With the Mimic Tear at his side, Arthur quickly took down the Glintstone Dragon, Adula.
The dragon even dropped a sorcery scroll.
It contained a spell called "Adula's Moonblade."
The effect: conjure a moonlight sword to slash enemies.
Arthur immediately fell in love with this magic.
The pure-white moonlight sword looked stunning. When swung, it left streaks of white afterimages and scattering motes of moonlight.
Of course, what really made him reluctant to part with it was the sword's sheer size—its starting length was already four to five meters.
And the blade could be further extended in length and width by feeding it more mana.
Question: What do you do when facing a towering monster over ten meters tall?
Answer: Whip out a forty-meter greatsword and serve them properly.
Arthur was looking forward to the next time he stood before one of those hulking beasts—he could already imagine the priceless expressions on their faces when he drew out this moonlight sword.
After testing the new spell, Arthur moved toward the church building ahead.
The Moonlight Altar was perpetually bathed in silver glow.
Even the radiance of the Erdtree was dimmed, concealed by the full moon in the heavens.
Streams of pale moonlight cascaded down from the sky, washing across the land.
Arthur's anxious eagerness to see Ranni slowly subsided under the moonlight's serenity.
Definitely not because of this Manus-something shard in his hands—
He'd just been too giddy from picking up loot and almost forgot the real business.
These starlight shards had two uses. The first was trading them with Seluvis for puppets.
Seluvis offered two choices:
The puppet of the finger sorceress Seluvis' apprentice, Seloline.
The puppet of the pot warrior.
The second use was direct consumption—restoring FP, that is, mana.
But the recovery speed was painfully slow.
Neither use mattered much to Arthur.
For one, he despised Seluvis and would get rid of that guy sooner or later. So naturally he had no intention of trading him anything. Whatever Seluvis owned, Arthur could just loot from his corpse.
As for mana recovery? Even less useful.
With his physique, Arthur's mana regeneration was absurdly fast. He didn't even bother chugging Cerulean Flasks most of the time.
Still—he couldn't resist the shards' glittering beauty.
He felt that in his past life—no, in the life before that—he must've been a dragon. His weakness for shiny treasures was far too strong.
Meanwhile, deep in the underground cavern, Ranni: If you don't come down soon, I'm leaving!
After sweeping up the shards around the church, Arthur jumped down into the cavern.
At its depths, an unfamiliar Two Fingers came into view.
Four or five stories tall, its body was ashen-gray, lifeless.
Between the two digits gaped a raw, crimson wound.
The cut was semicircular, with countless jagged fissures radiating outward—like a scarlet centipede crawling between them.
Blood streamed continuously from the wound, spreading until it pooled at Arthur's feet.
He had seen this sigil before—when he obtained the Cursemark of Death from Ranni.
Arthur knew: this Two Finger was already dead.
And the one who slew it sat before him—Ranni.
She was seated calmly upon the corpse, her snow-witch garb gone.
This was the first time Arthur saw her full doll-body.
Slender limbs with visible joints, bound by strings linking her frame together.
Without the voluminous witch's robe, her figure looked delicate, almost cute.
Yet the smear of the Two Fingers' blood upon her added a trace of cold allure.
She sat slumped with weary grace, as though the battle had drained every ounce of strength.
Even as Arthur arrived, she spoke no word.
"Putting on quite the act."
Arthur stepped closer, studying her face intently.
He knew full well she was unharmed.
After all, the Two Fingers were merely envoys of the Greater Will.
If they had real power, the Greater Will wouldn't have needed Marika to act as its vessel, walking the Lands Between.
These so-called fingers merely enjoyed some peculiar traits—hard to truly kill, wielding a few strange abilities.
But in Ranni's hand, armed with the Finger-Slaying Blade, they were cut down one by one.
Her feigned weakness was nothing more than a test for him.
She wanted to know: when she presented herself utterly defenseless, what would he do?
Would he slip the Dark Moon Ring upon her finger? Or would he raise his staff without hesitation?
Arthur did neither.
Instead, he stepped forward, gathered her into his arms, and whispered by her ear:
"My princess, you've worked hard. Now, rest well. When you wake, I'll bring you the surprise I promised."
He sealed the words with a gentle kiss on her forehead, then stored her inside his system space.
The system space lacked oxygen, unfit for living beings.
But Ranni was a soul dwelling within a doll—she needed no breath.
And since she offered no resistance, it was easy to put her away.
Having done so, Arthur logged out of the game and returned to reality.
He entered the Zen Garden.
"System, manifest Ranni for me."
[Manifestation count deducted. Manifestation successful.]
The doll body appeared before him again—this time in the real world.
Her eyes were shut tight, clearly in deep slumber.
Arthur placed the doll-body into little Ranni's incubation chamber.
He was puzzling over how to extract the soul from the doll when the solution came on its own.
The moment doll-Ranni touched little Ranni's body, her true body emitted a pull—an instinctive suction, drawing the soul back into itself.
Ranni's soul sensed the familiar resonance and cooperated without resistance.
"…That's it? Success already?"
Arthur had expected a troublesome ritual. Instead, the process was smooth as flowing water.
The fusion of soul and body would still take time.
While waiting, Arthur manifested his equipment inventory.
Dozens of outfits spilled forth at once—each one elaborate enough to double as cosplay costumes at a convention.
He picked out the snow-witch set and dressed Ranni in it.
Back when her body had been soaking in potions, clothing hadn't even crossed his mind.
Now, worried she might feel embarrassed upon waking, he thought it best she be properly dressed.
System-manifested clothing was quite considerate—it automatically resized to fit the wearer's form.
So the young Ranni now wore a scaled-down snow-witch outfit, faithfully restoring her original look.
But unlike the doll's bluish complexion, her true skin gleamed pale and flawless.
While Ranni's body reformed, Arthur kept himself busy.
Using the technique of crafting Albinaurics, he restored her hair to its dark-blue hue.
Yes—permanent dye.
He was simply more used to seeing Ranni with blue hair.
By blood, as Radagon's daughter, she had inherited his red locks.
Yet when she forged her doll, she chose her favorite blue.
She'd once claimed the doll was modeled after her mentor, the witch Renna.
But Arthur could see it—her features resembled Renna only slightly.
Enough to suspect that Ranni had, in truth, sculpted the doll in her own image.
Comparing little Ranni with the doll only strengthened his conviction.
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