Chapter 3: Chapter 3: Threes (3!)

Hineni hammers away in the forge, finishing up his work on the short-sword. It’s the next day and he had spent his entire night not sleeping. His work is the only thing that feels like it will calm him down now and he focuses with all of his efforts on it, doing his best never to lift his head and to look up towards the window. Because he is sure that if he does, that the owl will be there.

 

As it should be. It’s where he left it, after all.

 

After a night of consideration, he doesn’t think that someone is messing with him anymore. Hineni hammers away, striking the metal into shape over and over, his wide eyes staring at the sparks that fly out like fairies through a midnight wood.

 

His mother had seen things too, though she had only begun to do so when she was older. He remembers the talks that she and his father would have the morning after he had caught her and wrangled her back home, after she had spent the night running away from demons and fae that didn’t really exist.

 

The sickness runs in the blood. His mother had it, his grandmother had it. He had always assumed that it reaching him was a possibility, but he had never thought that it would happen so early.

 

Maybe it was only mild though. Maybe, if he keeps his wits and lives a healthy life, he can stave it off for a time. He doesn’t want to see fairies, he doesn’t want to see demons and right now, he doesn’t want to see the owl either. He just wants to make a sword. Something pragmatic, something real, something physical.

 

The strike of the hammer shines out again.

 

You are reading story Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] at novel35.com

Iron is a good metal for making things like this, simple beginners-weapons for adventurers. Copper, bronze, tin all had their uses for different things. Armor and trinkets and the like. But he likes making weapons and for that, out of the metals he has cheap access to, iron is the best suited.

 

Sure, there are more powerful ores. Rare ores from the deep depths of the dungeons or from far away, exotic places.

 

But, no matter where you go in the world, no matter what city you reside in, iron is the metal that makes the blade of every adventurer’s first sword. Except for those kooky elves in the south. Hineni shakes his head. They use wooden weapons. Still, iron is good. It holds its shape well, it takes a lot of punishment, damages are easily repaired, blades are easily resharpened, it’s durable, cheap and abundant; the bread and butter of metals.

 

Usually making a sword like this would take him a little longer, but he has a few short-sword blades at the ready. The only custom part of the order was that the anonymous customer wanted a longer and fatter handle without a pommel, for whatever reason. But it isn’t his business.

 

Usually, he does everything by hand. But handles… well, he hates doing them. It’s too finicky, getting the measurements right. There’s always the risk of it being lumpy and uneven and then the whole sword would feel like shit. No, for things like this, things he doesn’t enjoy doing, he uses his blacksmithing abilities.

 

Holding his hand above the rectangular bit of metal that he had hammered into roughly the size he needed it to be, Hineni focuses, feeling the rising heat scorch his calloused and burnt finger-tips.

 

---