The Goddess of Cycles, Thema, watches over Agaia as one of the two main forces of the world. As a deity who advocates change, she actively participates in the world’s events via her champion to propel change and prevent stagnation where she sees fit to involve herself. Thema is said to be the main reason for the ending of the Age of Gods to usher in the Age of Mortals, by the act of introducing random variables into Agaia – the intelligent races of humans, elves, dwarfs, beastmen et cetera. Hence, she is also known as the Mother of Creation to all of her children.

On the opposite end is Balces, God of Balance and Stability. He usually serves as a counteracting force to Thema, promoting constancy instead of change. Unlike Thema, Balces does not have a personal champion and is generally considered as a god of peace and equality. However, there are times when Balance and Change do not clash, and work together to influence the world. The Father of Monsters created leviathans from the corpses of dead gods and molded monsters, animals and the like to balance the power of the up and rising sentient races.

Beneath them are the six lesser gods. Aptenia, Enki, Taerra, Lorq, Aluyyse and Mulrecg, each governing an element and an aspect of their domain. Aptenia, the eldest daughter of Thema, rules the wind and spurs artistic creativity in the heart of men. Enki, ever the fiery one, watches the flames and passion of knowledge. Taerra of Nature and Earth is the kindest and strongest of them while Lorq is cold and distant as the goddess of Ice and Death. Aluyyse favours those who take risks and is the patron god of Water for sailors against the mighty ocean. Lastly, Mulcreg is the lightning of justice that dispense divine retribution-

“Oww!”

A bump in the road had knocked Beast’s head against the wooden side of the carriage, disrupting his read. The book dropped onto the dusty planks that made up the bottom of the horse-drawn carriage. A snicker came from Aveye sitting beside him, while weird stares were made by the NPCs and other players on the same ride.

Beast picked up his book sheepishly.

“Where are we right now?” He directed a question to Aveye in a low whisper while trying to maintain his dignity as much as possible.

“When you bumped your head? Near Corelia.”

“That was faster than I expected.”

They had stopped at Torintu for a break, upon which Beast completed his troll quest left from before Lanos. Guard Apollon had mistakenly thought he sacrificed himself to drive away the trolls, given how long he had taken to return after accepting the quest, and was pleasantly surprised when Beast appeared before him once again. After completing the quest that gave him some experience and 25 public relations with Caerheim, he was well on his way up the beaten path through Tarron Hills to Corelia.

Aveye was indeed correct. He could already see the sharp spindly tips of the Splinter Mountain range jutting out into the sky like a massive pincushion of needles. It was no wonder where the place got its name. There was supposedly a spring in there somewhere that he would need to find, which begged the question of how it would have occurred naturally in the first place.

“We are going in there… right?” Aveye asked, also daunted by the view of the treacherous geography.

The roads have become bumpier now that they had left the dirt path for a mountainous trail.

“Yea, but I will have to prepare something first.”

It took a full second for the implication of that statement to hit Aveye fully.

“Again?” The archer groaned, her head lolling along with the shaking of the carriage. “Please don’t say that you want me to help you hunt monsters again.”

“Actually… I may need your help getting some Rockbull meat while I head into the mine.”

Aveye buried her head into her hands for a second before she looked back up and stared at Beast. “Really?”

Beast nodded. “They are level 50 so I think it would be good for you to level up some before going into the mountains. The monsters there should be more powerful than a level 40 plus like you could handle.”

“Urgh… fine.” Aveye rolled her eyes. “What is it that you have to do there anyway?”

“Mine, of course. What else can I do?”

Aveye grimaced. “Sounds boring.”

“Well, I fully intend to level my blacksmithing.”

The carriage rolled to a halt.

“To make your dagger?” A knowing smirk crept from the corner of her lips.

“To make my dagger.” Beast repeated with a soft smile as he got off the carriage behind the rest of the passengers travelling with them.

The carriage had stopped just outside the town of Corelia and it was exactly the same as it had been the day he came by with Kiki. Refugees and merchants alike littered the overcrowded streets, spilling out into the outskirts along the Inpelmarr River. His objective, however, is not the quaint mining town nested at the foot of the Splinter Mountains, but the mine entrances located at the side in the face of a granite wall.

