There was no verbal reply in his mind, but of course there didn't have to be. There was a vague sense of thinking, and then acknowledgement, with the concept of a brief delay Jinyi would need to wait.

Long minutes passed before the clacking taps of a Cleaner's feet became audible. While the factory was always guarded from the outside, the workers of the Hive did not enter unless the place was getting dusty or the like (unlikely) or otherwise needed real cleaning. That was to say, they'd handle Dontas crumbs, but otherwise, it was outside their patrol--simply to give Jinyi his space. So the sight of a Cleaner squeezing in past a door wasn't rare, exactly, but probably comical to those who hadn't seen it, assuming Jinyi's vision at least was available to the rest of the Hive right now.

It passed a few tables, and clinked and clicked to Jinyi's side, forelimbs delicately reaching out to place a beautifully faceted but ever-so-slightly asymmetrical chunk of Clearstone onto the workbench's top, beside Jinyi's work. It then backed up several steps: once this piece was approved, it would depart. Or if it were not (Mother seemed to assume it would not keep its shape, and of course the lack of symmetry had likely rendered it defective), it would remove it and return with a replacement.

@Jinyi

He patiently waited for the Cleaner to arrive. In the meantime, he plotted the necessary next steps in his head: the colored dyes would be done, and he just had to paint them onto the figurines. Once they dried, he simply had to assemble the pieces. Next he would have to learn the spell to imbue objects with magic. He could seek out another to teach him--he had heard somewhere through the network that there were those who were experts in doing so in Leo--or, should they be unwilling to aid one of the Hive, simply teach himself. Surely it had to be possible; those Gembound had to have learned it themselves, after all. A gift in return for the favor would only be the polite thing to do; he would have to prepare that as well...

He lifted his head as the sound of a Cleaner's footsteps approached, and passed a sense of gratitude over as it set down the Clearstone on the benchtop. The Drone's critical eyes quickly found the imperfection, but that would swiftly be addressed now. In a decisive motion, Jinyi raised the hammer-apparatus, fused its five heads into one larger one suited for crushing hard gemstone, and smashed it into glittering dust. He brushed the dust into the same jar as the bugs, and added water.

Jinyi swirled the jar and eyed its contents critically. Something was missing from the mixture; neither the crushed bugs nor the Clearstone dust were really mixing fully with the water, and it could not function well as a paint like this. What else could he add--magic, maybe? By imbuing the dye with the same Ordered magic that created real Drone chitin, would it become what he wanted?

He tried it, in any case, drawing his magic out from his own Clearstone gem and pushing it into the mixture, and--slowly, it worked. As he swirled the jar, the solid clumps slowly faded into the mixture, becoming well suspended. The dye took on a quality that was as strikingly reminiscent of his subject's own chitin as Jinyi could have hoped.

Similarly, something was missing from the jar with nacre and white dye inside as well. The sparkles did not come out as well as he had hoped, and the consistency was not quite right. He stared at it, thinking, but he didn't think he had the right kind of spell to make this one work. He set this aside for later, and instead focused on painting what he had.

The hammer apparatus was discarded in favor of something he could apply the dye with. Since hard chitin was not suited to mimicking the fine bristles of a paintbrush, Jinyi went with another idea: something that came to an applicator point that could spread dye around, and held more dye in a hollow space. He wasn't sure if it would work; his idea would be a more complex construction than the apparatuses he had made before. But his magic responded well, and he grew the exact image of what he had envisioned.

He set to painting the now-hardened polymer figurines. Red dots for eyes here... splashes of white, red, and gold there... washes of glassy chitin dye across their torsos...

It took him long hours to finish the detailed work, pausing only when hunger and thirst became too much to ignore. But this kind of work was what he liked to do with his time anyway, so Jinyi did not mind the process. But now the figurines were almost complete, waiting only for the last coat of sparkling dye across the centerpiece's wings. He would have to acquire the missing piece somehow in the coming days.

