Dawn broke and Ares bid goodbye to Lizzy before heading straight over to Elaine’s lecture. He slept throughout the lecture but Elaine didn’t say a word about it as Ares had managed to break through to the 4th realm of cultivation, skeletal structuring. Ares had obviously worked tirelessly throughout the night to finally achieve it. As long as Ares was constantly working towards improving his cultivation, Elaine just decided to let him be. If whatever he’s doing is working, then trying to make him do something else would just be pointless and maybe even detrimental. She made sure to wake him up when the lecture ended, to which he groggily thanked her.


    Ares walked over to the market, just as it opened, and restocked the stall. He had previously stated he would open the stall every other day, but wanted to do so every day at the start to gain some popularity with the other disciples. He spent the majority of the day selling Beads and the profits just kept being raked in. About halfway through the day, someone came to visit Ares to discuss something with him. “Hey, how’s my technical been treating ya? You know, you could have just begged me for it. You are my good buddy Ruddy after all.”


    “Ugh.” Rud felt like he’d just been hit by a one-two combo from a single sentence. “I’m just letting you know that Dabble wants to speak to you again. He wants to see how far your merging skill can go. Also, Julio wants to know if you can make more Zephyrs for him to fool around with. You should go and check in with him at some point. Actually, I’m pretty sure Julio is going to be at the forging department later to pick up a batch of Dabble’s new creations. If you can catch them both at the same time, it might save you some hassle.”


    “Well, aren’t you the epitome of efficiency? Thanks for letting me know. By the way, I’ll be stopping by the treasury later, could you set aside some substitution talismans for me?”


    “How many?”


    “How many do you have? How long does one last? And how much do they cost?”


    “Each one lasts a week and we have about one hundred in stock that refreshes weekly. As for the price, one will set you back a mid-grade piece of stardust.”


    “Tsk, that’s daylight robbery compared to my Beads, you’re going to make me go bankrupt. Whatever. I don’t have any mid-grade stardust, but they’re each worth one thousand low grade pieces, right? Can I just use low grade pieces to buy them?”


    “Sure, fine by me.”


    “Then I’ll buy fifty.”


    “Fifty? That’s half the stock you little bandit. What on earth could you possibly need such an absurd number for? Also, where’d you even get that much stardust?”


    “Lizzie lent me some… And, well, Aejaz has been cultivating quite diligently... I just want to make sure Appa doesn’t run out of clones to cuddle.”


    “I mean, I get it but, isn’t fifty excessive?”


    “It’s for Appa. The only reason I’m not buying all one hundred is because I can’t afford it, and I know you’re a stingy bastard that wouldn’t let me anyway.”


    “Tsk, your ability to run your mouth is really unparalleled under the heavens. Do you have any idea how many Elders have started to complain to me about the way their disciples are trying to speak to them? You’re a bad influence. One idiot tried calling me a grinch and, because of you, he ended up in the medical department.”


    “You’re blaming me for that!?” Ares felt this was a little unfair. It was understandable to an extent, but unfair!


    “Who else speaks to Elders like you? You’re the only damn brat that doesn’t greet people respectfully and properly. That tongue of yours would be cut out anywhere that isn’t here and disciples are starting to notice you aren’t being punished for things you really should be. They’re treating you like some kind of role model and it’s doing the Elder’s heads in. Well, whatever. I know asking you to stop is as fruitless as asking Aejaz to stop stealing from the Elders all the goddamn time. I’m warning you though, if some moron decides to use me as a practice doll for a Shock Rock, I’m going to come looking for you for answers, and then you really will get punished.”


