Chapter 23

“I hope this Orc Smithy can actually teach me something. I've been working under masters back on Earth since I was a wee lad. Our last name isn't Smith for nothing, you know. My father was a steelworker for Jerry Jones's Oil company in Tulsa back in the 70s, Grandfather a metallurgist for Ford Motor Company, Great Grandfather built locomotives, and Great Great Grandfather made horse-drawn carriages. Go back far enough, and we forged guns and cannons that decided who owned half the world. Before that, we were making arms and armor for the British, and Romans before that. What I'm getting at here is we have iron in our blood, and the forge in our hearts. I'm always willing to learn, but I'm afraid of what I'll have to unlearn to progress forward," Flint told Evolon as they walked through the bustling morning streets of Dunblag.

"Magic makes the impossible possible. The best engineers are able to adapt to new materials that sometimes have impossible properties compared to what came before. My advice is to remove the word 'impossible' from your vocabulary, embrace what you see, try to understand it, only then can you apply it, and possibly improve and innovate with it," Evolon said as if she were training a new engineer back at her outdoor equipment company.

"Easier said than done. Someone says the sky’s purple, and your first instinct is to argue with them, but with magic and strange planets, the sky might actually be purple," Flint laughed.

"Not to mention an alien might see at different wavelengths, making what seems like blue to us, purple to them. From each point of view, both could be right, so arguing would be useless," Evolon mused at the absurdity of the situation she and her group of friends found themselves in.

The pair stopped at a large intersection, waiting for a herd of brown animals to move down the street and into the bottom floor of a skyscraper a block away. The large animals looked like cattle-sized capybaras with large, smooth faces and thick, bristly brown hair. Directly in front of Evolon, one of the beasts paused and deposited a fresh line of softball-sized dung pellets. After the herd passed down the street, being directed by several reptile-like dog animals, three Orcs followed behind, scooping up the pellets and tossing them into a cart that was moving slowly forward without an animal pulling it.

"You know, there are so many things about this place I don't understand. They use magic to pull the cart, but manpower, or I guess Orcpower, to pick up the smelly bits," Evolon mused as the pair continued towards the Forge district in the distance.

"Jobs. Could you imagine the chaos if magic did everything unskilled laborers could do? Back home, we're facing the same issues. Powerful corporations pushing for automation in their shortsighted greed. Companies that still use skilled artisans become small boutiques where only the wealthy from the powerful corporations can afford the handmade items. Look at Hermès, Rolex, Japanese chef's knives, Solovair boots that once made Doc Martens, now make handmade boots that look much the same after Doc Marten moved production to mass-production factories where a few employees make pennies. I'd rather be in a world that rewards artisans over profits," Flint finished his diatribe as they entered an 80-foot square stone building with several open arches around each side.

Entering the smithy, Evolon could hear several working bellows and hundreds of clanging hammers. But there was obviously some sound magic lowering the volume of the work around them to a level they could easily talk over. The smell of coal, the heat of the fire, and a cool breeze entering from all directions could be felt as the bellows pumped air into a central forge and up a chimney composed of more stone arches, where each smith worked. Smiths opened their metal doors, placing metal in the forge, where it melted into molds or was retrieved on long metal rods to be hammered just steps away from the glowing coals.

Flint approached a middle-aged, strong Orc in a leather apron hammering away at a glowing red piece of metal and waited for the smith's current task to be complete before interrupting.

“Hail and well met, Ongor, Master Smith of the Zotto Clan,” Flint said with a small bow.

“Hail and well met, Thor of the Red Sands. I see you survived the Arena,” Ongor said with a small bow before placing the metal he was hammering back into the forge, its long metal handle sticking out of an opening in the bottom of the forge door.

“I have come to learn under the esteemed Master Smith, and my companion here would like to do the same with your leatherworkers,” Flint said as he retrieved his leather apron, gloves, and smithing helmet from his inventory.

“My mate, Bethril, makes the soft leather padding for my armor and leather grips for my weapons. While she is no master, I am sure she could use a set of strong hands for the day,” Ongor said, sizing up Evolon with a glare.

“Your generosity brings honor to Clan Zotto and will be rewarded in this life or the next,” Flint said, setting a pouch of 10 gold on Ongor's workbench.

“This is acceptable. I rose early this morning to make up for the losses of betting you would die in the second round. Maybe today will turn my misjudgment into fortune,” Ongor said with a slight smile.

