DTK 37.1

I met Sandy in the morning after breakfast. Then we headed to meet Gerald.

His forge was running. We hadn’t seen him in a couple days — I know he mentioned off hand that his skill made him obsessive until he finished working on something. I think he had under sold what exactly that meant.

The forge that his family owned had no walls, letting the heat of the forge out. It had a roof to prevent rain, but today was windy, and it was blowing through the area around Gerald.

Gerald was muttering incessantly. Bob was no where to be found. The colder weather and overcast sky drove most people inside for the day. Except for Gerald, who was pounding at a metal rod.

“No… no, that’s wrong…” He said. One of his hands was wrapped around the burning hot metal, seemingly completely unphased, while the other hit it with a hammer.

I looked at Sandy. She looked back at me, one eyebrow raised.

The forge was in utter disarray.

Half slagged metal sat on the ground around Gerald, along with a half dozen imperfect halves of gigantic scissors. They featured a dozen different decorations; reliefs in the metal decorated the dark rods along the ground.

Piles of leather and leather scrap decorated a table in one corner, while another had a half dozen knives and cleavers stabbed into it.

“Gerald?” I asked, walking into the workshop. He was in a fugue state, focused so completely and totally on his work that he didn’t even seem to notice me calling his name. I had to step over lumps of half shaped metal or rods slagged into the floor.

Stepping around the side of him, I saw half of a gigantic scissor just past him on his right, leaning up against a wall. It was polished to a sheen, impressions of flowery filigree decorating it with leather wrapped shoddily around the handle. The blade seemed to be cutting into the stone beneath it.

I wondered what it was enchanted with.

“You okay buddy?” I asked Gerald, returning my attention to him.

He still didn’t seem to notice. I stepped up, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Gerald flinched, turning around and making eye contact with me. The burning hot rod he was carrying swung with him, and I flinched when it stopped in midair a few feet to my right.

I blinked.

The room was burning hot here, the heat of the furnace radiating off of it and overcoming the chill of the wind.

“Gwen.” Gerald said, blinking. “Gwen!” He shouted this time, eyes sparkling, the gleam behind them partially manic.

“Gerald.” I said, taking a step back.

“I didn’t expect to see you so soon! I…” He swung the metal rod as he spoke, turning around to look at the half of the scissor he had made. “That wasn’t ready for you to see yet! Oh!” He said the last word as he noticed the metal rod in his hand, stepping over to dunk it into a bucket of water where he left it. Steam boiled up around it, filling a quarter of the room and clinging to Gerald’s skin.

He blinked the water out of his eyes. Scalding hot droplets clung to his skin, his head steaming.

“Are you… alright?” I asked.

Sandy stepped passed me from behind.

“I’m amazing! This is the best I’ve felt in weeks!”

I flinched as Gerald put his hands on my shoulders. They were also wet from the steam. I gently removed his hands and he pulled them away, leaving a soot stain on my shoulders.

“Oops. Sorry.” He said. “I uh — don’t touch that!” 

Gerald suddenly turned and shouted behind me to Sandy. I heard a scream and flipped around, getting ready to start activating [Quick Change.]

Sandy’s hand was on a screaming blade, a gigantic cleaver that began to sink deeper into the wooden table. She flinched back and the blade stopped vibrating and screaming, though she was shaking her hand as if the blade had bit her.

“You alright?” I asked, stepping toward Sandy.

“Yeah, but the damn thing took a point of mana. Gerald, what the hell are… all of these?”

There must have been a dozen blades on the table, including the gigantic cleaver. Sandy had reached for the biggest. Gerald made a non-committed grunt and stepped toward the table, grabbing and flinging the screaming sword to the side quickly. It split the stone floor where it landed, sinking just an inch into the ground to remain upright.

“I… made a few knives for you. You can see some of them didn’t quite work out. That one ended up having a… side effect. [Buzzing Blade.] Vibrates really fast. Also makes a horrible sound if you don’t optimize the shape of the blade. I have to figure out how to restructure that one so it isn’t screaming…”

As he spoke, he looked over the blades.

“Only one of them is worth while. But which one… this one?” He asked, grabbing a cleaver that was half embedded into the table. “Oh oops. Oh shit.”

The cleaver went from dull gray to red hot in a few seconds.

“Oh shit oh shit oh shit — ” Gerald pushed past me, flinging the knife into the bucket of water right as it started to vibrate and hum. There was a splash and then an even bigger explosion of steam.

Gerald stepped back from the steaming bucket.

“What was that?” I asked. “A heat enchantment?”

“Yes! But I couldn’t find a way to turn it off and on.”

“Gerald, how long have you been crafting?” Sandy asked.

“Huh? Oh. Is that the sun?” He was staring passed us and outside the little outdoor forge. “What day is it?”

Gerald had been at this for multiple days. We hadn’t passed by since we hadn’t been to the center of town. My jaw was slackened.

“Are the rest of these fucking bombs too?” Sandy asked.

“No! None of them are explosive. I tried, though. An enchantment to stab something and make it explode. Sounds helpful, right?” Gerald said, walking back to the table.

“No! It doesn’t! We need the monsters in one piece. We can’t build armor out of scraps!”

Gerald ignored her, grabbing an axe from the table.

“I tried to enchant this one with [Gravity Resistance] but it…” he pulled the blade out of where it was sunken into the wood. Immediately, it started to float upwards from his hand, until he was holding it above his head. He had to grab it with both hands to stab it back into the table, which bounced when he slapped it down. “Yeah.”

“Floating metal seems to be a recurring theme for you.” Sandy said.

“Well… yeah. But now, the good stuff!” Gerald said, lifting up a chefs knife that was just sitting on the table. The blade was a bright, shining silver, polished to a shining edge. Gerald gestured with it as he talked. “This one is enchanted with a — oops.”

His casual flick of the rest projected a visible aura of light that shot out and sliced the table in half. One half of it clattered to the floor with the weapons on it. The other half floated towards the ceiling with the axe embedded in it.

“Uh…” Gerald said.

“Gerald? You alright, dear?” His mom asked, slowly pushing open the door that led from the forge to inside the house. She looked at Gerald, who was still steaming. Then she looked at the floating table. Then she made eye contact with me. Finally, the door slowly swung closed as she retreated back inside.

“Don’t point that at me.” Sandy said, stepping back as Gerald started to talk again.

“Right. Right.” He said, stepping across to the table covered in leather scraps until he pulled out a boiled-leather sheathe embellished with complex designs and put the blade inside of it. Then he looked at the table scraping the roof of his dads workshop, seeming to consider it. “Did you bring any rope with you?” He asked.

It took a combined effort between the three of us and a few minutes to get the table back to the ground. Gerald tied the axe to one of the pillars holding the roof up, leaving it floating and bobbing in the wind like a balloon. It looked more than a little dangerous.

“So… is this for me?” I asked, reaching out to grab the handle of the giant half of a scissor blade before thinking better of it. Who knew if this one would really explode or not?

“Yes! But its no good without its other half.” Gerald said. “And I haven’t been able to forge another half with the right enchantment.”

“Do you attach the enchantment before you finish forging it?”

Gerald shrugged.

“They both kinda happen at once.”

“Gerald?” Sandy asked. She was holding the sheathed chefs knife in her hand.“What does this knife do?”