Because I keep forgetting to write it at the end, Ill state it at the top of all my chapters: Edited by Wesley Au (Paradox)

(Can't show your editor enough appreciation :D )

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Helping around the workshop was always a terrible chore. The room was consistently blazing hot, was darkly lit by the single furnace making it smell like sweat. The walls were pitch black with soot and the air inside was musty and damp. There were a few windows here and there, but they were each hatched shut, allowing no light to come in or out. Ragnar really didn’t like workshop duty.

Today was the fifth day in a row that the Forgeron Household was shaking vividly. Olaf Forgeron had been working on his current project, not even taking time to look up when people entered the workshop, as he was finalizing a very delicate piece of jewelry. Sweat was pouring down his skin and his hair became completely wet. Little droplets of salty water flew through the room as Olaf smashed his majestic hammer on a piece of metal for the 10,000th time. There was a green gem at the top of the hammer that glowed a bright green strike and the flashes of green going up and down was an indicator of how fast the hammer was being swung.

Small purple orbs started to appear around the anvil at some point and were now moving around the anvil like purple fireflies dancing under two full moons.

As his father was working vigorously, Ragnar stood on the side to watch him work. He was in charge of maintaining the workshop, his job was to keep the furnace at the right temperature, provide the materials his father needed and at times he’d force his father to stop in order to eat. He usually loathed this kind of work for it was hot and smelly, but today was a special occasion.

Although it wasn’t rare to see his father get caught up in the making of a product, it is not every day that he got to watch his father’s secret technique. Those purple orbs were mesmerizing and he really wanted to touch one, but he knew he shouldn’t. One by one, the little purple dots disappeared into the red hot metal. For every ball of light that disappeared another showed up. There was an endless supply of them, and Ragnar had no idea where they were coming from.

Olaf stopped hitting the anvil and placed the piece of metal back in the furnace. The purple sparks disappeared the moment the rhythmical movement of the hammer stopped. Not even Olaf knows exactly what they are, but he does know their effect on his work and that is all that mattered. It was a technique passed down for generations, how could those purple lights be harmful?

Ragnar was about to approach the anvil to clean it when Olaf stuck out his hand and said:

“Son, I think you should help Mia with cooking now,” and he pointed his thumb at the furnace. “The hardest part is almost done, I should be finished with it in about an hour or so.”

“But dad…”Ragnar started to protest. He’d never been allowed to see his father finish the technique and he really wanted to see it. He could only imagine what it could look like, sometimes Ragnar would imagine a huge spectacle of light appearing around his dad as he finished the job, how could he not want to see that?

But his dad shook his head, “Not tonight, boy, you’re still too young to learn the method.”

Ragnar looked down, but he knew that when his father said no, he meant no.

“Look on the bright side,” Olaf said with a gentle smile on the face. “Maybe this time we won’t have to eat Mia’s cooking again.”

Ragnar gave a snort, “You call that stuff food? They’re abominations, I tell you.”

Olaf barked out a laugh at that response. For the past few days both Ragnar and he had been working in the store for entire days to create a present for Ymil’s birthday. This left Mia in charge of the cooking and, to be frank, she was terrible at it. The first day was supposed to be baked tuna with broccoli but what they got were burnt pieces of charcoal. Apparently she tried to roast the broccoli and the tuna was completely forgotten. She was 10, so it was kind of adorable but the guys still liked to eat normal food.

Ragnar then turned to the door and said to his father, “Okay, I’ll go make us something edible.” and he walked towards the door. He opened it and before he left he asked, “But could you please teach it to me some day?”

“When you’re ready, son. I can’t be more specific than that,” Olaf answered.

(Author’s Note: Collin Johanson has a famous quote for the GW2 expansion: “When it’s ready.” It sucks and I love it )

Ragnar gave a curt nod and walked out the room, closing the door behind him. Olaf then turned back to the furnace and closed his eyes. He took a few deep breaths and focused on the dancing flames in front of him, only hearing their radiant dance within the constraints of the furnace walls.