    “Fine, fine… Grinch,” Ares whispered that last part under his breath. Ares finished up his business and headed over to the treasury to pick up the talismans before taking a trip to the mission hall. There were two things he wanted to do here. His first order of business was to become a foreign aid disciple. This was the title given to disciples, or members of various other organisations in other lands, that would frequently travel outside their own


    countries. These people would be given a token that allowed them to take missions in other lands and countries as well as temporarily reside in other organisations. For instance, a foreign aid disciple of the Heaven’s Path Sect could stay at ‘Roboworks Academy’ in Punk Station, as well as take on missions that were usually reserved for their own members. The second thing was to make sure the mission he had his eye on was still here. It wasn’t possible to take a mission over a week in advance of when you were actually going to set out and do it, so he hadn’t picked it up previously. Some missions had smaller time windows depending on the severity of the issue, but the average reservation period was about a week. Ares headed over to one of the Rud clones and asked for the requirements to become a foreign aid disciple.


    “Usually, you’d have to be a particularly well-known, trustworthy individual in the sect. One that wouldn’t damage our reputation if we were to send you abroad. Unfortunately, I personally don’t think you’ll ever meet those requirements, but I know you won’t quit pestering me until I at least pretend you do. Still though, I can’t give you that title just yet. You still need to contribute a little more as you’ve only been here for two days. You’re already the biggest name in the outer court, so just keep selling those Beads for a little while longer and I’ll give you the go ahead and, more importantly, the go away.”


    Ares rolled his eyes but listened intently. It was valuable information, but nothing he needed to act on as everything was already going smoothly. He then headed over to the missions area and went directly to the mission he’d found earlier.


    It was a mission near the outskirts of Central Land, it was perfect for now. It wasn’t too far for a first adventure, but it wasn’t close enough to be overly familiar to Aejaz. The mission itself was to hunt various monsters and cull their populations to make merchants’ lives easier. This was a mission that multiple people could accept before the mission was taken down. When Ares found it again, he noticed there was only one slot left for a group. As his hand touched the scroll, another smaller hand grabbed the other end. Ares looked over and saw a girl whose face was covered by a hood.


    Ares gave a light smile. “Well, this is certainly awkward.”


    “It’s mine! I saw it when I came in!” The girl had a rather high-pitched voice, but not so much so that it became squeaky, grating, or overly annoying.


    “By that logic, it’s definitely not yours as I saw it the day before yesterday.”


    “ZHANGGGG!”


    “Zhangggg? What the hell is a ‘Zhang’?” for a split second, Ares thought this tiny disciple was about to use a unique art on him.


    “Hahaha, I’m a ‘Zhang’.”


    Ares turned his head and immediately recognised the Elder he caught a glimpse of six years ago. Ares let go of the mission scroll, not because he was afraid that an Elder had shown up, but so that he could wave and say hello. “Thank you for your help six years ago, that pill was lifesaving.”


    “Lifesaving? No need to exaggerate, it was just a broken arm.”


    “Ha, using a pill of that quality on a broken arm would have been a waste. It certainly did a lot more than just heal my arm, so thank you.”


    “Oh, well, no worries. No need to thank me or owe me anything, I was just trying to bring you two to the sect is all.” Zhang waved his hand.


    “I don’t owe you anything? Ok then.” Ares immediately put his hand back on the scroll that the little girl had thought was now hers.


    “Let go! I need this!” the girl was not happy to have been made a fool of. She’d been far too complacent in relishing what she had thought was ‘victory’, so she hadn’t been on guard for a follow-up attack! “Zhang! Beat him up! Kick him out of the sect!”


    “Listen little missy, you need to learn to sort out your own problems. Besides, are you really still unaware of the correct way to solve this?” Ares questioned lightly.


    “Huh?” the girl clearly hadn’t thought about a potential peaceful resolution. “You just want my Mini-Pillies in exchange for letting me have the mission, don’t you? No! My Mini-Pillies are mine!”


    “Oh, I get it. You’re a dunce.” Ares had no clue what a ‘Mini Pilly’ was, and he certainly didn’t want any.


    “Allie, he’s right… Maybe not about the dunce part… But about there being a correct way to solve this. Try to think this through and be a bit more reasonable. I’m not always going to be around to solve your problems, so don’t just rely on me,” Zhang spoke as Allie turned to face him for help.


