Lenna took Isaac home, he was not completely in the real world mentally so it was for the best. Isaac took Lenna home, she was still not up for spending the whole day out of bed. They both needed to be home and away from the rest of the world for the next little while. Over the course of the following few days, more things were checked off of Isaac's list. They took it slow, between meditation sessions, teaching Shamesh martial combat, and time playing in the orchestra hall. By the end of the week, Lenna was able to play for an entire song without having to rest. In addition to that progress, Isaac's shadow-wolf cloak was finished, as was Lenna's black steel sword.

Isaac sent his new cloak to receive a few enchantments via courier. It was to receive Warming, Cooling, Self Repair, Tear Resistance, and Self Cleaning enchantments. In all, it would cost him sixty thousand gold in total because he wanted the enchantments to be done in platinum so it would never need to be replaced and would lack any color to preserve his ascetic. The cloak would be able to last at least two hundred years unless he tried to contain an explosion with it or something equally as unreasonable for a cloak to survive.

Lenna's sword was something to behold. When Isaac had ordered the sword, he had expected just a steel sword that had been treated to look black from the outside. What he was not expecting was a sword made out of an alloy of steel that was charcoal grey the entire way through. Isaac had no idea that it was even possible to do something like that but Stan had made it without asking any questions. He did send Isaac a bill for twenty two thousand gold though. Apparently the 'shadow sand' that had been a part of the steel alloy was only good for turning metals black so it was expensive by being rare and not by being important.

Shadow sand was something that was found after rituals related to the Queen of Shadows. It was commonly understood that it was literally bits of what served as the 'ground' on the plane of perpetual darkness. When Isaac thought about it, he started to wonder what planting plants in shadow sand soil would be like. That inquiry led to him learning that it prevented plants from growing entirely and that some extremely rich people used it to keep certain paths from being overgrown.

When shadow sand was used in steel alloys, it seemed to act much like coal but had the unique ability to dye the metal nearly black. The black steel sword that Stan had made for Lenna was equivalent to a high carbon content steel, making up around one percent of the total product. This meant that her sword would be very strong and solid until it wasn't. The sword would hardly wear and it would cleave through things that most swords would struggle with. The downsides were that it was more prone to shattering when it did slam up against something that it couldn't plow through and it was harder to repair. Most swords tended to be made of softer steel with repairing the weapon in mind but Stan had assumed that Isaac had done his research when he made a request for a 'Black Steel' sword.

Isaac's ignorance had somehow turned out to be a boon. The sword that had been commissioned for Lenna would be able to have its enchantment plan altered to fit its new properties. Two levels of sharpness would be enough to have an edge that would be able to cut through unenchanted swords. Four levels of hardening would be the same as six on a standard sword. That left fifteen available levels for whatever Isaac or Lenna's little hearts desired. Now, normally Isaac would have just said to put fifteen dawn capacitors on it so Lenna could one-shot a mountain. Isaac caught himself this time, however, and realized that the sword would still need six levels of hardening or else his lovely wife would find a way to break it. Lenna's entire fighting style revolved around her ability to bring power to bear in short bursts of extreme violence and her sword would need to be able to handle that. With that in mind, the pair settled on three levels of sharpness enhancements, six levels of hardening enhancements, and twelve dawn capacitors. Now they just needed to wait until the artificer from the Heidenburgs showed up.

Speaking of the artificer, he was to arrive the day after Sera was supposed to come over for tea. His arrival had the high potential to prevent the duo from joining Sera at her home for tea on the tenth of the month, which was their old tea date day. That was a bit disappointing for all three of those involved but it could not be helped. The artificer was going to be traveling across the country in order to meet them so it was only proper that the duo show him decent hospitality.

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Lenna still ached thoroughly, and she was nearly out of the medicine from Jina, but she was more than capable of going through an entire day without a nap. Before, the pain induced exhaustion would lead to a post breakfast nap and another one right after dinner if not an early night entirely. Now she could survive an entire day which was very comforting to everyone around her. A slow recovery was exhausting for everyone but a fast one brought hope and high spirits.

Isaac had almost entirely recovered and was more or less back to normal from his resurrection. He knew that he was close but how close was something that he could only test by actually pushing himself to his limits. He wanted to do so but just flexing his throughput was not the same as truly pushing himself. He needed to fight something, to bring his power to bear in as intense and sustained a manner as he was capable of. At that point, he would be able to tell exactly how close he was to being one hundred percent back. That was the state of the duo when Sera arrived for noontime tea.

No sooner had Margaret opened the door to reveal Isaac and Lenna had Sera practically thrown herself at the duo. Sera pulled them both into a long and tight hug. She didn't have to say anything. Her feelings were expressed plenty well through the tight embrace. She had missed the duo, yes, but not overly much considering her other friends that she hadn't seen for an even longer stretch of time. She was glad to see them more or less in one piece and safely returned to their home and her city. She was sad that their honeymoon was cut short. But more than all of that, she was there for them if they needed her. She knew what it was like to lose those close to her and she was available and waiting for if or when they would need her.

"Thank you, Sera." Isaac told her and patted her on the back to let her know that the hug had gone on for long enough.

"We missed you." Lenna told the younger woman and pulled back slightly.

Sera released the duo but kept a hand on each of their exterior shoulders. She looked back and forth between them. "I would have come over sooner but Isaac's letter made it seem like it would be best if I waited." She began. "Please, tell me everything."

Isaac, Lenna, and Sera all found themselves on the roof overlooking the city. They sat around a small tea table as Margaret and Marie waited off to the side. The two ducal guards that Sera had been forced to bring along were waiting at the entrance to the manor and Martha had brought them both cups of water while they waited. Together they drank tea, ate pastries, and talked about everything that had happened during their time apart.

Apparently, there had been a crime surge a little while after Isaac and Lenna had left. It seemed as though many of the local criminals were on their best behavior, out of fear of Isaac and Lenna, but once they were sure that the duo were gone, that had stopped. It hadn't been too much for the rest of the local adventurers and guards to handle but it had brought new piles of work to Izen and Sera's desks. Phantom had helped a bit here and there but he had other work that required his primary attention. No one of ill repute had dared to come within even two blocks of Isaac and Lenna's manor, if not for fear of the duo, or fear of the Phantom who everyone knew worked with Isaac, then for fear of the drow witch who had actually turned someone into a frog for being a general nuisance in her immediate vicinity. Alexander had been forced to turn the person back so it wouldn't become an abuse of power situation. Everything else that had been happening, the duo were already apprised of.

Isaac and Lenna had barely managed to get through an abridged version of everything that had happened to them before it was time for Sera to leave. They would have gotten done more than an hour earlier but Sera asked so many questions that it had drug on. In all, it was a pleasant tea time that reminded the duo of how things used to be before they left. It was nice to have that semblance of normalcy after everything that had happened and it helped ground the duo, not that Lenna really needed it. Sera had ensured, before she left, that the duo would join her for tea the following month on their usual day. It was but another tether of normalcy for the duo.

Even with all of the progress going on, both in recovery and progression through his checklist, Isaac was on the verge of starting to go stir crazy. It would be a little while yet before it would start to get bad but the signs were starting to show. He had started pacing while reading and the amount of time it took for him to enter mediation had started to increase. After Sera left, Isaac still had three conversations that he was expecting in his near future. The first was to ask Shamesh if he wanted to protect caravans going between Safeharbor and Ben's End. The second was to see if Edward would be fine with that and if he could facilitate it. The third was the negotiations and payment for Lenna's new sword. But those were for the rest of the week. Now, it was time for one last workout before dinner.

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