7: A month passes

Samantha’s view

My parents named me Samantha. Friends call me Sam. Strangers call me “Hey you!” I’m a nobody.

I work with metals. Shaping, grinding and pounding. Even melting it down and using molds. Whatever is needed, I do it. 

In the poor part of town though, there really isn’t much for me to do. At least, there wasn’t, until a strange young lady gave me something amazing. 

She said it was instructions for making a portable array for cultivation. While I’ve heard of such things, they were always the works of great masters, made with expensive materials. Not a simple copper device like this is… perhaps simple isn’t the right word for this. 

These instructions are extremely detailed. It seems less like an explanation of what is wanted, and more like a lesson on how to make things, with the desired product as merely an example of what can be made using these techniques. I wasn’t sure what to make of it at first, and didn’t really believe the child, but as I began work following the instructions, I came to realize this was a treasure more valuable than any I’d been given before. These were lessons, lessons from a master.

It didn’t take long to make the first time I tried it, but I wasn’t satisfied. The quality was poor. In light of the value of what I was given, I wanted to make sure I returned a quality item. I closed my doors, and spent a full month working on it before I was able to produce a product I was proud of. Thankfully, the instructions included where to send it at the end. 

Now, I wasn’t foolish enough to think I had actually perfected it, but it was the best piece of work I’d ever made. Also the hardest. A three dimensional array. Like a small ball made of copper lines. When I first opened my shop, I never thought I’d someday be able to make something like this. After all, I’d given up on becoming a true master. All the masters I begged to teach me turned me down. In the end, I had to become an apprentice to a nobody. Heh, maybe I won’t be a nobody anymore.

…

“I’ve got a package for a miss Mellanie?” 

“Ah, thank you. Let me see.” The little lady carefully unwrapped the spherical array, and examined it closely. “Good, good, this will do. Can you please wait a moment? I have something for you.”

I didn’t have to wait long, before she came down with two more scrolls. 

“These are to help you become a better metalworker. In the future I’ll have something even more challenging that I need made.”

“Thank you very much, miss.” 

“You’re welcome. It’s good to see my lessons appreciated. I’ll see you again someday.” 

…

When I got back, I took a look. One was a cultivation method I’d never heard of before, while the other was another portable array. According to the instructions and explanations, these are both specifically designed for me. It seems that while they might be of use to others, they’ll have reduced effectiveness when used by someone else. I’ll have to experiment and test it myself to be sure, but at this point, I have no reason to doubt it. 

…

This cultivation method… how? It is optimized in a way that requires knowing the exact ki flow rates in each of my limbs. How could she have determined that without even examining my body? For optimal speed, this method requires very exact timing, yet I’ve not needed to make any adjustments to the instructions to get the timing right. The instructions even include how I need to change the timings to account for how the portable array she gave me instructions on creating would alter the ki flow. If I had not used it myself, and merely heard someone describe it, I’d think they were lying or exaggerating. This level of instruction should be impossible. I found a master. A true master.

…

Spy’s view

Tracking down two of the escaped servants wasn’t too hard. They clearly knew nothing of how to hide their trail, and the pawn shops they sold their ill gotten gains to were quick to cooperate. However, tracking down the missing miss Mellanie and her maid proved more difficult. It seemed they left no trail at all. 

None of the inns had seen them. None of the stables had either. They did not visit any pawn shops, or restaurants. The only possibility is they must have left the city on foot, immediately after leaving the household. This will make it very difficult to track them down.

***Author Note***

I thought that if the spy was lucky, they might find some hint of the main character. They rolled a 3… they are looking in all the wrong places. >_< I guess it will be a while before they have any idea what happened to her.