Arc 4 Chapter 58: Hidden forge

Akira added the new bonus points to his stats and looked at his stat window for a short time.

Akira’s attention moved from the stat window to the new skills he had just learned. He read and reread the information on the skills multiple times trying to absorb everything.

These skills were so cool! By the look of them, they were not meant to do much damage they were more useful for supporting allies. He wanted to use the skills immediately but there was no enemy to fight.

Growl!

Akira’s stomach let out a loud noise letting it be known that it wanted food. He rummaged inside his bag and pulled out a handful of the snacks he had taken from the banquet and began to wolf it down.

Varbu seeing Akira acting weird again just shook his head while watching Akira stuff his face with junk food from who knows where while crumbs and other bits of the snacks were getting stuck in his fur making it a mess.

Akira’s face, when transformed, was a fierce sight to behold that would make many humans scream in fright. But right now it looked more comical than fierce with all the crumbs all sticky residue covering his chin, mouth, and fur all over his face.

“Ah! I feel better,” said Akira after taking a drink of water while rubbing his now quiet stomach.

‘Why was I paired with an idiot?’ asked Nox mournfully.

Akira stood up ignoring Nox’s complaining and walked over to the pile of rubble that used to be the [Rockman golem]. He could not see any coins around the rocks so he took a wild guess that they were under the rocks.

“Nox come help me search for anything unusual under all these rocks,” ordered Akira.

Nox grumbled as he walked over and began helping Akira sift through the large pile of large and small rocks collecting items that had been dropped by the large golem.

After gathering all the coins and dropped items they could find Akira reverted back into his human form to save energy.

The sticky gunk and crumbs that had been stuck to his fur was now on his skin. When Akira noticed this used some water to quickly wash his face.

When Akira finished counting all the coins he had gathered from both the first and second floor he was happy to see that he had made nearly three gold in one day.

The items that had been dropped by the [Rockman golem] other than the silver coins, were two sealed scrolls.

Akira didn’t have time to look at them right now as Varbu was getting antsy from waiting on him wanting to move to the next floor.

“I’m ready to move to the next floor,” said Akira after putting away his coins and the two sealed scrolls.

Varbu nodded and walked over to the dark hole leading to the third floor descending before Akira could say another word.

The path to the third floor was not a set of stairs but a cramped shaft with a stone ladder carved into the wall.

Upon seeing this, Akira for the first time wondered how these dungeons were made? Who made them, and for what purpose?

The distance they had to climb down felt longer than the stairs had been. The heat rose a few degrees as they continued to descend.

After what seemed to be numerous hours but was really less than an hour they reached the bottom of the stone ladder with a blasting heat radiating from the third floor.

Akira looked around and was able to see the air shimmering from the heat. He was stunned to see that the third floor was far different from the first two. It was a huge wide open plane with a high ceiling and hundreds of big and small lava rivers that created both an enormous amount of heat and bright light.

Looking around he could not see any monsters walking around on the barren land that was not covered by the lava rivers. The third floor was to quite and its emptiness felt wrong.

“Where should we go?” asked Varbu.

“Dunno, Nox can you detect anything on this floor?” asked Akira.

‘Nothing,’ said Nox shaking his head.

“I guess we will have to do it the hard way and manually search every part of this floor to find the entrance to the next floor. Who knows if there is even a next floor,” said Akira.

The three of them set out to search every part of the third floor.

A short time later while walking close to one of the lava rivers Akira felt a sudden rise in the already hot temperature.

He instinctively jumped away from the direction the heat was coming from and watched as three fireballs passed through the air where he had been standing seconds before.

Turning to see what had attacked him he saw what looked like fish swimming in the lava river. [Lava fish Lvl 25].

“So that’s where all the monsters were hiding,” said Varbu.

When they moved away from the river the lava fish stopped attacking them.

“Let’s take a break I need to eat something,” said Akira.

“Again? You just ate a few hours ago,” said Varbu.

“This heat is making me hungry.”

Varbu didn’t say anything more because he was also hungry as well but had been trying to ignoring it for some time.

This time Akira didn’t eat like he was going to die and slowly ate some food and drank water to wash it down replacing the lost moisture due to the high heat.

With the rising heat, it was getting uncomfortable to wear his armor.

Now that he had some free time while they rested he pulled out the two scrolls that he had found on the second floor and broke the seals on both of the scrolls.

Ding!

Obtained New Blacksmith Blueprints! Add them to collection? Yes / No

Chainmail Gloves (Uncommon): Requires Beginner Blacksmithing Lvl 7.

Akira silently accepted and two new windows opened.

Chest armor blueprint (Uncommon): Intermediate blacksmithing needed to create this item.

Ding!

New quest! Create chainmail Gloves part 1: Find random scattered ‘Lavium’ and mine it until you have more than 40 pieces to use in leveling up the blacksmithing skill. Use the Third floors Hidden Forge to create items.

A blinking green dot appeared on Akira’s minimap in a far away area they had not searched yet.

