Chapter 174: 174


    CHAPTER 174


    HEAVEN PIERCER


    Lino was currently inspecting the tools on the third floor as the army of variety of people gathered up, standing near the edges of the vast smithy and observing him while also passing somements over . They entered one and left the other ear peacefully, as Lino was far too immersed in his inspection .


    After all, the tools here were far and above better than anything he ever encountered on the Western Continent, especially hammers, tongs, a variety of hardies, and even a couple of bellows that Lino rarely encountered on the Western Continent -- at least ones capable of being used with the Mythical mes .


    He grabbed the hammer first and held it tightly; it was much heavier than the ones he encountered before, yet also fit his hand far better as well . He swung it a few times, getting a feel for it, before simrly checking out other tools . The forge rested as the centerpiece, and was beyond massive Lino evenmented the waste of the precious stone that went into building it .


    It wasrge enough that it was split into four sections, each capable of providing a single smith with more than enough room to operate freely . He didn’tment, though, as this was amercial smithy after all; they had more than just a couple of cksmiths employed who worked around the clock to provide weapons to the shop on the first floor .


    After ensuring that everything was there and that he could work with it, Lino turned toward the audience which had grown quite considerably, extending past fifty ording to his quick estimates . Though slightly surprised, he merely smiled at the variety of gazesing his way .


    Edward suddenly huddled his way through the crowd and arrived next to Lino, huffing and puffing, while holding a head-sized chunk of [Frosted Steel] and a few pieces of [Hardening Stone] . The former had a brilliant, cyan sheen glistening across it surface and was shaped almost like a perfect rectangr . This was actually Lino’s first time ever seeing [Frosted Steel] as he knew about it purely in theory .


    "Is it enough?" Edward asked after he recovered his breath .


    "Aye," Lino nodded, taking the chunk and ying with it for a moment to get a feel for the weight, sturdiness, age and purity . Rather durable . . . about six times the ordinary steel? Not bad . . . "Is it free crafting?" he then asked as he nced at Edward .


    "Hmm . . . I suppose," Edward nodded as he battled to reach the table and put the [Hardening Stones] onto it . "But, the main rule is that it needs to be marketable, that is that it needs to sell . So, no creating some weird weapon that not even Dhralls can wield, alright?"


    "What are the requirements for passing?" Lino inquired .


    "Item cannot be below Level 150 and it has to be at least of [Rare] quality . Naturally, we don’t expect you to forge such items on consistent basis, but as this is a one-off test, we at least need to see that you’re capable of doing it . There are no time restrictions, but the longer your take the less favorable your grade will be . "


    "Oh? There are grades?" Lino mumbled, smiling faintly . "That’s cool . I’ve never been to school so this should be exciting . "


    "So, what are you gonna craft?" Edward asked .


    " . . . a spear," Lino said in a low voice as he nced at the [Frosted Steel] yet again . "No, perhaps it’s better if I forge ance . Though there’s some flexibility, the spear would be too rigid . Is there a demand fornces?"


    "Ha ha, but of course!" Edwardughed as other people in the room chuckled and looked at him strangely . "You really ain’t around here, are you?"


    "Nope . " Lino replied honestly .


    "The Empire’s second-strongest Legion isposed entirely of cavalry . Half of them are archers, while others arencers . So, yeah, there’s quite a bit of demand fornces . "


    "Not bad . " Lino’s lips curled up in a smile as he put the chunk down . "Can I use my own me?"


    "It can’t be a Void me . " Edward cautioned .


    "It’s not . "


    "It’s alright then," he nodded . "Anything else?"


    "You don’t happen to have some ink and paper?"


    "Oh! Right! The design," Edward eximed . "I forgot you might be such type . Hey, any one of you here carry any?"


    "Here . " a rough voice quickly sounded out from the crowd as a rather old man stepped out . His face bore wrinkles of at least seventy years, yet his body was remarkably sturdy and bulky . He gave Lino a quick nce before handing over a parchment and some ink over and withdrawing back into the crowd .


    "Alright, here it is . " Edward then hobbled over to Lino and gave them to him . "Anything else?"


    "Nah, I think this is enough . " he smiled . "Just sit back and enjoy the show . "


    "Ho ho, quite confident, are ya’? Alright, show us what you got kiddo!"


    Edward withdrew back and joined the rest of the people present as Lino slowly sat down and began scribbling the design onto the paper . The crowd -- led mainly by Edward -- quickly broke off into chatter, almost as though they werementators, despite the fact that Lino had done practically nothing so far .


    He was, however, already in apletely different world, one where voices and noises of the outside one didn’t exist . It would be his first time crafting ance, but he was fairly confident . In his eyes it was simply a denser, sturdier and less flexible spear, and as he was crafting it without any leather, he would have to waste at least one [Hardening Stone] on the handle before inscribing an array that would make it harder for hand grabbing at it to slip .


    Designing itself didn’t take him long; breaking downponents, he decided to go with duality;nce head and the guard would be a single part, with the other being the handle . Asnces were generally considered less of a battling weapon and more as an anti-cavalry ’de-mounters’, he decided to experiment a bit and add a projectile array at the top which would convert injected Qi into sort of metallic-like needles with freezing properties due to the baseponent .


    He quickly finished up and picked the [Frosted Steel] chunk before bringing it over to the forge . Due to the material’s nature, one had to be really careful during the melting process as one mistake would lead to defrosting, which would ruin the whole chunk irreversibly . The mes could not be too hot and they could not ever reach the core area of the chunk .


