ch121-ch140 · 136-ch136

Chapter 136: Mia-san's Past Part 3

SIDE: Akashiya Miyako (【Blacksmith】 Mia)

We broke off the orc hunting on Floor 15 by midday and started back for the surface.

My level had gone up, and the magic stone take was split a proper five ways, so I had zero complaints.

If only it could stay like this forever...

Half the iron swords Watanabe-san had been so busily collecting came home with me.

They fetch next to nothing sold as-is, and they weigh a ton, so ordinary folk don't haul back more than a few—more trouble than it's worth.

The quiet little earner of us 【Equipment Weight Reduction】 holders.

The other three said nothing about it.

"Might I ask about your plans for tomorrow? If you would, I would very much like to see your skill as a 【Blacksmith】..."

Watanabe-san said that to me on the way back.

I'd become a 【Blacksmith】, sure—but the truth was I'd barely smithed at all.

Nowhere to do it—that was the reason.

I'd rented a workshop whenever I could, but nothing good ever came out, and I couldn't even sell the stuff that did.

The state of things: I still hadn't made anything better than the spear I bought the day I became an adventurer.

Incidentally, my parents have the first knife I ever made on display next to a goblin magic stone...

...It's just a knife, okay?

"I don't have anything special planned tomorrow, so that's fine, but..."

"I will have the venue arranged, so please come find me at the reception desk on the dungeon side tomorrow morning. Let's use these as materials."

Watanabe-san held up the armful of iron swords.

So she'd been collecting them with this in mind from the very start...

They say Association staff are well paid, so of course money was never an issue for her.

We chatted happily the whole way back like that, and before I knew it we were at Floor 1 and splitting up.

Honestly, that might have been the most fun I'd had since becoming an adventurer.

Watanabe-san was Association staff—maybe starting tomorrow I'd be getting 【Blacksmith】 work too.

"If it ever gets to be too much, you can always quit, you know?"

That's what my father said to me when I got home.

Apparently I'd looked like I was having a rough time lately.

He said he'd missed the signs before, so this time he was keeping a close watch on me... or something like that.

(So he did notice... but it's too late for that now.)

The me of two days ago might have cried and quit adventuring right there.

But then I went and met Watanabe-san.

I told him everything since yesterday, chest puffed out.

"Yesterday I ended up in a party with a lady from the Association, see..."

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The next day, Watanabe-san guided me to the workshop district tucked into a corner of Floor 1.

She rented out one of the shops in it—the idea being, try your hand at smithing.

"A long-handled hammer, please. Decide the size of the head with the handle's strength in mind. No—actually, this one I should simply leave to you. Please."

What I was ordered to make was a hammer for use as a weapon.

An iron handle too, huh...

That's going to be seriously heavy.

I fired up a special furnace that runs on magic stones and started melting down the mountain of swords we'd picked up yesterday.

The 【Smithing】 skill was already active at this point, so the heat went through them in no time flat and they began to melt.

I'd studied the basics of smithing from videos.

Activating the 【Smithing】 skill lets you compress the whole process down to a fraction of the time.

You spend MP and get the result immediately.

That's what production-type skills are.

But what comes out is barely any different from what I could make on my own.

If you want to make good things, the only way is to keep honing your own craft.

Luckily I also have a skill for adjusting finished products, so adjusting them over and over does improve the outcome somewhat...

"Done. But is something like this really okay?"

Two meters of handle, plus a seriously heavy head.

Watanabe-san lifted the whole thing one-handed like it was nothing.

As expected of an 【Equipment Weight Reduction】 holder.

If this thing came swinging down on you, not even an orc would get off easy.

"Very good. Next is whether it can be enhanced... Akashiya-san, do you have 【Tool Enhancement・Hammer】?"

It's a skill learnable with 【Blacksmith】, but I hadn't taken it.

"Huh? This counts as a tool? You just said it was for combat..."

"For combat, yes. I would like you to enhance a combat weapon with 'Tool Enhancement.' Could you try?"

"Um... can I?"

"You can."

If this woman says I can, then I probably can.

It's definitely a hammer, though, right?

"【Tool Enhancement・Hammer】. Ah—pretty sure that worked."

It worked.

"Congratulations! Combat just got a whole lot easier for you!"

"Huh? This one's for me? For combat? Wasn't this a test for the 【Blacksmith】 work?"

I couldn't follow what she was telling me anymore.

So I wasn't getting the 【Blacksmith】 work after all?

"A test, you say? Well, I did intend to bring you work if the results pleased me... Akashiya-san, how would you like to use this space? The Association provides workshops to new production-class jobs at rock-bottom rates. In fact, today's rental was nominally an interior viewing. If you're willing, Akashiya-san, you can start using this place as of today."

"Even with the space, I can't make weapons that'll actually sell..."

"You just made one, didn't you? A weapon that can be enhanced with 'Tool Enhancement'! And that's not all. There are plenty of new adventurers out there struggling to find a weapon that suits them, just like you did. Let's build made-to-order weapons for those people. I will bring the customers—I know any number of them. I want your skills put to work for those people."

So this WAS a weapon meant for me after all.

And on top of that, it sounded like the work was mine too.

"I'm in. Please let me. But before that..."

"You want to test the weapon first, don't you? Floor 11 orcs ought to do, shouldn't they? Two of us should manage fine on Floor 11, so I'll come along. I'm taking the afternoon off, so let's get the workshop contract signed while we're at it."

She'd read me without my saying a word.

We were off to see whether 'Tool Enhancement' really could do the same thing as 'Weapon Enhancement.'

"And she's even taking the afternoon off for it..."

And so I came into my own workshop and my own weapon.

The weapon? Spectacular.

I pounded the Floor 10 Minotaurs flat, and on Floor 11 I flattened an orc's skull in a single blow, of all things.

When I used 【Tool Enhancement・Hammer】, the magic stone shattered right along with it, and Watanabe-san and I cracked up together.

A long-handled hammer far too heavy for anyone to wield, its weight erased by 【Equipment Weight Reduction】, its force multiplied by a 【Blacksmith】's 【Tool Enhancement・Hammer】.

Skill synergy...

One weapon changes this much, huh...

With this, I can make it.

Combat aside, it felt like I could get by as a 【Blacksmith】 too.

Me—the one who'd been stuck because I couldn't fight properly—helping newbies stuck the exact same way.

I could do even something that dreamlike.

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From there, I'd call it smooth sailing.

Selling made-to-order weapons cheap to the customers Kasumi-san introduced.

Since the materials were picked-up orc swords, you could say the prices were fair enough...

And if they liked what they got, next time I'd sell them something in finer materials at a finer price.

That alone started earning me more than adventuring did.

And it wasn't just the shop—my adventuring career was going well too.

I somehow managed to handle orcs now, and I'd started making my own armor on top of my weapons.

No amount of weight bothered me, so I ended up looking absolutely ridiculous, and Anego had a good laugh at me every time.

I started joining the freelance women's parties regularly and got pretty close with Anego.

The workshop became a hangout spot for the women adventurers, and I was having a great time of it.

Everything was smooth sailing for me...

Kasumi-san started to change around the time the first party broke through Floor 30...