[Blue Bird]
“Myungwoo!”
My first thought upon seeing him was that this was bound to happen. I’d told him every time we met to get proper sleep and rest, but he just kept chanting he was fine, and now look at him! Should I call 119, no, would a healer be better?
I put down Peace and Chirp and approached Myungwoo while taking out my phone.
“Are you okay? You’re not hurt anywhere, are you?”
At least there’s no smell of blood. Still, since he might have been injured when he collapsed, I took out a potion without hastily trying to lift him. Myungwoo turned his head slightly with a dying sound, apparently not unconscious.
“Mana… potion…”
Ah, mana depletion. That’s somewhat fortunate. When I quickly gave him a mana potion, his pale complexion improved a little.
“Should I get you some water? Or how about being admitted to the hospital for a few days to rest properly?”
I even considered forcibly hospitalizing him. But there’d be no point in tying him to a bed since he could just enter the forge anyway.
“…I’m fine. The mana consumption was just much more than expected… I ran out of potions…”
“That ‘I’m fine’ nonsense again!”
This is getting really tiresome. I helped the still weak and stumbling Myungwoo to the sofa.
“Have you eaten? When’s the last time you slept?”
“I did sleep a bit when I collapsed…?”
Myungwoo answered while drinking another mana potion. And he’s smiling like he’s done something good.
“You’re not some ultra-black company employee working mandatory overtime Monday through Sunday, so why are you voluntarily grinding yourself down? Make a schedule and leave work on time. Rest on weekends.”
“Okay.”
Somehow his response comes more easily than usual. Wondering about this change of heart, I examined his expression, and he grinned again. That face seems familiar. Ah, that’s right.
“Did you finish what you said you were making?”
“Yes.”
Apparently recovered enough to move properly now, Myungwoo stood up. Then he pulled an item from his inventory.
What appeared was a beautiful sword. The blade was transparent as if made of glass, with a soft blue light swirling around it. Though it looked more decorative than practical, being an item, the power imbued in it wouldn’t be weak.
“You made a weapon?”
“Ah, a Dragon Heart’s basic form is a sword.”
“…What?”
“The design is her taste.”
I don’t understand what he’s talking about. Just then, with a flutter, a small bird appeared. It was a small, round blue-feathered bird that could fit in one hand.
-Peep
“Her taste.”
-Peep peep
I understand even less now. I reflexively took the sword Myungwoo held out.
[Eunhye ? L-rank
A sword born from the magic stone of Dragon Lord and Master Blacksmith Sharlos.
Contractor ? Han Yujin]
Hmm… hmmmm…
First, what’s with this name? L-rank… what? Dragon Lord? Master Blacksmith? Sharlos, as in that bead material? Magic stone… Dragon Heart… And why am I the contractor when I don’t remember making any contract?
“…That transparent magic stone you showed me before wasn’t SS-rank after all.”
Looking at the transparent blade reminded me. The dragonkin’s SS-rank magic stone was opaque white.
“Yeah. It was an L-rank magic stone. Specifically, a magic stone with a particular name — Sharlos’s Dragon Heart. They say it’s higher ranked than normal L-rank magic stones?”
Wow… I see. I see. Wow, learned something new.
“Um… just skipping ranks like this, I mean suddenly an L-rank…”
“It’s a material grade I can’t handle with my current ability, but Ismuar is a spirit created by Sharlos. Thanks to that, though I struggled terribly, I could complete it! I still can’t handle SS-rank materials well for other things. Still, my proficiency increased a lot this time, so I should be able to make low SS-rank items soon.”
Mister Sharlos, making spirits and giving L-rank magic stones. The forge seems to be his too — he’s really like the giving tree.
“Usually it would be more convenient to transform it into a bracelet or ring. As a weapon, its only property is that it absolutely cannot break.”
For an L-rank? I tried changing it to a bracelet. It transformed as soon as I thought about it, but… two transparent chains with blue jewels dangling all over — it’s disgustingly flashy.
“This is a bit…”
“That’s her taste.”