He opened his eyes and proceeds to perform the final step to his secret forging technique, Mjölnir Strike.

—-

“Hey Mia, do you know father’s secret technique?” Ragnar and Mia were both working in the kitchen. Ragnar was making a salad using his soul as a kitchen knife while Mia was mashing up raw potatoes.

“Nah, dad would let me see it,” she replied. Mia usually helped out at the workshop whenever there was an order. She enjoyed working in the furnace’s heat and creating new things. She was sometimes tasked with making metal bricks from the leftovers for them to be reused later. The girl would sometimes even use one of these bricks to make a few things of her own but besides beautiful works of art, she never produced anything useful. It was a good pass-time though, and it occupied her when Ragnar and Ymil were out training.

Ragnar sighed deeply. “That’s too bad…” He finished chopping the vegetables and started to marinate chicken fillet in vinegar. He added a few random spices to it and then leaned his back against the kitchen counter to face his sister.

“Do you think those purple lights are dangerous?” he was really curious.

“No, they don’t seem to hurt you when you touch them.” She giggled. “But you know when you’ll get to learn it, right?”

“’When I’m ready’…” Ragnar said grumpily. This was the tenth time he got this answer and every time it infuriated him even more. It made sense to not teach him the technique when he was a child, but now that he was 11, Ragnar was sure he could handle it.

Ragnar looked out the window and saw a boy run by.

“By the way, don’t you think Ymil has been training too hard? He has no time to play with us at all!” he said. Although he was busy helping his father with Ymil’s present, he still have some free time and he really wanted to play with his friend.

Mia stopped mashed the potatoes and looked at Ragnar. “I know! Since both you and Ymil are working so hard I have to play all by myself!”

She too was sad because of Ymil’s absence. Whenever Ragnar was in the workshop, she had to keep herself entertained. She had shaped her soul into her favorite toy, a brown ragdoll with clay colored curly hair and a green gem stuck to its stomach. It was barely the size of a fist so it was perfect for playing house. The problem was that she had no other dolls so it quickly became boring.

“Uncle Max is way too mean, why would he make Ymil do all that? Isn’t his regular training enough?” Mia was referring to Ymil’s daily exercises. Ever since Ymil started to live with his uncle he has been forced to train his martial arts by repeating the core moves every morning. He spent an hour every day training the 5 basic moves of his uncle’s arts, and had the rest of the day to either play around or work at the bookstore.

But this week had been different. Ymil hadn’t been allowed to go play even once and he was carrying out some intense workout. Like right now, Ymil was running around the village with two buckets of water and he had to do ten push-ups for every drop he spilled.

Ragnar grimaced, “Yeah, Uncle’s being too strict on him. I mean, it’s almost his birthday!”

“Yeah! What if he’s not allowed to go play on his birthday?! That would suck so much!” she exclaimed.

“I wouldn’t worry about that, little ones,” said a deep laughing voice as the big man entered the kitchen. “Uncle Max might be strict, but he isn’t inhumane. He’ll let Ymil play with you guys. I’m sure of it.”

“Dad!” shouted Mia and she ran towards the big man. “Did you finish it?”

Olaf smiled and pulled out a thin bracelet from behind his back. Both his children looked at it in amazement, the golden trinket was large enough to fit around one’s wrists and small purple emeralds were embedded within the intricate designs engraved on its surface.

“Here it is. We won’t know what its effect is until Ymil has bonded to it,” he said. He showed the piece to everyone and placed it in his rear pocket.

“We’ve got more pressing matters at hand though. This old man is hungry as a bear!” And the big man stalked into the kitchen.

That night, the Forgeron family ate something edible for the first time in a week.

—-

Ymil woke up with considerable effort. He’d been training none-stop for the past 6 days and his body ached from all the exercise. His body’s limits were being pushed to the max because Uncle Max thought it would be a valuable lesson, the body has its limits.

