Chapter 36 - Kai, the Blacksmith

I turned a corner to find a large and spacious plot of land, with trees and vegetation abundant and it overall looks alright. Looks just like my grandmother's land in my previous world. However, in the middle of this beautiful land, there was a rather shabby old shack or should I say house. Is there really a blacksmith in here?

"Are you sure this is the right place?"

"Affirmative. The wavelengths are most concentrated in this area."

"B-But, is there really an expert blacksmith in here?! I figured that someone who is hiding or looks like was hiding as a blacksmith will disguise itself among the crowd but I didn't expect this…"

'Well, only one way to figure it out.'

Ugh, well alright. I went to the front of the house and started knocking gently so as to not disturb anyone too much but loud enough for anyone inside to hear. I politely asked:

"Hello! Is there someone there?"

Silence. I knocked and asked again but louder this time. Still no response. Louder. Louder. Still nothing. What's going on?

"Are you sure he is in there? Oh wait, I can just-"

"Understood. Activating [Heat Sense]."

Wow, it activated it without me telling, it's growing alright.

I scanned the area and found no heat traces that resembles something humanoid inside the house. So they weren't in this house.

Although there is one right around the back corner of the shack, I mean house. I went towards the location and found another building. It looks a lot better than the house itself. From polished stones to expensive wood, it was a massive upgrade from the house just near it. It was small but big enough for something of a storage room or a smithery- Wait, don't tell me-

"Excuse me, is there someone in there?! Hello-"

"Hey, can you shut up, I'm working in here- huh, it's a kid." The door opened to find a rather large old man, maybe around their 30s or 40s, maybe 50s, bare naked in the upper half of his body, sweating buckets upon buckets of sweat.

The vibe he is emitting right now is like saying: "Hey, I'm a very experienced blacksmith who has been working all day, all night without rest." That's the vibe I'm getting here.

"Woah, you look cool- I mean, hello! May I ask if you were a blacksmith-"

"Yes, I am. So what do you want, brat?"

Ok, turn it down a bit, gramps. I don't want to deal with this 'brat' thing that I always see in novels.

"Well, I wanted to find a blacksmith who can make me something…"

"Hell Nah. I ain't doing your bidding, find another one! There are plenty of blacksmiths around the capital anyways, those arrogant youngsters, so go to them rather than here. Don't waste my time."

Yikes, what should I do now? He has quite a personality that I don't know how to deal with personally.

'Hey, Tomo.'

'What?'

'Show him our blueprint.'

'Are you sure?'

'Really sure, c'mon.'

Ok, if she says so. I called out to him again and before he got to say anything, I showed him a blueprint of what I wanted to make. His eyes widened in shock and started to stutter.

"Y-You, did you make this?!"

"Um, no? It was my 'friend' who made it for me, she was fairly good at drawing."

'Hey! I'm a great artist! Not fairly good!'

'Yeah yeah, I know. I just wanted this reaction of yours.'

'Hmph! I'll get you back for this!'

'Please don't.' I really hope she doesn't, she always hits back harder so I don't want it to happen.

"...Hmm… this is…"

"How about this? If I were to give you two Ice Dragons scales that you can use however you want as compensation, including a few high magic cores and some coins, can you make this staff of mine? And maybe add some improvements to this staff?"

He was thinking hard about my offer to him. I'm sure he is. Even if he is the best blacksmith there is, they wouldn't pass up the opportunity to get rare materials to use. Dragon scales are hard to get since, they come from dragons, very powerful and dangerous creatures so it is quite rare to make materials with them.

"...Haah… fine, I'll make this damn staff of yours. I was already planning to add improvements by myself without you telling me, however, a little compensation like that is not a bad deal, sure."

"Thanks! Well then, may I ask for your name, Mr. Blacksmith?"

"Kai, yours?"

"...Hmm… Tomo, nice to meet you, so let's do this deal, alright?"

"Yeah yeah, kid. Do you have the materials for this one?"

"I do have a few of them already but I still need to get more-"

"Get them. I'll make this staff of yours. This is the first time I'm making something so intricate…"

'Wow, he seems excited for this one.'

