The Runesmith

“Here is the last batch.”

Bernir placed a couple of blades onto the workbench and was having trouble fitting all of them next to the other items. When he looked around the workshop it looked jam-packed with weapons and armor parts.

“Are you sure about this boss? Even you will have trouble with all of these.”

“It’s fine Bernir, I’ll just get this over with.”

“If you say so, good luck, I’ll go tend to the Runic smelter.”

The half-dwarf gave a smile and a thumbs-up before leaving this section of the workshop. Since the expansion, they had installed separate rooms.

The largest one was the main smithy with all the tools, the forge, and all of the runic tools. Then in one side room was the generator room. It was soundproof as well as cooled. The generator that he made produced a lot of heat, which had to be kept in check with magic.

Then in the newest room, there was the new smelter. Roland had made a card that Bernir would be able to use. It was programmed to work with deep steel for now. When he figured out the other ratios he would try the more exotic metals.

A last room that was mostly unoccupied was also there, it was devoid of tools and furniture. Inside of it was just a board with a large schematic nailed to it. It depicted strange runic parts and symbols that almost no one would be able to decipher.

“First this and then I can get that project underway…”

Roland gave out a sigh before chugging down a large blue potion. It was bitter and tasted awful but the moment it was gone he could feel a strange prickly feeling wash over him.

“With the mana regeneration buff from this potion, I should be able to do this.”

He picked up one of the blades and brought it over to the furnace. After heating it up gently he started hitting it with his runcesmithing hammer. It didn’t take more than ten minutes for the lesser rune to be formed and the enchantment was done.

This was his workload, for the time being, he had gotten some of the better deep steel and deep silver blades from his associates. The decision was made to not overdo it. Other craftsmen would produce the items while he just inscribed runes on them.

This wasn’t all as each and every one of these items would also possess a mana stone. The blacksmiths that prepared them were given the diagrams and fashioned the hilts accordingly. What Roland only needed to do was to engrave the runes with his skill and place the mana stone in the socket.

With this phase one of their plan would be going in motion. They would flood the market with runic weapons that also lowered casting requirements. The runes were all simple ones like sharpening or impact, thanks to this Roland could work fast.

His skills were quite high at this point and he was able to make these weapons when he was a Runic Blacksmith. Now as a Runesmith Lord this didn’t pose a problem and he could go through them quite fast.

The only problem was his mana, the more he worked the faster it dropped. Luckily for him, he was working for the adventurer’s guild and the mana potions were given to him at 50% of the normal price.

He hoped to get them for free but the guild master was quite stingy. There was nothing of the sort in the contract and mana potions were not a requirement for his work.

They would make it faster but wouldn’t really profit the guild that much as Roland intended to make other items for himself. The guild master knew this so he only went down to about what the guild was buying them for.

Even this helped as Roland could now buy mana potions at a great discount. This was only possible when someone bought such items in bulk. There was a downside to the potions, a person couldn’t just drink them constantly. With time they would cause a debuff which would be akin to feeling melancholic and tired.

The only reason he was willing to put up with this debuff was that he wanted to go back to his own projects. Even with Bernir working the smelter they were understaffed. The trip to and from the city for more resources always took up a lot of time.

With that in mind, he would need to ask the guild to lend them a porter. He was even willing to pay their wages if they just took care of the errand work.

The work continued late into the night. Roland was seen with bags under his eyes and a somewhat glassy look.

“There… that’s the last one…urp... ”

Roland covered his mouth after burping. To the side, he looked at the empty six vials that were previously filled with the mana regeneration potions. With their help, he was able to power through all of these low-level weapons.

In one day he was able to do what other runesmiths would need a week or more. His large mana pool and all of the bonuses that came with it were the reason. This along with all the skills that lowered runecrafting requirements allowed him to get this done.

The only downside was that he still needed to boost himself with the mana potions but it was nothing that a good night of sleep wouldn’t cure.

‘I’ll be able to focus on the golem now, before that I also need to take care of that.’

