I Became a Blacksmith the Rankers Are Obsessed With - Chapter 78

WeTried Translations

Translator: [IncomeElastic]

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◈ I Became a Blacksmith the Rankers Are Obsessed With ◈

Chapter 78

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Pioneers Are Always Criticized

* * *

I always felt grateful toward Ruby.

...Should I call her admirable, or just plain kind?

Either way, Ruby used to have Dolores's affection all to herself.

Then one day I showed up and started sharing that attention and affection with her, but even so, Ruby accepted me without so much as a hint of complaint.

For someone her age, I think she's remarkably kind.

That's why I care for her like a real little sister, too.

[But still, you're the one who saved Dolores, aren't you?]

"Well, I suppose if you look at it that way."

She's just a kid, though?

Even factoring all that in, from where I stood, Ruby was plenty kind.

Anyway, since this would be my first weapon, I intended to show her exactly what I could do.

"I'll show you who I am."

The first step was carving out the mold.

This time I couldn't just knead some clay into shape the way I had with Dawn Bringer.

The materials alone made this one unusual.

So this time I planned to build the basic frame by melting molten iron, pouring it into the mold, letting it cool, then pulling it out.

"Can't finish it in one go, though."

If I tried to finish the whole thing just by pouring it into the mold and calling it done, air bubbles, pockets, basically, would leave defects inside, so the key was to reheat the piece after casting it and hammer it out properly.

Forged gear made by actually hammering it out really is far stronger and more reliable than a cast piece you just pour and leave.

Pour, hammer, then polish.

That was basically the whole process for the staff, but...

I think the simpler a process is, the harder it becomes to pull a truly high-tier result out of it.

Making something no one else could, out of a simple weapon anyone could make.

Doesn't that sound hard just thinking about it?

But that's also what real skill looks like.

"Before I make the mold..."

First, let me think a little about the spirit stones.

I'd already ground them down into thread, but as is typical of elven crafting, there weren't many methods that involved heating or melting them with fire.

There were a few in accessory-making, but for the most part, spirit stones were usually just cut and set in as a finishing gem.

Which brought me to the spirit stones themselves.

"Can these even be melted?"

No, wait, before that.

"Do they even melt...?"

That was the question on my mind.

Every single one of them was precious, so tossing them around carelessly felt a little too risky.

Ruby had worked hard to get her hands on them... well, regardless, they were valuable.

So I spent a long time digging through the writings of the Children of the Forest.

"Well, that's a bust."

It turned out spirit stones were precious enough even among the Elves that there was no recorded method of using them beyond spinning them into Spirit Thread.

[NOT FOR SALE]

Nothing. There's nothing.

I suppose unless you had real nerve, you wouldn't dare melt one of these...

...Well, as it happens, I've got plenty of nerve.

- Whoosh...

The crucible furnace was already heated to its limit.

Right, I had twenty of them, so let's just try ten as a test.

I opened the lid of the crucible furnace.

Into two small crucibles, I dropped five sunlight spirit stones and five wind spirit stones respectively.

"Will you melt for me?"

I closed the lid for a moment and waited.

- Whooosh...

I counted a few numbers in my head, then opened the lid again.

"...Holy shit, it actually melted?"

The sharp, angular edges of the spirit stones were visibly melting away.

The way it flowed was almost identical to melting iron.

Naturally, there was only one thing left to do.

I slowly stirred the two spirit stones with a heat-resistant rod.

Since there were two crucibles, I stirred one with each hand. Felt like some kid rowing a boat.

- Glop...

I kept stirring until beads of sweat formed on my forehead and arms, until the stones inside had melted completely.

Before long, the wind spirit stones and the sunlight spirit stones had melted down into a sky-blue liquid and a white liquid, respectively.

In fire that ran something like 1,600 degrees, hot as hell, the two liquids shimmered with different colors of light.

"It melted."

Just as I was thinking that.

Something appeared before my eyes.

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[Achievement][Pioneers Are Always Criticized][★★★☆☆]

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『You successfully melted a spirit stone using a method no one had ever attempted.』

[Title Acquired - 'That's Not Recklessness, That's Courage']

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"...See?"

Told you it was courage.

[……]

...Thank god. Thankfully, neither spirit stone had evaporated.

But hold on, no reward?

Setting that thought aside for now, first things first.

I checked the blue one first.

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[Molten high-rank Wind Spirit Stone][★★★☆☆]

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『A liquid formed by melting a high-rank wind spirit stone with the flame of an Heir of Flame.』

『The wind power the spirit stone held has been released into liquid form without any loss.』

『When it seeps into a mana-receptive material, it imparts the property of wind.』

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And the white liquid on the other side.

