Extra Story: A Father and Daughter’s Magical Tool Invention Diaries—Waterproof Cloth

“Dahlia... Wait, you asleep?”

Carlo’s daughter often chided him for nodding off in the workshop. Today, however, that same daughter sat slumped over the workbench, dead to the world. There was a large white cloth spread out over the bench alongside a collection of bottles filled with blue and green powder—the powdered remains of blue and green slimes. Noticing one of the bottles was open, Carlo grew concerned that Dahlia might breathe the stuff in, and quietly closed the lid.

For the last few weeks, Dahlia had been working tirelessly in an attempt to make a kind of water-repellent fabric, using slimes as her enchanting material. However, the project didn’t appear to be progressing well. Likely due to their relatively weak magical power, slimes were seldom used for enchanting. Dahlia had had little success finding reference materials on them in either the college library or the city’s bookshops.

She’d been met with odd looks when she went to order slimes from the Adventurers’ Guild. The first batch that had arrived had been muddy, far from fresh, and smelly. They were also lacking in variety and few in number. That was only the beginning of her troubles. One of the blue slimes, only half-killed, escaped from its bottle. Birds carried off the green slimes drying on the roof. Others rotted in a persistent spell of rain. Barely a day had gone by without something going wrong.

It was a hazardous endeavor as well. When Dahlia had developed a persistent cough while powdering some slimes, Carlo had insisted that she drink a potion. As far as he could tell, she’d burned her throat by breathing in some red slime. Her vocal cords could have been in danger. Dahlia, however, wasn’t pleased. It was a waste, she said, to use an expensive potion over something so minor. When a black slime resurrected itself one day and began to creep menacingly toward them, Carlo managed to hold on to his fatherly dignity and exterminate the creature with apparent ease. In truth, however, the sight had chilled him to the bone.

But even in the face of all these setbacks, his daughter persisted with her research and experiments. The idea of leaving her project unrealized seemed unthinkable. When it came to dealing with other people, Dahlia could be somewhat shy and reserved at times, but as a craftswoman, she displayed extraordinary innovation and always welcomed a challenge. To put it another way, she could be recklessly, dangerously adventurous. Of course, Carlo knew better than anyone where she got that from. He was in no position to criticize. What was a father to do?

“Dahlia. Dahlia...” Carlo called softly, giving his daughter’s shoulder a gentle shake, but to no avail. She was obviously sleeping more deeply than he’d thought.

Until ten or so years ago, Carlo would often carry his sleeping daughter up to bed and tuck her in. But as the gray hairs had crept in, the strength and will to carry his now-college-aged daughter had slipped away from him.

Thankfully, the nights were warm at this time of year. He gave up trying to wake her and draped his coat over her shoulders. At that moment, he felt a twinge in his right wrist. He’d been working too hard lately; his arthritis was flaring up. The heart palpitations had been coming on a little more frequently too. He had age and excessive drinking to thank for that, no doubt.

Once, he’d been able to wrap his little Dahlia up completely in a jacket of this size. How she’d grown.

She had begun her magical toolmaking studies at age five. She’d loved to play with magic crystals and read her illustrated crystal guide. Before long, she was attempting to craft her first tools—with a little help from her father, she even achieved some successes.

While she was in elementary school, the maid had begun teaching her to cook. In the early days, her style had been...individual, to say the least. Carlo always praised her and ate up whatever she produced, though he found himself losing weight for a while. Her skills rapidly progressed, and now Carlo eagerly anticipated each and every meal.

When she’d turned sixteen, this kingdom’s age of majority, Dahlia had tried her first glass of wine. Carlo could still remember what a grimace she’d made upon that first sip. He’d thought that perhaps, unlike him, she might not take to liquor, but these days they often shared a drink or two over dinner. She seemed to enjoy it a great deal too.

