Caeden could see the sweat and grime on his uncle's body. He’d worked practically nonstop in the forge for the last three weeks. Almost a year of downtime had left him far out of practice. Unc needed time to get back into peak condition. Of course, Caeden had fully agreed. He’d done his own forging work in the Academy forges like he used to before claiming the Hearthhome.

To fuel both of their recovering skills, Caeden had been using the ether and magical materials granted to him for free by the school. Under normal circumstances, it was a policy meant to help develop aspiring ethersmiths, as the biggest barrier to entry was the cost of the raw materials. For most continental students, the Academy footing that cost was their only way to enter the field.

But Caeden had arrived at the Academy with Master level ethersmithing skills. He had no need to learn through the arduous process of failing over and over again, wasting those materials. Instead, he had put them to work, making large quantities of infused weapons and armor for the members of the Forged. All of it on the Academy’s dime.

At first, he had been skeptical and a little guilty about abusing all those valuable materials. Though he had no intention of stopping, not when he was using them to help people. But later on the master of the Academy forge told him that he was not the first student to enter the Academy already trained in ethersmithing. Caeden was the most skilled of them, but only by a small margin. All those previous students had been given the same privileges.

The way the forge master explained it, this was an advantage given to acknowledge those shrouded’s efforts. After all, gaining significant smithing skills at such a young age was an exceptional feat. The Headmaster had felt that penalizing those efforts went against the tenants of the school. After all, this was a place where the strong and resourceful were given ever more resources to thrive. Someone that had achieved such a high level of ethersmithing would have to be one or both.

When Unc’s injuries were healed, Caeden started feeding those resources to him. Normally, this would be unacceptable. Students were allowed to use the Academy’s resources for their own forging, and the infused items they created were their own to sell or give at their discretion. But the raw materials were never meant to be handed out to others. After all, if it were allowed, any student could enter the forging department, take all the resources for free and resell them without ever putting any effort toward learning the craft. It would subvert the entire point of the program.

In this, Caeden was once again lucky that he had met Cat. Damon’s love for his granddaughter had caused him to bet big on Caeden and his friends. As such, he had told the forge master to look the other way regarding Caeden’s ‘requisitioning’ of materials. As such, Unc had a steady, practically endless, supply of ether and magical materials to work with. It was an ethersmith's paradise and exactly the environment needed for him to recover his old skills after such a long downtime.

All of this led up to today, a week after Caeden and his friends passed the qualifying tests for the Tournament of Powers. Caeden couldn’t help but feel both nervous and elated.

“Caeden, It’s time to see what you can do.” Unc’s smile was clearly visible, even through the mass of hair covering his face.

“Does that mean you’ve fully recovered?” Caeden couldn’t stop the massive grin, big enough to match his uncle’s. It had been so long since the two of them forged together, and Caeden could hardly wait.

“Of course. Who do you take me for? I’ve been holed up in such an excellent forge with an endless supply of every material I could ever want! Honestly, the fact that it took me a full three weeks to get back to my old standard makes me ashamed to call myself a master!” Unc laughed uproariously. “Now, get to forging. I want to see how far my nephew has progressed. It’s been three years since I’ve seen you forge. I expect to see some improvement.”

Caeden nodded. Despite the nervousness of such a test trying to creep in, most of his mind was occupied with an overwhelming sense of relief as he started setting up the forge to suit himself. Just as much as healing his uncle’s injuries, Caeden had been worried about Unc regaining his skills.

Spending an entire year essentially incapable of being independent, having to rely on others for everything. It could put pressure on anyone. For someone as competent and independent as Unc, Caeden was sure it was a special kind of hell. Some part of him had worried that his time in invalid care would cause Unc to lose his skills. The kind of loss of confidence in one’s self that no healing could fix.

It would have been worse than death for someone who had devoted their whole life to the forge. If Unc had lost confidence in his hammer, Caeden wasn’t sure he’d have survived it. Despite Unc’s laughter, he could tell that these three weeks had scared him. He must have spent too many days wondering if he could ever be the ethersmith he was before that explosion.

Luckily, he pushed through. Despite his worries, Caeden wasn’t actually surprised. His uncle had always been strong-willed and stable. A boulder of a man. He was just glad to confirm what he had always known. Nothing would keep Unc down for long.

Focusing back on the forge, Caeden finally put some thought into what he would do for this impromptu test. He wondered if it would be more appropriate to make something he couldn’t have when he was last in Unc’s forge, or show his progress with an old design optimized beyond his previous limits.

After a moment of thought, he chose the second option. Making something new, like Lily’s independent infuser gloves, Chillvein and Frostbreak, would be impressive. But it wouldn’t be a proper show of his advancement in his time away from his uncle’s teachings. He needed to show his progress.

So, rather than do anything even slightly new, he chose to make something he knew very well. Something he’d made a thousand times that his uncle knew as well.

He was going to make a plow head.

Caeden had made literally thousands of them, both when he worked under Unc and afterward. What better way to showcase how much his core skills than something they both knew so well? In a certain sense, it was the only way to truly showcase how much skill he’d gained.

At that thought, Caeden was glad he hadn’t slacked on his remedial training, even with all the preparation for the Tournament of Powers. He’d shaken off six months of rust built up during the monster hunting expedition almost a week ago. Since then, he’d been refining himself.

Honestly, Caeden was also curious about how much he’d progressed. After all, judging one's own gradual progress with a craft is hard unless you look back at older works. Caeden hadn’t had the opportunity, seeing as all his old creations were on his home continent, many weeks away.

This would be a good opportunity for him as well. He wanted to see how much he’d improved just as much as Unc did.

