109, 2/2

 

Erick barely finished breakfast before Poi announced that there would be guests today, if Erick would have them, and of course he would. Ratchet and Arial had made great progress on working with chocolate. The two greyscale ladies in question showed up at the front door not twenty minutes later, both carrying their own basket of goodies.

“Welcome, ladies,” Erick said, moving aside so that they could come in.

Ratchet stepped forward, giving a momentary ‘how do you do’ before immediately launching into, “We managed to temper your chocolate!”

Erick’s heart swelled with joy, as he said, “Fantastic!”

They moved to the chocolate room. The ladies had left with 50 kilograms of chocolate liquor the other day, but they came back with much, much less than that in product. A lot of chocolate had been ruined by experimentation, but once they got their methods down, the rest came easy enough.

With baskets emptied, a table in the chocolate room stood full of chocolate desserts; the fruits of their labor. Dense chocolate cakes, chocolate-covered candy, chocolate and caramel cookie bars, chocolate-covered fruit, chocolate covered pretzels, and more, and of course, solid bars of chocolate itself. Dark, half-dark, milk; all solid as could be, with a sheen to the surface and no swirls or blemishes upon them.

“How’d you do it?” Erick asked, picking up a bar of milk chocolate to smell it. “It smells and looks better.” He snapped it. “Good snap.” He tasted it.

Divine.

Ratchet chuckled, seeing Erick taste the chocolate. She said, “It’s good. Nice taste, nice presentation. Different from other candies, too.”

“So how’d you do it?” Erick asked, again.

Arial said, “We—”

Ratchet said, “You figured it out, Arial, not me.”

Arial smirked at Ratchet, then continued, “We crumbled the chocolate into pieces, then submerged it into a hundred degree, water-boiling [Temperature Ward], just long enough to get the chocolate to melt, and then a single second more. Then we took it out, and put it into a 30 degree [Temperature Ward], stirring all the while, like you suggested. The chocolate turned glossy fast enough. When the heat was gone, we started pouring it into molds. From there, we left it in 22 degree room temperature [Ward]s.” She smiled wide, saying, “And it set! Just like you theorized it would.” She fluttered a hand at the milk chocolate and middle-dark bars, saying, “Those were just variations on the method. Bit lower maximum temperature, otherwise it burned.”

Erick asked, “Did you try the seeding method?”

Ratchet said, “That didn’t work. Or else we couldn’t do it.”

Arial said, “I tried. This method works, though.”

“That’s fine.” Erick smiled as he gazed upon the chocolate. He grabbed the dark chocolate and snapped off a corner of the glossy block. He popped it into his mouth. One of the niceties of chocolate was that it melted at body temperature, and this was no different. The mouthfeel was fantastic, as was the taste. Dark chocolate wasn’t really his thing, but he could still appreciate the flavor. “This is really good.”

Ratchet and Arial giggled like schoolgirls, proud of their achievement.

Teressa, Poi, Kiri, and Justine had stayed on the other side of the room while Erick interacted with Arial and Ratchet, but Erick invited them to try, and they came rushing over. Teressa loved the dark chocolate. Kiri liked the middle-dark. Poi and Justine both preferred the milk chocolate.

Justine asked, “Is there, perhaps, a more milky version possible?”

“Oh yeah! There is. I had forgotten.” Erick said, “White chocolate is an option, too.”

Ratchet rapidly asked, “What’s that?”

Arial’s eyes went wide, as she waited for an answer.

“White chocolate is…” Erick blanked. “Uh.” He looked to Poi. “Anybody seen Jane? She left so fast after breakfast… She would know.”

Poi said, “She’s at the Barracks. She should be back later.”

“Then I’ll have to give you an answer later, Ratchet, Arial. But I think it’s cocoa butter and sugar and milk solids. Vanilla is a good additive, as well.” Erick added, “No cocoa solids at all. You have to press the solids out of the fat, and just use the fat. You can save the cocoa powder for hot chocolate, though, so it’s not really a waste.”

“There are similar treats made from the oils of the uranga tree and the oils of fatflower berries.” Arial said, “Those two tend to be savory or floral, but I could try those recipes. They might form a good base for the ‘white chocolate’ you suggest. I will try this with cocoa butter.”

