Searching for Repair Materials
It was still not fully dark, so the shops probably weren’t all closed yet.
The street stretching from the academy’s main gate was lined with stores targeting students—weapon shops, magic tool stores, catalyst vendors, potion sellers, simple eateries, and bookstores. The atmosphere felt completely different from the shopping district near the royal palace. If that area maintained formal dignity for wealthy nobles and officials, this one was far more chaotic. Discount signs dangled in front of every storefront, and crates of secondhand gear that students had used and discarded sat stacked in piles.
What I needed was likely hiding somewhere in a place like this. Not expensive, flawless materials, but something decent and ordinary. Yoo Hamin didn’t require a hero’s weapon just yet. For now, a glove that could protect one wrist would be enough.
But which shop should I walk into?
Back when I served in the royal court, I never would have faced this dilemma. I could simply jot down the materials I wanted and hand over the list. Someone would have delivered them without question. But those days were gone. I had retired and only just opened my own shop. While I had money, I wasn’t about to waste premium materials meant for royal commissions on my very first customer’s glove.
A secondhand junk shop wouldn’t be the worst choice.
Surprisingly useful items sometimes turned up in places like that. It had been the same on Earth—discarded buttons or fabric scraps that proved essential at just the right moment. Still, this was for my first customer. Digging through a pile of trash right from the start felt a little too uncertain.
In the end, I turned my attention toward the magic tool shop that handled catalysts and magic stones. They would probably try to push expensive, high-powered materials on me, but if I wanted circuit thread, that was the fastest place to look. If they didn’t have anything suitable, I could always head to the secondhand shop afterward.
I let out a small sigh and started walking toward the magic tool store. Choosing a shop had somehow become an entire ordeal just to fix one glove for my first customer.
Is this the biggest magic tool shop in the area?
“Welcome,” the owner greeted me.
The moment he saw my clothes, his eyes shifted. Seo Yirin’s body drew attention in every way—the floor-length light purple hair, the luxurious coat I’d worn at the palace, and above all, the fact that any merchant who judged customers by wealth would find it hard to believe I had empty pockets.
“What are you looking for? If it’s circuit thread for combat gear, we just received some white silver thread. It’s a rare item even in the capital.”
The owner promptly opened the back of a glass display case. A spool of thread with a pale metallic sheen rested inside. It was clearly high quality. The magic conductivity appeared excellent, and the strands looked perfectly even. It would work wonderfully for luxury magic robes or knight-order battle uniforms.
But not for Yoo Hamin’s glove.
“It’s too fast.”
“Pardon?”
“The reaction is too quick. I’m looking for ordinary materials.”
The shop owner’s face went blank for a moment. I examined a few other threads as well. Some of the excellent materials from the original story were here—blue scale thread with its faint azure tint, and red flame thread optimized for fire magic circuits. All of them were fine products.
And none of them were right.
Good materials didn’t automatically create good clothes. An outfit made from the most expensive fabric could still ruin its wearer if it didn’t fit the body. Magic materials worked the same way. Strong circuits didn’t necessarily produce good equipment—especially not for a student like Yoo Hamin, whose body hadn’t finished developing. Equipment should never drag the body behind it. I’d always believed that.
“Don’t you have anything a little duller?”
“Duller… materials, you say?”
The owner looked genuinely confused, and I couldn’t blame him. Customers at a magic tool shop usually wanted faster, stronger, clearer reactions.
“Well… we don’t carry anything like that among our premium stock.”
“It doesn’t have to be premium.”
His gaze cooled noticeably. He must have decided this sale wouldn’t be worth much. Looking somewhat annoyed, he pointed toward a wooden box tucked in the corner of the shop.
“Those are items scheduled for disposal. Leftover practice materials from students or pieces that didn’t meet standards. You’re welcome to look through them if you’d like.”
The box contained a jumbled mess of materials—snapped spools of thread, scraps of old leather, faded magic stone powder, and metal buttons whose purpose I couldn’t even guess. I crouched down in front of it.
The youngest special-grade court mage of the kingdom, squatting in front of a disposal bin and rummaging through trash. Anyone who saw might find it strange. Then again, ordinary people wouldn’t recognize me, so it didn’t matter. The sight itself would still look suspicious, though.