The mines work the same way as in most other games, holding roughly the same veins and composition. Copper and Iron can be found close to the surface of the mine, while rarer minerals such as mithril will require one to head deeper in. Sometimes, depending on the player’s luck stat, they have a possibility of unearthing a gemstone from the rock during the mining, which will prove useful in various blacksmithing and jeweler professions. Diamonds, one of the rarest gemstone of all, could sell as much as three thousand gold pieces in the market and are sometimes discovered among low level veins such as copper and iron. This prompted plenty of amateur miners who dreamt of getting rich filling up the higher levels and flooding the market with an abundance of copper and iron ore.

Beast strolled past the legions of farmers until he found a relatively secluded spot and began his own mining operation. His Ancient Blacksmithing is at Basic level 7, and his aim is to bring that up to at least Intermediate 1 by the end of this trip. To do so, he will need tons of ore and possibly mithril to break into the next tier.

Then, he can proceed with crafting his mandibles.

The first strike of his pickaxe rewarded him with a lump of iron. It was a good start.

You have received Iron Ore x1

Oh, it seemed that someone else a distance away had found something. A brief gleam of something pristine and translucent indicated an uncut diamond find. Lucky bastard. Attributing it to luck and RNG, Beast thought nothing of it and continued at his task.

You have received Iron Ore x1

You have received Iron Ore x2

As Beast mined, he began to notice something weird going on with the same person. Every now and then, he would bend down and pick out an uncut gem from his payload of ore. The problem was not that he found them, but that it happened way too often to be true.

Beast did a double check that he had not unknowingly wandered into the deeper levels by mistakes. Yes, he is still on the upper levels of the mines where gems should be rare; the deeper levels have monsters to contend with which interrupts mining every now and then. So what sorcery is this person wielding to be this fortunate in his draw?

Hacking? That could be a possibility. Games of the past usually have some kind of resource hacks that basically allowed infinite returns at a certain task. Ages Online, however, prides itself on being hack-free. If he had been hacking, someone would have noticed and banned him a long time ago.

“Excuse me.” He could not hold in his curiosity any longer.

“Yes?” The man looked up from his toils. He was short and stout and framed with a muscular build that hinted at his dwarven lineage. Instead of the face-full of beard hair that dwarves were famous for, this particular dwarf is cleaned shaven with a prim and proper moustache to accompany his sharp features. Topless, he only had a pair of work pants to cover his rippling and toned muscles.

“How may I help you?” The man repeated, unsure of the silence that had followed.

“Ah… sorry. I… noticed that you are finding gems way more than me. I was wondering how you did it.”

At first, the man was confused. Then, he broke into hearty laughter that rang throughout the tunnel once he realized what Beast was thinking.

“Oh, that.” He paused to gather himself. “I simply have a lot of luck that is all.”

When Beast maintained his questioning gaze on him, he elaborated. “I literally pumped most of my stat points into Luck.” He corrected himself. “All of them actually.”

“Really?” Beast had to actively stop his jaw from dropping. He had heard of people going for single stat build, such as Strength or Dexterity, but Luck? Never. The reason was simple – Strength gives attacking power while Dexterity gives avoiding ability. Even Wisdom has its role in providing a maximal mana pool for sustained spell casting. Luck on the other hand, seems to have no visible benefit in any aspect of the game.

“Yes.”

Beast shrugged. “I have heard of min-maxers but this is the first time I’ve encountered someone who adds purely luck and nothing else.”

“Is it really that hard to believe?”

“Well, considering that I have no idea how you survived this long with only Luck stats, yes.”

At his comment, the dwarf shot him a look that spoke only of scorn and pity and Beast momentarily feared that he might have stepped on other’s toes.

“Fighting isn’t the only thing that awards experience laddie. If a blacksmith smiths, he gains experience as well. You are underestimating us ‘casuals’ too much. I suppose you are one of those elitist kids going around who think that the conventional classes are the bomb.”

