Whatever it was that Claire said as my exhaustion took over…
Well, with my consciousness cutting off the mont my body perford an ergency shut-down, I could only try to guess.
Yet, when my consciousness finally returned, the distinctive sound coming from just nearby quickly wiped the idea of guessing from my mind as I inherently focused not on the past, but on the present.
'Is she still…' I thought as I slowly pried my eyes open, only to then start blinking them rapidly to get rid of the surprisingly painful itch on them.
It felt as if soone forced to keep my eyes open while having my face subrged in salty water before making stare right into the sun for hours upon hours only to then throw a fistful of powdered pepper in my face at the end, just for a good asure.
'Why is it so painful?' I asked myself, struggling to accept the idea that I've actually pushed my body to the point that re recovery from exhaustion could turn into such an ordeal.
It just didn't make any sense. Sure, going for two days without a mont of rest would put a strain on anyone… But it was still sothing I was perfectly capable of pulling out even before I finally managed to force my way onto the path of cultivation.
And now? As a cultivator of a sixth stage with designs on quickly reaching the seventh level of mortal cultivation?
'This amount of exertion should never co at the cost of so much fucking pain!'
Quelling the inner desire to scream out in pain, I squeezed my eyes shut and kept them closed for quite so ti, all the way to the point where the itch finally, sowhat subsided.
And throughout this entire process, only one set of repeating sounds that only alternated in their fine details accompanied .
'I can't tell how long I was out. I can't tell what's going on with . Just what did…'
Before I could finish the thought, I forced my eyes open. And just like attacking soone else in the middle of them speaking, doing the sa for myself proved to be a great way to bear with the pain that returned the instant I dared to expose my eyes to the air again.
"Haaaa…" I released a long sigh, trying to find anything to focus on other than the burning pain in my eyes. Once I've finished my sigh, I clenched my fists to the point my nails started to dig into the skin of my inner palms.
Once that no longer appeared to work, I clenched my ass instead, as if there was so brutal gay rapist on the loose, ready to challenge my sexual orientation the very mont I dared to lower my guard and relax.
In the end, it took quite a while to finally get myself accustod to the pain… Only for it to pretty much vanish the mont I've learned how to feel it… but keep it in the back of my head, along with the whole library of the things I didn't have the ti to study, investigate, or solve.
Now, however, with my eyes working once again, I leaned my head over to the side to investigate the source of the sounds I've kept hearing ever since I woke up. And just like I assud, it was Claire making all of this white noise as she patiently and carefully did her best to replicate the steps I've showcased, steps necessary to turn a bunch of half-products into a finished device.
Just like I did during the showcase, Claire first picked up the charging cable before gently pressing it into the indentation of the device's fra while using her other hand to slightly bend away the plastic lock.
Then, with even more care than before, she picked up the separate wires sticking out from the cable's end before sorting them by the color of their isolation, matching it to the single drop of the sa color at the beginning of the circuit board before carefully pushing each of the wires through the hole of the pin before wrapping the rest of the exposed wiring around it to secure the connection.
This was the mont when she also introduced the first alternation to how I did it, by actually following the proper protocol and adding one more elent - a cap made with a mix of plastic and rubber that she slid down onto the exposed wires.
In theory, this step wasn't all that necessary, given how the entire cable was now locked in place and after wrapping the wiring around the pins there simply wasn't enough for one of the exposed wires to reach the other and shortcircuit the entire system… Still, even though most of my crafting wasn't based on a solid foundation of knowledge and experience, I knew this was one good step to make and a habit to obtain.
From there on, the rest of the process followed exactly as when I did it myself, with Claire carefully inserting the circuit into the special, plastic slot made to fit the board before securing it in place with a set of four, non-conductive tal screws.
Finally, she inserted a set of four big Spricur stones into their respective slots before using the cable with syringe-like endings to connect the circuit board the very sa way she did with the charging cable before moving to the very last step and using the syringe-like ending on the other end of the cable first create an extrely narrow hole leading all the way to the very center of the crystal before pressing down on the syringe's piston and forcing the wire into the hole.
"I see you are working hard," I spoke out only once I'd confird that Claire put the finished device away before grabbing another set of half-products, ready to repeat the whole process from scratch.
"Oh, you are awake!" Claire joyfully called back, dropping the cable that she'd managed to grab before rapidly turning around and then quickly crawling on all fours to my side. "How do you feel? Tired? Is there any pain? Are you okay?" she bombarded with questions while raising her hand and bringing it up to my cheek in a caring if not affectionate gesture.
