Jude and Ellie meet back at the Steel Flower after a long day. Each shared their stories and what they accomplished while they ate dinner.

“Congratulations on finding a mentor!” Jude said.

“I know right?! I can’t believe I found one so quick.” Ellie replied.

“I’m surprised that they aren’t clamoring for you since you are a Divine Smith,” Jude said.

“I was actually avoiding the Organizations for that purpose,” she said. “I don’t want to be tied down to an Organization unless I really have to be. It is a nice feeling to be in charge of my own destiny. I can decide what I want to make and how I want to make it. I can choose what project that interests me the most and not have to worry if it fails or not.”

“Stick with me and I will make sure you don’t lack for anything to become the greatest smith of all time.” Jude joined in the excitement.

At this she turned sad, “But you're over level 20 now aren’t you? Each of your classes are now level 10 or more. You won’t get much EXP here for long. But I will have to be here for a while with my new apprenticeship.”

“I will be here for a while yet. I still have a lot of skills to Rank Up and Warrior to level. Besides, I’m not even sure where to go next.”

“But how long would it take you to Rank Up and level the Warrior class? For most people that would take a while, but for you, a week would be a long time.”

“To get things to Rank III maybe, but I want to work on getting my skills past Rank III.” Then Jude jokingly said, “That ought to take me an extra week at least!”

“I know you can do the impossible, but even for you that might take years.”

“See, then I guess I’ll just have to stick around here until you are done with your apprenticeship. Besides, don’t you want me to help you level up your Blacksmith class?” Jude had already told her about his title that let him level up the non-combat classes.

“Yes, I do!”

“Great, we can go to those the Goblin Village tomorrow and clear out the place.”

“Actually, I can’t.”

“What? Why?”

“I just became an apprentice! Starting tomorrow I will start working at Master Theodwin’s shop. I’m not sure when my next free day will be. This will also be my last night at the Steel Flower. I will soon be living in the shop.”

“I see,” Jude said, “Then let’s make it a habit of eating dinner every evening together. He will let you eat right?”

“Yeah, that will work!”

After dinner, Jude spent the rest of the evening in his room working on his Spell Analyst skills. They were progressing slowly but figured it was good to have at least one area that was normal. Normal for the people here, that is.

***

The next day Jude decided to stay in town and work on and explore more of .

Jude hadn’t though much of at first, but the more he looked into the skill the more interesting it became. It was a lot different than or and it had some similarities to . The skill would not only connect to an object to find its details but would also store those details into the . This was why it was similar to , there was stored knowledge! Unfortunately, that is where the similarities ended.

He had gotten the skill to Rank III, but he was unsure how to gain access to the stored information. Getting past Rank III on any skill was proving to be more and more difficult. Perhaps what he needed was another life and death situation. But those were not pleasant, so he put that aside for now.

Instead, he worked on the other newly unlocked skills. But before that, he had to go out to the market and buy some items. After attaining some Cursed Items, he quickly Ranked Up the rest of his skills.

Source Magic

Rank III

Identifying the source of all things.

Unlocked:

· Identify

· Remove Object Curse (Object)

· Break Magical Object

Identify

Rank III

Mana: 10/50/100 (Depends on item Rank)

Identify items up to the Rare Rank

Remove Object Curse

Rank III

Mana: 50/100/200 (Depends on item Rank)

Allows one to remove the curse on an object up to the Rare Rank. Stronger curses can backfire on the one trying to lift the curse. Use with care.

Break Magical Object

Rank III

Mana: 50/100/200

Efficiency: 30%

Break a magical Object up to the Rare Rank. Only magical resources will be recovered.

He lifted the curses off the items he had bought and then broke them down. He was left with some magical powders, a gemstone, and a piece of wood. Jude figured he would give them to Ellie later.

***

On his way out of the market, Jude found a ‘for rent’ sign. Curious, he looked inside and found a spacious courtyard with several practice dummies. There were a couple of storage buildings and the main building that was two stories tall.

Someone else was there who greeted him, “Hello, the Rumblescars disbanded last month, so if you’re looking for an organization, you should try another place.”

Jude guessed, “So this was the Rumblescars HQ? Who were they and why did they disband?”

“I don’t know the details,” said the other person, “But they were a mercenary group. They probably ran out of money. I’m the owner of this place and now I’m in need of a new renter.”

“I see; how much is the rent?” Jude asked.

“50 gold a month. What is it to you?”

“I could use a place to train, but I can only afford 10 gold a month.”

“Wait… you're that new hero aren’t you? If that’s the case then I can give you a discount, but 10 gold is really too low.”

Relying on his higher than average Charisma Stat and his status of Hero Jude ended up settling on 15 gold per month. He now had his own place which wasn’t big as far as HQ’s go, but more than big enough for Jude.