“Thank you.” Erick said, “I have yet to speak to the Garden Council on the matter of purchasing some land for a cocoa tree farm, but I was planning on doing that today… Along with a few other tasks. I might have an answer for you by this afternoon.” He said, “But for now…” He looked to Ratchet and Arial, and asked, “Could I commission you two to create some cakes and bars and goodies? I need enough for a large party, tonight. In ten hours. I’ll fill the backyard garden with cocoa trees for you to use in the meantime.”

“In ten hours?” Arial frowned. “What are you doing for Shadow’s Feast? You’re not hunkering down like the rest of us?” She rapidly added, “I mean. Course you’re not. But… I would expect you to go on high alert with all rest of the Army. But a party?”

Ratchet shifted from joyful to serious, as Arial spoke.

Erick said, “Upon threat of unknown danger, I’m required to visit the Feast they’re holding in Ar’Kendrithyst.”

Arial gasped. Ratchet harrumphed.

Erick couldn’t blame them for their apprehension. It was only prudent for them to be like this. But it still stung, because the way they looked and the way they stood, made him think that they were ready to walk out right this moment, and never return. It was like when Savral and Al agreed that he and Jane needed to move out of the Sewerhouse, because Erick was playing around with forces beyond normal magic, and Jane was talking of fighting Shades.

Serious as a heart attack, Ratchet asked, “You gonna be okay? Are we gonna be okay?”

Erick almost answered that he had no idea if they would be okay.

But then Ratchet clarified, “I mean, as in Spur. Arial and I already talked and we’re fine playing in the background with you as our patron. Archmages are targets, and we talked, and we’re fine with it.”

Arial quickly nodded, “Uh, huh. That we did.”

Ratchet added, “But we need to know if there’s an immediate danger to Spur. Something to prepare against, aside from the normal night terrors. We’re both staying with our families tonight and lighting real fires to drive away the shadows, but if we need to move out of Spur for the evening we can do that. I just need to know.”

Relief.

Erick felt a body-thrumming warmth, hearing Ratchet’s words, and seeing how her stance and eyes changed from one of worry and trepidation, into that of a warrior, ready for battle. He smiled, and said, “Silverite has assured me that the only danger will come from me not going. So she’s required me to go to prevent that unknown danger.”

Arial put a hand on Ratchet’s strong shoulder and slumped a little, experiencing her own tide of relief, as she said, “Ho oh oh, thank Rozeta.” She stood up under her own power, saying, “Had me worried there.” She laughed. “Isn’t nice to do that to an old lady like myself.”

Ratchet warmed, saying, “Good to hear.” She turned stern again, saying, “We’ll have your desserts ready by this afternoon.” She waved a hand at the cakes and candies on the table, asking, “Which ones do you want? No charge.”

Erick’s smile returned.

They spoke for twenty minutes of cakes and candies, and designs Erick wanted. Before long, Ratchet and Arial went back to their business to get certain things ready, while Erick went to go to the backyard, to the experimental garden, which he began transforming into a cocoa tree grove. Seeds went into the ground, while platinum rain raised them all into tall trees. Erick cast [Tree of Light] on a few as an experiment. Those trees then produced almost double the number of beanpods, but if that product was better or worse than the rest, only time would tell. Time that Erick did not have.

He did have a little bit of time, though, so for the last row of cocoa trees, he instead planted seeds, and then cast [Grow], imbuing the spell and the seed with all of his ideas for coffee that he could think to try. He stripped the oil from the cocoa, while leaving a certain bitter dryness. He implanted the perkiness of a morning cup, and the energy to get through the day. Three iterations was all Erick could put into this crafting, so he left the fourth generation maybe-coffee trees in that last row, hoping that he had done everything correctly. The [Cleanse] of the trees came back negative, so hopefully it was good. The preparation of coffee beans was almost the same as the first steps in preparing cocoa beans, so that was good.

Meanwhile, Erick had asked Teressa and Justine to help with cocoa liquor production, and they did.

When he was done with the maybe-coffee trees, Erick set a few Ophiel with instructions to begin making person-sized diamonds in stone tanks to the side of the yard. When that looked good, he blipped out into the Crystal Forest. It was time to complete his Class Ability Quests, one way or another.

– – – –

The sun beat down from above. A warm wind scraped across an endless sea of orange dunes. Ophiel floated in the air, just above Erick, while Poi and Kiri stood behind, protected under a [Prismatic Ward]. Erick looked at his Quests.

