"What do you think, Solus?" Lith asked.

"That for a ring that required simple ingredients and a single pseudo core it took a lot of effort making it. A Skinwalker armor uses four pseudo cores at once and if they all grow up to 120% your maximum magical power, it will take 480% of your output to make just one.

"The runes we have currently available are not up to the task. Any attempt to craft a masterpiece is doomed to fail." She said.

"Hey, being a pessimist is my thing. You should be the one looking at the bright side. I mean, we wasted no purified Orichalcum and can make more rings." Lith replied.

"I'm sorry. It's just that even if you can't notice it, under my golden glow I'm green with envy." Solus was gripping her own hammer as hard as she could in frustration.

She was staring at the ring without floating around as usual. Her head was low and her shoulders slouched, making her look even smaller than she was.

"What good is having a hammer, having my body, if all I do is watch from the sidelines?" She said. "Is this really all that the future holds for me? Being your second?"

"I don't know." Lith was shocked and hurt by her suffering, but he didn't want to give her false hope or empty words. "All I can tell you is that I'll do my best to give you the life you deserve.

"I'm sorry for always being so egotistical. Saying that I got distracted by the latest load of crap is no excuse since it happened to both of us. Would you like to work on the magic holding ring? This time you lead and I follow." Lith said.

"Really?" Solus lifted her head, brimming with joy.

"Really."

"Do you promise me to not get angry, even if I waste all the purified Orichalcum we've left?"

"I promise. Compared to your happiness, it's just scrap metal." He said, hugging her.

"Thank you so much. I promise you I'll do my best to gift you a masterpiece worthy of Master Menadion." She replied while losing herself in his warmth and hoping that moment would never end.

"Don't worry about it. Worst case scenario, once I master Origin Flames, we can always recycle the metal." He said with a mocking tone.

"I hate you, damn son of a gun. You ruined this moment for me." Yet she refused to let him go.

***

Between the real vacation and the experiments on runes, Lith's birthday was coming up so fast that he would have forgotten about it if everyone else didn't keep reminding him.

Solus was ecstatic at the idea of meeting all Lith's old friends, Kamila was terrified, and his whole family was as thrilled as if he was going to become president of Mogar instead that just one year older.

Tista had finally managed to come back from her mission and she almost had a heart attack after learning about how close Rena had got to losing her children.

"I'm so sorry, big sis. I don't know how could I miss it." She repeated many times until Rena hit Tista on the head with a slipper just to make her shut up.

"It's not your fault, dimwit! Lith explained to me that lungs develop late and by then you were already gone. I can't possibly ask neither of you to give up on your life every time I get pregnant." Rena loved her sister, but being constantly reminded of the narrow escape while the pregnancy term was so close made her cranky big time.

"But it must be my fault somehow. I'm the only one in the family who ever suffered from the Strangler. Somehow I must have passed it on the baby." Tista sobbed.

"Sure. You fell ill for the fun of it and then you dived into my belly to infect my baby without me noticing. Do you even realize the amount of nonsense you are spouting?" Rena held Tista tight, cradling her little sister in her arms.

Rena had helped Elina taking care of her siblings since she could remember. She had changed their cloth diapers, fed them, and rocked them until they fell asleep when they were ill.

To her, Lith and Tista were more like her children than siblings. Sure, Lith rarely cried or fell ill even as a newborn, but it didn't make him any less precious in Rena's eyes.

Lith watched the scene, feeling moved by the bond between the two sisters.

'I could tell them that in theory, it's Mom's fault since she has passed unto us defective genes, but I think it would only make everything worse and kill Mom in the process. It's better if they think it was just bad luck.' Lith thought.

'By the way, when do you plan on telling them about you being a hybrid?' Solus asked.

'First there is my social event birthday with the Ernas, my academy Professors, and all those people that I worked hard to avoid during the rest of the year. I can't risk my family being so upset that they might be forced to cancel the event. I'll wait for my private birthday party at the Verhen household.' Lith thought.

'Are you scared?'

'Half to death. To be honest, I can't wait for Rena to deliver the babies. With my luck, I'm afraid that it will either happen during the social event or right before I start shapeshifting in front of my family.' Lith sighed.

Fate for once seemed to listen to his wishes because Rena went into labor just a few hours later, in the middle of the night. Lith of course welcomed the news by cursing at his bad luck and calling Faluel.

Elina set the heating to the maximum while preparing hot water and clean cloths for the arrival of the magical midwife.

"Excellent thinking, Elina. I could use a hot tea to shake the cold off my poor bones." Faluel wrapped herself in the cloths and added tea leaves, mint, and Hydra strong alcohol to the pot containing the water.

Winter had finally arrived in its full might, with below zero temperatures, cloudy sky, and plenty of snow. All things that Faluel hated. She gulped down the entire pot in front of the flabbergasted Elina.

"That's much better. Now, I need everyone who's not a Healer to stay out of my hair." Faluel said with a burp before moving to Rena's bed-chamber and kicking out everyone but Lith and Tista.

"Now watch and learn." She said, placing her hands on Rena's hips.

A white light engulfed the woman in labor, enhancing the elasticity of her skin and muscles. Then, the Hydra manipulated the rhythm of the contractions along with the hardness and softness of the tissues.

The babies came out one after the other in less than five minutes since Faluel's arrival. While the siblings cut the umbilical cords and cleaned the babies, the Hydra kept working on her patient.

Tista was flabbergasted noticing that whatever the Hydra had done, it had prevented the formation of stretch marks and reverted Rena's figure to that she had before becoming pregnant.

"What… How…" As far as she knew, not even Manohar could make a delivery that easy. Mostly because he would rather commit treason than work as a midwife.