Wolves Fang

The wedding of Hugart and Rebecca would actually happen 2 months after the time that Rebecca had previously stated. Rebecca was talking about when the preparations for the wedding in the capital would begin, starting with the arrival of the Whites in the capital city. This wedding would be the union between the future king and queen and the joining of the two most powerful families, the Whites and the Golds, so of course this meant that all Colonels and Lieutenant Colonels would attend which meant that the border between the Gold kingdom and the Horde would be weakened. To deal with this they aligned the wedding with a time that already warranted the full attendance of the army's upper echelon, the ruin diving. In the capital city, Gold Heart, there was a ruin that the Gold Kingdom was built upon that was rumoured to be created by a peak expert far beyond anything seen in Bakre before. The Gold kingdom was founded on this ruin as the ancestor and founder of the Gold kingdom had gained the yin devouring art from this ruin when he was young. Using this method and the resources he gained he was able to build a kingdom that was able to control the continent and became as big as it was now. Although the ancestor had already gained such a powerful, albeit cruel, technique, he had only reached the inner region of the ruins. The core region that was thought to hold the true inheritance of that senior had never once been reached by anyone. Every year the ruin would loosen its barrier at the 5th month of the year and those below tier 2 could enter but usually only the various youth would enter as an experience to sharpen their will and mind. Most of the Colonels and the royals had entered when they were younger and had already gotten as much as they could and had seen the barrier to the core region already and concluded that they wouldn't be able to break through it. Thus leading to the situation where only the various youths would enter, and this year the Prince would enter as a ritual of ascension into becoming a man before being married.

Each year when this event happened, the Colonels and royals would gather their forces and do a cleanse of the Horde, annihilating enough of them so that the threat could be contained by a border army and a few unlucky Lieutenant Colonels. It was currently the 4th month of the year so Jack along with the White Wolves and a portion of his army, the rest stayed to defend the town, headed for the city of Golden Heart. Jack and the White Wolves were already used to the annual cleansing but this time they would also have to collaborate with the royal family and arrange the wedding that would take place after the ruin delve, which would go on for 2 weeks. The barrier of the ruins would strengthen back to its original shape after 2 weeks so if anyone stayed inside they would have to remain there for the rest of the year and hope to stay alive. It took the White army a few days to reach the capital city.

Lucius was going to attend the ruin dive too but before that he had a few weeks before it actually started and he didn't plan on helping Jack with the cleanse, as Lucius had never killed anyone yet and he didn't plan to go out of his way to participate in genocide. Instead he researched and learnt about the weapons and armour of the armies in this world. He was already bored of the cooking job and had made enough money for himself, he found that making food for people he didn't know at all didn't bring him as much joy as cooking for himself or Delilah, and now John and his parents were added to his list of people he would cook for after staying with them for nearly a month. He was getting closer and closer to the Whites and was beginning to form a bond with them, all with the exception of Rebecca. Lucius was quick to trust and like people as it had only taken him a few days to listen to everything Delilah told him, as seen by his fear of debtors even to the point of being scared of Jack who he knew he could overpower if he needed to. His interactions with Rebecca only got worse as time went on and although Lucius tried to be nice and appease her, nothing he did seemed to work so he simply stopped talking to her at all. They both would simply ignore each other now.

Lucius took his time studying the styles of armour and weapons while playing with Jack in his spare time. The Blacksmithing he had learnt under his mother was broad and widely encompassing so it didn't focus on any one style. The other books on the first shelve were about the different applications of different types of weapons and armour, how to recognise the grading or quality of an artifact and the application and construction of traps and other miscellaneous items like siege ladders, bombs, climbing spikes and picks. Lucius had learnt so far that the Gold Kingdom had prioritised functionality and cheapness over quality. The Gold kingdoms army was massive, being a billion strong, and even though it had plentiful resources, arming a billion men with armour and weapons was taxing on the financial department. To solve this issue the armour was designed to cover only vital spots while it was made in a way to deflect rather than stop attacks. He was able to realise that his armour that he had made could be optimised further as, however smart Lucius was and even with all the books and knowledge at his disposal, he wasn't able to rival centuries of study and optimisation. Lucius was able to realise that material and grade wasn't the only thing that mattered when it came to artifact creation but the function of the artifact was even more vital. The artifact should be shaped by its function instead of being shaped by the construction of the artifact itself. Meaning that in order to increase the functionality of his future creations he would have to tweak the things he would do, if he needed to be faster he would use lighter materials instead of using top tier materials merely because they were top tier.

Time passed by as Lucius learnt and applied his findings. He had streamlined the armour he created as after his sparring sessions with Jack, which had become a regular occurrence by now, he had noticed that his style of battle focused more on speed and finesse rather than power. He got rid of the steel boots he made and instead created leather boots from the hide of the tier 1 beasts he had killed before. He also created a belt for utility that he filled with throwing knifes and smoke bombs and caltrops and such. Although he could simply keep them in his ring, he would have to think about it and find the desired thing when taking something out of the ring so keeping it in the belt at the ready was actually quicker. He had also realised that Devils Calling should be attached to his body somehow in case someone did actually have the strength to pull it out of his hands so he created some gauntlets that he added a ring onto for the chains to attach to. Being influenced by the minimalistic style of the Gold Kingdom, the gauntlets were simple and functional rather than stylish. He inscribed grip, attach, energy channelling and cleaning inscriptions into each gauntlet.

