As I found out on the way back to the inn, wearing three pairs of pants was just not doable. This wasn’t thin, synthetic clothing you could easily layer with, after all. Even the fine-woven stuff I’d bought was decently thick. Making matters worse, my jeans were never built as an inner layer.
Even without Aerion sniggering at me the whole way back, I would’ve ditched a pant, pronto. The jeans just weren’t working with the other two, even though I’d picked a looser fit for the [Uncommon] stuff I’d bought.
The moment we returned to the inn, I stripped off my jeans, leaving me with two bottom layers and three uppers, in addition to my scarf and bandana. The shirt layers were much more manageable. My T-shirt was so thin, I barely noticed it under the other two, though with my cuirass going on top of all that…
I was definitely going to overheat, but I didn’t feel too bad about it. I now had room to grow in every single stat, and the gains mattered far more than a bit of discomfort. Besides, my body could stand to sweat it out a bit.
“You do realize how ridiculous you look, yeah?” Aerion said, shaking her head.
“Call it a fashion statement,” I said, striking a pose. “I think it’s time I shake up the clothing scene in this world, don’t you?”
Aerion rolled her eyes. “Well, before you head out, how about dinner? I’m going to sleep after.”
I nodded. “Dinner.” And then a full night of work.
I was going to be so tired by morning.
----------------------------------------
Rogar was wrapping up for the day by the time I showed up at his smithy.
“You’re late,” he grunted, not even bothering to look up from his hammering work.
“You told me to show up at dusk. It’s dusk…”
He seemed to be pounding out a shortsword, which piqued my interest. Unfortunately, Rogar wasn’t nearly generous enough to just let me watch him.
“You’re later than I like. Philip’s already working. Go and join him. You’ll wrap up at dawn.”
The short man finally looked up at me, and did a double-take.
“The hell kinda clothing is that?” he asked, barking a derisive laugh.
“Does it matter?” I asked, unperturbed. “Not like it’ll affect my work.”
“Besides looking stupid as shit? Nah, I don’t care. Suit yourself, get ‘em dirty. It‘s your coin, after all.”
“Thanks. I’ll do that,” I replied, walking past him to the semi-enclosed yard where Philip worked. It wasn’t like I wanted to ruin my new clothes, but I’d happily burn them if it meant boosting my stats.
Philip did a double-take when he saw me.
“I know, I know,” I said, waving away his look of utter shock. “Laugh it up.”
“It’s not that,” Philip replied. “I’m not one to judge on matters of fashion. Never did understand it myself. Just… You’ll be hot, friend. Are you certain of your choice?”
I realized Philip hadn’t been looking at me with ridicule, but concern.
“Er, thanks,” I said. “I should be alright.”
Or rather, I would be, once my Vigor ticked up a few ranks.
We got to work immediately, with me manning the Bellows as usual. I didn’t have to wait long for the stat boosts to start flowing in.
Congratulations! Vigor has increased to 21.
Congratulations! Vigor has increased to 22.
Congratulations! Dominion has increased to 13.
When I was taking my first break, Philip called me over to the hearth forge—the one used for heating metal for forging.
“Watch carefully. I want you to try this next,” he said, gripping the handle of a misshapen, worn-out skillet.
“First thing about recycling metal is sorting the different types. Can’t recycle cast iron—not without pounding some steel into it. The list goes on. The easiest thing is when you work a full item, like a forged pot or this skillet, and pound it into shape. No need to worry about mixing metals there.”
“So, that’s what you’re doing right now?” I asked. “You’re heating that pan to reforge it?”
“Yep. Just watch.”
He stuck the skillet into the coals of the forge while I worked the bellows. Some minutes later, Philip asked me to stop.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
When he retrieved the skillet, a portion of its rim was white-hot.
Quickly taking it to a nearby anvil, he hammered the skillet’s lip inward, folding it over.
When the metal cooled to a red state, he returned it to the forge.
We repeated this process several times, and thanks to the exertion and heat, I started sweating profusely. My Vigor also went up again, bringing my heart rate back under control. I could definitely notice a difference in my stamina now, compared to when all my clothes were off.
It was honestly an intoxicating feeling, and getting to go from my normal strength to my enhanced one whenever I put my clothes on meant that I’d never get used to the feeling. It meant it would always be an exhilarating experience.
A bit like Iron Man, in fact.
“You watching?” Philip asked, bringing me back to the present.
“Like a hawk,” I said, which earned me a curious look. I wondered if the hawks in this world didn’t have excellent vision. “Anyway, I’m ready to give it a shot, if you don’t mind.”
“I was gonna suggest that if you didn’t say anything,” the jovial elderly man said. “Just, be careful, alright?”
