Chapter 48: Mad Tailor
The tailor moved with terrifying speed for a man who looked half-starved on sheer spite. He lunged across the counter, skeletal hands quivering in mid-air as if touching the ruined fabric would contaminate his fingertips.
"Eighty thousand stitches!" the man wailed, clutching at his hair. "All by hand. And you... you troglodyte, you wretched... Wait.... Did you say put it on the director’s tab?"
All the previous anger was gone, replaced by a mischievous smile of someone who already knew what to spend the money on.
Looking completely puzzled, Godric nodded. "That’s right. The director and I have a... alliance, you could say, and so he will be taking care of all my expenses, including this one."
The tailor straightened up as much as his hunched back allowed. "And is there a limit to that ’alliance’?"
Godric blinked.
For a moment the mad tailor appeared like a sane person, if it wasn’t for the sly smirk on his face, that is.
"Can one put a price on such fine craftsmanship?"
The tailor nodded enthusiastically. "Ah, what a fine young, distinguished gentleman you are! A man of culture! True craftsmanship knows no price!"
The man already hurried toward his desk, writing down a list of things he was going to need, mumbling to himself as he wrote.
Watching him, Godric caught a few items from that list: a hundred core fragments, ten kilos of shadow cashmere, and fifty kilos of finest steel.
It almost sounded like he wanted to arm an entire army, not just a single person.
Still, Godric wasn’t about to stop the man from doing his job. Especially not when it wasn’t his money he was spending.
"Make sure it’s lightweight—"
"Quiet, boy! We need silence! Absolute silence!"
’We?’
Godric looked around, only to see the tailor running around the shop, mumbling to himself.
"The shoulders must pivot without resistance," Julian hissed to the empty air, unrolling a ribbon of measuring tape with a violent snap. "Hold still, you rascal!"
The tape whipped around Godric’s chest, shoulders, and forearms with blinding precision. The tailor no longer wrote anything down. His mind was entirely consumed by the blueprint taking shape behind his wide, manic eyes.
Circling Godric like madness in human form, he measured everything, from his arms all the way to his calves, whispering to himself at every step.
Then, just as abruptly, he stepped back, admiring his chaotic workspace with a look of pure, unhinged ecstasy.
"Three days," the tailor whispered, a wild grin splitting his face. "Return in three days, boy. And pray the Director doesn’t suffer a stroke before he signs the invoices."
Before Godric could even reply, the tailor waved him off and went back to his chaotic workstyle, running around the shop and whispering to himself in the process.
Godric had met a few good people. He had also met a lot of evil people. But he had never met anyone like the tailor.
The man was completely and utterly crazy.
Shaking his head, Godric stepped out of the tailor shop and let the heavy wooden door swing shut behind him. The muffled shouts of Julian fiercely arguing with an empty mannequin faded into the background, replaced by the crisp afternoon breeze of the academy grounds.
The cool air stung the burns on his arms, despite the wound already healing on its own, it was still there as a sharp reminder of how narrow his margin of error can be against magical beasts.
Three days was a short wait for custom-tailored gear. Most craftsmen would take weeks or even months to weave steel with core fragments. Godric had no idea how the tailor was exactly going to make an armour in such a short period of time, but it wasn’t his problem to deal with.
All he could do now was focus on his preparation and leave that task to Julian.
Armour would solve the durability problem, but it wouldn’t close the gap in raw destructive power.
He had a weapon that could deflect abilities. He also had one that could deal raw, physical blows.
What he did lack was a way to inflict magical damage.
Depending on who he drew in the first round, the beast might be resistant to physical attacks, no matter how powerful they were.
It was a problem he was going to solve with Raven’s unexplained obsession with him.
Calling upon Blackpearl, he summoned its description window.
***
Summon: Blackpearl
Grade: Primordial
Tier: 3
Abilities 1/2: Discharge
Discharge Ability Duration: 23 Hours 47 Minutes and 11 Seconds.
***
Relying on random abilities he might encounter during the tournament was risky. Beasts were usually more durable against not just their own abilities but the abilities of the same element.
That’s why he decided to copy one ability and master it before the tournament.
Under any normal circumstances, that plan wouldn’t be possible.
Finding someone to spar with consistently was hard, even more so before a tournament when you might face that very same person.
But that wasn’t the case with Raven.
The girl, for reasons he couldn’t begin to understand, was eager to see him no matter what. And there was nothing wrong with utilising some of that friendliness, right?
A small, calculating smirk tugged at the corner of Godric’s mouth as the glowing status window dissolved back into nothing.
After making his way back to the training facility, he found an empty room.
He walked toward the centre before drawing Blackpearl with a practised motion.
The moment the dark blade cleared its sheath, a distinct static charge filled the surrounding air. The dark, lustrous steel didn’t just hold the copied essence of Skybreaker’s ability. It hummed with it, as if there was a trapped tempest longing to be let out.
Pointing the tip of his sword toward a dummy on the other side of the room, Godric whispered a single word: "Discharge."
Unlike Raven’s purple lightning, black sparks ignited across Godric’s sword before coalescing into its tip and shooting out like a laser beam.
The mannequin, reinforced to withstand the attacks of an elite Tier 3 beast, lasted a total of three seconds before exploding into a thousand pieces.