After battling Kiri in a real mage match, he noticed some problems that he had, that Kiri did not. He was truly impressed with many of the young greenscale’s spells, but [Firelight Assistant] was something special. That thing cast Bolts of radiance at the target, and even adjusted its targeting when the target adjusted their position. When Erick fought against her, he had had to defend against that spell the entire time he was fighting. Erick brought up the blue box Kiri had shared with him a while ago.

While the numbers weren’t that impressive, it was a great spell. Useful, too. Erick could have defended against it, but when the duel had been decided in the space of global cooldowns, there had been no point to [Dispel]ing the Assistant, for acting to counter it would have left him open to much worse magic.

But he had still needed to spend some mental energy to deal with the Assistant, and that had been less than optimal. Had Kiri’s Assistant been the difference between a win and a loss? Maybe not. But it had been effective in its own way.

Erick didn’t want to make an Assistant. Something close, though? That would be good.

Something that was outside of the range of [Dispel], too.

Something that demanded action, with numbers larger than [Firelight Assistant].

Something that could threaten its power in plain sight, and demand a response, to put the target on the back foot.

There was something poetic in the spell Erick was about to create. He had felt threatened by all these awful things waiting for him on the horizon, and now those awful things were here. But he could make threats of his own. No one could easily [Dispel] what he was about to create, for it would be piecemeal, and distant, but he would be able to cancel the spell at any time. It would be like that Red Dot. A warning and danger all in one; an inevitable doom requiring one’s full attention, while assassins and other deadly forces would fight down below.

Erick started with [Force Bolt] and the barest touch of Mana Shaping, for only 10 mana.

He pointed at a pillar a hundred meters away, and cast.

A spot of force flowed from his finger, like a drop of water hanging on to the lip of a faucet, barely dropping. When it finally separated from Erick’s aura, it flowed through the air; a gentle touch of disruptive Force that took its sweet time floating toward the pillar. Erick smiled, as he read the blue box that appeared.

Erick had managed to upgrade the ‘inevitable’ of the original [Force Bolt] into the ‘inexorable’ that he had gotten out of [True Plasma Bolt]. He also managed to double the Willpower contribution from 50% to 100%, all for a mere tripled cost of the original spell. The 15 base damage of the original [Force Bolt] was gone, but whatever. Base damage didn’t really matter, right now. This was good. This was Mana Shaping at its best.

While Erick had been evaluating the spell, the bolt had yet to fly five meters forward. Erick could jog faster than the spell, and so he did, but that was a bit disruptive to observation, so he used his Handy Aura to hover around and observe the spell from multiple angles. One thing was immediately apparent: He had never truly observed a Bolt before.

It was shaped like a teardrop diamond that was out of focus on the back end, but perfectly visible on the leading end. Crystalline and refractive, with facets and iridescence, the spell flowed forward, its dome-end leading the way toward the target.

Eventually, it struck, with all the impact usual to this sort of low-power spell; a single ‘spack’ barely heard above the windy sounds of the Crystal Forest, and then it was gone.

It took ten seconds to get there, though!

Erick got back into position, and only smiled as Kiri wordlessly looked at him like he was a crazy person. What was he doing with such a slow spell? It made no sense to her. Erick just smiled, as he looked up the next part of his planned magic.

Channeling mana through [Inevitable Bolt] produced a deep sound, like the sound of watching a knife slowly plunge into an artery. Erick grinned wide. It was exactly what he wanted.

In a contrasting and highlighting sound, [Force Crash] was the whistle of bombarding rain.

They went together, so well.

Erick dismissed one of his extraneous Ophiel over Candlepoint and reconjured the little guy onto his left shoulder, to pair with the one already on his right. He gave one of them [Force Crash], and the other [Inevitable Bolt], as he became the crucible in which that sound evolved into something more than the sum of its parts.

He turned his attention to the air above the stone pillar, and cast.

The small part of the blue sky briefly turned solid, becoming a mutated jewel of 15 jagged points that broke all at once. Some of the conjured Force became naught but white dust that returned to the manasphere. The rest became 15 jeweled tears, separating fast and far, maybe thirty meters between the most distant ones. All at once, they turned to the target and began their long descent, some arriving in three seconds, some arriving in twelve.

