blacksmithoftheapocalypse

100. The Exam (3)

The caravan didn´t celebrate for long. The adventurers got back in formation and the caravan hurried along. They needed to keep going to reach the next spot for camping. The dwarves had created several checkpoints along the trade route where they either cut completely new halls into the mountains or expanded existing caves and caverns. In these places, everyone from single travelers to big merchant caravans like theirs could stay the night without having to fear a wyvern attack.

Their ...

99. The Exam (2)

Above them circled three young wyverns. As relatives of the dragon race, their skin was densely covered in scales. Unlike a dragon who had 4 legs and two wings, their front legs had turned into wings, like a bat or a pterosaur. Their hind legs were big talons like a raptor´s to grab their prey. Only their head looked like a real dragons with piercing sharp eyes and long teeth like daggers. The only silver lining was that they had lost their dragon breath, so their attacks were purely physica...

98. The Exam

On the morning of the day of the exam, all adventurers taking part in the quest assembled at the great gates of Ora. The Merchant Caravan was already waiting outside the city. It was a long row of carts and covered wagons with traders and drivers already waiting. Seth wore his new jacket and the serpent bone armor on top. The others had explained to him, that as escorts they had to be ready at all times. There was no coming back if you got caught off-guard without wearing your armor.

He...

97. Before the Exam (2)

Seth's eyes almost fell out of his face. This jacket alone rivaled the performance of the serpent armor! And he could combine them. The smooth metallic fabric felt cool under his touch. The inside was lined with a different warm making it unnecessary to wear any clothes below the cloth armor.

He equipped the jacket and was almost unable to feel its weight. Even so, it was weaved from metal with several layers and quilted, it felt no bit heavier or more cumbersome than his ordinary cloth...

96. Before the Exam

The following days leading up to the exam were dominated by fighting in dungeons and working on his teamwork with “Yulecat’s Fur”. They slowly started to fight in more dangerous dungeons and Seth and the group got used to each other. In the time Seth worked with the adventurer party he realized how hard-pressed for money adventurers actually were.

Without a well-paid quest, they could only grind the monsters in dungeons and sell the drops. The money they made in this barely justif...

95.Setting up shop

Marn visited him in the evening a day later and brought the papers he had to sign to take over the shop. Of course, Seth read them, before he signed them. He finally had a shop! This meant he could test Cerberus!

He was too excited to wait for tomorrow, especially since he was scheduled for another dungeon dive with the party. Seth left Puffles at the inn to sleep and followed Marn back to the shop. The Half-elf didn´t know what Seth planned to do but dutifully led the way. After all, ...

94. Settling some Debts

Marn explained to him, that Mr. J was the loan shark he had gotten the money for the shop from. He was one of many shady businessmen on the third underground level, the black market. Seth collected the stolen weapons from the thugs and ordered them to lead him to Mr. J’s place.

The three thugs led them down some dirty staircase into the lowest underground level. This level was not officially made, but hewn into the bedrock by people looking for a place to stay. As such it had a lot mo...

93. A Workshop

Seth felt only a little bad about leaving their big, expensive hotel room to Puffles and spending the nights with mina in some cheap inn rooms.

Today he did not join the team on the raid and decided to visit the commercial district with the Ivicer. After he managed to part from the horny- no, the impassionate cat girl he returned to the Inn for a shower, a meal, and to pick up the caterpillar.

The two leisurely walked around Ora. They had already spent some time in the city, but t...

92. Cerberus

An Assistant? Seth was alone on the wide and quiet graveyard,  so he summoned the whole smithy to see what it looked like.  Among the different crafting stations, Seth already knew towered a humongous figure. At first, it reminded him of Anubis as the three-meter-tall giant was a muscular dog-headed statue.  On the second look, unlike Anubis, the golem had 3 dog-faces reminding him of a buddha lycanthrope.

The information came to his mind as he inspected the “assistant�...

91. Bloodslaves

A horde of Ghouls, humanoid creatures with hunched backs and long sharp claws, was banging onto the thin light membrane Puffles had summoned on the door. While the barrier was still holding Seth decided to chuck his throwing knives into the crowd. It was simply faster than using his bow to shoot them in close range. But the ghoul's reactions were unbelievably fast and while some evaded his attack one even caught the throwing knife with its mouth and bit it into pieces!

