On my way to the forge, I stopped by the book store to hand in all of the leather that I’d found. I managed to find 70 leather, so I had the 50 that the old shop keeper wanted, as well as an excess for crafting, I’ll need to buy the remaining materials though.

I entered the book store, and walked past the isles of book cases, making my way towards the old man at the desk.

“Ah, hello again, did you find that leather?” He asked.

“Yes.” I replied, the leather was taken from my inventory.

“Thank you very much! I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to make my next order.” He told me.

“I’m happy to help.”

500 gold was placed into my inventory, now I could afford my materials.

I thanked the old shop keeper, and left his store, finally heading towards the forges.

#

I was greeted by the smell of red hot iron, and the clinking of the hammers that shaped them, all of the blacksmiths were hard at work.

All but a few of the human blacksmiths were dwarves, it was one of the more race oriented crafts, but that was no matter, a blacksmith is a blacksmith to a blacksmith, and that’s always worthy of some respect.

I walked up to the closest dwarf at the closest anvil.

“Hello,” I began, “I’m sorry to interrupt your work, but I was wondering if I could ask you a few things.”

The dwarf sighed, placed his hammer on the anvil in front of him, and set aside the iron that he was working. Wiping sweat from his brow and his iconic brown dwarf beard, he turned to face me.

“Shoot.” He said, his voice deep.

“From where can I buy supplies? Things such as tools, materials, and the like.” I asked.

“There are plenty of stores that sell all of those things, the only thing you can’t buy is your hammer, you have to go to the blacksmithing guild and take the quest to forge your own, the sign of a true blacksmith is the hammer he forged.” He explained.

“Ok, that’s pretty simple. Do I need to complete any quests other than the hammer quest before I can start the craft?”

“No, that’s the only quest you need to complete, you can then start crafting.”

I thanked the dwarf for his help, and started towards the blacksmithing guild to craft my hammer.

#

The guild building was impressive, it was made from granite bricks that gleamed when the suns light hit them, a dazzling sight. It was a 2 story structure, the ground floor looked to be a workshop, and the upper level seemed to be where they did all of the guilding things.

I ascended the staircase that lead from the workshop downstairs and entered the main room of the blacksmithing guild. A bulky old dwarf was sitting at an oak table near the window that overlooked the bustling courtyard, the drab brown curtains and his his grey beard waving in the breeze that blew inside. And at the white oak table opposing him, sat 3 dwarven players, all chatting about their beloved craft.

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One of the 3 dwarves looked up at me as I entered, his buggy little eyes peeking out from behind his ridiculous red eyebrows, I could feel his gaze follow me as I walked towards the master of the guild.

“Hello master,” I started, “I’m here to take the quest to obtain my hammer.” I told him

“Oh yes, yet another blacksmith among us,” he said excitedly, stroking his bushy grey beard, clearly excited to see yet another blacksmith come to him, “although, the quest is not as easy as you would think.” He warned.

“That is no matter,” I told him, “I would overcome many obstacles for this craft.”

“Spoken like a true blacksmith,” he said, “you may use the workshop below. Here, take this beginners hammer to craft yours with.”

A simple steel hammer was added to my inventory.

“And I’ll spectate.” Said a rather shrill and annoying voice.

The red headed dwarf was the one that had spoken, he was looking me up and down, trying to assess whether or not I was a threat.

“Do as you wish.” I told him.

#

I had gone and spent all of my gold, bought enough iron to make 10 hammers, and I was going to keep crafting until I was at least kind of happy with the results. And after I had gained the materials, I headed back to the forge on the lower floor of the blacksmithing guild.

I tossed an iron ingot into the forge, and waited for a few minutes for the grey metal to turn a deep crimson. After the desired heat had been reached, I grabbed the ingot with my tongs, and took it from the forge.

The red headed dwarf was watching me closely, almost as if he was waiting for me to make a grave mistake, he stood still as a rock close to an anvil near by, patiently watching, with those buggy eyes of his...

I placed the ingot on an anvil, and began to hammer it into shape, four straight sides, much like a rectangular prism, as well as one side that was completely squared, and one side that was rounded, the hot metal clinked and clanked as I struck it with the hammer, slowly taking the shape of a hammers head as I continued to beat it into submission.

After 20 to 30 minutes of carefully striking the steel, it had taken shape well, I picked the steel up, with my tongs of course, and quenched it in the concrete vat of palla oil that was sitting next to the forge. Palla being an oily fruit in the Trega Continent, the continent that Drakemore belonged to. With its oil having an incredibly high combustion point, it was ideal for quenching heated materials.

I pulled the now cold steel from the vat of oil, and set it aside.

And every hammer head needs a handle.

I tossed another iron ingot in the forge, and waited for it to reach the same crimson colour, the red headed dwarf continued to watch me closely.

After the ingot had reached the correct temperature, I began to start beating it with my hammer, shaping the hot metal into a long and skinny cylinder, rolling and beating it accordingly until it started to take the form I wanted.

Once I had finished forging the handle to my hammer, I quenched it in the vat of Palla oil, and set it aside.

I grabbed the manual drill from the toolbox in the workshop, and made my way back to my anvil. I then grabbed the hammer head that I’d spent near on an hour working into shape, and proceeded to drill a hole through the centre of one of the rectangular sides, protruding from its opposite. The hole that I had drilled was slightly smaller than the handle itself, with a tolerance of at most half a millimetre.

After that had been done, I took the handle that I’d forged, and placed it in the forge again, awaiting that familiar deep crimson, and once it had been reached, I pulled it from the flames of the forge, and placed it in the hole that I’d previously drilled, and started to beat it into place with the steel hammer that the master gave me.

Sparks flew as the hammer struck, the handle slowly but surely inched into place as I tapped it. It took about five minutes, but the handle was secured. I tossed the 2/3rds completed hammer into the forge again, allowed it to reach a smooth crimson, and then quenched it again. I repeated this process 5 times, tempering the steel to strengthen it.

After the tempering process, it was time to work some leather onto the handle. I turned one of my leather into 3 medium length leather strips, and joined them to make a single extra long strip.

Once the extra long strip was made, I wound the rough leather around the smooth steal, gluing it into place with the resin from the Glooe tree.

Finally, my hammer was complete.

A blue screen popped up in front of me.

“Blacksmithing (Basic) Level 1 has been added to your stats.” Said the white text.

I clicked on the ok button.

Another screen popped up.

“Blacksmithing (Basic) Level 1 +30 XP”

I again pressed ok.

“Quest Completed! It’s Hammer Time! Speak to The Blacksmith guild master to obtain your reward.”

‘not yet,’ I thought to myself, ‘I still need to make a decent hammer, after all, it’s a blacksmiths pride!’