'Of course, my blueprint is very detailed, you know?'

'Yeah, I know. Still, how the hell did you know those things? You also know the wavelength that an expert blacksmith emits.'

'Well, I made weapons in the past and I had a master blacksmith as my companion while I was still human so yeah.'

'Wow, you are more impressive than I thought… wait, can't you just make the staff then if you actually knew how to make one?'

'Nah, I don't have a proper material body to make things, maybe enough to draw on paper but wielding a hammer is too much. Unless you make a habitable host for me to use, I can't really do much in the material/physical world other than magic.'

'I see.'

So she can actually use some of her past skills if she has a host body to use… I might find one in the future, oh well.

"Oh yeah, can you start making some of the parts while I'm gathering the rest of the materials?"

"Hm… I can. If you give me these-"

"Here." I pulled out the materials that I have on a table from my storage skill. I knew what materials he was going to say since it was analyzed by my skill on what parts can be made with the current materials. And Aurelia pointed it out too.

"Hmm, not bad kid. These materials are in perfect condition too, as if they were just hunted. Did you hunt these by yourself?"

"Yes, so?"

"Ha, I must have underestimated you for a weak brat. Well then, you better get started on getting those materials, don't you dare come back late or I'll beat your ass!"

"Thanks!" And I ran as fast as I could. I immediately commanded my skill to show me the locations I need to go to get the remaining materials and made a shortcut there. I only need a lot of highly concentrated magic ores, frost essence, large and powerful magic stones, some holy/divine wood, and some other stuff.

"Wait, now did I think about it, aren't the remaining materials actually hard to get? Magic ores are abundant here since the magicule density is quite high but there aren't many of the highly concentrated ones. Frost essence, we can get that by Ice Spirits found on the Frosted Caverns specifically. Magic Stones, we need a rather large one, I forgot how small magic stones were. That wood… how the hell do we find something like that in here?! And don't we need some elemental-"

'Yeah, I know they are hard to get, so we should get the simple materials first in the market. I'll just tell you where to find the rest of them efficiently and how to get them.'

"Alright."

We scanned through the market to find the materials that we want and haven't found anything.

'What the- Why aren't there [Minotaur Horns] or [Elder Divine Frost Tree]?!'

"I don't know. They must have run out of stock. Let's just find them in the wild then."

'Alright…'

We went out to the wild and immediately went to the nearest location, the Frosted Caverns. I think I can get three or four of the materials here already. I walked around more and found magic ores. Not highly concentrated ones but if I go deeper into the cave, I'm bound to find one.

I went deeper and encountered monsters. It was beneficial for me since I might get magic stones from these monsters which I can then turn into Elemental Cores with spirits. I also found some Ice Spirits, natural ones, and got a lot of Frost Essence from them. The deeper I went, the thicker and more concentrated the magicules are, which would lead me to-

"Found them." An abundant amount of highly concentrated magicule ores. I took twice as much as needed using [Gluttony] just in case and immediately left. I heard that the reason why there are so many magicules in here is because of a certain flower and phoenix but I shouldn't think of that for now.

After I went out, I ran into a dragon of all things. Not a flying one but a [Glacier Dragon], which is similar to [Earth Dragons] who doesn't fly but have control over ice and the ground. It is slightly stronger than the one I fought years ago where Aurelia one-shotted the darn thing but it shouldn't be too bad, wait-

"The Gods must be helping me. This guy should give me a rather large magic stone." Of course, I wouldn't fight monsters if they weren't hostile or had no malicious thoughts but thankfully this dragon seems to have other ideas. I didn't fight for long and just smacked it without damaging anything and immediately absorbed it with [Gluttony].

Lastly, I ran around looking for Minotaurs and the wood at the same time.

"Two Minotaurs and a whole forest of the wood as well. That is twice as much as I need, well the more, the better."

After that happened, I immediately started running towards the house. I should have used teleportation to get there but I was already running anyway so might as well continue. I arrived and was immediately greeted by the old man, Kai.

"You arrived late, you brat!"

"Sorry, it took a while to find some of the materials and I just had to fight another dragon. Well then, here."