“Well it’s not like the ring is too bad, you just shouldn’t sell yourself short so early, as any of the houses would offer you patronage since you’re my apprentice. There are 4 main houses who mostly run the merchant’s guild, the Borgia, the Sigvard, the Magus Servir and the Nemean. They’re all about as rich as each other, but each focuses in a different aspect, the Borgia specialise in heavy armour, holy rituals and artefacts, their shops center mostly around kingdoms with a high focus on faith or honour. The Sigvard specialise in weapons, medium armour and monster parts, their shops are mostly in lands famous for hunting or militaristic nations. The Magus Servir focus on magical ingredients and tools, for instance the enchanted clothing and staves they use often come from the Magus Servir, their stores center on anywhere with a magic academy, or nations known for spending on magical research. Though these three often support any store that fit’s their motives, for instance in the consecrated holy land known as Estariel where many paladin’s train the Borgia have a store, it often gets products from the master dwarven smith Rotdram Heartforge, his store is counted as a member of the Borgia and their discount would also apply there."

“So lastly is the Nemean toy lions, they’re the descendant of a great halfling adventurer, they start off peddling and exploring the world, and then when they have the money and find a nice enough place they make a store, which is often empty because they soon get the thirst for adventure again. Yet even without a set store they rival the other three houses, who often sell to armies, the answer is while exploring they often find amazing things, they often get large amounts of gold from single items to private sellers. They’re quite an interesting lot too, you know I’m a friend of their current clan leader, he actually made me his patron after I ‘saved’ him from the hoard of a dragon, not a higher dragon mind you, if you meet a dragon who can talk try your best not to offend him and run, it was just a child who had just left the nest, minor dragons are as dumb as beasts so it wasn’t a problem, but don’t kill the kid of a higher dragon, a lot of higher beings can only have one child so they often get really protective.”

A smile full of nostalgia crept up on his face.

“Anyways, half his hair was curly and singed from the dragon’s fire, he thanked me for saving his life and gave me his ring, he said he didn’t loot anything from the hoard, and I’m good at reading people, he just had a knife from it to hand, ‘to try and protect himself, when he heard something coming’. Later that night we were at the same tavern and we had a bet, if he could drink me under the table he would get to keep the dagger as a memento, if he won he would give me something good from his inventory. I don’t know where the bugger put it all away, but eventually I passed out, while he was grinning ominously. I woke up the next morning in my bed, a note from him with a pair of magical earing as a gift, from the hoard and the earrings I made about 2500 gold, the next time I met him, I found out he made 5 times that amount on the dagger.”

The old man let out a hearty laugh.

“So yeah, if you’re gonna use that ring before you do, try to get something good out of it, from the halfling’s exotic goods, for the Nemean that ring is the most important thing to them, because it marks a customer, whoever gave you the ring has a good eye, ‘caus someone of your level of talent often gets good things to sell and buys their more exotic goods.”

“Master I just have a few more questions before I go, my sword mastery is maxed at beginner and won’t improve, what do I need to do, I found an egg, is there any way to hatch it, and I found an elven bow in need of repair, do you know any elven craftsmen who could do it?”

“For now don’t worry about your sword mastery, you need to have a class before you can improve any skill past beginner, but to make the breakthrough you’ll have to realise something about the sword to make intermediate, it’s a measurement of your skill with the sword, not just how much you’ve swung it, otherwise every man would be a grandmaster, with some skills though you can evolve them, they’ll change and go back to beginner one but it will be a better skill, riding is one, if your class allows it I can teach you mounted combat, but I won’t baby you past beginner, you gotta be a man and find your own way, though if you wanna learn more about magic pay a quick visit to Phenatos.”

“The egg is quite simple, if it’s a monster egg, quite a few types of monsters lay eggs, these eggs hatch by absorbing experience, while in the nest they will passively absorb experience from their mother until they hatch, however if they are stolen from the nest this can no longer goes on and it begins to slowly lose all the experience, at this point it can be fed with experience by the person holding the egg, this happens naturally and there isn’t a penalty to doing it, it won’t die if it doesn’t get experience though, it’ll go into a dormant state until it starts being fed with experience.”

“Repairing your bow will be a bit trickier.”

He actually slightly scowled.