Even though his body was sore, his mind was razor sharp. He looked around his room and observed the scene. Judging from the amount of illumination and the direction of the shadows, it was no later than 7 o’clock in the morning.

“Got to ask Uncle Max to skip training today, he murmured and he jumped out of bed. Today was a special day and he wanted to celebrate it to the fullest.”Ymil picked some clean clothes from his closet and walked down the stairs into the living room. He really didn’t have the energy to run this morning.

Uncle Max was sitting on the sofa holding his soul formation, a book. It was a black covered tome with a red ruby sparkling on its front. It was in no way a weapon of destruction, but it was much more powerful than it appeared. For this book contained knowledge, all the knowledge Uncle Max had ever obtained in fact, and was stored in this form. His memories, his observations, and even his emotions were all stored in this seemingly inconspicuous tome.

As Ymil walked into the room, Uncle Max looked up and closed the book in his hands. Ymil was standing in front of his uncle, struggling to find the words to ask for a day off. What if uncle denied his request?

Seeing the boy’s struggle he smiled a bit. “Yes, boy, what is it?” And put down the book to show that the Ymil had his full attention.

“Erm… Uncle…” started Ymil, “Would it be possible to… like… get a day… uhm… off?” he looked at his uncle shyly.

“That depends,” replied Uncle, “on what you learned over the past six days.”

Ymil sighed, he knew what his uncle meant. Not only was the intense training meant to tax his body, he was supposed to observe his surroundings as much as possible. According to Uncle, knowledge was the true source of power.

“Off course I can, but it will cost you,” Ymil said and a smile appeared on his face.

Uncle laughed at this reply. “A day off isn’t enough for you? What else would you have me pay for this information?”

“I want the training to stop. It’s boring and I want to play with Ragnar and Mia. Allow me to play around until I go off to the Academy next month and I will give you all the details I uncovered,” Ymil said with satisfaction.

“That is a very big demand you make there, Ymil. Are you sure your info is worth it?”

“Without a doubt,” replied the boy and he crossed his arms. “I might have something about Olaf’s smithing technique.”

Uncle taught about this for a moment. He’d intended to keep training Ymil until he was sent off to Military Academy, but learning about the smith’s secret technique was too tempting of a chance for him to let up. Olaf was the only person in the entire country, if not continent, who could forge magically enchanted trinkets. Knowing his secret would open up a lot of possibilities.

“Alright, spill it. What did you learn?”

“First off there are the new cats that Mrs. Barnaby…” started Ymil.

“Not that part, Olaf’s technique!” interrupted Uncle. He didn’t even try to hide his interest in Olaf’s work.

“Oh, well, the details are fairly vague but I can give a rough description of the method,” said Ymil.

Ymil then proceeded to describe the Mjölnir Strike as he observed it. He had been eavesdropping form under a shut window and concentrated all of his energy into his hearing. The technique consisted of rhythmical beating and tampering while pouring spiritual energy into the tool used.

“How’d you know he was using spiritual energy?” asked Uncle.

“Using the technique you taught me. I felt a slight disturbance in energy around me and the only logical conclusion was that Olaf was using some,” replied Ymil. He’d been taught this technique to sense oncoming attacks from hidden opponents. Using spiritual energy always left some kind of trace and skilled practitioners could sense it. Uncle Max could even see the flow of energy itself.

“That’s good, carry on,” said Uncle. The boy hadn’t said anything he hadn’t learnt himself yet. He’d tried to observe the technique before as well, but failed.

“Well, that’s where it gets interesting,” said Ymil. “At some point Olaf sent out Ragnar so that he could work on the final part of the technique. After that, it’s all a blur, apparently I lost consciousness. All I remember is that a crackling sound suddenly rose from the room and light purple sparks flew from the window. It truly felt like an intensely strong attack.”