    “Here, I’ll even help you figure it out. I just told you I saw this mission the day before yesterday, correct?” Ares tried guiding Allie to the answer.


    “Yes?” Allie wasn’t very confident in her response as she thought this rascal was asking a trick question!


    “Right, so why didn’t I take it then?”


    “Because you’re stupid?” Allie seemed quite confident in this particular answer though.


    Ares sighed. “Ok, you’re clearly dumber than I thought, so I’ll spell it out for you. I didn''t take it because I couldn’t. I’m only leaving in a week''s time from today so I couldn’t accept it at the time I found it. You were brought here by Zhang, correct? That means he chose this mission for you. The reason he didn’t bring you here until now is because you also couldn’t take it until now. In other words, we’re leaving for the exact same mission, at the exact same time in a week from now. Do you understand?”


    “No.”


    Ares slapped his head in frustration.


    “Allie, what he’s saying is that you can both accept the mission by acting as a group. That being said, you don’t have to actually work as a group, travel together, or even interact with one another. By accepting it as a group, everyone can go. You’ll just have to leave and report back at the same time. Whether or not you decide to work together is up to you. That mission can be ‘shared’.”


    “Oh, I get it! Your explanation was much clearer than his.” Allie pointed a tiny little finger at Ares.


    Ares ignored the finger that was still rudely waggling at him. “How many people are you taking with you? No matter how I look at it, you’re clearly not cut out to go on this trip alone, but it doesn’t look like Zhang is going with you. There’s a maximum of five people allowed to group up at a time for this mission and I already have a plus one.”


    “I’m only bringing one more person.”


    “Then let’s go and talk to Rud about accepting the mission, ok?” Ares had subconsciously started treating this disciple as more of a child than he did even with Appa. At least Appa would have been smart enough to understand the previous situation without needing an explanation.


    The trio headed over to a counter and found a sleeping Rud clone. Ares created a Shock Bead and tossed it onto Rud’s lap who then woke up in a startled panic. He thought he was finally about to be attacked by a disciple or a jaded Elder using a Shock Bead when he felt the ancient aura come flying at him. “For fuck’s sake, are you trying to give me a heart attack? I’m too old for this shit you bastard.”


    “Good morning, buddy Ruddy,” Ares replied calmly.


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    “STOP CALLING ME THAT!” Rud’s shouting had attracted a fair bit of attention and even managed to make Zhang raise his eyes at this usually unseen sight. “You! Why is it always you annoying me now? Every. Single. Day. Day. In. Day. Out!”


    “Well, luckily for you, I’m going to be leaving the sect for a while.” Ares put the mission scroll on the counter.


    “Heavens, I thank you for this generous gift.” Rud snatched the scroll and checked it. “How many people?” Rud spoke quickly as though he were trying to get rid of Ares this very instant.


    “Four.”


    “Four, huh? Zhang, are you planning on sending him to go with Allie to the alchemy competition in Venti City?”


    “No, just an unintended series of events have led to this situation.”


    “Right, of course. No-one in their right mind would ever invite Ares anywhere.”


    “I’m standing right here you know?”


    “Unfortunately, I’m well aware. You’re going to bring along Aejaz right? I need to make sure to note down everyone in the group.”


    “Yep, it’s Aejaz.”


    “Right.” Rud started writing down names on a piece of paper. “Ares, Aejaz, Allie… My god, that’s a lot of ‘A’s’, and you all have unique aspects. You’re also all annoying. Does ‘A’ stand for asshole? The world is getting lazy and repetitive with this new generation, huh?” Rud was grumbling to himself. “And last, but definitely not least, Enyo, the only tolerable person in this sect it seems.” Rud tapped the pen to make one final full-stop. “Alright, you’re all good to go. The sooner the better.” Rud made a shooing motion and went back to sleep.


    “Enyo? Ha, small world,” Ares couldn’t help but joke about the nature of the name.


