WeTried Translations

Translator: [IncomeElastic]

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ I Became a Blacksmith the Rankers Are Obsessed With ◈

Chapter 010

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Would It Be a Problem for Me to Bring You Along?

* * *

“I’m not sure if you’ll like it.”

There was no “liking it or not” to be had, really.

She was giving me a hammer. Of course I should take it gratefully, but…

If there really was a problem, maybe it was that this hammer was built for combat.

“I’m not sure if I should accept something like this…”

“I got it in a hurry.”

Seemed like it.

It really did look nice, though.

I don’t really want to fight, though.

Wait, no, maybe what I want doesn’t matter much to her? Could she be planning to raise me into some kind of combat mercenary…?

It looked pretty heavy, at least to the eye.

Dolores was holding it out to me like it was a light little stick.

Just then.

A window popped up.

─────────────────

[Magic Enchantment List]

[Weight Reduction][LV.4]

[Lightning Enchantment][LV.3]

─────────────────

Whoa?

What is this?

Out of nowhere, a magic enchantment list for the gear appeared.

An interface I’d never seen before.

Had gear just never had this before now?

The moment I found myself wondering, in my head, just how strong these enchantments actually were,

[Level 1 cuts 30 percent, Level 2 cuts 60 percent, Level 3 cuts 90 percent. Level 4 cuts 99 percent.]

[Guess it’s not easy to pull off.]

“I made sure to have the weight cut down a lot, in a hurry. Want to try lifting it?”

She really did seem to mean to give it to me. Seemed like she’d rushed to have it done, worried I might not be able to lift it.

It was touching, honestly.

I carefully took the hammer from her.

Despite how incredibly heavy it looked.

- Thunk.

The hammer settled into my hand, light as anything.

And yet it still had good balance in the grip.

“…Nice.”

“…”

It is nice. It really is. I’m genuinely so grateful.

“Are you really giving this to me?”

Dolores didn’t answer my question right away.

“There’s a lot I can’t quite make sense of, but… I tend to focus on what I can actually see.”

She pointed to the gloves on her hands.

“So in that sense, this is-”

Dolores leaned down to meet my eyes.

“A thank-you, for the gloves.”

“…Thank you.”

Dolores smiled, bright and wide.

The scene behind her came into view. Sunset light slanted in through the window,

and against that unreal, almost otherworldly face, my eyes went a little dizzy.

The Warming Gloves. Whatever verification she’d been running, it seemed the results had come back good.

No words in particular came to mind.

I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d been rewarded for working hard at something.

Same went for this kind of goodwill. A strawberry latte my advisor bought me, near the tail end of my doctorate.

That was where my memory of it cut off.

It was strange.

Something settled quietly, in a corner of my chest.

And if there was one more thing the two had in common, it was that the goodwill arriving didn’t quite suit me.

Back then, I’d had a strawberry allergy.

And this hammer, was built for combat.

I’d have to say something.

How should I even put it. She’d gone and bought it for me, I couldn’t just say “I don’t want this.”

I’d lay out a reasonable explanation, and walk her through why it wouldn’t work.

I decided to use the single most beautiful way of asking a question that existed, back in the world I used to live in.

“Dolores, actually, it’s not that it’s anything, but I wanted to ask if it might be all right for me to request permission to ask whether it would be acceptable for me to inquire whether I might be permitted to report that I have a question I’d like to raise about the hammer you were kind enough to buy me, and whether it would be all right for me to ask if I might be allowed to wonder whether it’s appropriate for me to bring up a concern I have, and I humbly wonder if I might dare to ask…”

While my question kept going, a smile slowly began spreading across Dolores’s mouth.

“Pfft, Lionel.”

She laughed, bright and unguarded.

A genuinely delighted laugh.

Looked like my nested string of questions had struck her as pretty refreshing.

“You can just speak plainly. No need to be so nervous, okay?”

“…Okay.”

I took a deep breath.

[Want some help?]

Yeah, please.

I closed my eyes and opened my mouth.

“So, actually, here’s the thing.”

I looked back down at the hammer one more time.

“It says Combat right on it” wasn’t going to fly. She’d have no way to make sense of that.

“The handle length on this hammer is fine. A short handle, forging hammers are normally about this length.”

Safe, so far.

“But the head, I mean the hammer head, both sides are shaped exactly the same, right? Normally a blacksmith’s hammer has one flat side and one narrow or rounded side. The flattening face and the finishing face are different.”

“…”

“But on this one, both faces are flat… and kind of narrow. It’s shaped to concentrate the impact into a single point.”

[So basically, it’s a hammer you can’t fine-tune with your wrist, (pause for a beat! with a hurt little expression~) so I think it’s a combat hammer.]