Uncle sighed. This had happened to him before as well. He’d hidden himself behind the door and heard the crackling, but then he too lost his consciousness. Even though it was only for a few seconds, it was already over when he came to. The lightning was new though, and he contemplated its meaning for a bit.

“Was that enough info to get me off the hook?!” asked Ymil.

Uncle Max looked at the boy for a bit and then replied, “Allright, I’ll stop the rigorous training until you go off to Military Academy.”

Ymil jumped in joy. “Huray! This is going to be the best birthday ever!” He started dancing around in the middle of the room.

“Hold your horses!” interjected Uncle quickly. “You still got to do your regular training. You get the day off once you’ve done 50 iterations of each of the five core moves.”

“Aw,” and Ymil hung his head in defeat. Fifty iterations of each move would take him quite a long time.

“But look on the bright side, once you’re done we’ll celebrate your birthday.”

This thought cheated the young boy up again. He finally got to play with his friends again, basic training was a small price to pay for this.

—-

It was well past noon when Ymil finished his training. The sun was shining high up in the sky and the summer heat was making all the villagers sweat. The entire village had gathered to celebrate Ymil’s birthday. All 52 inhabitants came to the central plaza to express their congratulations to the birthday boy and to chat with the other adults. They had each brought some food and a present to celebrate the birthday on one of the three children in the village.

There weren’t many children in the village, actually there were only Ragnar, Mia and Ymil, but that didn’t mean that the party was boring. The trio was playing tag, but because Ragnar and Ymil were faster than Mia it mainly consisted of her running after them as they kept calling her “little piglet” or “monkey brain”.

As evening fell, a large bonfire was lit and everyone gathered around. They all sat at tables facing the fire while eating from the various dishes every villager had made. Ymil sat next to Mia and Ragnar and was eating some delicious stew when Olaf approached their table. Seeing their father approach, Ragnar and Mia quickly grew quite.

“Hay there, boy,” said the big man with a jolly laugh, “I believe it’s time you got an awesome present.” And he produced a small yellow box from behind his back. He placed it on the table and looked Ymil in the eyes. “Happy birthday, hope you’ll find it useful.”

Ymil could already guess what was inside the box. He’d already observed the making of it in as much detail as he could, and considering Ragnar had gotten one for his birthday as well, it was only natural to come to the conclusion that he was getting the same.

But that didn’t mean he wasn’t excited about it, this present as unique for everyone and he’d never actually seen the finished product himself. He therefore greedily threw himself at the box and opened it with all his might. Ragnar and Mia were looking at this scene with huge grins on their faces because they already knew what it was.

“HELL YEAH!” shouted Ymil and he took out the item within. His eyes were sparkling brightly.

In his hand was a purple-golden bracelet. It was decorated with four purple emeralds and a strange curly pattern was etched all over the surface. The bonfire’s light danced over its surface hiding half the designs it featured in dark shadows. It looked magnificent.

“Well, boy, you might know this already, but that thing you’re holding is a Spirit Brace. It uses spiritual energy to help in some way or another, but its effects are dependent on the owner,” said Olaf. “Do you know how to claim its ownership?”

Of course he remembered.

“Yeah, I do. I’ll do it right away.” Ymil shaped his soul into a sharp white knife and pricked his finger tip on it. A small stream of blood came out and Ymil held his finger above the bracelet. A small droplet fell onto his present.

Small purple orbs appeared around it as the metal of the bracelet started to glow a soft purple light. The light was steadily growing brighter and started to float in mid air. The floating lights then fused with the bracelet and it started to shake violently. It flashed once more with a vivid purple light and then dropped back in Ymil’s hand.

“Woooooooow”, was Ymil’s reaction.

Everyone else was staring too. The entire party had gone silent and they were all looking in Ymil’s direction.

“Well now, looks like it worked splendidly,” commented Olaf. “How about you try the thing out?”

Ymil nodded and quickly put the bracelet on. It was slightly too big for him and upon seen that, Olaf commented, “You can adjust its size by pouring energy into its frame. Imagine it smaller.”