    “You stay away from big sis’, you creep!” Allie harmlessly waved her balled fist at Ares.


    Ares thought this was cute and instinctively pet her on the head while chuckling, he really just couldn’t stop himself from petting cute things. The mental notes he kept trying to hardwire into his brain about this very thing had just all been frazzled and abandoned. “I’m joking.”


    “Did you just pet me? Do you think I’m an animal?” Allie turned her head slightly but couldn’t hide her flushed cheeks. Allie quite liked it when Enyo would do her hair and then pat her afterwards, and this situation was remarkably similar.


    “Nope, I just think you’re cute. Not as cute as Appa though.”


    “Appa? Who’s this ‘Appa’? No one is as cute as me! Big sis said so!”


    “Yeah, well, your big sis is wrong.”


    “Nuh-uh!”


    Ares could see this was going to go nowhere fast so he held back the urge to drag this girl back to his house and show her what true cuteness really looked like! Appa was far cuter! Allie and Ares agreed to meet up at the gates to the sect in a week''s time and then went their separate ways. Ares headed over to Dabble’s department as Rud reminded him that Julio was going to be there soon.


    ---------------------------------


    When Ares arrived at the forge, he could hear two people arguing before he had even entered the building.


    “Nae! Ye can’t have it. It isn’t ready yet ye twat,” a voice that could only belong to Dabble was the first thing Ares heard.


    “Come on! Just give me the goods, short-stuff,” this new voice was rather energetic and had quite a spring to it, making it sound like the owner of it was always up for either adventure or mischief, perhaps even both. Ares could imagine the person speaking giving Dabble the finger guns. He just seemed like that kind of person, like an overly-energetic Aejaz.


    Ares entered and, both surprisingly and unsurprisingly, he saw an elf pointing finger guns at what he guessed was Dabble. This scene looked far funnier than it probably should have though because Dabble was hidden behind a workbench, so it just looked like this psychotic elf was talking to himself and threatening to shoot his own foot off.


    “I can nae give ye what I don’t have. I already told ye time and time again that the ‘Nature’s Wrath’ will take a long time teh craft. What part of ‘long’ did ye not understand?”


    “Long, huh? Ha, I should be asking you that, little guy. Seriously, I need something more than… This.'''' Julio pointed at a couple of crates full of new weaponry. “I know runemancy is a quicker procedure than forging, but we’re running out of practice tools for the disciples. Don’t even get me started on how bored I am! I haven’t had a real good meaty artifact to sink my teeth into in foreverrrrr! Plus, that artifact is going to be mine, all mine! I want ittttttt.”


    “Yeah, I know. Ye’ve told me this a hundred times before and, no doubt, ye’ll tell me a hundred times again.”


    “Sooooo?”


    “So, prepare to hear teh same exact response I’ve given ye a hundred times before, a hundred times AGAIN!”


    Julio let out a sigh and tilted his head, as he did, he caught a glimpse of Ares playing around with a lump of metal. The metal would sometimes become a dagger, sometimes a sword, sometimes a gun that he would twirl around his finger. Ares could freely control the shape and, to some extent, the properties of various inanimate objects thanks to his nothingness aspect. “See? Look at him! He’s quicker than all of you tool fools put together!” Julio said while pointing in Ares’ direction.


    It seemed today was a day of being pointed at for Ares.


    Dabble’s beard poked out from around the corner of the bench before he himself finally came into view. “Laddie! Perfect timing! I needed teh speak with ye.”


    “What do you mean, perfect timing? We’re still in the middle of something here!” Julio was flabbergasted.


    “That’s WHY it’s perfect timing. Now I have an excuse to ignore ye!”


    “Umm, would a weapon of this quality be satisfactory for your runemancy department?” Ares moulded the metal into a small dagger. It didn’t particularly matter what weapon he made, he just needed to know if the quality was acceptable.


    “Yes! Maybe not for me though, the metal is lacklustre, but it would be good for the disciples to practise on.”


