Tools (1)

"Rocks?", the man asked confused. He could understand him asking for iron ore, but why would he need these useless rocks.

As the main craftsman for the company which was planned to craft and sell dungeon supplies, he knew all the drops, that had been found in the dungeon until now. But according to his knowledge, there was no use for these rocks. The people who had collected the raw materials in the storage hadn't even brought them out with them after they had tested the first few and found nothing of value.

"You don't have any?"

"We have some.", the man hurriedly nodded and told one of the workers nearby to get the requested things from the storage. "Do you need anything else? We even have a small forge in the basement."

Wow, this company was seriously well equipped for being located in the middle of the city. Who would expect a small forge in the basement of an office tower?

Still, Ivan shook his head, "No, but a secluded area like an office would be good."

"My office is separated.", the man responded and directly led him towards his office.

As he had said, the office was closed off. In fact, there wasn't even a window.

"I don't like to be disturbed while working. I hope it's suitable.", the man explained.

"This is perfect.", Ivan agreed.

While they were waiting for the materials to be delivered, the man asked, "Do you mind if I watch?"

If it was before, Ivan would have disagreed. He hadn't wanted anyone to see how his crafting worked, in fear of arousing interest. But now that he had decided to change his way, he decided to agree.

"As long as you don't disturb me, I'm fine with it."

"Great, Thank you.", the man excitedly thanked him.

Ivan found his strong reaction unusual but ignored it. Instead, he started asking questions about their work with goblin leather. Since he was planning to make his own armor from it, it could only be good to get some additional knowledge from people more experienced in leatherworking than him.

The other man happily answered his questions. But while he was able to answer some of his questions, such as how goblin leather differentiated from normal leather, the main thing he gathered was that they had incredible problems working with it.

It wasn't just that their scissors and needles were unusable, but also that they had problems finding suitable additional materials to make armor possible. This began with the string used to stitch. The normal string was unsuitable as it would present too much of a weakness. Other solutions usually used, such as sinews weren't available. Finally, they had decided on a high-tech synthetic string, which was the best they could find. But even so, it was just barely passable. There was just no material suitable to be paired with the leather.

"We just haven't been able to craft anything that doesn't pose a significant weakness when used for stitching armor."

"But isn't it possible to hide the stitches?"

"Sure. We have designed the layout so that the stitches are in the most hidden position. We could even use an overcoat to hide them even better if the enemies are intelligent to make use of such a weakness. But all that doesn't change the fact that they disrupt the force distribution of the armor."

"Force distribution? Does this play a role with leather armor? I thought it is too soft to distribute force and is more used for stopping cuts."

"Of course there is force distribution. It's just not as important as with harder armors. But even with leather armor, we try to get as much as possible."

They continued talking about leather armors and how they worked until someone came and brought the materials Ivan had asked for. Ivan had learned a lot from the elderly man so he was a bit unwilling to stop their conversation, but seeing his expectant look and thinking of the fact that he would have many more chances to exchange knowledge, he started the process of crafting.

When he pulled out the NAT there wasn't much reaction from the elderly man, but this changed when he used his mind to enlarge it to deposit the needles in it. Ivan had kept an eye on the man's face, so him opening his eyes wide didn't escape him. 'It seems like he knows something.'

Pushing this thought back, he started to use the NAT to scan the needles and create a blueprint. He ignored the inner structure and only focused on the outer form.

Since it was simply scanning an existing material, it didn't cost him much mental energy and it didn't take much time either.

A few minutes later he had a good scan and saved it in a new folder. He then took out the needles and instead put in the scissor.

This scan did take a bit longer since the structure of a scissor was more complex than that of a needle.

Unknowingly some pearls of sweat had appeared on his forehead.

"Pfff....", he exhaled deeply when finishing the scan. It seemed like the donation had taken a toll on his mind as well. He could feel that he was much more exhausted than he had expected.

Seeing that he had finished, the elderly man asked worriedly, "Are you ok?"

Ivan smiled slightly. "Yeah, I'm just exhausted. I'm not as fit as usual today."

"Wait a second.", the man came to the table and pulled open a drawer. He then took something out and presented it to Ivan. "Here, this should help."

Ivan took a look at the thing and was surprised to find that it was a clear packet with a simple label. It was clear that it wasn't something bought. There were only two words on the label, 'Goblin Jerky', but these words gave him all the information he needed. The stick inside should be processed goblin steak, making it easier to store, carry and consume. The only question was how well its energy had been conserved.

He opened the package and pulled out the stick. Its consistency was much better than that of the raw steak. Not that that was hard with its consistency being so disgustingly slimy.

After biting down on the stick and swallowing a piece of it, he could feel the energy flowing through his body.

"Thank you. This really helps.", he said to the other man with a grin.

Taking another bite, he put down the rest and grabbed one of the iron ores.

[[Ore: Iron

Grade: 1F

A rock containing a large amount of iron.

]]

As often the description provided by the System wasn't very informative. But to Ivan, the important thing was only that the System accepted the ore.

He exchanged the scissor with the ore and choose to scan it.

[[Scan: Rock

Base Material: 2 Iron Ingot

Rest Material: Manifested Energy

Remark: After extraction of the Iron ingots the rest will disappear, leaving nothing behind.

]]

As he had expected, the ore consisted only of material for iron ingots and manifested energy. Although he was surprised that it was 2 ingots and not one, this didn't change much.

He chose to extract the iron ingot and the NAT got to work. As always he could feel the energy slowly flowing out of him, as the NAT separated the iron from the rest material.

Soon 2 ingots had formed inside the NAT. Taking one out, he couldn't help but glance at the elderly man, to catch his reaction. After all, he had just refined an iron ingot out of the raw ore and that without any smelting.

He wasn't disappointed, as the man's face clearly showed a look of astonishment. But there was something else mixed into the light of his eyes. Was it elation? Ivan wasn't able to clearly guess it but he was sure that it was a positive emotion.

He took another bite from the goblin jerky and then started the next step.

He was planning to just cut the needle forms out of the iron ingot but he soon realized a problem. The needle he had scanned had a completely different surface since it was made from a different material. It was impossible to just cut the ingot according to the blueprint. Instead, he had to modify the blueprint to better align with the structure of the iron ingot.

If not for the fact, that he had soon found a way to easily do so, this process would have taken a long time. But after finishing a small part of the first needle, he had realized that basically, all he had to do was to smoothen the surface of the blueprint. After doing so he only had to take care of deformations, which had been created because of using the needles or because its material was inferior. There were also some defects that were a result of the crafting method.