Beast was horrified. He had never intended it that way.

“I-I…”

“I guess it doesn’t matter.” The dwarf smirked as he flashed an uncut gem in Beast’s face. “Just know that I will be ten times richer than you once I sell these off. Bye~”

With a finishing jibe, the dwarf cut the conversation and walked to another spot away from Beast, leaving the Lore Keeper speechless at his spot. It was a full ten seconds before Beast re-gathered his bearing and returned to his original task, all while muttering,

“This must be how the first PK happened.”

…………….

After gathering a substantial amount of iron and copper ore, Beast decided he should head down deeper into the mine for mithril.

It was also the point in time he should keep his guard up. Anything can happen in the darkness of the deep mines, more so if one is too preoccupied in combat against a monster to defend their backs against a surprise attack. Many a miner had died in the deeper levels to monsters, and even more to opportunistic PKers who wish to rob them of their hard work.

It was this exact reason that the lower levels were devoid of players except for dedicated miners.

A shuffling of feet alerted Beast to something before him. Swinging his torch at the general direction of the disturbance, the light of the fire illuminated a mole-like creature that is known to infest the mines – the Diggers. At level thirty-five, they are much weaker than the Rockbulls outside of Corelia, but they make up for their lack of strength with numbers and unpredictability.

The sound of earth cracking could be heard from behind.

Two quick jabs of Burfrest to the soft fleshy stomach of the creature to his front were enough to destroy it, and a roundhouse kick to the back disrupted the attacks of three more and knocked them back. A brief flare of blue burst forth, forming the blade of mana that would bridge the extra distance to cut one of them down.

The power and brutality of their foe did not go unnoticed. They hesitated for a moment before the surviving diggers surged forth in tandem to attack with their claws specialized for cutting through rock. However, it was too slow. Before their claws could reach him, his fist already reached them. Smashing into a Digger with fistful of blue mana, Beast obliterated it.

That was when a fifth Digger popped out of the ground from right under his feet and swept him off-balance.

“Crap!”

When he found his balance back, the other Digger had taken the chance to attack.

-177 Hp

What the monster did not realise was that the thing about getting a successful attack also places it within attack range.

A predatory grin surfaced on Beast’s face, and if moles could widen their beady black eyes in fear, this one would have done so. The last thing in its life that it saw was a menacing pincer-like weapon shearing a bloody scar across its body with its sharp edge.

The final Digger decided to flee. As it popped back down the hole it came out from, Beast immediately thrust Burfrest after it, activating the weapon’s special ability while he did so. An animalistic grunt of pain sounded, indicating a hit and Beast subsequently deactivate and activated Burfrest again. Another grunt, another hit, and it was how the hole flickered black and blue until a dying squeal was finally heard.

Beast froze in his position, his face illuminated by the light of his fallen torch in the dark mine.

With only the sound of his pumping heart for company, he kept ears out for any other signs of life and was relieved when he could find none. It was a full ten seconds before he could relax and began setting up his tools for mining.

“You fight well kiddo. Thanks for clearing the area.”

Wait. What?

The dwarf from before sauntered in and set up his tools on an adjacent wall. The sound of pickaxe hitting rock rang out soon after. Beast could not help but stare at the back of the buff dwarf once more. Never mind the fact that he did not hear him coming, the latter had just implied he was following and using him for mob clearing.

“H-How?” Beast found enough of his senses to ask. Is the dwarf purposely tempting him to PK? He could barely restrain himself from sticking Burfrest up this infuriating dwarf’s butt.

“Dwarves have low light vision. We need them for this kind of work.” He stopped his work and looked deep in thought. “Though, I am curious… You don’t fight like a conventional class and I have never seen that weapon before.”

“I am a historian.”

This time, it was the dwarf’s turn to boggle his eyes. It was an entire minute before he found himself to talk. When he did, his tone changed entirely.

“A ‘casual’ too? Well I did never. I figured you might have been a warrior or something, especially with our prior conversation.”

This might be a good time to clarify some outstanding issues.

“I didn’t mean to offend you, really.” Beast said.