With all that in mind, Caeden’s plan was formed. The steps laid out. Quickly, he selects his base material and the necessary ether, getting the forge going and adding ether to the flame. For his material, Caeden had selected low-quality iron with many impurities. This was on purpose. Neither a magical material nor a high-quality one; only his skills could draw out its potential.

Of course, part of an ethersmiths skill, a large part, was knowledge. He didn’t just choose low-quality iron for a challenge. No matter how low-quality, wasting materials was an ethersmith’s shame. Unc had taught him a long time ago that anyone who used suboptimal materials simply to showcase skill was a poor smith, undeserving of the craft.

No, he chose this impure iron for its strong affinity with the ether flame he would use. He stoked the fire, checking with the equipment and his shroud to make sure he had reached the appropriate temperature. He would need a high heat for this piece. Eventually, the fire surpassed 2,000 degrees (Fahrenheit. 1,093 Celsius). He needed such an intense flame because the ether he chose was very stable. It took a lot to melt it down and meld its Ki into the fire.

Earth ether. A dirty brown chunk of crystal. He threw it into the fire in fist-sized chunks, making sure to space them out within the flames. He would need an even ether distribution. Earth ether was a stubborn material, difficult to deal with. Its high stability made it unresponsive to most methods of refining, so directly melting it was the most viable infusion method.

Not to say it was easy. Earth ether’s melting point and evaporation point were very close, within a hundred degrees of each other. Caeden had to maintain careful control of the forge to make sure the ether melted into the fire without vaporizing. If it did, he’d lose large portions of the material, requiring more ether to achieve the same effect. A waste.

When he was working with temperature as high as he was, a difference of 100 degrees existed all the time. Portions of the forge could fluctuate by even wider margins based on fuel consumption and air supply. He spent considerable attention using Sharp to segregate the forge as needed to ensure the Earth ether remained at the optimal temperature.

Eventually, the flames had properly integrated the ether, taking on a dark brown hue with hints of red at the tips of the flames. Caeden estimated he’d lost less than 10% of the ether to evaporation, an outcome he could be proud of. Now, it was time to heat the iron.

Using tongs made entirely of manifested Sharp, Caeden picked up the hunk of iron and moved it into the heart of the flame. The iron would take nearly an hour to heat. Adding Earth ether to the flame lowered the effective temperature. Of course, Caeden could have heated it back up, but the lower temp gave the ether more time to permeate the iron as it heated. This permeation was a slow process with Earth ether, so the added time was necessary. Caeden would stop every minute or so for that hour to check the permeation and heating progress of the iron, making sure they were happening at the same pace. He wanted the iron to be ready for shaping at the same moment the desired level of permeation was reached.

But he was not idle while this was happening. Instead, in between checks, Caeden was preparing the other ether type he would need for the plow head. Again, the process was simple but required care and skill to do perfectly. Caeden took several smaller pieces of Plant ether and placed them in a mortar.

Like most ether, Plant ether looked like some kind of crystal. It had a brilliant emerald hue, and if placed in front of a bright light, flecks of brown, yellow, and purple could be seen. Despite its appearance, Plant ether actually had a soft, moldable texture rather than being rigid or brittle. This made grinding it down into the small particles he needed difficult.

Grinding down Plant ether was all about pressure. Too much, and the ether would paste. Too little, and it would break down into chunks too large to be useful. Caeden had to work carefully to form grains of ether no bigger than rice. Surprisingly, if he had tried to cut the ether into chunks instead of grinding it, the pieces would have reconnected when placed close together. Just one of the many quirks ether could have.

After almost an hour of careful grinding, he had the nearly two hundred grains of ether that he needed. The last thing he needed to do was dump a brick of Water Ether into his quenching barrel. No skill needed, just drop the sucker in and stir. A few minutes later and he had glowing blue water. Now, everything was ready.

The heating done, Caeden once again used tongs of Sharp to draw out his glowing red iron. This was the point where the impurities of the low-quality iron showed their true value. Pure iron would have taken multiple sequential heatings to absorb the same quantity of Earth ether currently in this ingot. The various impurities accelerated the absorption. Even better, the main purpose of the Earth ether was to reinforce the iron, adding to its durability. This process was also reinforced by the impurities, meaning that this iron was more durable than pure iron that had undergone an even longer heating and permeation.

Finally, Caeden unhooked Forged Infinity from his sash as he lowered the hunk of iron to the anvil. His shrouded weapon transitioned to 007, the hammer. Now, Caeden would have to show the skills that really mattered, his adopted family’s resonance technique. The Hammer of One Hundred Hands.

Without hesitation, Caeden used Sharp to place grains of Plant ether onto the iron at specific points along the metal. Following those grains, his hammer blows began to rain down in a steady rhythm, dancing across the metal in an elegant waltz. This was the ninth hand, blossoming willow.

Enhancing his strength, Caeden used Sharp to position the Plant grains at the necessary locations just before his hammer beat them into the iron. Rapidly, the iron’s shape began to shift under his heavy blows. It split, forming the v-shaped plow head as he went. He could feel the resonance growing as he continued to force the Plant ether to mix with the Earth ether already in the iron.

Like seeds being buried deep in soil, the grains of plant ether began to spread out roots through the metal, connecting to each other. Over the course of half an hour, Caeden hammered away. The iron remained malleable, the Earth ether trapping the heat and preventing it from hardening.

Caeden had to place the Plant grains right before his blows landed; otherwise, the hot metal would burn it into Ash ether. It was an effort of precision and timing. At the end of his half-hour, the 183 Plant grains had successfully been added, and Caeden had finished his plow head. The only thing left was to water the seeds.

Unceremoniously, Caeden tossed the infused plow head into the quenching barrel, listening to the slow and steady hiss of the heat leeching out and the Water weather leeching in.

Turning to Unc, he asked. “So, how did I do?”

Unc smiled widely.