-Peep
The blue bird landed on the back of my hand and tilted its head. It’s made from a Dragon Heart, so why is it a bird? Was Sharlos a Blue Dragon?
“Um… Eunhye?”
-Peeep
“Could we make it a bit more simple?”
When the blue bird peeped, the dangling jewels disappeared leaving just the chains. No, one remained. It chirped piip-piip as if that one absolutely couldn’t be removed. Ring… wouldn’t be right, let’s try a necklace — a dazzlingly sparkling jeweled necklace appeared. Is it a crow rather than a blue bird? Or maybe this was Sharlos’s taste in life? Dragons being fond of jewels is famous, but are dragons from other worlds the same?
Anyway, the bracelet was better.
“…Her name really sounds like a person’s name.”
“I didn’t name her.”
Myungwoo explained that it was just decided naturally.
“Currently it only has one skill. The same damage nullification skill as Sharlos’s bead before. However, it’s not single-use and the rank can be adjusted. When magic power is full, let’s say fully charged, the maximum duration for L-rank damage nullification is about an hour, and like before, the theoretically unlimited rank level is about 10 minutes? Depleted magic power can be recharged by feeding her magic stones.”
Since Sharlos’s bead was probably a Dragon Heart fragment, I guessed the skill effect would be similar. But L-rank damage nullification for an hour, and it can be replenished with magic stones? That’s broken.
“However, absorbing magic stones takes quite some time, and you need to feed at least S-rank ones, so it’s best to use it only when needed.”
“S-rank magic stones aren’t hard to get, but how long does absorption take?”
“If completely empty, about a week?”
“That’s not even that long! Wow, if an S-rank Hunter used this-“
“The skill doesn’t apply to anyone but the contractor.”
The cold water I’d been dreading was thrown. But why? Myungwoo scratched the back of his head and explained at my indignant look.
“Without such a restriction, it couldn’t be matched to L-rank… It’s not single-use and it’s above a simple barrier, right? You can act freely while nullifying only damage above a certain level. Plus the maximum is unlimited rank.”
That’s true. But… no, if it’s limited to the contractor anyway, it’s better that it applies to me. I have the double skill for poison curse resistance too.
What a really good item. Now that the duration has increased too, I should notify the Sesung Guild Leader that my value has gone up even more than before.
“Since it’s a growth type, more skills or effects might develop in the future but…”
Myungwoo’s face suddenly turned serious. My expression grew heavy too. Are there side effects or something?
“Stat point increase was… impossible.”
“…Huh?”
“Even with S-rank items, since they have separate skills, stat increases are either secondary, or barely S-rank threshold items can have stat increase effects. Stat increase is kind of… considered cheap, you could say. Even among same-rank items, if it has stat increase, it’s considered lower quality, something like that. From SS-rank up, you could say there are no stat increase items at all.”
“…I see.”
No wonder S-rank stat increase items were hard to get. I wondered why they weren’t available when not many people would use them. That’s a bit sad.
“Still, this is already amazing. No, the damage nullification skill is far more impressive! I just asked on the off chance, but to think you’d make it this perfectly. With these materials and time…”
As my initial surprise at the unexpected item settled, emotion welled up. At the same time, the bracelet in my hand felt too heavy. This is too much, really.
“You could have used it yourself. It was left to you in the first place. To go this far for me-“
“There are other words besides that kind of talk.”
Myungwoo cut me off firmly. I looked at him startled. His face was beaming with pride. His expression and eyes showed complete satisfaction.
Seeing that, I realized what I needed to say.
“Thank you. Really.”
“It’s nothing.”
“Truly, thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“Myungwoo, you’re the best. You’re amazing.”
“I do feel pretty amazing myself. Ah, it really was hard though.”
“Take breaks while working from now on. Please.”
Myungwoo nodded with a smile. His attitude was bright and light, as if a heavy burden had been lifted.
“Still, don’t go around alone. You know from trying it before, right? Even with the damage nullification skill, normal daily contact isn’t a problem. Of course that’s the natural result since I wanted defensive ability in a state where contact is possible.”
“Ah, I know.”