How many more years would they have together in this tower? Surely not as many as he might like. Carlo loved living with Dahlia, but recently, he’d begun to worry that his existence might be robbing her of the encounters a young woman ought to be having. He could scarcely imagine any man wanting to come live in a tower with his bride and father-in-law. No, when the time came for Dahlia to be married, he would have to let her go. Considering her age, he couldn’t put off thinking about this much longer.

However, Dahlia had never shown any particular interest in romance. In all their conversations, she’d never made a single mention of the subject. For a time, he’d thought that perhaps she simply kept those feelings private from him, but a visit from Irma—her childhood friend—the other day had dispelled that thought. “Slimes, slimes, slimes, every single day! Are you going to marry a slime, Dahlia?!” Irma had cried in exasperation. His daughter’s total lack of appetite for love remained a mystery.

Carlo put on a pair of reading glasses and sat down beside Dahlia to look over an order form. On one end of the workbench, he noticed a little blue slime powder that had been spilled. As he gazed at it, an idea occurred to him, and he brought down several bottles of the liquid chemicals they used for crafting their tools. So far, Dahlia had been using only one type of liquid to mix with the slime powders, but as far as Carlo could surmise, combining two or more would be much more likely to produce the effect she was striving for. However, he knew that if he did it himself, he’d be getting in the way of her research.

Suppressing his urge to experiment, Carlo selected four liquids that were likely to combine usefully and placed them in a row upon the workbench. He made doubly sure that they were far enough out of Dahlia’s reach that she wouldn’t accidentally knock one over when she awoke. He still worried about these little things. She’d long since grown into a young woman, but he was as doting and overprotective of her as he was when she was five years old.

As Carlo looked at one of the bottles of blue slime on the workbench, a memory surfaced. He recalled the first time Dahlia had come to him and begged to be carried. He had bent down and lifted his darling little girl up toward the clear blue sky above. She was so small and so light, yet her smile shone with all the radiance of the sun. Carlo knew then that he would do anything—he would become the most pious saint or the blackest villain—as long as he could protect that smile. It was as simple as that.

Whenever Dahlia stumbled and fell, he could never keep himself from rushing to her side.

“Mr. Carlo, you mustn’t coddle her so! Children must learn to stand up on their own!” the maid always scolded him sourly.

It became such a regular occurrence that eventually, after taking a tumble one day, Dahlia told him, “No, Father! You’ll get in trouble!” and got up by herself. He felt like a pitiful excuse for a father.

He may have been a half-decent toolmaker, he’d thought, but as a father, he was third-rate or worse. While he could teach her his craft and help her with her school studies, there was almost nothing he could tell her about being a woman and making her way in the world. And so, in the hope that others might do so in his place, Carlo began secretly asking favors of his friends and acquaintances. He called them debts to be repaid, but in truth, they were pleas. In return for some small kindness, he asked people to look out for his daughter once he was gone—to lend her their aid should she ever need help.

Most of them laughed. They’d probably never met a man who doted on his daughter the way Carlo did. He expected most of his pleas would go unanswered, but that was all right. If Dahlia found out about them one day, would she be thankful? Or would she just laugh too? Of course, ideally, she would never need to know a thing about what he’d done.

Someday soon, once Dahlia had found someone she could happily spend her life with, Carlo could pass all his knowledge and skills on to his apprentice and at last rest easy, without regrets... His train of thought petered out there, and he smiled wryly. Not a chance.

No matter how many years went by, his attachment to Dahlia would never wane. He would forever be fretting about his precious daughter. Once she married, he’d start longing for grandchildren. Once they were born, he’d fret over them too. If his ex-wife—Dahlia’s mother—were still by his side, could he have watched his daughter fly the nest with a smile and not spend the rest of his days fretting about her? He very much doubted it.

“Live a life unshackled by regret”—so went a teaching from the gods. But what kind of life would you have to lead to achieve that? “Live righteously,” the temple priests regularly proclaimed. “Live with love for your brothers and sisters. Live without regrets.” Was it his age that made those words sting his ears? Or was it the thoughts of those he’d been unable to protect?

