic around his wrist area so that he could pull the rest of the prosthetic off more easily, before putting a new one onto there.

Luckily, that wasn't all that complex after Eiro removed all the parts of the prosthetic he was currently using and carved into the rest that remained on his arm, fused with his flesh. This was a part that Eiro couldn't really remove that easily. It would be like cutting off a chunk of his flesh, something that Eiro didn't particularly want to do.

The Demon changed the structure a little bit and gave the few extra pieces that he ended up with to Armodeus so that he could put the metallic insets into them as well. But Eiro added some other parts to the 'base' of his prosthetic as well.

He added 10 small pins onto it. For one, they were part of what helped Eiro put the other parts into place, and they were something that Eiro could place the rings from the Three of Swords onto. Since the rings that the threads were connected to could be any size, Eiro figured it would be a good idea to try something out like this.

Eiro activated the card and and watched as a ring appeared around five different ones of the pins, one ring each of course. Like this, Eiro might be able to fight a bit better even if something happened to his right hand, like it getting damaged or him getting surprised while he was repairing or cleaning the insides of his prosthetic.

But beside that, the main thing that Eiro wanted to use these for was the thing that he tried out next. He moved the blades toward the pieces of his prosthetic laying on the ground in front of him, connecting the threads to the different parts.

Like this, the Demon was able to swiftly pull all of the parts into the right place, steadily building up his prosthetic. For one, Eiro was able to increase the speed at which he was able to assemble and de-assemble his prosthetic by quite a bit.

And just like that, Eiro had figured out a way to properly use this prosthetic, even within battle. He would be able to switch out small parts bit by bit.

He would be able to combine different pieces of the four special sets to use certain combinations of magic a bit better. For example his flash-freeze, by combining the Frost-Set with the Fire-Set, heating water up to freeze it instantly.

Eiro tested this out for a moment. The only thing that he had to do now was to figure out a way how to carry the different sets with him in an organized way. He wouldn't be able to keep them with him using his treasury, after all. It could hold many different items, but each had to be one of a kind. Similar pieces of a set wouldn't count. Sure, Eiro could probably put the whole prosthetic into his treasury, since he could properly acknowledge it as 'one item', but that would also only count for one of the prosthetics. The others would need to be kept outside anyway.

Well, Eiro would be able to figure something out sooner or later. For now, since the Demon played around with these items a bit, while Armodeus prepared some other things, Eiro continued practicing his Aura manipulation a bit more.

First, he attempted the Aura 'Blocking' a bit more, where he stopped Aura from moving outside of his body to seem weaker than he actually was. It seemed like there were different ways of doing this, like different 'steps' that would make it easier to use this ability as time went on.

For now, Eiro was only able to shrink his Aura down, pulling it back into his own body. But a way that was far more efficient than this was to stop his Aura from leaving his body in the first place. Hence, 'blocking' its path outside by creating a mental barrier in the location of his skin.

Eiro figured that mastering this would also make it easier for him to block only the 'Vibe' from his cards, as if the barrier was some sort of sieve only letting through his aura, but keeping his 'Vibe' in. Then, he could go from there to manipulate the leftover 'Vibe' within himself. At least, that's what Eiro hoped he would be able to do.

While Lognir was happy to explain a couple of parts about this some more, giving Eiro a few tips here and there, for the most part he left the Demon alone so that he would be able to figure things out on his own. Then, the Dragon would fix any mistakes that Eiro was making.

Eiro focused on everything within himself. He thought about his aura and started to manipulate it, getting a bit of proficiency in that in itself. Eiro tried to simulate the different ways that his aura would react depending on his emotions. He made it fiery and spiky to make it seem like he was angry, and he made it mellow and soft to make it seem like he was sad.

Once Eiro figured he had gathered a little bit more proficiency with this for now, getting better at directly feeling his Aura, as if he became more familiar with it as a 'substance' of sorts.

And then, he slowly pulled it all within himself, letting it flow out of him ever so slowly to be able to test out creating a proper barrier. Carefully, some of his aura leaked out through his skin in a place where Eiro was trying to focus it to go, and attempted to hold it back somehow. Eiro didn't want to control the Aura itself, but rather the create some other force that held the Aura back.

But just as the Demon thought he figured something out, nearly being able to grasp at the feeling of holding it back, Eiro heard a loud, powerful voice in his ear, "Lad, open yer eyes already!" Armodeus exclaimed.

Eiro slowly opened his eyes, deeply annoyed over being interrupted, before he turned his head over toward Armodeus, "...What is it?" He asked, and the old man quickly handed Eiro the two daggers that he improved upon.

The Dagger that Eiro inherited from Avalin back then, the one with the Flame Magic Stone set into its handle, now had a few inscriptions placed on it that were filled with the Fire-Dragon's Metal, while the outside generally had a thin layer of this Metal now covering it except on the edges.

And then there was the hollow dagger that was meant to be filled with poison. Armodeus covered the inside of it with the Poison-Dragon's Metal to strengthen poison that went inside of it, and then covered the outside in a similar way as the Flame-Dagger was coated.

"You could have just put them over there and told me when I was going to be done. There's something else, right?"

"Of course, lad. I want to... make another item for ya. But for that, I'll need to measure yer stinger." Armodeus explained, and Eiro looked at the materials that the Dwarf had left over, while also taking a glance at his fingers where Eiro noticed a slight residue of a certain metal.

"You want to make something to improve my stinger's poison?" Eiro asked. Armodeus immediately nodded his head, "Aye, that's exactly it, lad. Yer tail is rather strong, right? If you're fine with it, I'd like to make it a steel base with parts that are made of this special poison-based metal. Your stinger is strong, sure, but it's like... A claw. A dagger will always be stronger than a claw, and the same will be the case when I make a needle. And a small system to push large amounts of poison into something quicker than yer stinger can. Of course, I can also make some small storage containers to increase the amount you can use at once, if ya want."

Eiro scratched the back of his head as he slowly lifted his tail up, holding it toward Armodeus, "That would be great, actually. Just... be careful. It feels kind of weird when it's touched."

"Aye, ya got it, lad." The craftsman said with a smirk on his face. He was probably excited to be able to make equipment for someone other than a regular person. Making armor for stingers, as well as weapons to improve upon those stingers probably wasn't a common item that one came across in general.

And so, the elder Dwarf squatted down behind Eiro and took a close look at his tail and stinger, measuring everything about it out and figuring out the dimensions. For the most part he was being careful, but sometimes Armodeus had to press onto Eiro's tail and stinger to figure out how tough that carapace-like structure really was.

Just like that, Eiro became something that Armodeus used to fulfil his dreams of unique craftsmanship.