I nodded, sticking the skillet into the coals of the forge. The hearth forge was open on all sides—basically just a bed of coals with a chute below where air could be pumped in from the bellows.
Philip worked the bellows this time, compressing and expanding the accordion-like device to superheat the fire. When it got to the right color, I gave him the signal to stop and brought the increasingly deformed skillet to the anvil, where I hammered… and hammered, and hammered.
Congratulations! Dominion has increased to 14.
Congratulations! Dominion has increased to 15.
Congratulations! Vigor has increased to 23.
Congratulations! Grace has increased to 13.
With every Vigor upgrade, my rhythm grew steadier. Dominion allowed me to strike harder, and Grace seemed to help with my technique.
Each hammering and heating cycle took the skillet one step closer to our goal, and after an hour or so of work, we finally had something that resembled a long, flat, rectangular plate.
“That’ll make for a good blank for Rogar to forge into a sword or a knife,” Philip said. “Shame that demand’s been picking up for weapons, lately. Normally, all we ever make around here are nails, knives, and kitchenware.”
“Such a shame,” I said, thinking exactly the opposite. This was great news for me. If Rogar wanted weapon blanks, well… I figured experimenting a bit with making weapons wouldn’t kill anyone.
Besides, I could just re-melt the weapon and start again. My productivity might suffer a bit, but it wasn’t like Rogar had set out exact quotas for us each night.
The only issue was… How would I convince Philip to let me do this? Even if it didn’t harm Rogar’s operation, I doubted the man would allow me to slack off like that.
That was a problem for another time, I thought. Philip was currently turned away, tending to the Bloomery forge used for processing iron ore.
I picked up a rusted, bent knife from the recycling pile, but before I stuck it into the forge, I took a moment to Initialize it.
Much of the rust on the knife flaked off, but it didn’t unbend.
Shoddy Mangled Knife [Common]
This thing is so crappy, you can hardly even call it a weapon. Better than nothing, I suppose. But I’ll bet that isn’t why you Initialized it, right? Right?
Essence Cost: 5
Condition: 5/5
Stats: None
Abilities:
— Boomerang: Foundation - 0: This item [rarely] returns when thrown.
That was actually a fascinating ability, considering the absolute garbage that the knife was. Based on the brackets, I assumed it got better as the ability leveled up.
As the description said, though, that wasn’t why I’d bothered to Initialize it.
Philip returned, and I stuck the knife into the forge before he could see that the rust had fallen off.
Being of the right shape, this one was far easier to hammer than the skillet.
With just a couple of cycles of heating and hammering it, I had something that looked like a much smaller version of the blank we’d created from the skillet.
Incidentally, the knife’s durability dropped when I hammered it, going to zero as the thing progressively lost its shape. My Essence was reclaimed, and I got to try it again on the next mangled knife we hammered.
That one had the same description and ability, despite being slightly larger and in better shape. The difference was clearly not enough for the System to classify it as something else, though.
That was good to know.
Hours later, I came away with more entries for my cookbook. I didn’t always get a chance to Initialize scrap metal while Philip wasn’t looking, though to my elation, the metal pieces did always Initialize, regardless of how messed up the item was. If it was just scrap metal, the System considered it a shiv or a shard. For pots and pans—bludgeoning weapons.
The key takeaways from this session—confirming what I’d found in the Trial—were that Initializations were consistent for similar objects. The System was also pretty lenient with what it considered ‘the same’. For example, despite the metal shards we recycled coming in various rust-levels and sizes, they all ended up being the same thing in the System’s eyes, and thus all had the same ability. Only the Condition varied, depending on the size and quality.
Furthermore, as I saw with that Boomerang ability, some of these abilities were actually useful. There was one that made the edge sharper, and another that gave the projectile a whistling sound when it flew—useful for distractions.
Which meant that my arsenal probably could stand to use a mix of rarer, more exotic items, as well as cheaper stuff with cool abilities. For now, I melted everything down, choosing not to hoard items until I had a much better idea of what was out there.
When dawn broke and Rogar returned to the forge as grumpy as ever, both Philip and I felt like zombies on our feet.
I’d stupidly not slept the day before, and I was so tired, I could probably just curl up on the spot and crash right there. I barely even noticed Rogar telling me not to bother showing up tomorrow—he didn’t need me until the night after.
I didn’t especially care. I was tired, and Rogar was an ass, but I now had a way of experimenting with Initializing a bunch of different objects.
That just left figuring out how to level my Wisdom, Cunning, Passion, and Order. Despite ample headroom, none of those had leveled once while doing physical exercise.
So it was a good thing Rogar had no work for me tomorrow. After getting a good day’s rest, I intended to use my day off to tackle that puzzle with everything I had.