    “Then I don’t mind creating a few whenever I have time, if that’ll help alleviate the issue you seem to be having. It''s a pretty quick procedure and doesn’t really use too much mana so I’d be willing to set aside some time if the forgery department can set aside some materials.” Having both the forgery and runemancy department owing Ares a favour could come in handy in the future. He wasn’t particularly fond of any of the weapons he had seen in the treasury, so maybe he could chance upon something here.


    “Really? Great!” Julio seemed ecstatic as now Dabble could wholeheartedly focus on the artifact for him and his disciples could also get busy. “Dabble? I thought you said this kid was a ‘wee nonce’? The only ‘wee’ anything is you!”


    “Tsk, ye don’t know how embarrassing it is fer some inexperienced wee laddie to hop along and be better than ye at yer own craft even after hundreds o’ years o’ practice.”


    “You’re right! I don’t! BUT YOU DO!” The finger guns had come out again.


    “Whatever. Laddie, could ye come with me fer a wee bit? I want to see what metals ye can and cannae ‘merge’, and how accurately ye can do it.”


    “Sure, but first, Julio, you wanted some more Zephyrs, right? Here, I made about thirty copies. If you need any more, you can let Rud know and I’ll come find you.” Ares took out a large number of Zephyrs from seemingly nowhere and handed them over.


    “Ahhh, you''re a great kiddo. Thanks, but, errr, where the hell did these all come from? You don’t have a spatial ring. Were you hiding these up your ass?”


    “Sorry, but that’s a secret. Also no, obviously not.”


    “A secret? I love secrets!”


    “And I would love some peace and quiet around ‘ere! Get lost ye pointy menace!” Dabble started shooing Julio off.


    On the way out, Julio figured it would probably be quicker for him to just come and find Ares himself if he ever needed anything rather than going through Rud every single time. It was more work for him, but he didn’t have much work to do to begin with! As he was being thrown out by the dwarf, he created a tracking rune and fired it off at Ares.


    Ares didn’t have time to react so it landed near his elbow unimpeded. His first thought was to get rid of whatever this invasive thing was. He was sure it wasn’t harmful, but he wanted his own privacy. Elder or not, he was getting rid of this thing that had been put on him without his permission! There was only one slight caveat however. When he looked at it, he didn’t understand a single damn thing about it. It’s not like he had ever studied runemancy before, so he didn’t know how to properly unravel it. The thing is though, he didn’t need to. It just looked so... Fragile. Like even the tiniest amount of disintegration magic could completely shred it. Ares poured a bit of magic into his finger and flicked that stupid little rune right off!


    Julio, who was previously trying to resist the little Dwarf’s abnormal strength was now just being pushed along without any resistance. When Dabble noticed something was amiss, he turned around to see the rune marking was completely gone. It may have only been a tracking rune, but a tracking rune from an expert like Julio would take even Dabble about a week to remove as he wasn’t very familiar with runemancy. Wasn’t Ares completely a novice when it came to runes? An evil smile crept up on Dabble’s face when he realised, he was no longer the only one! Now this silly little elf would know his pains! What it was like for some inexperienced wee laddie to make you look like a fool! He didn’t even care how Ares had done it; he was simply incomparably joyful he had done it. “Haha, it seems teh laddie is as good at runemancy as ‘e is at forging!”


    “What… How…” Julio was losing his mind. He thought it was funny when Ares was effortlessly moulding metal into high quality gear. Now that he had literally flicked away a rune of his like a speck of dust, it wasn’t so funny anymore. For the first time in years, he actually felt like he understood Dabble. “What did you do?”


    “I used some disintegration magic and, well, uhh, flicked it?”


    “O… Oh. Right. Of course.”


    “Ha! Why don’t you come down to my forge, Julio? While we’re checking his forging skills, we can have you check his runemancy skills.”


    “Yeah… Ok. Yeah.” Julio slapped himself to regain some composure.