Three days before the ruin would open up, Jack made a request to Lucius to make a sword for him. After noticing Lucius' skills and realising he was a lot better than the royal blacksmith Jack starting gathering materials to build himself a sword. Lucius agreed straight away and got to work immediately. Lucius knew Jacks sword style and knew he was heavy handed and powerful with his strokes. Instead of making a standard sword that was of superior quality, Lucius decided to make Jack a special two handed sword named the Zweihander which was translated literally to two hander. Most Zweihanders had a large handle and hilt along with a second smaller hilt that was mostly too small to be considered another hilt. Lucius would make the blade first so he started by purifying and smelting all the ores he received from Jack. Jack had given him high quality spirit steel and a good deal of SST along with a special ore called Flames Lick ore. He had found this ore when he was a teenager in the ruins, he had kept it all this time since he had never found a blacksmith good enough to use it. The Flames Lick ore was named like that because if it was used in a knife or sword, when it cut the enemy it would leave them with the sensation that they were burning yet wet, almost as if they were being licked by fire. It was a cruel material that had reached the mid grade of tier 2. Lucius was given enough to coat the outside of the blade and use it to forge the edge of the blade. Lucius began working by using the steel as a core that he forged into a simple steel plank that was 15 cm wide and 250cm long. He inscribed some toughness, smoothness and other auxiliary inscriptions and then melded SST over the plank. He shaped the SST layer into a sword with a hammer while keeping it heated with his qi techniques. He cooled and hardened the blade in some spirit water. Spirit water was even better than oil since its ability to distribute the heat slowly and evenly was even better. After repeating the quenching a few times he brought out the Flames Lick ore and melted it. It had to be smelted at a much higher temperature as it was an ore with a fire affinity. After smelting it he hammered it into the edges of the blade adding a red ring to the blade that was a purplish silver colour, almost like Lucius' hair, and then added the smaller hilt in too. The smaller hilt was shaped like two bloody fangs sticking out of the waist of the blade. This would be a deadly attachment that could stab or scrape the opponent in unexpected places and inflict the fire lick onto them. After crafting the blade and sharpening it on a whetstone, Lucius spent a few hours inscribing the highest grade inscriptions he could and using special herbs and oils to treat the blade. He increased its longevity and decreased the oxidation of the blade and coated it with a protective layer of oil that would protect the inscriptions from scraping and such. Creating the blade took the entire day in total after Lucius' careful working, but even then it was a lot faster than other blacksmiths. Jack and John had been watching in awe the entire day and were stunned by the beautiful end product. As a Colonel of the army and a middle aged man he had seen many blacksmiths craft blades but he had never seen anyone as swift and smooth as Lucius. He felt that if even the royal blacksmith were to do the same thing he would need a full 3 days to create that blade, especially since the inscriptions should have taken an entire day by themselves alone.

The next day, Lucius started to work on the handle. He decided on making a steel handle that was wrapped in beast leather for comfort and grip. He needed to make a steel handle to balance the weight of the sword and keep it stable, with a weaker handle it could be detrimental to the user. He started of by forging the handle it self using mostly spirit steel but he used SST for the guard and pommel. He had designed the pommel in the shape of a wolf's head after the White Wolves that Jack commanded, and then designed the guard as two claws of a wolf. He inscribed more inscriptions on the finished hilt and began to work on wrapping the grip of the hilt. He used tier 2 leather that Jack had also gotten in the ruins when he was young. The leather was wrapped tightly around the grip and then treated with oils and herbs before Lucius stitched in some formations using spirit silk he provided himself. The same way that the Garden turned water into spirit water after a while it also turned normal silk into spirit silk because of the rich ambient qi within the Garden.

In the end the blade was 3 metres long as the blade was 2.5 metres and the handle was 0.5 metres long. It was designed like a wolf at the handle and had a red edge, that merged with the black, almost as if the blade had already drawn blood. The blade had gone from purple to black because of the protective oils, same for the guard and pommel as the sword was entirely black with a red circumference. Jack held the blade in his hands in awe after Lucius handed it to him as John stared at in pure wonderment too. Lucius had a proud expression on his face as he knew it was his greatest work yet. Jack started crying with a happy expression on his face as he rubbed the flat of the blade on his cheek, while murmuring "My precious...". Lucius face turned weird as he was freaked out by Jacks enthusiasm and crying. John on the other hand didn't even care as he just kept staring at the shiny blade.

Jack turned his head after a while and looked to Lucius, saying with anticipation and joy "What is its name then?" . Lucius thought about it and he couldn't really decide by himself so he just asked back what Jack would name it. Both men couldn't say anything as they went into deep thought to think of a fitting name for such a beautiful blade. It was then that John spoke up.

"What about Wolves Fang? I think it fits well with dads position and personality!"

"YES! GREAT! That is a brilliant name! From now on you shall be called Wolves Fang!"

Jack shouted out as he kissed the blade again and again with a drunk expression on his face.