“Later, MC Hammer,” Evolon said over her shoulder as she walked through one of the arches of the forge building, directly into the adjacent building where dozens of female Orcs of all ages were working. Among the crowd, one Orc woman about Ongor's age stood out. She would stop hand-sewing two pieces of finished leather together every few seconds, looking towards the smithy with an angry sneer and muttering words under her breath. Approaching the woman, Evolon took a closer look, appreciating the beautiful Orc beneath the leather apron. She reminded Evolon of Gamora, with her pale green, curvaceous body and delicate facial features. The way she expressed her anger at her mate also reminded her of how the famous Guardian of the Galaxy would often fight with hers, even though it came from a place of love.

“I'm guessing you are Bethril,” Evolon asked before remembering the group were still in incognito mode, using aliases to hide their involvement with the auction in a few days. “I am Arrow. I am here to learn tanning and leatherworking, if you would be so kind as to teach me,” Evolon said with a small bow, echoing Flint's introduction earlier.

“Did that Pak Tuk Ongor send you here to sabotage our family into more debt, or are you how he is to repay his losses? You don't look like you would live through a round bedding even the mildest of Orcs,” Bethril spat, pulling two long needles through the leather stitching in opposite directions before tying a simple knot and performing the stitch on the next hole in the leather.

“A debt is owed. Your time and instruction is all I require. I am a warrior, not a bed maiden,” Evolon said with a glare.

“We sweat, we bleed, and he bets it away at the Sands,” Bethril growled between stitches. “But we honor our word. I will teach you, Arrow the Warrior,” she said, tying off the thread one final time, unclamping her legs from the leather piece with soft, plush leather on one side and thick, tough leather on the other.

“Come, let's see if your brain is as unimpressive as your arms,” Bethril said, massaging a waxy substance on both sides of the new armor piece, rubbing it into the leather with a practiced motion.

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Evolon handed the woman a small pouch of 10 gold, saying, “To pay for your time and materials I may destroy while learning.”

“This is the tannery. First, we take the rough skins the warriors bring us and delicately remove any fat, dirt, blood, meat, or other unneeded parts through scraping and soaking with these special scraping knives. You try, just like the three young ones here,” Bethril said, handing Evolon a rounded knife.

Evolon first observed the young girls before attempting to clean the hide herself. Near one edge, she placed too much pressure, tearing through the hide and creating a hole before correcting her movements, quickly burning the process into muscle memory, easily repeatable for her magical strength.

“Now bring the cleaned hide to the baths,” Bethril motioned Evolon to the next area, where several slightly older Orcs than the last group were dunking cleaned hides in a liquid several times before setting them on a wet pile near the copperwood trough.

Evolon easily dunked the leather, waving it under the surface, mimicking the young Orcs. One of them gave her a little giggle before looking up at Bethril and pointedly ignoring the human.

“Next, we salt the hide, press, dry, and repeat the process two more times.” Bethril showed Evolon how to toss a handful of salt and another white powder onto the hide, then run the hide through a set of hand-cranked rollers to press out all the liquid. Next, Bethril had Evolon pass a fist-sized stone over each side of the hide in a sweeping pattern, quickly drying the hide before repeating the dunking, salting, pressing, and drying process two more times.

“Now for tanning. While you rub this into the hide, trickle your mana through your hand into the hide,” Bethril said as Evolon watched several teenage Orc women around a large table move handfuls of wet, spongy material over their hides while focusing intently on the process.

Evolon approached her workstation and picked up a strange, oily, dodgeball-sized piece of pink sponge and started working it across her hide while focusing on her mana. Slowly, she let a trickle flow down her arms, into her hands, through the sponge, and into the hide. Slowly, she worked her way up to a volume of mana that felt right and moved the sponge in a pattern to coat the hide with a solid, thin sheet of oily liquid before flipping the hide over and repeating the process on the opposite side.

“Mana control is not horrible, but that volume of mana… you use far too much and will wear yourself out in minutes, waiting a full day to work another. While the quality of the finished goods would be great, the process is not sustainable,” Bethril said with the tone of a seasoned instructor.

“I see, thank you for the information. What is next?” Evolon asked, realizing she may have blown her cover, exposing her mana pool in public.

“We dry and tan the hide two more times before the final dry, where it becomes leather ready to be worked,” Bethril said as Evolon repeated the process two more times.

“The leather has two sides. A tough, smooth side, and a rough, soft side. We will now reinforce the outer layer,” Bethril said, showing Evolon how to place long, thin, bendable quills on the soft side of her leather and infuse mana to glue the quill into place. Placing a pressed, wool-like material on top of the layer of quills, then another sheet of leather atop that, she used a pair of magically sharpened scissors to cut the leather into shape. Then, a hammer and a strange chisel to punch small holes through all the layers. Finally, following up with two needles and extremely tough thread, sewing through the small holes in both directions, tying the thread off after each stitch.

