pertwk Chapter 4 Fire Pit
Chapter 4 Fire Pit
"No need." The dwarf sat back down by the fire. "Go and separate the scrap metal."
Lynn followed his gaze to a pile of scrap metal deep in the waterway: broken horseshoes, rusted nails, half a hinge, and a lump of molten iron that had solidified. It looked like it had been salvaged from various abandoned workshops and accumulated over an unknown period of time.
He sat down and began to work, sorting the iron piece by piece according to the simple standards Old Tok had given him—a crisp sound meant good iron, a dull sound meant it was rusted. Ellie watched for a while and then joined in to help; her halfling blood had given her nimble fingers.
Old Tok was cooking soup by the fire pit. The ingredients included a few wild vegetables, a handful of unidentified grains, a small piece of dried meat, and he sprinkled some ash powder into the soup. After a while, a strange aroma wafted from the pot—not the taste of the meat itself, but rather the aroma "extracted" by the ash powder.
"Can etching powder be used for flavoring?"
"Alkali powder can do many things." Old Tok didn't look up. "Adding one qian when melting iron lowers the melting point, adding half a qian during quenching allows a layer of grayish-green veins to seep into the blade, applying two qian to a wound kills bacteria, and adding half a fen to soup enhances its flavor. But this stuff is poisonous; too much and you're ruined. In the first year of apprenticeship in the Hephaestus Federation, they learn nothing but the art of measuring. Three qian is a hurdle, five qian is a wall, and more than eight qian—even a god can't save you."
He ladled out three bowls of soup, giving one to each of them. Lynn took a sip; it was much better than the rainwater from the workshop. A new entry popped up on the crystal slice: Toxicity Identification 0.1%.
"Old Tok. You used to be a blacksmith in the Hephaestus Federation, why are you in the Lower City?"
The dwarf paused for a moment.
Then continue stirring the soup.
"A sword was forged for someone. The sword's owner used it to kill a duke of the Kingdom of Aldric. The guilds of the Federation said that dwarven weapons should not be involved in human wars, and they made me take the blame."
In just a few sentences and a few dozen words, Lynn understood the whole story—the diplomatic friction between the Hephaestus Federation and the Kingdom of Aldrich needed an outlet, and a rune blacksmith with no background was handed over in exchange for the continued smooth flow of trade routes.
"They cut my beard in front of the Federal Council. They confiscated my rune hammer and forging license. I was deported, and my name was removed from the guild register. No apprentice I've ever taught in the Federation is allowed to mention my name again."
"Where are your apprentices?" Ellie asked.
Old Tok remained silent for a while.
"Someone came to Graymist City looking for me. He brought half a cartload of iron and wanted to continue learning from me. I told him to get lost. If he learned my craft, he wouldn't be able to find work, and people would talk about him behind his back. I kept the half cartload of iron, but sent him back."
"What's the difference between a rune blacksmith and a regular blacksmith?" Lynn asked.
Old Tok glanced at him. His gaze was like that of someone examining the quality of a piece of iron.
"An ordinary blacksmith can forge iron into the desired shape. Once you've honed your skills enough and mastered the craft, the world's consciousness will recognize you as a blacksmith—three skills mastered, linked together, making you no different from any other profession. But that's all. The weapons you forge are inanimate objects."
He stretched out his left hand, which was missing half of its little finger, and picked up a piece of scrap iron from the edge of the fire pit.
"A rune blacksmith can 'bring to life' the ash crystals hidden within iron. It's not about coating or plating; it's about letting the crystals flow along the patterns you forge—like blood flowing in a vein. The resulting weapon is not just sharp; it has its own 'nature.' Different formulas of ash powder, mixed with iron of different colors, used at different temperatures, with different hammering techniques, and at different quenching times—result in completely different 'natures.' Some swords emit a deep sound when drawn, not because of the sword's clang, but because of the resonance of the ash patterns flowing along the blade."
He flicked his wrist, and the scrap metal tumbled between his short, thick fingers without falling. It wasn't a matter of finger dexterity, but an instinctive judgment of the metal's center of gravity.
"That sword—"
He stopped. He gripped the scrap metal tightly in his hand for a moment, then gently placed it back on the ground.
"I spent four months forging that sword. The patterns on the blade were hammered out by me, one strike at a time, in the same direction. The quenching was done with sulfurous water from the depths of an underground river, mixed with three parts ash-etching powder. When it is drawn, the patterns on the blade will glow in the dark—not with firelight, but with a cold light. The sword's owner said that if he stood on the battlefield with it, the opposing mage would not dare to cast spells."
Why?
"Because that sword can sever the flow of magic. When a mage manipulates magic, the magic has a direction in the air—it's invisible, but it exists. That sword can sense the direction of the magic flow and strike at the point where the flow occurs, thus interrupting the spellcasting."
Lynn's fingers tightened involuntarily. A sword that could sense the flow of magic. A dwarf in the underground drains of Graymist City, making soup from scrap metal, his eyes still shining as he talked about the works he had forged.
"That duke—" Lynn said.
"It was the Minister of Military Affairs of the Kingdom of Aldric," Old Tok said without wavering. "The man who killed him used a sword I forged. The pattern on the sword was recognized—every rune blacksmith's pattern is different, like a signature. The Federal Council investigated for a day and identified me. The next day, my beard was shaved in front of the council."
Quiet.