“I know. And I am sorry for being a jerkass just now. I get too much elitist shit thrown in my face by stupid warrior types.”

Beast wisely remained silent that he used to be one of these ‘elitist warrior types’, at least until Ages Online. The dwarf might have been a tad prejudiced against those, if prior interaction had anything to say about it.

“Caldrin. Profession, Forager. I harvest resource nodes.” Caldrin extended a hand towards him. “Let bygones be bygones?”

Beast looked into the dwarf’s eyes. He seemed sincere enough in wanting a fresh start.

“Fine.” He grasped the offered hand in a firm shake. “I am Beast.”

“Awesome.” Caldrin exclaimed. “So… What is a historian like you doing here? I doubt there is anything ancient about this place.”

“The same thing you are here for. I need materials for crafting.”

“Can’t you simply buy them? I need a market for my stuff you know.”

“I prefer to get my own materials I guess.” Beast shrugged.

“Excellent! I like your style.” Caldrin abruptly closed the distance between them and grabbed Beast’s hands. When he released them, there was a small stone left behind in the middle of Beast’s palms – An uncut Sapphire of the deepest blue.

“Take this as a meeting gift and an apology for my attitude. If you use it in whatever you are crafting, you might be able to enchant it with magical properties.”

“But-“

“No buts. Besides, I am not doing a charity here. Take a good look at it.”

Beast followed as told. As he surveyed the stone, he noticed a subtle crack at the bottom of the stone. It was a tiny flaw in an otherwise beautiful gemstone.

“See it? I’d rather fill my inventory space with better quality stones, so it is yours.”

It is true that some farmers prefer to maximize their payloads per haul by only taking the best with their limited inventory space. Beast had no idea to laugh or cry – Laugh because even with the crack, the uncut gemstone is still a high quality item that required a long time of digging to acquire, or cry due to him being treated like a common disposal bin. He did neither and simply accepted it with a stoic face.

“Thank you.”

“No problem. I will depend on you for any more monster attacks.”

With that amount of compensation, there was no reason to refuse. “Right.”

The level of the mines was soon filled with the echoes of metal hitting stone and the occasional screams of Diggers dying.

……………

The furnace blasted with a few hundred degrees of heat, while Beast unwaveringly stared into the flames. With a flourish, he drew the mithril rod out of the fire before hammering the end of the rod into a pointed tip. When he was satisfied, the metal was dunked into a bucket of oil to quench.

Your Ancient Blacksmithing has increased to Intermediate 1.

+ 5 Strength

Ancient Blacksmithing (Intermediate 1)

You gained Sharpen

Sharpen

Sharpening a weapon using a whetstone allows a +10% effectiveness in damage for 1 hour.

Finally.

That was the last mithril spear he would craft to reach Intermediate blacksmithing. After hundreds of throwing spears, he had finally broken the barrier into intermediate tier. Now he is ready to craft his dagger.

On the table behind him laid the mithril ingots he had refined from the ores he obtained in the mine, as well as a cleanly cut sapphire gem that would be placed into the eventual dagger. Because of this gemstone, Beast had first asked around for people who could process it. When he received a hefty quotation of 5 gold pieces, he decided he could probably cut it on his own and spent additional hours carving wood and stone skewers to level up his carving skill.

Aveye had returned from her hunting many times and they always had barbeque at the same resting spot near the Inpelmarr River before he sent her off to kill more Rockbulls. She looked miffed every time she came back to find that he was not yet done, but there was nothing she could do about it. Like this, they made hundreds of BBQ steak pieces for their rations as well as leveled Aveye up to 59. Beast also did not forget to boil some Inpelmarr Herbal Soup to pack for the trip and even received an increase in his cooking level from the excessive barbeque he was doing. The rest of the meat he could not keep or eat, he made Aveye peddle them off to other players while she went off to hunt.

It came to a moment in time where he had to sacrifice all the cheap peridotite gemstones he had found during his own mining to push his carving to Intermediate 1. That was when he spent several more hours slowly cutting the sapphire stone with utmost care. Even Aveye knew better than to disturb him then. One mistake was all it needed for the entire process to fail and end up with a low quality item that would be a waste of Caldrin’s ‘gift’.