After taking a warm bath and for once not passing out in it, Roland headed to his bedroom. There on a cabinet was a crystal ball, the same one that he bought from the strange magic shop. He had already gone through the runic structure and everything that was important was scribed down into one of his notebooks, what remained was to go through with his promise.

It was already late at night so he wasn’t planning to talk just yet. What a person had to do at first was send something similar to a direct message. After this, the mage on the other side would know the ‘number’ of this crystal ball and only then a call could go through.

The crystal balls were large and required a lot of magical energy to run. It was hard to catch the mage on the other side at the correct timing. There was also a way to talk via writing which required a lot less preparation and was a lot faster. This was Roland’s preferred way of talking as he never liked long phone calls even when he was in his old world.

It was already close to midnight so he didn’t expect to get a reaction. With a little prod to the crystal ball, he sent his message. It was just a simple greeting and he intended to call the person on the other side when he woke up in the morning. After getting through so many potions he was not really feeling too great.

“Huh?”

But as luck would have it, the moment he turned around he could feel the crystal ball gave out a chime. This sound was an indication that a person on the other side received the message and was going to respond.

This was something that he could not stop, when the connection went through and there was a response it would commence the magic call. Thus when the person on the other side popped up on the crystal ball, she could see a very grumpy-looking Roland.

“Greetings Sir. Roland!”

It didn’t seem that she was able to read into his mood too much though as she sounded rather cheerful.

“Greetings Lady Lucille, didn’t expect you to be awake at this hour.”

“I’ve been busy with my studies, after our little adventure I’ve been inspired, there is so much to learn from the runes! I still remember Sir. Roland’s runic magic during that battle.”

He was not able to get a word in while Lucille went on a tangent. As always he was praised by her, though it seemed she was mostly praising the runes that he made and not him for using them.

“I was worried that you wouldn’t contact me, or that something bad happened, it has already been over a month!”

“Ah yes, I apologize, I’ve been busy with my work…”

“Work? What are you working on?”

“Ah, I constructed a runic smelter for aether alloys but that doesn’t matter. I just wanted to give you my coordinates. It's late, we should go to bed…”

Roland tried to end the conversation fast before the devilish woman there started barraging him with questions. He had already forgotten how much of a dark hole Lucille was when it came to runic stories. Mentioning the runic smelter was already the wrong choice as she quickly figured out the meaning behind it.

“A runic smelter for aether alloys? Does Sir. Roland intend to build something with those? But if you speak about aether metals, those are mostly used for golems. Oh my, is Sir. Roland building a golem?”

It seemed that Lucille was pushing her face up against her own crystal ball. It was as if she wanted to climb through it and come over to his workshop to look at the golem plans.

“Y-yes, something like that. Lady Lucille, could you tell my brother that I’m doing fine.”

He quickly steered the conversation elsewhere in the hopes that he would not need to talk about his runic wares.

“Sir. Robert? Ah yes, I’ll be sure to include this information the next time I see him.”

Lucille seemed to quiet down but soon she recalled something.

“Speaking of Sir. Robert, I think his shield did quite the impression on the Professor.”

“The Professor?”

Roland recalled that Lucille mentioned such a person before. This was supposed to be some old teacher that was also a Rune Mage. Being a reclusive introvert as he was, Roland was not looking forward to the introduction.

There was a finite number of people that he could stomach. On the other hand, this person could help him with his research if he ever got stuck on something. Lucille had already informed him about his extensive knowledge and years of expertise.

If this Professor was a Runic Mage he would probably be very knowledgeable about the software part of the runes. This was probably his biggest weak point. He even felt confident in recreating tier 3 runes if he was ever able to procure them in the future.

As it stood now, he lacked the funds to get them and he didn’t feel like rushing it was the right plan. While he still lacked a perfect understanding of the software component in the tier 2 runes there was no reason to jump those steps yet. He would arrive there sooner or later and with time his heightened skills and stats would also make things easier.

“Ah yes, there was a person like that…”

“Yes, when the Professor saw Sir. Robert’s shield.”

Lucille covered her mouth and started giggling, it seemed that something happened between the second runic nut from the magic institute. This time around his brother fell victim to it.

“Did Robert give his shield to the Professor?”