    However, so long one knew what they were doing, it was easier to work with than ordinary steel as Lino didn’t need to melt it all too much -- merely enough to roughly fix its shape as [Frosted Steel] can easily be further refined with hammers and chisels . He first experimented a bit with the free hand and the me’s force before reaching the satisfactory point and bringing it back toward the chunk .


    The melting processsted less than ten seconds before Lino was satisfied; using tongs to sp at the chunk carefully without applying too much force, he brought it over to the anvil and rather than use the hammer, he used a wide chisel to mould the chunk roughly into ance-like shape . As he didn’t want it to be merely a ceremonial weapon, he limited its length to roughly 3 meters . While still muchrger than other weapons of thrusting type, it was somehow manageable especially for elite, cavalry unit .


    After getting the rough shape in order, he extinguished his mes and began to slowly chisel and hammer the edges to define its shape further . He first extruded the guard portion at the bottom into a half-dome shape -- simr to the [Lunar Beheader] with the main difference being that he left far more room for maneuverability within this one .


    "Hah, what do you think Jack?" Edward asked with a certain tone of pride a man standing next to him; the man was roughly Edward’s height and size, though appeared slightly older .


    "He’s good . " Jack replied, nodding . "His control of the me was crucial . The me should be near the very edge of the Void mes, yet he showcased aplete mastery of it . His speed is also nothing to scoff at . He’s only slightly slower than the two of us, but pretty much on par or even better than the rest . "


    "I told ya’ I had eye for this sort of a thing," Edward bragged . "Now . . . I only hope he knows some of more advanced arrays . Otherwise . . . nobody’s gonna buy it, no matter how good it is at base . "


    "I’m just wondering why’s he making the guard part of the head," Jack mumbled, stroking his brownish beard . "It would disrupt the bnce of the weapon . . . unless . . . !"


    "Unless?" Edward nced at him with curiosity .


    " . . . unless he’s aiming to craft a General’s weapon . "


    " . . . he’s not that insane, is he?"


    " . . . "


    Lino, meanwhile, was still hammering and chiseling away at therge chunk of the [Frosted Steel] which was slowly beginning to take a proper shape . I’m lucky that dwarf gave me a good quality one, he mused inwardly . Otherwise I’d have to section it off into at least four parts . . .


    He was hammering and chiseling almost mechanically as he portioned off arge part of his concentration on trying to figure out which arrays to use . Unlike swords or even spears,nces were generally a one-job sorts of weapons, but he was unsatisfied with that . While he couldn’t really change the core nature ofnces no matter how many or even which arrays he inscribed, he would be able to slightly skew it and make it more applicable .


    Shortly after he seemingly connected the dots in his head, he let go of the hammer and the chisel and rushed over to the table where the paper stilly; he quickly began scribbling arrays like mad in fear he might forget them, then looking over potential mistakes and fixing them -- doing so for nearly two hours in total . After finally being satisfied, he raced back to thence and began finishing up the final details .


    Leaving the rueful trail of patterns for the arrays, he went on to quickly craft the handle from the remaining piece of the [Frosted Steel] before slowly melting the [Hardening Stones] and applying them onto the handle, guard, and the center-most point of thence . He appeared rtively satisfied before taking a deep breath and settling his mind and excitement .


    Rather than using his finger, he used a gouge to be even more precise in the array inscription -- a custom-crafted gouge that was a direct Qi conduit at that . He inscribed bit by bit, forgetting the minutes and hours he was spending on a single item . Rather, he even forgot about the test; the only thing on his mind was crafting the best item he could from what he had, leaving behind no regrets to eat away at him .


    This wasrgely his principle whenever he crafted something . It nearly wounded his pride permanently when he had to hold back for Ava’s shop, swearing inwardly that he would never do it again even if he had to starve .


    After finishing up with the arrays, his lips curled up in a magnificent, brilliant smile . He quickly added his own sigil onto thence -- just above the guard -- which shone in brilliant gold against the chilly blue of thence . Wings each had three curved lines, connected with a straight, sword-like line in-between . Finally done, he exhaled a deep breath that he seemed to have been holding in for years and picked up thence, inspecting its stats, causing his smile to grown even more brilliant .


    [Heaven Piercer - Epic]


    Level: 240


    Damage: 60% of Wielder’s Strength


    Requirements: 20,000 Strength


    +10,000 to Strength when Thrusting


    -90% to Hand Speed


    -50% to Agility


    Durability: 2,000,000


    Special Effect [Boulder] -- each straight Thrust has 100% chance to increase the weight behind the impact by as much as 100% of wielder’s Strength


    Special Effect [Piercer] -- chance to pierce through any equipment that has less durability than the weapon increased by 10-60% (depends on the difference)


    Special Effect [Whirlstorm] -- swinging thence in a full circle creates an outwardly explosive shockwave of wind, effect based on 60% of wielder’s Strength


    Special Effect [Cannon] -- injecting Qi into the handle allows wielder to shoot [Frozen Needles] from the topmost point of thence, up to 100 within 30s, with recharge time being 10 minutes . Each needle deals 10% of wielder’s Strength as damage with a chance to freeze the target


    Note: A marvelous creation that has re-shaped the original purpose of a weapon into a multi-dimensional one, offering the wielder a flexibility ordinarynces do not posses .