The firewood in the hearth crackled.
Ellie placed the empty bowl on the ground, shrank into the nearby sewer, and curled up in a ball wrapped in the tattered blanket that Old Tok had thrown over. Her halfling blood allowed her to maintain a certain alertness even when she was sleepy—her body could spring back up in the shortest amount of time, and her ears were always facing the entrance.
"Do you still want to work as a blacksmith?" Lynn asked.
Old Tork glanced at him. The dwarf's eyes were indeed reflecting the firelight.
"You don't want to learn blacksmithing. What do you want to accumulate through blacksmithing?"
Lynn's heart skipped a beat.
This dwarf has seen enough apprentices to be able to analyze a person's behavior from a motivational perspective.
He did not deny it.
Old Tork remained silent for a long time. So long that Lynn thought the conversation was over. Then the dwarf stood up—he only reached Lynn's chest, but when he stood up, the entire dome seemed to shrink.
He pulled a hammer from the depths of the waterway.
It wasn't one of those rusted junkyards in a scrap heap. The hammerhead was intact, with wear marks but a regular shape; the handle was made of glossy old wood, soaked in hand sweat for decades, its color changing from light brown to a dark brown that was almost black; at the end of the handle was an inlaid runestone—dull and lifeless, like a dead stone.
"This hammer has been with me for eighty years. I brought it from the Hephaestus Federation, and it's the only thing they haven't taken away."
He placed the hammer in front of Lynn very gently, as if afraid of disturbing something.
"Tomorrow morning, use this hammer to straighten the iron I'm pointing to."
Lynn stared at the hammer. The runestone was dull and lifeless. Faint marks were visible where the hammerhead met the handle—not decorations, but some kind of pattern he didn't recognize.
"What if it can't be straightened?"
"Then let's not talk about learning." Old Tork sat back down by the fire. "Straighten it out—I'll teach you dwarven blacksmithing. The kind that's not recognized by the guild."
Lynn gripped the hammer handle.
On the crystal slice, the progress bar for weapon grip flashed. It wasn't an increase in proficiency. It was some kind of change he couldn't yet understand—this mirror seemed to sense more than just progress. He just couldn't decipher it yet.
"Ellie," Old Tok suddenly spoke.
The girl, who was curled up in the waterway, opened her eyes.
"I'll pay back the money I owe the bakery tomorrow. The debt collectors in Midtown have recently changed their leader, and the new guy doesn't follow the rules. Those pliers aren't just for show."
Ellie touched the bruise on her wrist and nodded gently.
Old Tok turned to Lynn: "The four copper coins you borrowed from her will be counted in your wages for distributing scrap metal tomorrow."
Lynn was taken aback. The dwarf had heard what he and Ellie had said outside the old canal—he should have been deep inside the canal, ten meters away and several brick walls away.
He didn't ask any further questions, he just nodded.
Old Tok stopped speaking, closed his eyes, leaned against the brick wall, and began to breathe heavily. The iron-like sound subsided, and the entire domed space was left only with the crackling of the fire pit and the low murmur of the underground river deep within the waterway.
Lynn did not go to sleep immediately.
He looked at the crystal slice.
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Lynn Gray
Status: Minor injury (laceration on left arm, low risk of infection)
Strength 4 | Agility 7 | Constitution 3 | Intelligence 7 | Perception 6 | Charisma 5
Skills already mastered:
[Basic Throwing] Normal/Mastery (100%)
The fundamental skill of throwing an object towards a target area. It involves instinctive judgment of the angle, force, and timing of the throw, and is a prerequisite for all throwing skills. Accuracy is influenced by both agility and perception.
Proficiency Tracking: Stealth Movement 1.3% • Tracking 0.8% • Weapon Handling 1.1% • Harsh Environment Tolerance 0.4% • Complex Terrain Traversal 0.5% • Escape 0.4% • Hazardous Environment Operations 0.3% • Material Gathering 0.4% • Wound Treatment Knowledge 0.3% • Metal Material Identification 0.3% • Scrap Sorting 0.4% • Toxicity Identification 0.1%
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Twelve progress bars. One progress bar is now set to solidify.
The clerk's three bent fingers—the tools cost money, he didn't know if he'd mastered them, and he didn't know where they were headed. He couldn't reach any of them yet. But with the mirror, at least he wouldn't have to risk his life for the second hurdle.
As for the first one, helping the dwarves distribute scrap metal tomorrow will earn me a hot soup. The third one, I'll deal with it when we get to the Judgment Stone.
At this moment, the dwarf sitting by the fire pit, expelled from the guild and betrayed by the temple, was still willing to place a hammer he had carried for eighty years in front of a stranger.
Let's start by hammering that one tomorrow.
He placed the runic hammer beside him and closed his eyes. The crystal slice floated silently.
Outside the window, gray mist seeped from fissures in the ground. Gray crystals glowed in the cracks of the brickwork at the waterway entrance, like countless broken pieces breathing in the darkness. In the distance came the sound of a watchman's cane striking the ground—three strikes, a pause, two strikes. The lower city's patrol signal indicated that everything was normal.
Everything is not normal.
But tonight there's a fire pit, a roof, a dwarf's heavy snoring, and a mixed-race girl curled up in a corner, breathing peacefully. Tomorrow, there's a hammer that's been waiting for eighty years to strike.
Lynn closed her eyes.