Carlo had been an incorrigible child. He was always up to some sort of mischief, and he vexed his parents terribly. As a student, he’d loved to amuse himself with experiments and frequently caused trouble for his friends and teachers. When his mother and father died of illness in quick succession, he was inconsolable, filled with regret at not having been a better son to them.

At times, his path to becoming a magical toolmaker had felt like running into one brick wall after another, leaving him helpless but to grit his teeth against the pain of failure. After a fiery whirlwind romance, he was soon married only for his wife to desert him, leaving his daughter Dahlia bereft of a mother.

He often thought about what he could have done differently at one time or another. His was a life littered with regrets. These last few years, he’d found himself at the funerals of friends and acquaintances increasingly often. He guessed that his own turn wasn’t far off.

Perhaps before his time came, he ought to find someone who could protect his daughter once he was gone, he’d thought. It had been suggested to him a few times that Dahlia could be presented for marriage interviews as the daughter of a baron, but he couldn’t see the formality of noble life suiting her in the slightest. Dahlia had genuine talent as a magical toolmaker. However, her extraordinary inventiveness and headlong approach to experimentation could easily put her in danger. She would benefit from someone with a cool head who would rein her in when necessary.

As Carlo pushed up his reading glasses, his eye was caught by a glint of light. It was reflecting off a silver sheet that sat propped against one wall of the workshop. Its surface had been very evenly enchanted with a hardening spell—an impressive feat for a first-timer.

It was the work of Tobias, his apprentice and the son of a good friend. Despite there being no history of mages or magical toolmaking in Tobias’s family, he’d worked long and hard to enter college and pursue his dream of becoming a toolmaker. This young man was diligent, level-headed, and, much like Dahlia, he appeared to be a stranger to romance. Though he kept it well hidden, he too was always looking out for Dahlia, his junior apprentice. It comforted Carlo to see him care for her like an elder brother. He hoped that they would go on supporting each other as fellow apprentices for many years to come.

Carlo’s friend—Tobias’s father—had recently floated the idea of his son marrying Dahlia. It wouldn’t be a bad arrangement for either of them. But try as he might, Carlo simply couldn’t picture Tobias and Dahlia as a happily married couple. Thus, he’d been holding off on giving his friend an answer.

Frankly, he didn’t care if he was called overprotective or arrogant. If he could have his way, he’d see her wed to someone he knew would protect her no matter what and who would carve her a peaceful path through life that spared her every unhappiness. He didn’t want her to marry a man like himself, who’d been unable to take care of even his own wife. He hoped she would find a man who would protect her until the end of her days. He wanted that man to be like the waterproof cloth Dahlia would one day finish, wrapping around her to shield her from every cold drop of rain and gust of wind. He wanted a man who would stand between her and any danger, not letting a single hair on her head come to harm. It didn’t matter where this man came from or what position he held in society. It didn’t matter if the life he and Dahlia led was ordinary and uneventful. All Carlo wanted was for Dahlia to be blessed with happiness for as long as she lived. That was all he could ask for as her father—a simple yet grandiose wish. Naturally, he had no way of knowing whether it would be granted.

“Are you awake, Dahlia? No, still sleeping...”

She’d shifted her posture a little as she slept; that was all. The coat he’d laid over her slipped off onto the floor. She must have been having a good dream; there was a smile upon her lips. It looked so childlike, somehow. Carlo picked up his coat and laid it over her once again, smiling ruefully at himself.

She couldn’t forever stay that little girl he’d held in his arms. “No, Father!” she used to say. “You’ll get in trouble!” How would she scold him for his pampering now, he wondered. Having grown up as remarkably strong as she had, she might just laugh and tell him, “You don’t need to worry about me anymore.”

If, one day, she strayed from the quiet path he’d carved for her onto one of her own choosing, that was fine. If she was determined to go her own way as a craftswoman—as her own person—then far be it from him to discourage her. Even if that road were steep and entangled with thorns, he would congratulate her for braving it. After that, all that was left for him was to pray for her—pray that whatever road she took, it would lead her to happiness.