    Ares was led down into Dabble’s personal forge. It was closer to what Ares had originally imagined the forging department upstairs would be like. The brick room had a dark red hue due to the rampaging, flickering and flaring heat. A large furnace made the centre of the room its home and blazing fires spat from within. Countless shelves with numerous types of metals lined the walls. These walls had so much residual forging magic infused within them that Ares could faintly hear clanging coming from within. The walls were constantly absorbing lingering forging pillar magic and tempering themselves passively, turning the forge into a sort of impromptu, ever-evolving bunker.


    Dabble took out a piece of metal and tossed it to Ares. “Can you merge this with that wood o’er there?” Dabble pointed to a piece of wood on a nearby bench. It was a type of wood Ares had never seen before. It was pitch black as though it had been burnt, but its sturdiness looked unparalleled. “That’s ‘onyxian oak’. Quite the tough material that is. Really hard to forge with. I typically only let teh really experienced disciples use it and, even then, only with my supervision.”


    Ares ran his fingers over it and inspected it using mana to get a feel for its properties. He wasn’t doing it to check if he could merge it or not, that was a given. He needed to understand the intricacies of the thing he was trying to merge, that was the prerequisite. “Should I make anything specific?”


    “Ah, yes,” Dabble held up a mock-up he had pencilled out earlier, it was incredibly detailed and well-drawn down to even the most minute details.


    Ares paid careful attention to the specifics of the design. It was an axe but, interestingly, the metal was used for the handle and the wood was for the sharp pointy bit at the end. Ares was unfamiliar with axe terminology so he just stuck to calling it ‘the pointy bit at the end’. If Dabble could read minds, he would probably be furious, ‘What pointy bit!? There are multiple parts to an axe, ye wee nonce,’ Ares could imagine him saying.


    The merging process took a couple of seconds this time around as the design was considerably more complex than anything else Ares had made so far. The wood was supposed to coil down around the handle as the inscriptions added later need to be placed on the wood. It would be inconvenient to have to grab higher or use your other hand so the wood had to wrap around the handle near the base so it could be tapped easily by the thumb. It looked really cool to Ares. It was like a mystical, overgrown, ancient-elven berserker weapon.


    “Uhh, Dabble? Was that the weapon I personally requested? The one you said would take about five months to make?” Julio was pointing at the weapon while constantly turning his head between it and Dabble.


    “Aye, that would be teh one. Lucky you, eh? Seems we’ve got a prodigy over ‘ere.”


    “I don’t think prodigy is the right word… This kinda goes beyond being ‘prodigious’.” Julio shook his head but couldn’t think of a better alternative. The word ‘God’ did creep into his head a few times. The weird part was that he didn’t find it unreasonable either. Ares was literally treating rare materials like playdough after all. Plus, there was the absurdly quick creation process. If Ares went around calling himself a forging God for long enough, people would probably start to agree with him. At the very least, they wouldn’t be able to offer any better alternative competitors for the title than him.


    Ares couldn’t seem to care less though.


    “Ok, I guess it’s my turn now. Show me your strongest rune!”


    Ares scratched his head. “I don’t know how to make runes…”


    “...” Julio took a moment to comprehend what had just been said to him. “You really don’t know anything? Like, not even a basic rune that can emit light?”


    “Nope, never learnt a thing. Breaking them seems fun and easy though. It wasn’t much, but I felt my cultivation go up when I broke that earlier rune. That was nice, I guess.”


    “My runes aren’t cultivation material! And they certainly aren’t meant to be broken! But still, this could be an interesting talent… Dabble, do you have any dolls lying around?”


    “Ye, I have a few.”


    “Haha, I knew you would, you kinky little bearded man! Bring ‘em out!”


    “They’re fer the training hall ye damn stoopid elf” Dabbled groaned as he went to grab a storage ring with the training dummies inside. He came back and let a few out.