His attacks did s...

90.Party Play (2)

His feet slightly sank into the soft dark earth of the 6th floor. The floor was dark, but thanks to his pendant he saw everything clearly.  Still, it was Mina that was the first to find a monster. With a <Shadow Step> she had vanished from their formation. With a shout, a big spider with spindly legs and a big bulbous butt fell on the path. It was black with purple markings and had big wound bleeding with yellowish clear blood on its behind. Mina had brought it into the open with a...

89. Party Play

“I´m staying at “The Lucky Miner”

They had just finished their meal, with everyone being close to falling into a food coma. Before they left and split up again, the conversation led to their plans for tomorrow, where to meet. As Seth was still new to Ora, he suggested meeting at the inn he was staying at.

“The Lucky Miner!? Isn´t that the expensive inn at the elven square?” Lixiss exclaimed. She had a rather cold attitude until now but it suddenly changed now.

�...

88. Meeting Again

The girl that suddenly appeared acted like nothing was wrong. Seth on the other hand felt rather awkward. A girl he did not remember the name of, from a one-night-stand he was paid for, suddenly appeared when he was eating in a fancy restaurant and talked to him. It was an understatement to say, that he did not know how to react.

“It must be fate!” she said and joined them at his table as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

“Are you here to celebrate, too? Where´...

87. Ivicer's Name

In the evening they finally left the smelly dungeon. Unfortunately, the smell had already stuck their bodies. A rigorous bath was desperately needed! They returned directly to their inn to get exactly that.

At least this torture was not for naught. The Ivicer had reached a proud lv.6 and its magic improved. It was now able to even kill those lv.7 raccoons and learned how to create a light shield and a basic healing spell. It still lacked Fin´s iron fist, but it might be able to take on...

86. Performance Test

Seth had 2 Weeks until the exam and quite a few things to do. As the receptionist had explained, the exam would be a B-Rank quest under the guidance of an experienced examiner. A B-Rank quest could easily take several weeks on its own. He would have to make preparations for his journey and look for a shop to sell his weapons.

He still had a few leftovers, that he did not sell via the auction house yet. He had actually made quite a sum with the uncommon snake weapons selling them for 4-6...

85. New Beginnings

The bright light of the morning sun that fell in through the windows woke him up and hurt in his hung-over eyes.  it was a tiny window and the light fell into a tiny room right below the roof of an inn. The place was sparsely decorated with the bed he lay in, a cupboard, and a table with a chair. Clothes were randomly spread on the floor.

Something soft was pressing against his chest and his right hand caressed a smooth back when he tried to move. He had an educated guess but was s...

84. Parting Ways

Seth's jaw fell open and he didn´t know what to say.

“My father sent me a letter. He says it´s important that I return as soon as possible and I- I...”

She had dropped her cute act. She tried to hold back, but big tears welled up in her dark eyes. She bit down on her trembling lips.

“Hey... “, he lifted his hand to ...yeah what? Stroke her? As he stood cluelessly she rushed into his chest and firmly grabbed onto his shirt. She started sobbing with big tears and sno...

83. Ora

Finally, they reached Ora, the great dwarven city at the foot of the mountain range. Almost 4 months for a journey that he had not planned in the first place. The airship had done many stops in between and Seth had used to chance to actually enjoy this different world. His knowledge of materials had not grown a lot, but his <Blacksmith (Adept)> had reached level 4 and he had become accustomed to the system institutes like the Auctioneers.

But today was the day his stumbling in the...

82. Good byes

In the following weeks, Seth alternated between forging the snake materials until his mana ran out and spending time with Fin, Sarina, and the little Ivicer.

One of these days the little Ivicer suddenly popped out of the pet space when was just having a short break from forging.

“Seth, Seth! I finally did it!”, it said excitedly. Surprised the blacksmith asked the caterpillar what he had done.

“Didn´t you ask me some time ago about Holy Gold? I can finally make it now...

81. Spirit Forging

Seth had 8 attribute points and decided to put them all into intelligence. He felt good with the rest of his attributes, so it did not hurt increasing his INT to 28. Still, this meant he could only forge the tooth for 36 minutes.