Ymil did just that and the bracelet shrunk in size.

Ragnar got excited as well. His Spirit Brace increased his strength significantly at the cost of constant energy consumption. He really wanted to know what this one did:

“So Ymil, what does it do?!” he asked impatiently.

Ymil shook his head, he had no idea. He didn’t feel any different.

“I have no idea. I feel completely normal…” he couldn’t help but feel slightly disappointed. What if the thing was a dud?

“Don’t worry, little one, it bonded with you therefore it must have some effect on you,” said Olaf. “Maybe you should test it out for a bit.”

Ragnar jumped up and said, “Fight me, Ymil! Maybe then we’ll see what it does!”

“Yes! Let’s do that!” Ymil said and he ran around the table to an open space near the fire. Ragnar followed him quickly and they stood in front of each other.

“Same rules as always: Single soul and no hitting the crotch,” said Ragnar. Ymil nodded.

Ragnar summoned his blue claymore and took a defensive position. His feet were facing his opponent.

Ymil’s hands suddenly wore two white gloves and he lifted his fists to his head. He was skipping in place, ready for any action.

“Alright!” thundered Olaf’s voice, “I shall be the ref for this fight. Just don’t kill each other and we’re all set to go.”

Olaf raised his hand. “On your mark…” Dropping his hand, he shouted, “Fight!”

At the signal both boys dashed towards each other. Ragnar was pointing his sword at Ymil’s body as he rushed in. He focused his center of gravity slightly forward in order to generate more speed as he leapt ahead. This was his standard opening strike.

Ymil, on the other hand, noticed something was wrong. As he ran towards his opponent, he noticed that his body was moving much slower than usual. It was not because he was tired from training, it felt more like his body had already hit the limit. Nevertheless, he approached Ragnar as fast as he could.

Right in front of each other, they came to a halt and Ragnar thrust at Ymil’s stomach. As Ymil anticipated this, he turned his body sideways by taking a step back with his left foot. Strangely enough, he was not quick enough to avoid the attack and the sword grazed the skin of his belly.

It was freezing cold but it wasn’t as bad as he remembered. He ignored the cut and proceeded to crouch down while Ragnar rushed past his body. He looked up at Ragnar’s body and punched upwards with his right arm, aiming at Ragnar’s face.

But Ragnar was initiating his next move. He’d used the momentum from his thrust to spin his entire body around. Before Ymil’s punch even began, he was already swinging his sword to aim at Ymil’s arm.

The punch hit empty space and Ymil jumped into the air. He’d seen Ragnar’s move countless times and was ready for it. As Ragnar’s sword spun around, Ymil jumped over the blade and jabbed Ragnar in the back. His opponent lost his balance and he tumbled forwards.

Wanting to follow Ragnar’s falling body, he quickly realized that Ragnar hadn’t stopped spinning, but it was too late. The ice cold blade hit him directly in the right shoulder.

Ymil cried out on impact, but quickly realized that he wasn’t hurt. The sword hadn’t cut his skin at all.

Ragnar had fallen to the ground and he was quickly scrambling to his feet. He resumed his defensive position as he faced Ymil again. Ymil also lifted his hands again and jumped slightly up and down. They stared at each other for a while.

It was Ragnar who took the initiative, he took a step forward and lifted his sword from his left hip to above his shoulder. Ymil reacted immediately and took a step to the left. It was obvious Ragnar was starting his spinning attack and Ymil knew that it left his sides open.

But the incoming attack wasn’t the spinning technique he knew. Instead of thrusting the sword back down in an arc, the blade curved over his head and a diagonal cut came right at Ymil’s shoulder. The boy saw the blade coming at him and lifted his hands to deflect the attack. But he was too slow and because of it the blade hit him squarely on the right arm.

“HALT!” yelled Olaf and he ran over to the duo. Such an attack would leave serious injuries on even the strongest of soldiers. This fight was meant to be a friendly spar, not a debilitating fight.

