Chaotic Craftsman Worships The Cube

"Mora, sweetheart? I know it smells good but you're drooling," Sonya said as she reached out to wipe his lips as the plates came out, the boy letting it happen, even as his eyes locked onto the meal.

"I haven't figured out how to stop that yet. Having a mortal body is harder than I expected."

"Ha, the secret to that bit is to just be aware of it happening and swallow before any falls out," Ben told him. "Which definitely felt weird to actually explain with words. Thinking about the finer details of all of these small things we do and trying to verbalize it comes off a lot stranger than I'd planned when I started talking."

"Then stop so we can eat," Abel said, already digging in and practically shining at the first taste as she gushed. "So good. And you know what would be great for washing it down?"

"A nice, refreshing glass of water because I'm not giving you more blood today."

"Does that mean I can get one tomorrow?"

"If you're good and work hard on the things I'm going to be assigning you."

"And if you don't talk so much with food in your mouth," Thera added, imitating her aunt by wiping the girl's face. "It's a bad habit."

"Can I talk with a different mouth then?" She asked, growing a new one along the side of her throat as she said it while continuing to shovel food into her first, leaving Thera's brow to crinkle as she watched.

"That's probably fine if you aren't going to spit any food out of it while you're talking. And Ben, aunty said it was fine so you wanna bring it up?"

"Yeah, sure. So Abel, I know I said before there's not much room here but considering I should be done helping make Foast his armour in a day or two and the deal was you help out at the shop until he's finished, you wanna crash on our couch here instead of sleeping outside? Comes with breakfast and dinner too if you're interested."

"Can I really!"

"Yeah, I mean, I know you said you enjoyed nature and all-"

"Screw nature, I'm in! Ooh, does that mean we can hang out all night?"

"Considering all of us and you need to sleep, no but we usually hang out for a bit after dinner."

"Alright, alright, I guess but you have an empty yard out back, we could all have a good fight! You all seem pretty strong, even if I'm gonna come out on top, it could be fun."

"Okay, we're not all going to fight you. If you really want a contest then there's a different option."

"Yeah?"

"Board games, card games, video games, we've got plenty of leisure activities in this house we can do without drawing any blood and a few hours to go through some. Who knows, maybe you'll find something among them that really clicks."

Despite her chosen eyelessness, Abel still managed to be quite expressive. Her mouth and eyebrows played a big part in that, warping with any feeling she went through but her eyelids themselves would move too, scrunching up in that particular moment as Sonya hovered over one of her two remaining cards, deciding for herself if she was going to take mercy on her guest before settling against it, pulling the pair she'd needed and leaving the old maid in the young girl's hands.

"And it looks like this one was my win," She said while Abel pouted, even if she tried to soften the blow by reaching out and taking the young summoned's hands in her own. "But you did very well for your first game, it was a lot of fun, wasn't it?"

"Mmh, one more time!"

"Ha, I'm alright to play again if everyone else is."

"Sure, I will," Mora said, with Thera and Ben both nodding in agreement, Abel locking on to the last one's face.

"How did you lose so badly anyway? You're a mind reader, isn't that kind of embarrassing?"

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"Mind reading would kind of defeat the purpose of playing a game," He shrugged. "Why would I want to play something without being on an equal playing field?"

"If you want an equal playing field then maybe you really should be peeking in our heads occasionally," Thera teased. "Mister eldritch mind over here has managed to lose thousands of times and won what? A few dozen after your mind got to the second tier?"

"I mean, who's counting though?"

"Considering your perfect recall and crazy brain, I'm pretty sure the exact number of wins to losses immediately popped into your head the second I asked."

"...In this household since moving in, two thousand and forty losses to seventy-two wins, with those wins being from games like low mage and chess. Why can't I win when any level of randomness is introduced I wonder? It doesn't make sense."

Seeing how Sonya was encouraging Abel after her loss, Mora reached out to Ben to try the same, taking his hand and speaking with the brutal honesty of a child.

"If you're that bad, it might be okay for you to cheat a little. Even if we notice it would feel mean not to let you have it."

"Ha, thanks kiddo but I don't actually mind losing. It's more about spending time with you guys and having fun together."

"Well, I mind losing so the second I can start understanding what all of your different smells mean I'm never going to again," Abel boldly declared. "Now come on, let's do another and-"

She cut off as both herself and Mora turned to focus on Ben as some vague change went through him, leaving himself and the other two curious as he spoke.

"Ugh, what just happened to me to get a reaction like that?"

He was instantly looking down on himself, expecting some new change in his soul brought on by child of chaos but being off the mark, with Abel answering first.

"You smell stronger. A bit tastier too."

"Didn't need that second bit but thank you, Abel."

"Your mana regeneration just grew," Mora clarified. "By a lot. Four hundred and twenty-three points."

"That much?" He jumped, pulling out his card and seeing it was true as a grin spread across his face. "Looks like payment successfully came through!"

And Myriad and Helori scored me a bit more than I'd asked for!

"Payment?" Sonya asked him, left to wonder how having his attributes grown to such an extent could possibly qualify as payment.

"Both fortunately and unfortunately, eldritch mind is proving to be profitable as hell. Hold on, let me show you," He connected to her and looked at the skills she held before directly inserting knowledge into her brain, looking proud while she was left rubbing her head from the sudden burst of comprehension. "You start practicing any of your unawakened active skills and you're gonna get levels to them which happens to be something too good for the gods to deny. I had Myriad negotiate a bit of an agreement on my behalf for my work and it looks like the other gods agreed in the end."

"It really will never cease to amaze me how casually you negotiate with the gods," Sonya said as she stood up, testing out what he'd said as she began moving her body and feeling new information on how to do it, raising her unarmed combat. "But I can see the value here in particular. Thank you, Ben."

"No worries, this is just-"

"Something you should be doing for me too!" Abel jumped in. "You were already doing it with that old perv today, weren't you? I want a turn and if you're having me work for you then you might as well make me better at it!"

…Well, she is a third tier too so even if she has a lot less, helping her level some of her more normal skills would only help things and the reason I didn't do it from the beginning with the things I was teaching her was to see how she enjoyed the learning process, might as well help her out now that she's gotten those two skills.

"Alright, sure, just no complaining about me going in your head, I have to if I'm going to do this."

"Calling you out's different from complaining."

"Okay, yeah, fair enough. In that case, don't mind the intrusion."

The slight bit of extra alienness that stemmed from her heritage was easy to handle as he looked past it, trying to add what relevant information to her mind he could while doing his best to not pay too much attention to what it was screaming out. Plain, unabashed giddiness.

For someone who seemed like such an open book when it came to their emotions, it was almost surprising how much was being hidden away in the confines of her mind. Excitement about spending the night with friends, joy about getting to spend the evening playing with other people, even if she wasn't winning and it was less violent than her preferences, and an uncomfortable amount of anticipation from him saying he'd let her have more blood the next day which he was doing his best to ignore. All of it was there at the forefront of who she was, at a level that could only contrast the rest of her life.

He didn't think she was generally lonely, nor did she herself consider her as such. She had a shockingly positive attitude that helped in both their current world and her last but from the few looks he let himself take and what he'd seen in previous peeks in the past, it didn't seem like her days were filled with others who wanted her time. She may have been able to entertain herself and she may have enjoyed the bits of company she'd get but it couldn't be more plain that she would only be happier to get more.

He didn't linger too long though, giving her what bits of information he could and letting her start testing it all out, even if a thought couldn't escape his head from it all.

Between problems she doesn't even seem to fully realize she has fitting into the world and what trauma Foast is going through, there's really no way for me to do anything meaningful for these guys in the time they've got left here.

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