“I do know where you can repair the bow, but I’m oath bound not to reveal or take anyone there, the elves are a distrustful of outsiders, you can only go there on the word of a citizen or if they take you there, it’s been said wanderers have managed to find themselves there, but are turned away at the gates, you see a true elven bowyer can never leave their homeland, a kingdom hidden from mortals by an ancient magic, and that’s the only place you’ll find someone who can repair a true elven bow, which is a living weapon that grows with its user, though it only grows in the hands of an elf.”

Quest received: Find the hidden Kingdom of Elves

The elves are a race that are actually quite well spread, they have villages in many human kingdom forests and they integrate with humans quite well. However there is a hidden kingdom of elves somewhere on the continent that can only be found with the help of a citizen.

Difficulty: B

Find a citizen of the kingdom of elves

Find the hidden kingdom of elves

Rewards: Access to elven bowyers for elves, ????

Quest cannot be declined

Hmmm it’s a shame that I couldn’t use the bow itself, well at least not to its full potential, but it seems that it’s something much better than what it is right now, I think I would have to make an elf friend at some point.

“Thank you master, for now I think I’ll go try to find something to fight the undead with.”

My master nodded and I promptly left to head to the marketplace in the south.

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As I was walking through the marketplace I saw a familiar face sitting behind a red carpet with various small trinkets on it, he was still wearing his large backpack.

“Ah Sir Ezekiel, do come have a good look at my wares, I’m sure I can find something to amuse you.”

“I’m looking for something a bit more specialized, I need to fight the undead.”

A glint appeared in his eyes.

“You’re looking for a silver sword, it’s quite a rare thing, hardly anyone bothers to make them, warriors just use blunt weapons, and paladins can coat their swords in holy magic. However I have something several times better.

He pulled a sword out of his bag, it was actually very plain, a simple handle and cross guard, just a basic straight blade, it was almost identical to my steel sword but the colour was a good deal shinier."

“This wasn’t really for sale, my grandfather won it in a bet and he gave it to me as a good luck charm when I started my journey, this sword is unlike any other, the reason being that it’s indestructible, over time it reforms to its original state, even if shattered it reforms, though you can speed the process up by giving it mana, the sword also invalidates any immunities not just the undead, devils, adamantine and even barriers too, the only problem is that when the blacksmith forged it he was an amateur so the sword itself isn’t great and it can’t be changed, not re-forged into a better sword or amour, nor sharpened, it’s forever stuck as a beginner’s blade, it’s a shame that such a precious blade will never reach its full potential, so I’m more than glad to sell it you who could use it meaningfully in battle, not just because it’s good metal.”

This sword was created when a talented amateur blacksmith found the metal left behind by a falling star, it was a paradox, the metal was both burning hot, yet freezing cold, hard as the hardest metal yet seemingly made of water. Against his master’s advice of improving his skills first, the boy with dreams of forging a legendary sword attempted to forge the sword, and surprisingly he succeeded both in forging the metal and forging a legend. The boy had learnt much of the secrets of forging metal and his talent grew faster than anyone else, eventually reaching master tier, but the boy had wasted his chance of forging a legendary sword that could elevate him to the level of grandmaster, only a legendary sword that would teach young blacksmiths the meaning of patience, as never again did he receive that chance. Eventually he said goodbye to his folly in a drinking match, to this day no one knows how a hobbit beat a dwarf in a drinking match.

The Blacksmith’s Folly (Unique)

Two Handed Sword

Rank C

Damage :60 Durability 400/400

(Quicksilver):

This sword ignores damage immunities

This sword will always attempt to return to its soul’s form

This sword will slowly repair itself

If item reaches 0 durability can be repaired by expending mana equal to max durability to bring it back to 1 durability, otherwise it will slowly reform.

Checking my own sword, after days of hunting it was at 67 durability, this sword would be useful but it would fall off hard as its damage was not that much better than my steel sword, it also looked expensive since I had never seen a unique item.

“You’ve got me interested, but how much?”

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Two things guys this is marked 18+, so sex scenes coming up, vote in the poll as how you would prefer them, poll may or may not have an effect on what I do, vote seriously though, I will likely rewrite if people fell really strongly one way about it, for the guy asking about romance that's later ofc.

Other thing is I have this mundo chapter that's about 3 times the size of some of the shorter chapters, you want me to split it up into two or do you just want big surprise at some point? Vote a second time in the poll for this, this will most likely make up my decision since I'm torn between the two.