Age of Gods - A VRMMO Story

Thomas arranged the leather he'd already removed from his inventory in front of himself. With that set, he dug through all of his inventory space for any other leather he might have. After searching through various boxes and crates he found one with a few pieces of leather inside of it that made him grin. How could he forget about this leather when he was wearing armor made from it? He ran his fingers over glossy black scales covering a thin leather hide. The black Elder Lizardman hides. He'd used most of it before leaving on his journey but there were still three sheets left. Just enough to make a chest piece and maybe something else useful.

He removed the Elder Lizardman hide from the box and tossed the box off to the side. No need to keep an empty box inside his inventory. He smoothed out the hide and retrieved the plans for a vest. The armor he wore now was nice and provided some defense, but compared to how strong he had gotten it was pretty much useless. The new armor would be specifically designed to enhance his stealth. That would make it far more useful to him. He set the design on the back of the hide and began to trace it out so he would know where to cut.

With the pattern drawn out on the first two pieces of hide, he pulled out one of his knives and carefully cut through the leather while trying not to damage any of the scales attached to it. It took a bit of time but preserving the integrity of the scales would be worth the effort. They added additional strength without compromising the flexibility of the leather. Giving it all the benefits of scale mail with none of the drawbacks. Once the patterns were cut out he was left with two halves of a vest. It was time to reinforce the leather armor with some Origin Steel. Just because he wasn't going to enchant it to increase his defense didn't mean it had to have a weak defense.

Transmutation was used to create relatively thick slightly curved plates of Origin Steel that were lined them up on the interior of the hide. For the front half of the armor, he made several small plates and measured them against his own pectoral and abdominal muscles to get the size and shape right so he wouldn't compromise his own flexibility. Once he aligned a plate with where it would fit against his body, he fused the edges of it to the hide. He was constantly lifting the hide to hold it against himself with one hand while the other held the metal plate against his chest or abdomen. It was awkward and slightly annoying but it allowed him to perfectly align and shape the metal plates to fit his body. A tight perfect fit with no movement would make it better for stealth operations.

Once every piece of steel was fused relative to his pectoral and abdominal muscles it was time to add the enchantment to the armor before covering the backside with leather to protect it. Thomas took a moment to get a good image of the concept he wanted for the armor. He actually used the same mental image as the previous time he made stealthy leather armor, active camouflage. With an enchanting medium made from purified mana crystals, he began the enchanting process. At this point, he was an old hand at enchanting items. Today alone he'd enchanted over thirty items. There was nothing new or interesting about the process.

Once the enchantment was completed, he grabbed some regular leather and cut it into shape so it could be placed over the backside of the armor. This would sandwich the plates and enchantment between the two layers of leather. Once it was cut to shape, he fused the pieces together. Half of the armor was now completed. All that was left was the back half of the armor. For that, he made more Origin Steel plates that would protect his back and spine. Unlike the front half of the armor, the back half could use larger plates making the sizing and adjustments a lot easier to do. Once the plates were formed they were fused to the Elder Lizardman hide. Since the second half required no enchanting, he skipped right to covering the plates with another layer of leather.

Once the layer of leather was fused to the back half of the vest, Thomas fused the two halves together at the shoulder straps and sides. The vest would be a pullover instead of having any straps and buckles. Once everything was fused together the new armor was completed.