It was not that bad. At least the system guided him after he had obtained Intermediate Carving, causing him to instinctively know where to go with his knife. This was how he arrived at the current point in time.

You are fatigued.

-50% Max HP

-50% Max MP

It had been hours since he started the marathon towards crafting the dagger. Beast wiped the sweat off his brow with his sleeves. Just a while more and he would be done.

First, he removed all the hair present on the Antroach Mandibles, revealing the serrated exoskeleton that would form the blade of the dagger. Then he grinded off part of the mandible that had been severed from its original body so that it will be clean-cut and dagger sized, making sure to keep the sharp edges untouched.

Crack. A fault traversed up the section of the mandible he was working on and Beast could feel his heart metaphorically do the same.

“F*ck!”

Oh god.

Did he just ruin one of the pair of mandibles?

Beast was rendered speechless. He had been careful and still…

The heartache he was feeling was so much that he had to stop for a few seconds to calm himself back down. Fatigue might have affected only maximum health and mana on the surface but it seemed to also have an effect on crafting too. Either that or he was too tired to notice he had overgrind and weakened that part of the mandible.

Cursing himself for his stupidity, Beast drank a flask of Inpelmarr Herbal Soup to refresh himself before starting over again on the last remaining mandible, this time a hundred times more carefully than before.

Generally, Beast could always fashion a hilt and pommel for the blade and be done with it, but the durability of the weapon might be poor for sustained combat or direct weapon clashes. Therefore he decided to fashion an external spine-like extension that would travel half-way down the mandible’s blunt end to provide support and parrying power.

Mithril bars went into the furnace to smelt into liquid metal, which Beast then set into a mold he had made in accordance to his design to forge the handle. Adjustments had to be done to fit the blade and the sapphire to be set. Every time the result was unsatisfactory, Beast made modifications to the mold and smelted more mithril.

It was an arduous process with every step proceeding cautiously for fear of ruining the entire project, amplified by the costly mistake earlier on. He had even chosen to smith in the middle of the night so that the chance he was interrupted was minimized.

One could not describe how relieved Beast felt when he reached the end of it all. With a satisfying clink, Beast attached the mandible to his mithril hilt and set the sapphire gem in. That was when an unexpected thing happened.

Ding!

Please name your creation.

You can cancel the window, but the chance to name your creation will be lost forever.

Beast pursed his lips. Name his creation? Had he just made something worthy of being named by himself instead of the system? His mind wandered to Burfrest; it could be that artifacts need to be named.

“Blatta.”

It was the first word that came to mind. The german word for blade is blatt. Add an ‘a’ and it is a scientific name for the cockroach, but also a fitting name for a blade.

Ding!

Blatta

Type: Mythological

Artifact, Weapon, Dagger

A serrated dagger forged from the last living Antroach in existence, this weapon was personally made for a certain person in mind. This dagger can pierce through even the hardest steel. Reinforced by a mithril handle, it boasts both the attacking capabilities of the Antroach and the durability of mithril, granting devastating combat power. A sapphire gemstone had been set into the hilt, adorning this exquisite representation of the past and granting it slight ice properties.

Durability: 80/80

Value: 190g

Damage: 94-111

Level Restriction: 82

Job Restriction: Rogue

Crafted by Beast

When equipped:

+20 Strength

+15% increase to attacks from stealth

+10% cold damage to attacks

Enchantment:

Nil

Artifact Effect:

Piercing

Passive

This effect arises from the cutting property of the mandible, of which is known to tear through even the hardest of armor with relative ease.

All attacks made by Blatta ignore armor.

With all that options and effects, it is going to be one hell of a weapon. And it still had yet to be enchanted.

Kiki will like it, but until he meets up with her, he could probably take it out on a spin. First, a break is in order. He would probably regret it later, but staying up the whole night to make this one dagger had taken and will take its toll on him. Clearing all the mess that had been littered around the forge due to his project, Beast logged out for school.