It would be easy to grab and run since rough handling is fine. But I won’t be going around alone, and more than anything, I liked that I wouldn’t be in danger even if I just walked into dungeons now. Now Yuhyun won’t worry about me as much either.
“Eunhye, I’ll be counting on you.”
-Peep
The blue bird that landed on my wrist chirped as if answering. That’s when I noticed Chirp sitting dazed at my feet. He looked somehow shocked. Why? Did he realize the magic stone he’d been eyeing had turned into an item?
“Chirp?”
-…Chirp
Is he looking at the bracelet… no, at the bird? Just then, Eunhye fluttered over to Chirp. Chirp jumped up and called out strangely aggressively.
-Chirp!
-Peep peep peep
-Chirp chirp!
Then Chirp started flapping his tiny wings. So desperately it was pitiful. The blue bird watching Chirp flew back to my wrist. Then disappeared as if melting into the bracelet’s jewel. So that’s why one jewel was left.
-Chirp… chirp
“Ah, Chirp! Why are you crying!”
Teardrops bigger than his small black eyes fell sadly. Even when I quickly picked him up and tried to comfort him, he kept chirping and crying.
“What’s wrong, what is it.”
-Chirp, chirp
He kept chirping and flapping his wings… Could he be crying because he can’t fly? He didn’t mind Blue or Comet flying, but maybe seeing another bird affected him? But Chirp’s wings were too small compared to his body. They were mostly down feathers without proper flight feathers.
“…Hey, Myungwoo.”
“Yeah?”
“If you have time, could you make a flying item for Chirp? Just being able to float slowly would be fine.”
“Got it. I can make something like that quickly.”
His ready agreement made me feel really reassured and grateful. How could I live without you, really.
“Now I should properly set up an item production workshop.”
After comforting Chirp, I had dinner with Myungwoo for the first time in a while. The prepared side dishes were delicious of course, but the freshly cooked food was amazing enough to draw exclamations. I naturally thought of Yuhyun and Yerim, but since Myungwoo didn’t particularly like either of them, I held back. Yerim carefully comes to get side dishes sometimes, but bringing in Yuhyun too would be too much for Myungwoo. If only Yuhyun would be a bit friendlier to Myungwoo. Though things went wrong from their first impression.
“Making Eunhye made me realize something — the system seems to unexpectedly hold people back.”
“You noticed that?”
“Well, using skills in the forge is different from outside. There’s no status window either. You seem to have known already, Yujin.”
“Ah, I’ve had occasions where I went beyond the system too.”
The lizard master’s memories helped a lot with that especially.
“In particular, you shouldn’t just believe the skill description window. How should I put it, if it’s an ability to make fire, it just ends with ‘can burn things’. But you can cook food, ward off cold, light up darkness, and so on. Plus there are inaccurate descriptions too.”
“Not just that, skills are originally my abilities anyway.”
Myungwoo nodded and said.
“Though there’s a skill window and it works when you use it, without the window the feeling is completely different. Above all, within the system I absolutely couldn’t make L-rank items. But by combining forces with Ismuar and figuring out how to handle magic power, it became possible. You could say we went beyond set skills?”
To realize that already. Myungwoo is really amazing. Though I managed to use Diarma’s abilities somehow too, it would have been impossible without his memories and magic stone.
“So I’m thinking of training people who have talent but no item creation skills.”
“Training them?”
“Yeah. Making a team would be better than me making items alone, right? First I want to propose it to Mister Lee Minseok from Haeyeon. Though he only has repair skills, that’s still an ability to handle items. Plus he has much more real-world experience than me.”
Teaching skills, huh. That was the standard in worlds without systems. Taking in talented disciples and teaching them to learn special abilities.
“It might be possible inside your forge. I’ll send you people I find with related aptitude too.”
“Only if it succeeds since it’s not certain yet.”
“Ah, and since we’re out, let’s go level up.”
How many days has it been since I used My Kid Is The Best skill? It’s been a while. Myungwoo nodded, saying he was free now.
Since we’re going anyway, maybe I should drag Yuhyun along. So they can get closer too. I wonder if he’s named his spirit yet.
–TL Notes–
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