    “Alright, I’mma put some curses on these sex toys. I need you to try and get rid of ‘em and, if you do…” Julio winked at Ares. “...I might even let you take one home!”


    “Nobody touch the dummies inappropriately or I’ll call Rud to sort ye out ye pervy bastards.”


    “Wow, possessive much? Fine, scratch that last part. It seems the old grouch wants to keep them all to himself,” Julio joked around as he was busy putting curses on the dolls.


    Dabble had turned back to the bench and was inspecting the axe. It really had been done in flawless fashion. The wood came down to the handle in the perfect position, not a millimetre off. It was comfortable to grip and would be easy to access the inscription when it was added later. Dabble would have had to give it his all just to match this performance.


    Julio was progressively making the runes harder and harder as he went along. He wasn''t actually expecting Ares to be able to get rid of the later ones, but he was curious to see just how close he could get to unravelling and/or breaking them. He also wanted to know how long he would take to dismantle the runes as it was usually a laborious task that could take months even if you were competent. Even if Julio wanted to undo a beginner’s curse, it could still potentially take hours as sometimes it can be a matter of luck stumbling upon the right combination.


    Runemancy can be thought of in a similar fashion to those puzzles wherein you know if a number or letter is correct when you try it, but you don’t know if it’s in the right place or not. These were typically referred to as number or word lock puzzles and the rune version was aptly called a rune lock. Replace numbers or letters with hundreds and thousands of runes and, hey, that’s runemancy for you.


    As Julio was finishing up with the last rune, he felt something brush against his shoulder.


    “Ah, Sorry. I was getting a bit carried away,” Ares apologised.


    Julio looked back and had to cling desperately to a nearby bench to stop himself from fainting on the spot. He had somewhat of a difficult time with it though as the benches in Dabble’s forge were naturally quite close to the ground.


    Ares had been closely following behind him, dismantling every single rune he had placed seconds after he moved onto creating the next one. It was like a scene out of comedy street performances when someone would trail behind someone else, undoing everything they did with the lead person being none-the-wiser. Dabble could have set up a spectators stand and charged admission fees for a pantomime of this calibre.


    Not a single rune was left! Even the one Julio had just placed, using all his lifelong knowledge on runemancy, was mindlessly vaporised. He could make more difficult runes with defensive properties against foreign magic, sure, but those would take days to set up! Ares was destroying these ones quicker than he had been making them! The worst part was that this bastard was still flicking them! Julio shed a single tear.


    “That’s an incredible talent to have, laddie. Curses and runes can be real tricksy. Not to mention people would pay good money fer ye services, regrettably even more than forging. Typically speaking, removing a curse from a loved one would fetch ye a higher price than making an artifact fer a collector. Either way, ye can make a lot o’ money from either. Ye should never be lacking stardust no matter where ye are. It’s really a shame ye cannae cheat out runes like ye can destroy em, then ye’d be truly unfathomable. Still, this is unreasonable enough as is. I think Julio ‘ere needs a moment alone to cry his wee heart out.”


    “Well, at least he has a shiny new axe to play with. Maybe it will help ease his trauma.” Ares shrugged and looked over at Julio who was now sitting in the corner of the room and dramatically hugging his knees in the foetal position.


    “As for teh weapons ye said ye''d make, ye can come by whenever teh make a batch. It''s much appreciated. As for paying ye back, I can give ye some rare ores teh make a good weapon to replace that dinky thing ye ‘ave there. I’m sure Julio will be willing teh make some fancy inscriptions for it, provided ye promise not teh break them anyways.”


    “Thanks, that’ll be really helpful. I’ll find time when I’m not managing the stall or at the technical department to come over.” Ares realised he was slowly getting rather busy but, then again, it would be a waste not to use his wide-ranging talents.


    Ares left the forging department and started heading home as it was getting late. He was looking forward to going home today. He didn’t get a chance to cuddle with Appa yesterday so he was going to spend as much time as possible making up for it today! He also really wanted to try something out and was curious to see how things would go down when he returned.