“…I think it’s a combat hammer.”

Thanks to Yuna’s excellent script, I managed to keep talking without a hitch.

Dolores listened quietly to what I said, then slowly nodded.

Like I keep saying, lying to her face just doesn’t work.

She’d probably already run her analysis on this too, and it would’ve come back sounding true.

“…You really do know a lot of things, Lionel.”

“Being a blacksmith was my dream.”

That wasn’t a lie either, it was just a dream I’d decided on a week ago.

Kind of funny, honestly.

“Sorry, I don’t really know much about hammers. I thought as long as it was short, it’d be fine. Hmm… what should I do about this…”

Right as Dolores rested a hand on her chin, thinking it over,

- Bonk.

Ruby gave a small bump of her head against the folds of Dolores’s skirt.

Cute.

She wanted some attention too, apparently.

Dolores looked down at her with a smile,

“All right, it’s late tonight, so… let’s go out somewhere tomorrow.”

“!”

Ruby went still.

“Ruby, you like Eriel Plaza, don’t you?”

“Mm… I like it…”

“Good.”

Dolores soothed Ruby with the ease of practice, then turned to look at me.

“Let’s go buy you a new hammer too, while we’re at it. Pick out whatever you like.”

“I’m not sure if I should…”

“You should.”

Good grief.

Was she really about to just hand over a billion gold for me, casually, like that?

Wait, hold on, then what happens to the hammer she already bought?

My gaze drifted to Tozar’s Thunder Hammer, and as I fumbled over what to do, Dolores picked it up and looked it over.

“By the way, what should we do with this one.”

“By any chance, how much was it…”

“Two hundred thousand gold. It wasn’t that expensive.”

Two billion won?

Did she just say two billion??

My hands were trembling. There probably wasn’t any returning it, either.

Dolores, who’d brought back a two-billion-gold hammer like she was picking up bread from the corner store, calling it not that expensive.

“The material seems decent, at least.”

“…”

“Want to melt it down and use it as material?”

“…What?”

The thunder-vein ore or whatever it was called did seem like good material, I guess.

You want me to melt down two billion gold.

“Melt it down and use it as material.”

- Ruffle, ruffle.

Dolores ruffled my hair.

Without meaning to, I leaned my head into her hand.

“Was that a thank-you?”

“…Thank you.”

Dolores, it seemed,

was some kind of ridiculously wealthy.

* * *

As thanks for looking after Ruby, Dolores made sure I got a good meal.

I figured we’d head to some restaurant, but she suddenly pulled something out of thin air.

Vwoom.

A crack split open in midair, and out came a sandwich still steaming faintly,

along with a bottle of what looked like ice-cold orange juice, settling gently into her palm.

“…?”

Where did that just come from.

“It’s called pocket space.”

Seeing that I was curious where it had come from, Dolores answered with a smile.

“If you ever climb the Tower someday, you’ll come to understand it naturally.”

No, actually, I don’t really want to climb the Tower.

I didn’t say that out loud, though.

The sandwich turned out to be a surprisingly ordinary ham and vegetable one. The bread was soft, like it had just come out of the oven.

By the time we finished eating, the sun had completely set.

Stars had already been coming out one by one outside the window for a while now.

It was bedtime.

Well, time for me to head out.

Today had drained every bit of energy out of me.

“I’ll get going and head off to b-”

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“What? To my room…”

“Sleep here.”

Dolores pointed to the door leading further into the cabin.

It was fairly big, honestly, felt more like a vacation house, with maybe three rooms or so.

Looked like she was pointing to the spare room.

Resistance was pointless.

“Then I’ll just go wash up first!”

I hurried out of the cabin and made for the showers.

Some part of me worried she might tell me to just wash up here. That felt like a bit much.

I rinsed off quickly and knocked on the cabin door.

- Knock knock.

- Come in.

I stepped inside, and Dolores was sitting at the table.

She was already in her sleepwear, apparently getting ready for bed, and starlight drifted in through the window to settle on her shoulders.

The ends of her silver hair caught a faint blue glow.

Even just sitting there, she looked like a painting.

With nothing else to say, I asked after the missing little one.

“Where’s Ruby?”

“She went to bed. She’s always been the type to sleep a lot.”

“Ah.”

“Mages train even while they sleep, so the more she sleeps, the better.”

There’s a job that convenient and efficient in this world?

Good to know. Now I wanted to be a mage too.

“Right, well, good ni-”

“Sit down a moment.”

“Okay.”

Escape attempt: failed.

I swallowed my sigh and sat down across the table from her.

Dolores clasped her hands together and looked at me quietly.