Erick watched each drop of magic weigh in on the targeted stone. The pillar was solid rock, but still, it cracked after the fourteenth Bolt. It was not a large crack. It didn’t mean anything, for now. But it was still a line of separation at the top of a large pillar. A blue box appeared.

Erick examined the spell he had created, and then brought up the next part of the crafting.

He smiled to himself, as he gave parts of the magic to each Ophiel on his shoulder. They sang together, of inevitability, and doom; a deep sound that all would see coming. This would be the tricky part. Erick’s heart beat hard as he drummed up his own intent, beating in time to the magic, knowing that a sudden drop would come when it was ready.

He cast.

A piece of the sky broke, and separated. Tears fell, each sounding like a distant, wailing cry.

The first drop took two seconds to almost reach the pillar—

All the speed that first drop had held back, suddenly burst into existence, as the drop whammed into the pillar almost faster than the eye could see. And then it exploded. Erick laughed, his sound drowned out by the rippling booms of 15 slow teardrops, taking their sweet time to get into position, and then once the target was close, racing down, blasting as hard as they could. At the tail end of the spell, the bombs had trailed left, following a boulder that had been smashed into the sky, somehow, only to be blown up twice more as the final two bolts struck the stone. The whole spell lasted at least 15 seconds, but only a few bombs took more than 7 seconds to reach the target.

A blue box appeared.

Northern winds blew dust and sand away, revealing the scope of the destruction, or rather, revealing a crater. The remains of the pillar stretched across those craters, like scattered remains. Erick was rather glad to see that the ‘quick’ version of the bombs had adjusted course as the target moved. This was what success looked like.

Erick sent an Ophiel forward, further than the craters where the pillar had stood. Ophiel raised another pillar, a stronger one this time, and then blipped back to Erick, as Erick focused for the next part. Each step in the creation process was crucial, each step deserved his full attention, and its own music. He held his hands forward.

One Ophiel hopped upon Erick’s left hand, and sang of [Inevitable Bombs]. It was the sound of doom approaching. A thunderous beat. A weight, ready to drop, and break the world.

It was muddled, though. The sound wasn’t as clear as it could have been.

Another Ophiel hopped onto Erick’s right hand, and sang a song of Shaping.

Together, the sounds revealed a clarity of purpose, a wider doom. A depth that was there, but needed something new to bring out an inner truth. Some emotion that existed for more than just Erick, but for everyone. A universal truth.

And what was that Truth?

A straw that breaks the camel’s back. A mouse backed into a corner. A threat on the horizon that must be recognized, lest a man who has been pushed too far, push back.

Erick spoke that Truth, “I don’t want to do this, but I will if I have to.”

Far above, where the clouds lay, the sky cracked like a broken jewel. Teardrops spread over a hundred meter arc of the heavens, studding the blue like flickering diamonds, or a kitchen-full of bared knives, or the glittering edges of guillotines.

They descended in a disruptive concert, taking a full minute to reach the pillar, but when they did, they ripped through the remaining distance to impact the stone. Explosions of pure Force rocked the desert, again. This time, the pillar did not explode away, but it did explode into parts. Erick watched, as three separate flying boulders each received a bomb of its own, further exploding the remains of the pillar into even more debris, while the base of the pillar, still hidden by clouds of sand, received the lion’s share of the spell. 15 bombs came and exploded in the space of a minute, with almost all of that time spent on floating down, and converging on the target.

Two blue boxes appeared.

Erick shot both hands into the air, shouting, “Ah ha! Did it!”

Kiri spoke up for the first time, “What… Did you do?”

Erick handed a copy of the spell to Kiri and Poi, saying, “It wasn’t impressive in the beginning, but it got there!”

“Holy…” Disbelieving her own words, Kiri said, “That’s… 10,000 Force damage per spell?”

“What I did, was take the tier four spell—” Erick handed over that spell. “And ran it through 500 Mana Shaping to purify the sound and the intent. I got the Super Long Range that I wanted, but I did not expect the Willpower multiplier to go that high.” He smiled. “Force is pretty amazing!”

Kiri blinked. She said, “Force can be anything… That you managed to make a Force spell this… powerful…” She rapidly added, “If you turned this into burning Fire, you can make that 10,000 damage into 50,000. Easy.” She laughed a little, making a mostly nervous sound, as she said, “This could kill most any monster… And for cheap, too.” She looked to the sky, then to the craters ahead, saying, “But those theatrics. I’m guessing that you want the enemy to be able to see the spell coming? And make it hard to [Dispel], too?”

