It is a slow process since I have to try and figure out one letter at a time, especially since this language doesn't resemble any other language I have learned. After I have been studying the book for a few hours Kechara wakes up and indicates she is hungry so I start cooking. Once she has eaten I again ask her to feed me mana so that I can push it into the armor.

When the armor has a decent amount of mana inside it I tell her to stop and rest while I put as much sacred power as I can into it. Once the armor won't hold anymore I start trying to use the mana and sacred power to enchant the armor. The mana and sacred power slowly bond to the armor under the pressure of my willpower and I am eventually able to enchant my armor to repair itself.

*DING*

Congratulations! Skill Enchanting has progressed to level 6!

Enchanting

Level 6

Int +12 Wis +6 Cha +6

'I can enchant again! It is a lot harder and I need someone else to provide the mana but at least I can do it!'

It turns out I am limited to a single enchant using this method, so while my armor now repairs itself it doesn't do anything else. I was hoping to be able to add to its defense and maybe add a nifty ability but I will have to be satisfied with this. At least now I won't have to take it back to Walter every single time it gets damaged.

This method is alright, but if I have Walter make me anything else I should probably just pay an enchanter to do the work. Then again if my equipment becomes too good I may come to rely on it too much, I would rather avoid that. A lot of stories from my old world had characters who relied on their gear and then when they lost it they were worthless.

Thanks to my mind blade I can still fight fairly well even if I have nothing but my hands. That is how it should be in my opinion, gear should be useful but not required. Rather than spending a lot of time trying to improve my gear I would much rather spend the time improving myself.

Since I used almost all my sacred power on my armor I won't even be able to work on my core today. That and it has left poor Kechara exhausted, I won't be asking her to do this again. This method of enchanting just isn't worth the cost right now, so for now I am going to stop and only use it again if I absolutely have to.

Moving the tired Kechara to my lap I sit petting her while I work on the figuring out the language. I spend the rest of the day like that, and it makes me a little sad to see how long it takes Kechara to recover her energy. After dinner I decide the best thing is to make it an early night, hopefully a good night's sleep will allow Kechara to recover fully.

When I wake up in the morning Kechara is still sound asleep, she doesn't even wake up when I climb out of the hammock. After tucking it around her to keep her warm I do some stretches and then sit down to meditate. First I practice my mindscape a few times and then I burn through my sacred power working on my core.

Core Upgrade Progress: 64%

Since I don't plan to go exploring again I don't need to reserve any power, even then I only gained six percent. If I devote every bit of energy I have then I should be able to rank up in a couple more days. Once I am done working on my core I build a fire and start preparing breakfast.

The smell of food wakes Kechara up, and I am relieved to see her jump out of the hammock and run over to the fire to see what's cooking. Looks like the mana loss didn't do any lasting damage which is a good thing, I would have felt horrible if it had. Normally I wouldn't be worried but because she is so young I don't know if simple things might do lasting damage.

Once I feed her, Kechara seems to be completely back to normal so we spend the morning playing. When she takes a nap after lunch I spend the time working on the language in the book. I am starting to figure out a few of the letters and how the language is structured.

*DING*

Congratulations! Skill Linguistics has progressed to level 8!

Linguistics

Level 8

Int +16

You are adept at deciphering other languages.

When the skill goes up, decoding the runes that make up the language gets just a little easier. Still, it is going to take days just to figure out the basic alphabet, I won't be able to start reading until then. Several times I have to correct my mistakes, a lot of figuring out a new language is guesswork.

When Kechara wakes up she spends quite a bit of time trying to scratch her back. When I call her over and take a look I see that the bumps on her back are growing into wings. Since it is obviously bothering her I spend a while scratching her back for her.

As I am scratching her I realize she has gotten bigger again, she now no longer fits in my lap. Once she is satisfied with the scratching she wants to play again, so I start play fighting with her. She is now about three quarters of the size her mother was when I fought her, so it is time to start teaching her to fight.

She seems to understand what I am doing and takes the play fighting fairly seriously. It ends up being a good thing I managed to enchant my armor, Kechara's claws are really sharp. Of course I am not moving at my full speed, I slow myself down to about half so that she can have a chance to learn.

As her combat abilities develop I will slowly increase my speed to keep challenging her. She makes a happy sound every time she manages to hit me, and when she manages to dodge my attack I make sure to encourage her. I end the training when I notice her getting tired, her body is still developing so it isn't a good idea to push her too hard just yet.

When I sit down she curls up next to me with her head in my lap and rests while I go back to studying. An hour later I tell her to let me up so I can cook dinner, she moves instantly. All the exercise seems to have given her quite the appetite, so when I start cooking I make sure to make more than I usually do.

As I am cooking Kechara suddenly sneezes and a small bolt of lightning hits the floor. She freaks out a bit so I quickly calm her down and try to explain what just happened. Looks like I need to figure out how to teach her to use her breath weapon, I am just glad I am immune to lightning.