But now, he could put most of the music box back together. His apparatus changed to a screwdriver once more, and the advantages of Ordering things from the beginning became apparent. Each gear, each part, was arranged in the exact way it had been, aided by the meticulous organization of the items on his bench. Soon the music box was reassembled perfectly, with the new painted polymer figurines that would rotate when it played.

Finally Jinyi discarded his screwdriver as well and took a long stretch. He would take time to let his magic recover, and then he would learn the art of enchantment. Excitement thrummed through his body. It would not be long now.

temporary exit

Not long after the events of Exchange Student

He had the figurines, he had the music box, and now he had the knowledge of how to enchant. All pieces of the puzzle were laid out before him, with just one thing before the finishing touch could be placed: the magic to make the sparkling dye glow. Ember had told him that the magic was simple, which was reassuring, but Jinyi could not learn it himself. The magic belonged to that of normal Gembound, not Order.

However, the Strength of the Hive (haha foreshadowing) was in its members. Jinyi might not have been able to use the spell, but the Hosts could. And one Host in particular was active nearby, had spare time, and thought they could give this spell a go.

"Here we are," Jinyi announced to Yellow as they walked into the Dontas Factory side-by-side. Though chip production was temporarily on hold, there was plenty of inventory still, and he handed the sifaka a bag of fruit-flavored chips. "Tell me if you like it, by the way," he added. "It's still under development--but anyway, here is the dye. All it needs is the spell of light."

Before getting to work, Yellow opened the bag of fruit Dontas and popped one in their mouth. "Huh," they said, surprised by the texture. It was... thicker than the usual chips, and oddly sweet. Yes, there was a very realistic fruit flavor, but it just somehow did not mesh with the Donta flavor itself.

Jinyi, being connected to the sifaka through a hivemind, would hear all of their feelings on this already, so they opted not to express their opinion out loud in some attempt to preserve his feelings. Instead they offered him a bashful apologetic kind of feeling, dusted off their fingers, and picked up the jar of dye on the bench in front of them. They had never made something glow before, but in theory....

A long moment passed as they focused intensely. At first nothing happened, then the dye began to glow with the faintest light. Then, slowly slowly slowly, the glow grew brighter until at last Jinyi nodded his satisfaction.

"Thank you," the Drone said, to which Yellow responded with a quizzical tilt of their head and a little laugh. There was no need for such formal thanks among family! Instead they'd take another bag of chips. Classic flavor this time.

Glow effect for white-base Starlight dye

Yellow's reaction to the fruit flavor was met by a sigh, though Jinyi did not let himself become disheartened. That was the nature of experimentation, after all; some were bound to fail. Oh well! Plenty of other directions to develop.

He'd focus on the task at hand now that the dye was finally complete, though. Organic polymer streamed into existence and he shaped it into a brush-like form with a wedge at one end and a bristled brush at the other. The bristles would be too stiff once they hardened, but if he worked fast enough he could avoid that problem. He dipped the tool into the jar of dye and brushed shimmering white starlight across mini-Juggernaut's wings.

Now that the centerpiece figurine was done, the music box was all ready to enchant. Jinyi held it up in both hands and concentrated, feeling for the magic that would open a doorway for more magic to flow into the object. Whether by random chance or by the support of the Hive around him, it opened easily and he felt a new well of potential settle into place.

Now for the actual enchantment. This was Jinyi's first time casting this particular spell, but he'd watched and felt other people doing it through the Hivemind so it couldn't be that hard to learn, right?

Wrong.

Jinyi focused on the feeling of the Hive in his mind, which was what he thought he was supposed to do since this spell was all about the Strength of the Hive. So he should channel the Hive, right? Except all he could think about was the flavor of the fruit chips on Yellow's tongue. Starchy. Thick. Too hard and crunchy for their teeth. Sickly sweet artificial flavoring that fed back on itself and magnified until Jinyi gagged and had to put the music box down in favor of turning away and retching. Fuck! What had he been thinking with that flavor?

He felt Yellow's concern stream back at him from halfway down the exit tunnel and mentally waved it away, embarrassed. It's nothing. It's my fault. I swear your thoughts didn't feel like that. Arrrgh, he needed to get this taste off his tongue.