A few gasps escaped the lips of nearby villagers as I moved my legs to undo the straps around the lump of starmetal. I shook my head at the reaction. Even though nearby was pretty far away, it still felt excessive to me.

I held up the chunk of metal with my free hand. “Was wondering if you’re able to make a weapon with this.”

“Got a token?” The smith’s reaction came without hesitation or surprise.

“We do.”

I grabbed the token that Cellestra had removed from her backpack during my question and held it in front of his face. He eyed the leg that was holding it before his eyes moved to the disc itself.

“I was told you have something similar,” I said.

The muscled man nodded. “I do. Please follow me and let’s talk things through.”

I nodded and made my way around the stands as I followed the man inside. Several other smiths were working on smaller weapons, and some more mundane items such as nails and horseshoes. We were led to one of the four forges against the wall. This one wasn’t being used at the moment and the coal had gone grey.

He used a poke to prod in the coals before inhaling deeply and breathing new life into the forge. When a flame was born, he reached into his pockets under his apron and pulled out a disc, like ours but with a gold color, and held it up to the flame. I stood and watched the gold of the object fade away, revealing a teal glow underneath.

The smith turned his head and looked into my eyes, waiting for my reaction. When I nodded, he put his own token back in his pocket. “That’s a good chunk of metal you have. What kind of weapon were you thinking about having crafted?”

“A halberd like this one would be great,” I said. “What’s the crafting fee going to look like?”

The man chuckled loudly and I looked at him, confused.

“There’s no fee besides the token. Did whoever give you that not explain it?”

I shook my head. Vyath had not mentioned anything about that. I wasn’t sure if that had been intentional.

“Okay, so,” He continued. “It’s just that. You give the token, and I’ll craft you your weapon.”

“One more thing,” I quickly added. “Let’s say I want to use some of the metal to craft jewelry, how does that work? Will I need another token or?”

The smith crossed his arms and shook his head. “The tokens are only for weapons. Jewelry and arrowheads and anything else do not require them. Crafting jewelry from starmetal is unusual, but not unheard of.” He scratched his head. “I could turn this into a long story, but let me just stick to the basics. I need to know how much jewelry you want to make.”

“Just an amulet,” I said. “For Cellestra.” I jerked my head back, pointing at the elf on my back. “She has a gemstone she'd like to have set in it.”

“I’m not a jeweler,” The smith clarified. “I just do the prework like smelting. I’ll have a friend help out with this request.”

“I see.”

“So I’ll prepare part of the metal so that it can be used for this purpose. I estimate the costs to be about two gold coins. Unless you have more?”

I shook my head. “That would be all.”

I placed the chunk of metal on the forge and laid the token on top of it. I then asked Cellestra for the coin pouch but the blacksmith raised his hand in protest.

“There won’t be a need for that yet,” He said before reaching for a jute bag of coals. He took some and tossed them into the forge before he motioned us to follow as he exited the building. I had trouble turning around due to my sheer size and decided to walk backward slowly. As I did so, I noticed a young smith that was working on a dagger staring at me as he missed and hit his hand with a hammer, screaming in pain right after.

I winced as I saw it happen. Ouch.

The smith led us to the jewelry stall we saw earlier. On a wooden table were glass boxes with all kinds of accessories like earrings and bracelets. On the table next to it was a box that was dedicated to amulets, which is the one the smith pointed to.

Behind the stalls was an older elven woman. From the way she was dressed, I got the notion that she was some kind of noble.

She wore a luxurious dark blue dress over a white shirt. At the ends of the sleeves were golden strips that added to the high-caste feel. She didn’t appear to be a stranger to her own wares either as she wore two drop earrings, one in each ear with a large pearl at the ends. Around one of her wrists was a silver cuff bracelet with a large green stone embedded in it.

“I see you brought some… interesting company, Zearis.” The elven woman spoke with a voice that was unpleasant to my ears. I could only best describe it as if there was the cawing of a crow in her words.

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From her facial expression and the tone in her voice, I could tell her demeanor was dripping with condescension.

“We have need of your skills, Emerin.” The smith, apparently named Zearis replied.

“Skills, you say?”

“A starmetal amulet to be precise, and it needs to have a gem set in as well.”

Zearis looked at me, then pointed at the box of amulets again. “If you see a design that you like, that would certainly help out.”

“It’s not for me,” I said as I lowered Cellestra to the ground so she could step off and look for herself.

“I see.”

The brunette smiled at me and ran over to the display. I saw her eyes dart back and forth before they had settled on something within no time. In the meantime, Zearis and Emerin continued some kind of argument.

And here I thought she was a friend.

“You could have at least warned me she would come around. Look, all my customers, just like that, gone!”

“What are you complaining about? I brought you a customer, and you know she has the backing of a goddess. What’s better than that?”

“She looks like trouble to me.” The woman snarled. “I’ll help you with this, but just this once, and you owe me.”

Okay. I officially didn’t like this woman. I quickly skittered over to Cellestra to see what had caught her attention.

It wasn’t hard to see what the cause was. Almost immediately, my eyes found exactly what had sparked her interest. At the side of the box was an amulet that had a drop-shaped blue gem at the center, with at the sides, two angelic wings that partly overlapped the bottom of the gem, as if the wings held it.

“It’s beautiful,” I whispered.

Cellestra said nothing but nodded.

I beckoned the smith over who promptly dropped the argument he was having to see me pointing at the winged amulet.

“How much work is it to make something like that?”

“Don’t know,” He replied. “Emerin?”

“With chain, four gold pieces, without, three gold and five silvers.”

Quite expensive as it would almost cut our current wealth in half once again.

I shook my head. I didn’t care for money. Cellestra’s happiness would always come first.

“With chain, please,” I said.

“Are you sure?” Cellestra asked. I think she was taken aback by the cost as well.

“Yes,” I stated firmly.

“Well then,” The old woman said. “I was told there was a gem that had to be set in it?”

Cellestra nodded and put her backpack on the ground before diving in with an arm, reaching all the way to the bottom. She fished out a small pouch which she laid on the glass display.

“Please be careful with it,” She said softly.

Emerin didn’t say a word as she took the pouch and walked off into the building behind her. Cellestra kept her eyes on the pouch for as long as she could. Then, Zearis turned to speak to us.

“Don’t worry about her,” He said. “This is just who she is. Is there anything else I can help you with before I’m off?”

“Yeah,” I said while keeping an eye on the brunette next to me. “We’re looking for the dungeon exploration guild.”

“It’s that building,” He said, pointing to one of the two buildings with deteriorated signs. “Good luck whatever your business is there. Expect your weapon to be finished in a day or two at most. Feel free to stop by to check on its progress.”

“Thank you,” I warmly thanked him before he walked off to his booth again.

“Right,” I said to Cellestra as I stared at the building, its door to be more precise. “There’s no way I’ll be able to enter that. I might need your help with that.”

The purple-eyed elf chuckled. “I’m sure we’ll be able to get someone to talk to you outside.”

“Yeah,” I said with a smile. “Let’s see how this whole guild thing works, shall we?”