When I settled on Napcoon cards as my focus for practicing card craft, I had already mapped out how the various Grim Cyphers would be integrated into the process. It was during this planning phase that I finalized my choice of Dream Engine and Vibro Domain. I then fed the Dream Engine with comprehensive instructions detailing how the Vibro Domain would be used to weave Duskmouth silk into a Sleeping Beauty variant Napcoon, verifying the procedure through numerous simulations conducted within the Dream Domain.
I was only able to achieve this level of preparation thanks to the books from the institute's online library. Every piece of information I required was available there; all that remained was to organize it and tailor it to my specific needs. While the instructions demonstrated a near-perfect success rate within dream simulations, this would be my first attempt at executing the process in the real world.
If I could successfully produce a Napcoon card of fine grade or higher within these three attempts, it would be a significant achievement.
By leveraging Dream Engine's 'Dream Warping' in conjunction with Vibro Domain's 'Reality Resonance,' I successfully wove the Napcoon using Duskmouth silk, precisely etched the Gion circuit lines using Gion Ink and integrating them with the Sleeping Beauty design on my first attempt. I then injected the duskcoon gioncore stems into the gion circuit of the completed weave. I supplied it with my own gion until it formed into gioncore, successfully crafting my very first gion artifact.
[ — Fate Report —
Name: Napcoon (Sleeping Beauty)
Type: Gion Artifact
Gender: Neuter (⚲)
Age: Spiritless
Durability: Flawless Build (100/100)
Gioncore: Low Grade (micro)
Napcoon is a specialized sleeping cocoon woven from the silk of the Duskmouth Grimmon's cocoon. The silk retains adaptive adhesion, allowing the Napcoon to anchor securely to any surface at any angle and elevation or depth without external support. While sealed, the internal micro-environment remains thermally and acoustically isolated, optimized for rest and recovery. Due to the silk's exceptional tensile strength, durability, and flexibility, the resulting Napcoon has strong defensive capabilities against any external attacks.
i. Super Stealth: The Napcoon passively dampens sound, light, and minor Gion emissions from its occupant by dispersing them through layered silk. Movement within the cocoon produces no external vibration signature, rendering the user difficult to detect through conventional senses or perception cards.
ii. Rapid Recovery: The cocoon silk emits a slow, stabilizing Gion that reduces metabolic strain and accelerates natural recovery processes during rest. Fatigue, minor injuries, and neural exhaustion recover at a significantly enhanced rate.
iii. Beauty Sleep: While dormant, the silk optimizes surface-level biological coherence, maintaining skin, hair, and muscular structure by preventing micro-degeneration caused by stress, toxins, or poor rest.
Danger Sense: The residual awareness within the silk monitors the surrounding environment for hostile intent, and in case of threat it will gently awaken the sleeper.
Note:
i. Super Stealth doesn't guarantee complete concealment from high-tier detection abilities.
ii. The Napcoon cannot regenerate lost limbs or reverse fatal damage, and its effect is diminished if the occupant remains conscious or forcibly exits the rest cycle.
iii. Beauty sleep maintains peak condition, but does not enhance physical appearance beyond the user's natural limits.]
I was astonished to discover that I had crafted a flawless artifact on my very first attempt. It confirmed that the results of my dream simulations were accurate. Knowing this lifted a significant weight from my mind.
A low-grade gioncore proved more than sufficient for this Napcoon artifact design; once activated, it could sustain continuous use for a couple of months without any concern over Gion depletion. That was because Duskcoon was a low-grade Grimmon that required a minimum of two months to mature from its larval form into an adult Duskmouth.
But hey, Grimlocks can always feed the grim artifact's gioncore enough gion shards to increase its gion reserves or even increase its grade, like they do with their gioncore.
I could also directly sell the grim artifact to a wealthy mortal who had yet to awaken as a Grimlock. However, that market was extremely narrow. Mortals capable of affording grim artifacts were typically well connected and preferred purchasing from established, reputable crafters, making it difficult for newcomers to gain entry into that segment.
As such, I chose to adhere to my original plan. Now came the hard part: sealing the Napcoon artifact into one of my empty grim cards.
Over the years, researchers had developed a wide array of sealing methods that allowed a Grimlock to seal artifacts, grimmons, spells, and other phenomena within empty cards of their grim deck, crafting grim cards. Each category required a distinct seal, precisely calibrated to the nature of what was being sealed in the card. A mismatch, even a minor one, would compromise the card's integrity and drastically reduce its durability.
In other words, my flawless Napcoon artifact could easily be degraded if I made a mistake. A flawless one might be reduced to a merely fine-grade card, a barely usable one, or worse, a worthless trash Napcoon card, all because I failed to properly apply the correct seal when embedding the artifact into my grim card.
Sleeping Beauty variants of Napcoon cards relied on the Super Snooze Seal, a sealing art specifically designed to seal psych-aligned artifacts. Fortunately, this seal was fully compatible with the Dream Engine Grim Cypher, allowing the two systems to operate in harmony rather than in conflict.
Because of this compatibility, I planned to synchronize the seal art with the Grim Cypher, using them in tandem to embed the artifact into one of my empty cards. I had already run multiple simulations of the process within my Dream Domain, and the outcomes were not merely promising but consistently excellent. Given that the artifact's actual crafting had unfolded exactly as those simulations predicted, my earlier concerns had largely faded.
Within the Vibro Domain, I summoned an empty grim card. As the Dream Engine began circulating my gion in precise accordance with the Super Snooze Seal, the sealing sequence activated. Layer by layer, the energies converged, and the Napcoon artifact was successfully sealed into the card.