“Give it? No, he borrowed it and it was returned to him after a week, you should have seen how he pouted.”

Roland had a hard time imagining Robert's pouting face, the man was quite gruff-looking, he probably looked like a powder keg waiting to explode.

“Yes, I promised the Professor that I would introduce the creator of that shield, could we arrange an appointment?”

“An appointment?”

“Yes, how about in two days? The Professor is busy for now, don’t want to intrude but it should be fine in two days!”

“Two days?”

“Two days it is then! It’s getting late and I’m running low on mana, we will have to continue this conversation later.”

Before Roland could decline the invitation to the appointment Lucille vanished from the crystal ball. It seemed that he would need to have a talk with this professor. He recalled his old university days and was reminded how some of those professors there acted. If he didn’t go through with this his only connection to the magic academy could be void.

“Ugh… fine, what can go wrong?”

He tossed his hands up into the air before flopping down onto his bed. The fatigue from the full days of work washed over him and he fell asleep. Even his skill that resisted skill was not strong enough to counteract mana deprivation and build up stress.

“Ugh, there was not supposed to be a headache…”

On the dawn of the next day, Roland awoke with a splitting headache. He dragged his tired body into the kitchen to drink some pain-alleviating tea. It was possible to do this with more potions but there were also less intrusive ways of countering such pain. The migraine didn’t go away fully but it was bearable enough for him to work now.

‘Damn, It feels like I’m working back at the old repair shop.’

While placing some food in Agni’s bowl he recalled his old life. There he did spend time on the computer late into the night. In the morning he woke up half dead and still needed to go to work.

“Good Morning Boss!”

“Hey there Berning, could you bring the weapons back to the guild?”

“Oh, did you take care of all of them? You don’t look so good, maybe you should take a break today.”

“A break huh?”

While Bernir gave him the idea to take a break Roland didn’t really know what to do with that. In his past life playing games on his computer was his only pastime. The rest of the day was spent on work or cooking for himself.

In this world on the other hand he didn’t really have a normal hobby. Even if he wanted to take a break he found himself thinking back to runes and how he could improve them. There wasn’t really anything he wanted to do, instead of wasting time like that it was better to go down into the dungeon to train up Agni.

“I’m fine, I just need some tea and a couple of hours to recover. Also, give this letter to Elodia, she will know what to do with it.”

Bernir grabbed the sealed letter that Roland wrote not so long ago. In it, he just asked for a part-time porter that they could spare to work for him.

“Oh, what is this?”

Bernir looked at the letter in question and tried to peek into the writing. At the end of his examination, he gave Roland a big grin followed by an elbow to the side.

“I didn’t know that you had it in you boss, little Elodia isn’t bad, I would have gone for the elf myself, she feels like the fun type if you know what I mean.”

Roland just sipped his tea while looking at his pervy assistant with an empty look.

“Could you for once stop thinking with your underside, it’s business-related.”

“But I like my underside and the ladies love it too, he he.”

Bernir started laughing before removing himself from Roland’s house.

“Woof!”

“What is it Agni?”

Soon Roland was left behind with his Ruby Wolf. He was jumping around a lot this day and he had a sinking suspicion as to why.

“You probably want to go into the dungeon, huh?”

“Woof!”

Agni’s level was approaching fifty, it would probably only take one more dungeon run before this adolescent wolf became a proper adult. The only problem was that Roland wanted to focus on his golem but for some reason, there were other things pulling him away from constructing it.

“Can we do it next week? I need to work on something…”

Agni started whining and his tail curled up.

“No… Don’t look at me like that…”

Roland was given the puppy eye treatment that he was weak against. It didn’t always work but this time around it seemed that Roland was getting swayed.

“God damn it, fine… my head is killing me anyway… let’s go to the dungeon.”

He stood up while Agni started jumping around and making circles. His head was feeling hazy and he felt that if he started his work he would be making a lot of mistakes. It would take about half a day till he recovered so killing a few monsters would be a nice change of pace. Luckily for him, using runic weapons didn't require much concentration.

“Just let me grab my armor…”

“Woof!”