3.4 Picking up the Pieces

With the years of practice I've had with Father in the workshop, I effortlessly infused my hammer with Seigel Wesen; the hammer glowing with power as I showed it to a bright-eyed Lise.

"Woah..." the brunette marveled at the sight of it. "I can... do that too?"

I stopped channeling the energy as I cringed at my own incompetence at teaching. I should've shown her this over a week ago.

"Yes. And you do this by focusing on your heartbeat."

"Heartbeat?"

Fvck me... Why did I put this off until now?

I put on my best smile as I realized I wasn't exactly in the presence of people that knew basic biology. "Place your hand on your chest. Can you feel something thumping?"

"Yes... And it's... Moving really fast..."

"That's your heartbeat, Lise. That's where you should focus on."

My apprentice put on a confused expression before nodding. "Okay?"

"A Nenner's Seigel Wesen comes from the power of their heart," I explained. Father forgive me for embellishing your teachings with modern sensibilities. "Focusing on it will allow you to build up energy inside you."

I watched as Lise scrunched up her brows in concentration. Immediately, I felt the telltale pressure of Seigel Wesen gathering in her position.

"That's it, Lise. Now try making it go towards your hammer."

I looked on as my apprentice sweated even harder, a dull glow in her body visibly flowing slowly from the center of her chest towards her hammer. In no time, the hammer finally glowed a dull blue; a sign of Seigel Wesen flowing through it.

"It... burns..." She was panting now.

"You can stop now."

The pressure stopped, and Lise immediately fell onto one knee, her breathing labored as the glow of her energy dissipated.

"You're a natural, Lise," I smiled while helping her get back up. "You can take a break."

The kid simply smiled. A labored, yet heartwarming grin of pride and accomplishment. Laying her on a nearby bench, I returned to the task at hand. There was still a lot of work to be done.

I stared at the unfinished blade as I mentally mapped out the necessary etchings and Seigels required to make the damn thing function in a Zahler's hands. Normally, it would take at least an hour to manually carve out the Seigels onto the blade. But since I have a propensity for cheating and taking shortcuts...

*CLANG!*

I discovered a way to shave a whole hour out of my process by using Seigel Wesen to the job for me. Besides, it worked by mentally mapping out the Seigels anyway, the energy taking the shape of my imagination as soon as I applied it onto the material. So if I could imagine the stuff that I wanted on the blade down to a tee, I figured it should work theoretically. I actually laughed hard the moment I had the idea during one of my prototype-making sessions back then.

And of course, I laughed even harder when it actually worked.

The blade glowed as my Seigel Wesen did its magic; Seigels searing itself onto the metal in sharp twists and angles as the blue glow flowed throughout the sword.

"Easy..."

I gripped the sword on one hand as I inspected it for any dumb etchings or minor mistakes. That was one drawback for not doing it the proper way; it was prone to errors and possible misfires. I learned that the hard way when five of my blades spontaneously combusted when I didn't notice that the Seigel responsible for heat ran a few centimeters longer than it should've been. Father really scolded me for that and told me not to do it again.

Needless to say, I got paranoid after that debacle. Well, not paranoid enough to stop doing my cheat when nobody was looking.

With a once-over, I scanned the thing from tip to hilt, ending on the ugly-ass insignia of the Matheman Empire. It was honestly hilariously bad with its cross and mathematical symbols, but then again, who was I to judge?

Twirling the sword in my hand, I roused Lise from her short nap before making our way to the exchange booth where they'll test my product for Elementar Channeling before giving us our meals for the day. It might not be much, but it was honest work so far.

Well, that was at least until I got some form of an idea on how to get out of this place unharmed.

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It happened all too soon.

"NENNER ROUGE! YOU ARE HEREBY BEING ASSIGNED TO A ZAHLER THAT HAS CHOSEN YOU!"

Lise and I were in the middle of eating our daily rations, which was to say, me giving more than half of my portion to the younger girl since she needed it more than I did.

I was done growing, she wasn't.

"GATHER YOUR BELONGINGS AND HEAD TO THE BARRACKS IMMEDIATELY!"

My one eyebrow twitched as the same tin can from weeks ago bellowed out his orders. The nerve of this guy. Couldn't even keep his voice down despite him being a mere handful of meters away from my face.

Sighing, I stashed a short blade that I made in my spare time behind my back. It was the only thing qualified to be my 'personal belongings' anyway.

"Big Bro..."

Lise had unofficially become my little sister in the course of our stay in this hell furnace. She never left my side, and I, in turn, never left her to fend for herself in this cruel world that we lived in. The girl had improved in leaps and bounds in terms of 'Nennering' as I called it. Having taught her myself, it filled me with pride to see her growth.

It would pain me to leave her by her lonesome.

"It'll be okay, kid," I reassured as I slowly stood up from our table. Her hand was still firmly attached to mine as we followed the armored man towards what I assumed to be the exit.

"Good job, Rouge!"

All around me, my fellow Nenners cheered for my apparent promotion.

"Congratulations, kid!"

"I knew you'd be outta here eventually!"

I kept my head down as we silently trailed behind the knight leading me. Deep inside, I was equal parts happy and mortified at the thought of leaving everyone else behind.

"Not even another month, Newbie?~"

"Good luck out there, Kid!"

It wasn't fair.

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