“I think I just got an idea where to go!” said Akira.

“Where?” asked Varbu.

“That way,” said Akira pointing in the direction of the blinking green dot.

While walking towards the green dot they made sure to stay away from the lava rivers so that they would not have to fight with the lava fish.

Akira stopped before a pile of rocks that seemed to have been melted together. This shiny metallic rock was the common ore Lavium that he had been looking for.

A pickax appeared in Akira’s hand replacing his shield and sword.

“What are you doing?” asked Varbu puzzled at Akira who was not mining the ore in front of him.

“Need this ore for later. If I get enough I can try to make some better weapons for you also,” replied Akira between swings of the pickaxe.

Varbu scratched his head, he wanted to finish the dungeon and be done with it but he also didn’t mind getting a stronger weapon to use. In the end, he didn’t say anything anymore each time Akira stopped to mine any ore they found.

Around the 26th time they had stopped, Akira was staring at a small gathering of deep blood red ore that looked different from the common Lavium it was a rare ore know as Hottor.

There was only one problem, it was too close to the lava river.

“We can’t get that without the lava fish attacking,” said Varbu.

“Here use this,” said Akira handing Varbu his shield.

“What am I supposed to do with this?” asked Varbu who nearly dropped the shield.

“Use it to block the attacks aimed at me.”

“I swear something’s wrong with your brain.”

‘I’ve been saying that the whole time,’ said Nox who was now lazily lying on the ground watching Akira mine the rare ore while Varbu held the shield and ran around trying to block all the attacks by the lava fish.

I took them another hour before Akira had mined more than enough Lavium ore to fulfill the requirements of the quest.

In the distance, they were able to see a large building with open walls ahead of them.

“What’s something like that doing in a dungeon? Is this normal?” Varbu asked Akira since this was his first time in an active dungeon.

“All the other dungeons I have been in were small compared to this one so I don’t know if its normal for bigger ones to have stuff like this. Either way, it is odd. This whole dungeon has been different than all the other ones I have been in.”

Akira was in a happy mood due to having leveled up his mining skill to Lvl 5 along with receiving a few points in his dexterity stat. The higher level and dexterity would allow him to mine better ore more easily.

“Looks like it’s a forge. Guess I will be able to work on your new weapon sooner then I thought” said Akira as they walked into the large building.

“We’re going to stop here?” asked Varbu.

“Yeah, might be for multiple hours so might as well get comfortable,” said Akira.

Varbu sighed and sat down onto the hard ground with a large rock to support his back. Nox picked a nearby spot and also soundlessly flopped down onto the ground.

Akira worked tirelessly for multiple hours practicing his skills on creating prototypes of weapons and armor he had ideas for. Almost all were failures but they still allowed him to slowly level up his blacksmithing skill bit by bit.

Ding!

Blacksmith has leveled up to Beginner lvl 7. Dex +2

Quest updated! Create chainmail Gloves part 2: Using the Third floors Hidden Forge successfully use the Chainmail Gloves blueprint to create a pair of Chainmail gloves that is ranked uncommon or higher.

Akira decided to take a short break. He gathered all his failed projects and put them into his bag before walking over to Varbu and Nox.

“Done yet?” asked Varbu.

“No just taking a short break before I start on the real things,” said Akira wiping the sweat from his face and drinking a large amount of water while replenishing his energy with food from his bag.

“Aren’t you worried that the other adventures will catch up to us?”

“No. They seemed like the type that would run into that mass of lesser firemen and pick a fight with them. I doubt that we’ll see anyone for a long time.”

After a short respite, he was back at the forge smelting ore and then back at the anvil quickly hammering out multiple long wires and then reheating them and creating springs that would be cut for the countless small rings needed for the riveted chain mail.

When he had finished cutting all the rings out he began the tedious job of connecting all the rings together hammering them shut with a pin creating a 4-1 pattern that was shown in the blueprint.

With his increased dexterity and the blueprint guiding him he was able to do such a task far quicker than a normal craftsman.

Several hours passed before Akira came to a halt.

Ding!

Chainmail Gloves (uncommon): Defense:5 Durability: 50/50

He had created two pairs of gloves. With the first pair, he had rushed through the entire process and it showed with its many flaws which left it at the rank of common, and that rating was being far to nice.

On his second try, he was successfully able to create an uncommon pair of gloves.

He had also made a few quick modifications to Varbu’s Quarterstaff before putting down his hammer. Now the top portion of the quarterstaff was encased in metal and had a few crude protruding bumpy spikes to cause extra damage.

Akira equipped his new armor and brought the modified Quarterstaff over to Varbu.

“This should suit you better until I can make you something that won’t break. It should be more durable so you’ll be able to use it longer and with more power.”

Varbu grabbed the quarterstaff and began swinging it around testing it out.

“It’s a bit heavier than before but I like,” said Varbu.

“Give me a few minutes to rest and we can continue our search for the entrance to the next floor,” said Akira sitting down.