“Exactly right!” Erick said, “All correct, Kiri.”

“… If you would have made this spell a year ago…” Kiri frowned a little, as though she was reevaluating her stance. “I think your [Luminous Beam] does more damage.”

Erick chuckled. “Sending a message is important, too. Besides. I can just add [Luminous Beam] to [Inevitable Bombardment], once Particle Magic becomes a part of the Script.”

Kiri sharply inhaled. “Right. You can do that.”

“I could probably attach almost all my directed spells onto this one.”

“… Right.”

Erick teased. “You should make a spell like this.”

Kiri agreed, “I should make a spell like this.”

– – – –

After a small break to regenerate his mana, that only lasted longer than necessary in order to explain every part of [Inevitable Bombardment] to Kiri, Erick stepped away from Kiri and Poi. He stood under the sun, with the wind rushing through his hair, evaporating sweat and worries. He focused.

He cast.

The spell came upon him like a shift in perspective. The ground was brighter than before. The sky a bit more blue. The sun was a radiant sphere that didn’t hurt to look upon. Being under the sun felt good, actually. Really good. He smiled. He gazed around him.

In a twist of thought, the land around him made him recall the depressed people he had spoken to in his life, those sad souls and the downtrodden, after Erick had managed to help them out of their ruts. Sometimes, they would tell him that the world seemed brighter than before, though nothing had changed except their own perspective.

But something had physically changed around Erick. A topaz-bright edge in the sand showed the range of his spell; close range. Beyond that edge, the orange turned darker, becoming something less impressive. He walked toward that edge, and his aura moved with him, bringing brightness wherever he stepped.

Behind him, his aura lingered, but burned away as Erick distanced himself, turning bright orange sand to topaz, briefly, and then to dull, dark browns. Erick paused, and the new edge of his aura solidified, showing him the exact space of his new Domain.

Two blue boxes and one other color appeared.

He smiled, and sighed to the sky. His new Ability, Light Dedication, kicked in. From one moment to the next, the world became a solid brightness. Erick felt physically closer to the world, in a way similar to [Greater Lightwalk], but more as the god of his tiny domain, than as a simple ruler. With a thought, he activated [Greater Lightwalk].

He was the sand below his feet, and the air tickling the light. He was dry heat, and the bare moisture on the wind. He was the rays of the sun, and he was ready to face anything.

He wasn’t sure what it all meant, yet, but time would tell, eventually.

Erick turned to Kiri and Poi. She looked at Erick in wonder, but Poi looked on in pride. Erick cut his new aura, and his [Greater Lightwalk]. The world briefly lingered with brilliance, before normality closed in, like white hot metals cooling to something less intense, and Force flaking into dust, returning to the manasphere. As Reality became reality, as thoughts turned to solid matter, Erick sighed out with his pitiful lungs, and moved his inadequate legs, as he stared out with his pathetic eyes. He laughed. Pitiful lungs? Pathetic eyes? While true, because his new spells had shown him something he had never experienced before, Erick was perfectly happy being a normal person.

Erick said, “I don’t think I’ll be any more ready for tonight than I am already.”

Kiri faced Erick with determination in her eyes. “I hope so.”

Poi said, “You should sleep, now, if you can. Get a few more hours in before the night begins.”

“Soon enough.” Erick turned to Kiri, asking, “Can you check that stone board in Candlepoint, and go buy whatever seems prudent?”

Kiri readily said, “Of course.”

Erick added, “I know that beds are in demand, so buy a good one. Orcol-size. I’ll [Duplicate] it ten thousand times if I have to.”

Kiri perked up, saying, “Okay!”

Poi grumbled; obviously displeased with the idea of conjuring prosperity from nothing.

“Exactly,” Poi said.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

“I might be dead in ten hours, Poi.” Erick said, “I can leave behind good things for the destitute.”

– – – –

A whirlwind of tasks laid before Erick, but he was quick to do as many of them as he could.

After a short delay so that the respective parties could get ready, Erick met with Rollo and Calizi, the two Community Garden Council members that paid the most attention to the workings of the Garden. He could have met with one instead of the other, but after Ratchet and Arial’s mention that these two had taken over most of the duties of the Council, Erick knew it would be bad to meet only one.