Ragnar was shocked too and quickly took a few steps back. He normally wouldn’t be able to hit his friend this easily. He was always too fast to react to all his motions. It’s true that he had just tried out a new move, but Ymil should have been able to block that easily.

“I’m fine, really!” said Ymil as he saw a worried Olaf running in their direction. “Looks like it’s just a small cut. See?” And he held out his arm.

Olaf looked at it and sighed in relief.

“Geez, boy, don’t scare us like that. It seriously looked like he had you.” Olaf said.

“But he did, that’s the cool part!” shrieked Ymil excitedly. “I think it’s the bracelet! I feel very slow, but at the same time it makes me a lot tougher!”

Ragnar was still uncertain.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked.

“Yeah! Just take a look yourself!” And Ymil ran towards Ragnar. Ragnar dropped his sword and it vanished in an instant. He observed the wound for a bit saw that it really was just a small cut.

“Wow, that’s quite the amazing ability then!” he said.

“Yeah, but it makes me really slow so I’m not too sure if it’s too handy…” Ymil was staring at the bracelet.

“That only means you have to train more, my boy,” said an ominous voice. Uncle Max suddenly materialized next to Ymil and looked at the wound. “You should thank the kind smith for this present.” His sudden appearance startled everyone besides Ymil, they never saw him come closer.

“Ah, that’s right!” exclaimed Ymil. “Thank you sooooooo much for such a wonderful gift, uncle Olaf!”

“It’s quite alright, Ymil, it seems only fair that you’d get one as well,” Olaf had a big gentle smile on his face. “Alright, I think you guys have sparred enough for tonight! I think we should go on to the final act!”

the boys looked at each other and nodded. It was clear that if the fight dragged on, Ragnar would have won. Unarmed fighting techniques just weren’t able to compete with weapons in terms of strength.

Mia, who had been watching the fight with amazement in her eyes, rushed towards Ymil’s side and grabbed his hand.

“That’s right, Ymil! You’ve got to dance tonight or else you won’t get a year older!”

it was tradition to dance around the large bonfire at the end of the evening to celebrate the fact that they were alive. The dance was accompanied by lively music and peculiar dance moves and it was customary to dance with someone of the opposite sex. Those that didn’t dance had to stand on the side and clap to the beat.

Mia pulled Ymil along and they settled in a bright spot next to the fire. They looked at each other, shadows flickering over their faces as they wait for the music to start. Ragnar went to the sides as he had nobody to dance with.

There was only a single instrument and one singer. As the guitar started to play its tune, Mia gave Ymil a short bow and he returned it. They started to dance in place, the hands swinging from side to side and their feet dancing tapping the ground on the beat of the music.

“You know, we should do this more often,” she said and she smiled.

“I’ll consider that after we’re done fumbling around,” he said with a large grin.

And then the music became alive. The dancing people were being caught up in the melodies, laughter coming for every participant. The crowd was clapping enthusiastically to the beat of the music.

Mia and Ymil were no exception, they were laughing loudly as they spun in place, hooked arms as they passed each other and their feet shuffled to the beat. They were dancing enthusiastically and were releasing all of their childish energies into the movements of their dance. There was no ‘true’ way to perform this dance, but that didn’t matter. As long as both dancers didn’t trip, it was all fine.

They were completely caught up in the moment, they didn’t notice the onlookers anymore, nor did they hear Ragnar’s cheering from the sidelines. They only saw each other as they wanted to outperform the other’s moves, unwilling to admit defeat.

—-

Two figures were looking at this scene from the side. The big one had a huge grin on his face as he was watching his girl twirling around the fire. The shadier looking one was looking gravely at the scene in front of him.

“You know, I seriously doubt your surname is Forgeron,” said the shady figure without looking away.

the big man also didn’t look away, but his grin became grim.

“I also don’t believe you’re an ordinary book clerk,” he replied.

“Touché.”

And they continued to watch the scene in silence.