‘Scree! Scree!’

The sudden crying from the Great Serpent of Ronka chronometer at the corner of the table smacked Narius awake. As her senses slowly reeled back to her body, she raised her head from some blueprints of the new Amaro-model housing and wiped away a patch of drool that had gotten on the corner of her lips and the edge of the paper.

With a simple stretch to remove the feeling of exhaustion from her body, Narius stood up from her seat and turned to head for the washroom. Before she took more than a few steps, her right foot collided with something immensely heavy. The pain was brief, though the annoyance that lingered in front of Narius’ foot sat still, as if mocking her negligence. A box filled with a number of familiar red-tinted scales. It was the same one she had thrown out two years ago, and how could Narius forget the emotion they imparted her with.

The emotion was one of frustration, never knowing what the true glow that emanated from the weapons imbued by the spirit of the Demon would look like.

Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into moons, and moons turned into years, but the one piece of news she hoped that would come in regards to these Zurvanite Carapace Fragments never came.

Instead, people moved on to craft the weapons of later primals. Even Suzaku-glow and Seiryu-glow weapons started to see the light of day before Zurvan-glow weapons.

Narius reached down to sift through the contents of the box, her initial notion to make a trip to the washroom on a brief hiatus. As her hands moved through the coarse fragments, each one glowed, making her heart jump.

This was a reaction she did not remember observing in the past.

Her first thought was that the fragments were draining her aether, but she didn’t notice any signs of weakness with prolonged exposure. Narius glanced at a broadsword that leaned against the table, a second idea crossing her mind. The craftswoman grabbed a fragment before approaching the weapon. A small bit of doubt made her unsure whether or not it would work, but she figured it was worth a try.

Hilt of the blade in one hand, Narius pressed the fragment of the Demon into the flat of the blade with the other. The reaction with the red reagent made her wonder why she had not thought to try this sooner. It was as if the fragment was devouring the blade, coating it with sharp crackles of fiery red and bitter cold blue that made the blade seem dull in comparison.

Surprised, Narius could only force a few chuckles as if she had forgotten that she was a veteran crafter. It took a moment for the joy and euphoria to settle into her addled mind so that she could fully display those emotions, by immediately sprinting out of her room, the sword of fire and ice in hand.

“Linnea!! Jayden!! I finally did it!! After all these years, I made a Zurvan-glow weapon!!” Narius ran through the hallway and up the stairs two steps at a time, fueled by sheer joy.

(Prize: Gaelicap)