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[Molten high-rank Sunlight Spirit Stone][★★★☆☆]

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『A liquid formed by melting a high-rank sunlight spirit stone with the flame of an Heir of Flame.』

『The sunlight power the spirit stone held has been released into liquid form without any loss.』

『When it seeps into a mana-receptive material, it imparts the property of sunlight.』

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The spirit stones had been a mix of high-rank and mid-rank, but once fully melted down, the result had come out high-rank across the board.

"...Not bad, huh?"

It meant I could imbue the staff with the properties of both wind and sunlight.

There was no way to pour these into anything just yet, but leaving them out would let them solidify.

So I moved them to a small warming furnace I'd already heated up on one side of the workshop.

That took care of any worry about them hardening, at least for now.

"...Phew."

Felt like I'd just stumbled into some kind of century-defining discovery, more or less by accident.

Though from what I could tell, this probably wasn't something you could pull off through ordinary melting.

Just like the description said, it seemed to only be possible because of an Heir of Flame's fire.

Let's see, I'd gained a new raw material, at least.

It changed the backup plan I'd had, grinding the stones to powder and packing them straight into the staff as a last resort.

"...I was originally planning to use white iron."

One line in the molten liquid's description was bugging me.

『When it seeps into a mana-receptive material, it imparts the property of sunlight.』

My goal was to fold in the full strength of both the sunlight and wind spirits, but for that, all three energies would need to blend in properly.

...And the mineral best suited for that would be.

"...There's exactly one."

I stepped into the storeroom at one side of the workshop and opened the door.

Before I'd made the Cradle of the Earth, the imperial family had given me a huge number of minerals.

Plenty of them I still hadn't used even once.

Of course, I had every one of them memorized, I knew exactly what was in there.

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[Whiteheart Iron][★★★☆☆]

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『A white iron ore that has had its impurities washed away over a long time near a mana vein.』

『Having no innate property of its own, it doesn't reject outside mana.』

『Its color and nature shift depending on the power it comes to hold.』

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This was the one.

All I had to do was pull it out whenever I needed it.

To put Whiteheart Iron's identity simply, since it was mined near a mana vein, its long exposure to mana meant it had essentially no restrictions on accepting mana or any other kind of power.

All its impurities had been washed away too, leaving it with no innate property of its own.

A sturdy, empty vessel. You could call it the ideal iron for forging, too.

"Still have to check the condition, though."

Even if it came from the imperial family, it wasn't getting past my eyes.

Not trusting anything made by humans was just basic dwarf instinct.

I pulled out one ingot and appraised it.

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[Refinement][Optimal]

[Impurity Content][1e-7%]

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『Can be melted without any separate refining process.』

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For reference, that "1e-7%" works out to roughly one part in ten to the ninth. One in a billion overall, I think.

The kind of odds you'd only expect to see on a game's drop-rate chart.

In a word, this was pure iron.

"...The imperial family, as expected."

Did I ever doubt them?

Imperial family, number one.

Inwardly, I worshipped the imperial family.

"Before I melt it, though..."

Let's make the mold first.

I pulled out the two casks that would form the mold.

I took out the casting sand, kneaded it thoroughly, and packed it firmly into the frame.

For reference, casting sand is basically the sand that forms the inside of a mold.

Factoring in Ruby's height, her arm length, the size of her hands, and even room for her to grow, I'd worked out the staff's length down to exactly 155 centimeters.

I pressed the staff model I'd carved in advance into the casting sand, shaped it, and carefully lifted it back out.

A mold basically needed to have matching top and bottom halves.

You stacked the two halves and poured the metal in vertically, but the key was opening both a hole for the molten iron to go in and a hole for air to escape.

So what happened if there was no way for the air to escape?

"Air pockets."

Like I'd mentioned before, air bubbles would work their way into the iron and leave pockets behind.

It ends up something like taffy, and I don't mean that as the curse, I mean the actual honeycombed candy, riddled with air holes, which means it can't be used as a weapon.

I stacked the two molds together and locked them firmly in place.

"Preheat it, and that's it."

Pour molten iron into a cold mold, and the surface cools too fast, which spells disaster.

For something thin like a staff, the moment the molten metal cools too soon, it's over.

I put the finished mold into the forge, preheated it briefly, and took it back out.

Now, the last step...

"How many crucibles am I burning through today alone."

This was the moment all those crucibles I'd lined up got their moment to shine.

And then, crucible furnace, open.

The moment I dropped the Whiteheart Iron into the preheated crucible, flames roared up and swallowed it whole in an instant.

- Creak, creak.

Stomping the pedal to push the temperature higher seemed to be doing the trick.