Starlight lit half her face, and the lamp lit the other half.

“Lionel.”

“Yep.”

“We’re heading back to the territory tomorrow.”

Oh.

Territory? I guess since Dolores is a duchess, that’d mean the Duchy.

She probably had a home of her own too.

“That’s good news.”

I said it without thinking much of it.

Once Dolores left, the whole Warming Gloves commission would be over, and I’d go back to the orphanage.

Back to normal life.

“You’re coming too.”

Huh?

“What?”

“Lionel, you’re coming along with us too.”

Dolores repeated it once more, her expression calm.

I hadn’t misheard.

“But the orphanage…”

“Would it be a problem for me to bring you along?”

“No. Not at all.”

“I’ll have a workshop built for you at the estate.”

A workshop?

Wait, seriously?

The kind of workshop I knew of meant a forge, plus a properly stocked setup that let a blacksmith actually live and work comfortably.

“There, you can… work hard and grow your skills.”

“…”

“I can provide anything you need.”

The answer didn’t come right away.

Not because I didn’t want to. There wasn’t a single reason to refuse.

Telling me to grow my skills, that meant she believed my skills could still climb higher.

It meant she’d seen potential in me.

For a moment, the past came back to me.

Over the last five years, how many people had said something like that to me, again?

“…Thank you.”

My voice cracked, just slightly.

A man gives his loyalty to whoever recognizes his worth, that’s just how it goes.

Yeah, this time around, I’ve decided it’s you, Dolores…

[Simp.]

Yeah, yeah, I got it.

I shook my head lightly to clear it, then asked why she was being this good to me.

“What should I do once I’ve grown my skills?”

I had a rough guess what she’d say, but still.

“I’m not sure how you figured it out.”

Dolores paused for a moment.

“You were certain I was suffering from an illness called the Nine Yin Meridian Affliction.”

“Yes.”

“Make me gear that can cure it, or… at least slow it down further.”

Dolores gave a faintly self-mocking smile.

“It might sound ridiculous, asking something like this of a child. But I mean it.”

She looked at me.

“I won’t hold back on the support.”

From where Dolores stood, she was clinging to a thirteen-year-old kid, begging him to save her life.

A Duchess. Ruler of the 5th Floor. A High Ranker.

The very fact that someone like her was asking a favor of some orphanage kid,

it probably meant she’d tried everything, and I was the only option left.

“I’ll find some way to do it.”

That’s what I said, but

in my head, it was really just: no matter what, I’m doing this.

“…Okay. Thank you.”

- Ruffle, ruffle.

Dolores ruffled my hair again.

This time I didn’t lean into it. And yet her hand didn’t pull away.

She smiled softly and rose slowly from her seat.

“All right, let’s get to bed. Tomorrow’s going to be busy.”

“Okay.”

Dolores opened the door to the inner room.

“…”

Ruby was already asleep inside the room.

Curled up like a shrimp right in the middle of a huge bed, half the blanket already kicked off.

So, where’s my room?

But right then, something caught my eye.

Beside Ruby, a blue pillow sat neatly in place.

Wasn’t I supposed to be sleeping in the spare room?

And to make it worse, there was a white pillow on Ruby’s left side too.

Which meant: Dolores, then Ruby, then, right next to her, me.

“…Me too?”

“Of course.”

Dolores answered, perfectly calm.

“A baby shouldn’t have to sleep alone at night, it’s scary.”

I’m thirty, you know.

Obviously, that wasn’t something I could actually say.

Dolores made sure my whole body had made it inside the room, and then

- Click.

locked the door.

“…”

“…”

In front of me, Ruby mumbled something in her sleep and shifted.

So I’m actually supposed to lie down here. Really.

I set my head down on the blue pillow and stared up at the ceiling.

Starlight drifted in quietly through the window…

- Peck.

“…”

Dolores leaned down and pressed a light kiss to Ruby’s sleeping forehead.

Natural, like it was just something she always did.

Oh right, she did the same thing to my forehead earlier today too.

Wait, hold on, no, right?

No way… this is just me being self-conscious again…

Then.

- Peck.

“Sleep well, Lionel.”

My eyes were closed, but something touched my forehead.

Soft, warm, and brief.

“…”

The moment to say anything had already passed.

I felt the blanket tug slightly, then the far side of the bed sank down.

Dolores lay down, with Ruby between us.

Soon, only the sound of three people breathing was left.

Or more precisely, two. I still hadn’t managed to close my eyes.

- Pinch.

What the-

Someone had suddenly pinched my thigh with their fingers.

‘…So Ruby was awake too.’

Or, to be precise: one.

My forehead stayed warm for a long while.

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