Now he wouldn’t have to waste hours of travel each day to find a place to train.

The building was big enough to comfortably house 15 people, it had a dining area and large kitchen. It even had a crafting area for blacksmiths, tailors, and carpenters.

Jude decided to spend the rest of the day working on his against the practice dummies. Part of that time he would absorb knowledge from the stored areas inside the Modicuit and when he wasn’t doing that he was testing and practicing the moves out.

***

Ellie arrived at the Grass Blade Smithy very early in the morning. She carried with her everything she owned, which wasn’t much.

As soon as she entered she heard Theodwin say to her, “You're late! I’ll let you off this time since it’s your first day and you had to commute, but starting tomorrow I want you to already have the fires going an hour earlier.”

An hour earlier?! She was already here very early and getting a forge’s fire started was not always a quick task.

Seeing her complexion Theodwin added, “Don’t worry, I will show you tomorrow morning how it is done. It won’t take as long as you think.”

Ellie brightened with that comment and said, “Thank you!”

“Now I want you to start working on the things I showed you yesterday. For now, Blacksmith is all that you can do. If you are quick, in six months you will be level 3 and have your skill. Then you can start really doing some smith work.”

Ellie instantly regretted that she couldn’t join in with Jude and quickly level up her job.

Theodwin continued, “Now I will be gone for most of the day so you will have to man the shop and do your refining work. Come here and I will show you how my shop's security works.”

Theodwin had a complicated system of pulley’s, levers, gears, ropes and mirrors that allowed anyone working in the back shop to keep a close eye on anyone who entered the front area. She was beginning to wonder what classes Theodwin held. Clearly, there was the work of an Artificer here as well. But all the wares in the shop were either Common to Magical Grade. They were all things fitting for people under level 10.

But the devices he had for his security could easily kill someone level 20 or possibly even higher. Ellie wasn’t skilled enough to really tell.

After Thoedwin left Ellie began her work. With the skills he could take a piece of raw ore and purify it into an ingot. Using the skill alone would take a large portion of her mana and wouldn’t give her the highest quality of an ingot either. At best she would get a normal quality ingot. Theodwin had taught her how to do it manually, but not completely so. Using the combination of the manual technique and the skill she would be able to decrees the mana cost considerably if she used just the skill and the time it would take if one did it completely manually.

But first, she had to have enough experience doing it manually so at the moment she did the entire process that way. This didn’t drain her mana, but it did drain her stamina. She already had good stats from being a level 11 Divine Smith. So she didn’t tire out quickly.

The first part of was quite simple. Heat up the metal until it was molten and clear off the dross. Then pour the molten liquid into an ingot form. After the ingot cooled, it would then be reheated and placed on the anvil. She would then work the metal over and over until it’s quality slowly improved and the impurities were worked out. 

Adding powders would also change the metal. Most of these were magic in origin making the metal into a magic metal. Each application of powder would then require the metal to be folded several times. So the process of making the ingots ended up taking quite a long time.

But she enjoyed the entire process. Taking a lump of ugly ore and slowly crafting it into a usable metal was quite satisfying. Then taking that same piece of metal and improving it and making it magical was even more fulfilling.

She quickly lost track of time as no one seemed to visit the far out of place smithy shop. It wasn’t until she heard the ringing sound that it brought her out of her own world.

She looked up into the mirror viewing device and saw that it was Jude!

“Be right there!” She called out cheerfully, then quickly finished up what she was doing.

“I can’t believe you came to visit. Aren’t we supposed to meet for dinner?” She asked when she came into the shop area.

Jude smiled then laughed, “We are, except it’s already well past dinner time. Look outside.”

She did and noticed that it was quite dark.

“I’m so sorry Jude! I didn’t realize how late it was.”

“Don’t worry about it. You must be hungry, so let's eat.” Jude then lifted up the basket and she could smell of savory meat and bread. Her stomach quickly grumbled.

Jude set out the food on the counter and they began eating and chatting.

“So I rented a little place, apparently it used to be the HQ of a mercenary group called the Rumblescares.” Jude laughed.

“Oh, I heard of them! Apparently, their leader died a year ago to and since then the group slowly fizzled out.”

“The place they had was quite nice, now I don’t have to travel as much to practice.”

“That’s great, I’ll have to come by and visit soon.”

“Now that we have a place, perhaps it’s time to think up a good name for our own group.”

They started spitballing names like Mysterious Domination, Delicate Nightmare, Thunder of the Raven, Hunters of the Jaguar, Passion of the Fierce, Agony of the Dissipated, Doomshade, Silver Glades, Drumguards, but none of them seemed to fit and it became more of a joke!