“Now for the finishing touch.” Bethril showed Evolon how to attach small strips of thin metal to the outside of the leather pieces, finishing up a pair of banded vambraces, which now could be inspected as usable items.

“Fine Banded Leather Vambraces - 54 armor, +5 strength, +5 dexterity, +5 wisdom.”

“By the gods, a critical success on your first attempt! Throwing all your mana into a single item paid off, but don't make a habit of it. A single failure on any step ruins the piece, and you have to wait a day for the mana to regenerate, the whole time berating yourself for the mistake. Believe me, I know,” Bethril said, shaking her head.

Evolon pulled up her character sheet and marveled at her defense, shooting from 38 to 92 as she placed the vambraces on her arms. She did notice the two vambraces seemed to work as a set, each only giving half the total additions to her stats. Wondering if pierce enchanting them would count as one item or two, she was brought out of her mental calculations by an angry Orc shouting at her.

“Back to the tanning room with you! Start the process over with new hides. Repetition is still useful, even with your depleted mana pool. The finished product can still be used to line a full plate bracer.”

Evolon started the process over and worked her way through four more Fine Banded Leather Vambraces with little more than a look and a grunt from Bethril, placing them into her inventory before the Orc could inspect them.

As she finished the fifth and final pair of vambraces, Evolon realized her stomach growling was getting her odd looks from the other women who had taken small breaks between each round of crafting. With a wave, Evolon walked over to the smithy to pry her friend from the forge to search for food, then onto a well-earned pampering.

“I'm telling you, the molecules are lining up and weaving a pattern! If we use a strong enough magnet, we can ensure that the pattern is strong, with interlaced lines rather than a random assortment of material, much like a woven blanket is stronger than a pressed, raw wool blanket!” Flint was yelling at the larger Orc while hammering metal into a long, thin shape resembling a sword. “This will make for a sharper, stronger, finer edge, harder to dull, regardless of the enchantments.”

“Molecules? Whoever heard of such a thing? Tiny particles expanding and contracting? You talk as if the sword breathes,” Ongor said dismissively between hammer strokes.

“We shall see now, won't we? Now, about these sharpening and repair enchantments, do they require the user to input mana to work, and can they break over time?” Flint asked the Orc, changing the subject.

“Yes, the wielder inputs mana to trigger the enchantment, then waits a set amount of time for it to complete, like baking a loaf of bread. Too much damage can break the enchantment, but that matters not, as the blade is more often than not broken at the same time,” Ongor said like a professor in a lecture.

“Okay, we used the same materials to make the same weapons. The only difference was I used a magnet while infusing mana into the shaping of the blade to line up the steel molecules and trap the mana between them before quenching the blade. What would you like to bet my blade is stronger than yours, my friend?” Flint said as he was grinding the blade of his new short sword to a razor's edge.

“I would bet my forge on my craftsmanship over yours, but that woman would likely kick me out of the house for good, so I must decline,” Ongor said with a grimace on his face and a look towards the leather shop next door.

“You can't blame me for trying, and good on you, not angering the lady anymore than you already have. She looks fiery,” Flint said, preparing to test his sword against the Master Smith's.

“You have no idea. I would rather face the beasts of the wilds than her ire,” Ongor said, preparing for the blade clash.

Rearing back, the two swung forward, meeting blades. Ongor's shortsword shattered to his amazement. Inspecting the broken and the whole sword, mouth agape, Ongor bowed his head as a sign of respect. “Not even a chip on the cutting edge. Magnets while infusing mana… I will try this method for myself. Thank you, young Thor, master of the hammer, for teaching a humble smith this method.”

“Can I see that?” Evolon asked Flint before inspecting the sword.

“Fine Steel Shortsword - 44 damage, +5 strength, +5 dexterity, +5 wisdom.”

“Nice!” Evolon said, swinging the sword through the air before holding it back out towards Flint, handle first.

“Keep it. I made one for each member of the party, you know, for when the baddies get through bow range into slashy range,” Flint said with a large smile, clearly proud of his work.

“Aww, you shouldn't have, but I also made these for you,” Evolon said, handing Flint a new pair of vambraces.

“It's like Christmas morning all over again, except this is so much better than another pack of socks!” Flint said, sliding his hands through the bracers before pulling a strap to secure them to each forearm.

“So soft! These fit like a dream!” Flint said, slapping the outside of the bracers, feeling none of the force on his skin.

“Now, you promised me food and relaxation. To the Bathhouse!” Evolon said, taking her friend by the arm, charging down the busy street towards the east.