The meeting went about as well as Erick had expected.

They politically, and then eventually, openly fought over workers and contracts. Erick mediated. When the actual bickering started, Erick demanded they get back on track. He needed space in the Garden for ‘And Dessert!’s cocoa trees.

There was no space available. So Erick bought a small corner of space in the Human District, since he was a human and could buy more land in the District, and turned it over to the Council.

The process of buying said land involved a talk with Silverite and a few short delays while everyone talked to everyone they needed to talk to, and paperwork was signed, along with money changing hands, but it happened fast enough. They had expected Erick to get personally involved in the Garden well before now, and most of the paperwork to that effect had been preapproved.

An hour later, Erick walked out of the meeting with a new portion of land along the southern edge of the district to his name, while Rollo and Calizi both got more Garden space for both of their factions, and everyone was happy. Even Silverite was somewhat happy. The Mayor of Spur did not like that more of the Human District was being eaten away, as she had managed to preserve most of that space for the last hundred years, but the Garden was important, and Silverite hoped that the new land would lessen some of the friction between the various factions of the Garden Council.

In the middle of getting land for his cocoa trees, and while he had everyone’s attention, he also managed to get Silverite to consider approaching Valok to set up some food trade with Candlepoint, if nothing else.

Silverite sighed. “I’ll consider it, Erick.”

“Thank you. That’s all I ask.”

With that task done, Erick turned his attention to the large diamonds he had been making in the side yard.

Just outside of his house, to the south, Erick stood in front of several large stone tanks of water, each easily three meters deep. Water had spilled out of the tanks, as the diamonds inside had displaced the water with their growth.

With a Handy Aura touch, Erick lifted one massive, octahedral diamond out of the tank, splashing even more water out onto the surrounding orange stone. The diamond was magnificent. Like two pyramids stuck bottom to bottom, with each triangular side a mess of triangular growth planes, the diamond was crystal clear, and perfectly grown. It was all thanks to the five Ophiel, fluttering around from one perch to the other.

Erick smiled. He had trained them well. They had kept at least one [Cleanse Aura] running at all times to ensure that the [Crystallize Diamond] they cast, worked like the spell was supposed to work, and any toxic side effects were turned to thick air, instead of into more problems.

The diamond was well made, though it was a little short. Resting it against the ground, the top of it only came up to Erick’s eyes. Glancing over the other tanks, each with their own diamond, none of them were sized as large as Erick wanted, but they would have to do.

Erick had created these same sort of diamonds for the Rozeta, Koyabez, and Phagar statues in the bottom of his light slime dungeon, but he had grown those diamonds over days, instead of just one. This would have to be good enough. Besides! Ava would get 7 of them.

With a check to the backyard, he saw that Teressa and Justine were preparing cocoa liquor exactly as they had been for hours.

Erick blipped into the library of the house alongside Poi. He sat down in his chair to ensure the diamond delivery went well—

A piece of paper sat on the small table beside his chair, while Sunny floated in the air above the paper, holding a pen in her telekinetic grasp. Upon Erick’s arrival, she fluttered away, just a fraction, but Erick watched as Kiri took hold of the little couatl, and pointed at the paper with Sunny’s tail. Erick left the paper sitting there as he read. It was not a letter, but it was a list of items currently bought, and awaiting Erick in the gazebo-portion of the Crystal of Candlepoint. Erick had laid a [Prismatic Ward] in that space, so no one could get into it save for those he already authorized, like Kiri, but upon sitting down in his chair and transferring his senses to the Ophiel on scene, Erick saw more than one person looking into the space, watching Sunny blip in item after item.

Beds. Blankets. Towels. Moonblood products. Brushes. Soaps. Lots of soaps. Shoes. Boots. Razors. Socks. Fabrics. Pots. Pans. Cooking stuff.

… Footwear could be [Fabricate]d slightly larger or smaller, as long as there were other materials on hand. Erick had already seen a few non-shadelings walking around, so more people had successfully completed the transformation from shadeling to human. One of them, and likely a lot more than just one, probably had [Fabricate]. So Erick just needed to take the shoes Kiri had bought and copy them a whole bunch.

Kiri had picked up two beds. Both mattresses were of a very well made variety; likely even better than Erick’s current bed. One was sized for an orcol, the other was sized for anyone else. Both were only sized for one person, though. No doublewides.