He also tried to see how much he needed to forge the snake ribs he had. The effect it had on the ribs was tremendous and so was the mana consumption. Forging bones got rid of the porous structure within the bone and made it solid like ivory. This huge change co...

80. Rina

Sarina woke up in an unfamiliar room. She had gotten used to the tiny room she had lived in with Uncle Ben for the last two weeks. Uncle Ben had visited them when her mother had become sick. He was a friend of her father and his sworn brother. He had told her a lot of stories about her dad and their adventures when they were still young. Sarina had never met her father herself. She had lived her whole life with her mother in a small estate in the grasslands. Uncle Ben told her that her father...

79. A new Quest

Towering over the corpse of one of her own men was the busty leader of the bandits.

“We really shouldn´t have brought amateurs on this mission”, she said looking down on the guy who had babbled something about a “burning savage” or whatever.

“But Boss, it wouldn´t be believable, if there were no actually bandits among us. Isn't it fine that some of the cannon fodder died? It just helps to make this look more believable.”

“hmm, you are right. The nobles formin...

78. Hunt

Seth was sure he felt a vein bursting in his head. What was up with that title?! It was great that his <Fire Affection> leveled up, but what was that title?

"What´s wrong?", the little fairy asked looking away with a beet-red face.

Fin had a hard time sleeping listening to the screams of a man burning alive. She had no problems with the sound of screams in general, but it was just really loud. She decided to leave the bed and found naked Seth all grumpy, entering their room...

77. Burning Savage

A huge flying creature resembling armored manta rays were circling the zeppelin-like airship in the night sky. A band of burly men in ragged-looking armors and jackets was standing on their backs. The beasts were controlled by hooded riders whose faces could not be recognized.

A beauty lifting a sparkling cutlass and signaled the men to attack. She wore a tight uniform resembling a naval admiral that could barely tame her busty figure and a warm fur coat on top.

In complete silenc...

Ivicer`s Name

Don´t really know what name to give it. I think Puffles would be funny. Papi Troilus would be a reference to what he looks like at the moment.

76. Charon´s Obol

It was finally time for Seth to make his own hammer. This was a step any blacksmith would have to make, to really graduate from being a beginner. The process was like a ritual. In the case of Charon´s Obol, it really was ritual!

The blueprint for this hammer was special. It was not an option he could just click and use to train the process of making a workpiece like the other blueprints. He could only use this once and it had no guiding function. It came with instructions for the assem...

75. Rank up

It was a bright day and they could see the sea off in the distance from the terminal of the airport. The ship had arrived this morning and was now ready for departure. Seth wore his fresh traveling clothes and a sparkling clean Fin sat flew around him with a haughty look on her face.

They were about to board the airship as VIP with their ticket to a noble cabin! Even the small Ivicer was excited about flying in the sky. The airship really looked like a zeppelin, but only in form.

...

74. Desert Dragon Pavilion

The Desert Dragon Pavilion had a lot more items created by crafting classes. Lavishly engraved and enchanted armors, weapons, and accessories were displayed in the store. Despite the rating being lower on average, the things looked a lot more expensive because of the difference in craftsmanship. It was almost a shame that a talented enchanter could take a mediocre armor and take the same price after performing some magic on it as a talented smith who spends an hour on engraving or inlays to g...

73. The Arcane Emporium

“Hello Sir, how may I help you?”, Seth was greeted as he stepped to the counter. First, a little test. Seth wanted to see whether these people were really professionals or would act arrogantly? He put a small portion of bone powder into a small bowl on the counter. He had almost two full stacks of this stuff and one unit was 100g, so he had almost 20kg of bone powder, a common ingredient for many magical professions. It was neither expensive nor rare, but it did not matter. Seth just want...

72. Oriekot

So, what do you do first when you are on vacation in a foreign city?

“” Food!””, Seth and Fin said in sync

What followed was a crusade starting with the street vendors. They did not just eat until they were full. They ate and ate and ate to try every stall they could find. They became a notorious couple of food critics in record time. They had lived the last weeks in a palace. Their palate had gotten used to high-quality cuisine. As such, they showed no mercy when commenti...