"I'm more or less okay," I gently nodded my head while enjoying the caress of Claire's hand, only to then raise my own arm and cover Claire's palm with my very own hand, holding it in place as if fearing she would soon try to remove it. "I an, my eyes did hurt like hell for a while, but it's all good now. The one thing is…"
I looked away, suddenly feeling all shaful and embarrassed when it ca for to admit I had no clue what the reason behind my pain could be.
It was my very own body, my very own flesh! And yet, no matter how hard I thought about it, this eye-pain made absolutely no damn sense!
'Well, I'm not a doctor. Who do I think I am to bla myself for not knowing sothing that people spend years upon years to learn about?' I thought, only to breathe out before raising my eyes and looking at Claire again.
"The thing is, I have no idea where this intense pain ca from. It was like having a thousand needles poke every spot on my eyeballs… or if soone threw a fistful of so super spicy, powdered paprika in my eyes?"
I shook my head to showcase just how helpless I was on this topic.
"Oh, I think I know what this is!" Claire exclaid the tense look on her face that appeared when I first ntioned my forr pain, now thawing out a bit, parts of it replaced with a sense of relief.
"Do tell."
"It's basically a growth pain," Claire smiled lightly, even though her eyes remained sowhat sad. "It's a natural sign that your body is starting to properly accept the spiritual energy. And since eyes are a bit of a special part of our biology…"
I squinted my eyes.
"What do you an, a special part?"
Claire raised her eyebrows a bit, mildly surprised by the question.
"You didn't know?" she asked, leaning her head slightly to the side. "Well, it's no more but a small bit of trivia I've heard sowhere… But apparently, our eyes are pretty much a… hmm…" A frown appeared all across Claire's forehead as she sank into her thoughts in search of the right way to translate what she ant into proper words. "Our eyes are like parasites?
The foreign entity within our body that just happens to connect to our nervous system?"
Claire shook her head before raising up from all fours to sit on her heels as she knelt down with a slightly puzzled look on her face.
"The thing I rember best is that there are cases when one's own immunity system attacks their own eyes, recognizing them as a foreign object invasive to the body?" Claire muttered with just the sa amount of confidence in her own words as she had in what she said before. She then shook her head, as if to put this whole topic aside.
"Either way, it's pretty standard for those pains, in those who actually get them, to start with eyes. If those really were the growth pains, then you will have to endure the pain in your head next, then your heart, your lungs, your stomach, and finally your…"
As Claire's eyes moved further and further down as she ran down the list, her gaze only stopped when it fell upon my crotch.
"Well, what I actually ant to say…" she muttered with a bashful blush on her cheeks, "is that once those pains move from your lungs to your stomach, I want you to tell right away so that I can try my best to help you soothe those pains…" she whispered while reaching out and placing her hand down over the center of my pants while bashfully looking away, making it seem as if just saying those words, despite how many tis we went at it already, still was enough to make her all shy and embarrassed.
"Dully noted. I will be sure to report whenever I go through any of the paints you ntioned," I said with a small, slightly amused smile… Only for my face to sink as I looked over Claire's shoulder only to see quite the impressive number of devices she finished while I was asleep.
Claire did a great job for sure, diligently working while I was getting so of my much needed rest. Yet, for all the great work that she did… she rely just scratched the surface of how massive this project actually was.
"Changing the topic, how many did you finish?" I asked, hoping to turn our attention elsewhere before Claire's request turned into a match that would star the fire in our loins and lead us to wasting even more of the already precious little ti we had.
"About… Eighteen?" Claire took only a mont to count the number of devices she finished. "I didn't test any of them, though, so that's a step we will still have to go through."
I nodded my head to indicate I'd heard her before tapping my knees and then standing up, only to reach out and help Claire do the sa.
"Then, we shall get to working, shouldn't we?" I suggested as I threw a mournful glance towards the hundreds of circuit boards, thousands of cables, tens of thousands of the spricur stone Chihiro procured… and roughly about two hundred plastic cases where all the elents were to be rooted to turn into a bunch of half-product into a finished device.
"And as we work… Would you mind telling more about that spiritual world?"
Claire raised her eyebrows a bit… while already moving to bring the boxes with the parts a bit closer, so that we could both have them within our reach. -mp _y,r.
"Where did that co from?" she asked while raising one of her eyebrows only to plop down onto her knees right by my side as she planted the plastic case onto her lap before reaching to grab the cable.
"I just thought that since we are going to likely spend the night trying to complete the rest of those," I panned my hand over the boxes to indicate what I've ant, "it wouldn't hurt for to know why is it that your father is so desperate to break through his bottleneck in ti… Or why is your mother refusing to give up on that world and return back to be a part of your family again."
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