But tailoring had always been like this. You couldn’t throw away a single usable scrap. Leftover fabric, odd pieces of lining, buttons that seemed pointless at the time—eventually, the perfect moment always came.
As I dug deeper into the box, my fingers closed around a spool of grey thread. It looked utterly unremarkable. The color was dull, the magic response almost nonexistent. It lacked the taut tension of premium materials. Yet the texture that caught against my fingertips felt strangely promising.
I wrapped the thread around my finger and gently sent a thread of magic into it.
Just right. Perfect.
“What is that?” The owner leaned over to look.
“Oh, that. It’s grey silkworm thread. Not a popular material.”
“Why not?”
“The reaction is too slow. It feels sluggish for magic circuits, and the color is too murky to use as decoration on robes. Students tried it during practice a few times and returned every spool.”
Good. Very good. I set the spool in my palm and checked the texture once more.
Hmm.
It would be useless for attack circuits, but it was ideal for a wrist-protecting glove.
“I’ll take all of it.”
The owner blinked. “All of it?”
“Yes.”
“These are disposal items, so I can’t guarantee quality.”
“That’s fine.”
“Are you certain? I could lower the price on the blue scale thread instead…”
“This is what I need.”
Still looking baffled, the owner wrapped up the thread. The price was far lower than I’d expected—practically free compared to the costs I’d seen in the royal warehouses. I finished the transaction and left the shop with a bag containing the grey silkworm thread.
It might look shabby for my first customer. But clothes were never judged by surface value alone. Who they were for, where they would be used, and how they would serve—that was what a tailor matched to the fabric.
By the time I returned to the shop, night had completely fallen. I opened the door, stepped inside, and headed straight for the workbench. Yoo Hamin’s glove lay exactly where I had left it, its inner structure already adjusted to his hand. Now it was time to add the circuits.
I unraveled the silkworm thread and tested it against the glove’s interior. A line to wrap the wrist. A line running along the back of the hand. A line drawing power from beneath the thumb and channeling it toward the index finger.
It didn’t need to be as complex as a magic circle. In fact, simplicity was better. Excessive circuits on beginner equipment were poison.
I sketched a simple pattern on paper, then immediately crumpled it. Drawing it like a mage made it too rigid. The circuits used in royal magic tools were precise and beautiful, but they remained slightly removed from actual human movement. Bodies didn’t travel in straight lines. Wrists, fingers, and the direction of force all shifted slightly with every motion. Circuits sewn into clothing had to follow those natural flows.
I slipped the glove onto my own hand. Since I had sized it for Yoo Hamin, it felt a little large. Still, I could sense what I needed. Clenching my fist, spreading my fingers, rotating my wrist. I could feel where it pulled tight, where it gaped, and exactly where each thread should run. The lines appeared—not magical ones, but the natural lines of clothing itself.
I threaded the needle and made the first stitch.
Slowly. Not too deep. The thread stayed hidden between the lining and reinforcing leather without piercing the outer surface.
The thread connected quietly along the inside of the glove. It looked like ordinary sewing, but with each stitch I channeled a faint trace of magic so the thread would remember the flow.
Seo Yirin’s body still held the ability to read circuits. Adapting that sensation to fit inside clothing, however, was my job. From time to time I used the power in my fingertips to cut off any flow that strayed in the wrong direction, then reattached the severed line to a neighboring path. Cut and connect. The same power that had once torn through national barriers was now being used in a place far removed from any battlefield.
Huh. This is actually fun.
The ability to cut and connect only what I wanted. No matter how many times I considered it, it still didn’t seem like a combat skill to me.
The soft sound of stitching continued for a long while. When I finally tied off the last circuit on the inner wrist, the glove trembled faintly. I paused.
A failure? No. The thread linking the circuits was slowly releasing power inside the glove. It wasn’t fast, but the flow remained steady. The structure that divided impact from the wrist and redirected it across the back of the hand and beneath the thumb had taken shape perfectly.
I lifted the glove and examined its interior under the light. From the outside it still looked like a worn, ordinary glove. It didn’t gleam like new equipment or radiate power like some legendary artifact. Yet hidden inside was a magic circuit that would move in perfect harmony with Yoo Hamin’s hand.
Good. This was more than acceptable for my first customer.
I set the glove back on the workbench and leaned into my chair. Tomorrow, when Yoo Hamin returned, I would only need to check the fit one last time.