Hello everyone, thank you for checking out the new chapter, means a lot to me, all five of ya. I have some plans for Jake, but might have a timeskip into the pizzeria sim part, and have a beefed up Jake show up, might do that.

I groggily open my eyes, Shanna laying on my chest. I gently lift her off my chest, and realize there is nowhere to put her, we just fell asleep on the floor, and she used me as a pillow.

I wake up Shanna, or I try, she just stays asleep like a sack of potatoes. So, I just let her rest on my chest, I could get to work on some projects, but living life(even if you're dead) is a must.

A few minutes go by, and Shanna finally wakes up.

"Morning sleepyhead, did your pillow feel nice?"

Shanna does not even blush and just smiles, I guess I am not great at teasing. "If you don't mind, I would like to get up." This time she does blush, maybe I am not horrible? We get up, and I dust off my clothes...speaking of clothes, we need to get Shanna some proper clothes, those ones from the thrift shop were for me, not for her. She looks happy to be wearing my short though, so we can put it off for a while.

I get back to where I left off in the research. This stuff is truly a goldmine, its full of advanced knowledge on mechanics and remnant. And that only scratches the surface, I already have ideas of what remnant could do if dense enough, might even be able to do it with my body instead of a sword, as I originally planned. The remnant maker in my chest has been constantly producing small amounts of remnant, slowly saturating my being with remnant, the effects are not fully known, but lots of good can come from it.

I try something, focusing really hard on my hand...nothing happens. Thats when I hear Shanna gasp and point at my hand. "Are you okay?! What happened to your hand!" Hmmm. I stop focusing and Shanna sighs out of relief. My hand was certainly not invisible, but Shanna could not see it, so maybe I can cloak myself from technology? Maybe if I focus on my soul, I can have a similar effect.

I look deep inside and focus on my soul, instead of nothing happening, quite the opposite. I feel my attention shift to be inside my soul...and I see it, my soul is growing, and every crack and imperfection caused by pain and torment from my death are slowly being erased. I sigh, maybe I should install a core for Shanna as well, if remnant can actually repair the soul, cause right now, her soul is still pretty beat up, even after the remnant I gave, and having a compatible body.

I stop putting my attention on my soul, and get up. "Shanna, I am going to find a scrap yard for materials, wanna come?"

"Yup."

The rusty lock does not even slow us, I simply grab the lock and squeeze, breaking it into pieces. The gate swings open, and we walk inside. The scrapyard is huge, almost a whole acre. Plenty of high quality materials are just waiting for me to take.

Me and Shanna walk around, having scavenged several pounds of precious metals, having gotten a few pounds of Tungsten, copper, Iron, and even a few pounds of silver, just old broken candle holders and silverware. I am lugging the heavy bag of metal, and Shanna traipses next to me, humming a tune.

Then we head back, we can always come back and get more, and what we got now is plenty for what I have planned.

Now, I plan on making stuff using this metal, but I have to go shopping for everything needed to make a forge, an anvil, and a good hammer. And by shop, I mean steal.

I am in a hardware store, with Shanna, as she decided she can't leave me alone. Finally have footwear, and I have no intention to pay for it. And even if they do notice Shanna and I steal anything, it won't matter, as we are both wearing an Illuso-disc.

I snag a sledge hammer, and some files, putting them in a stolen backpack, before putting some bread...I understand if you are confused, hell even Shanna is. I remember seeing a guy use bread to make insulation for a forge, just gotta seal the bread in some pans, and keep all the oxygen out, and burn the bread, which makes some really good insulation.

I put several loafs of bread and aluminum tins into a backpack, before packing some plaster and sealant for sealing the bread.

Shanna and I walk out of the store, no one noticing the large backpacks on our backs, as the Illuso-disc hides it. We get back to the pizzeria and I begin converting the bread, I seal the bread, burn the tins, and eventually, a few loafs of bread are now great insulation. I then use plaster to keep the shape and make a basic forge out of bread. Pretty cheap...not that I paid for any of it.

For the hammer, I take the sledge hammer, and cut the wood handle at about my forearm length, and file down one side of the hammer head, making it convex, or spherical. This allows the blows from the hammer to spread the metal out, letting it shape easier.

There are still a few things needed to do, need an anvil, and propane for the actual forge. Thankfully both are relatively easy to get.

First we go to a hardware store and get some propane, its not that I forgot, its just that it would be hard to steal propane along with all the other stuff. Now with propane, and propane accessories, we can get that anvil.

Shanna and I walk along an abandoned train track, and find a relatively small section of bar. I use the propane to cut the I-beam, and pick it up and walk back to the pizzeria. It would be pretty heavy, but a normal person could lift this, I have no problems.

There is one very, very important thing that Shanna and I lack. And that is protection, we have durability yes, we are very, very hard to kill. But why not give our enemies an even harder time? I put the tungsten into the furnace, turning on the propane. It likely won't get hot enough to melt, but I don't need to melt it, I plan on forging this into some armor.

Actually, better thought. Sub-dermal armor.

After a few hours, and a few thousand swings, it certainly looks like my chest, fits my chest too.

I take a knife and cut open my chest, peeling the fake flesh off of me, before sticking the tungsten chest onto me, sealing it back up with the fake flesh. I only had to hold the flesh in for a minute, and the flesh joined together, at a visible rate. The wonders of having an over-abundance of remnant.

A few days later, and I finished the sub-dermal tungsten armor for my whole body. I offered to make sub-dermal armor for Shanna, but she just looked at me like I was crazy...kinda like how she did the whole time I was making the armor, after I installed the first piece. I guess she can't tolerate pain?

Why is she looking at me like that?

"Jake...are you okay?"

"Yes...why are you asking?"

"oh...I dunno. YOU RIPPED OPEN YOUR CHEST, AND ACTED LIKE NOTHING HAPPENED!"

ooookay, it seems like what I was doing was a little weird.

"Look, Shanna. I don't know why this is such a big deal-" "SUCH A BIG DEAL?!...Jake. I am worried about you, why do you act like that is fine?"

"I-...I don't know..I just want to be able to protect you. And if suffering through some pain lets me do that, then I will do it."

"Jake...thank you...for everything." Shanna hugs me, her white hair tickling my nose, and her ears tapping my forehead, kinda tickles.

We hold each other in this embrace for a while. Turns out, life can be pretty awesome.

Hello again, if the bread forge surprised you, it surprised me as well, yup, apparently that is an actual thing, bread can be used to make a forge, and with enough bread, you can get a pretty big forge, just need to borrow (steal) a few loaves of bread. Also, I never planned for romance, but I kinda like Shanna, even if she does not talk much, by the way, if the white hair did not give it away, Shanna looks like 2B, just with bunny ears. See ya next chapter. -Death