The next day was my favorite day of the week! Why was this day of the week my all time favorite? Because it is the day when I get to use my hammer! Thus that warm and fuzzy feeling comes back! Again, I am not addicted to it okay?

 

I end up smithing all the [Bronze Ingots] and [Iron Ingots] in one day with time to spare! This was also enough for me to finish one more [Creationist: Ingot Creation] quest! Thus getting me an extra +1 PER.

 

On the downside, that Unfortunately left me with not much to do for the rest of the day once I was finished...

 

So I had to endure till the end of the day… * sigh *

 

...

 

The following day, I got up after a good rest and after breakfast headed again to the counter. Today was finally my last private lesson.

 

So I went to the Advanced Disciple ward and met up with Gregon, and from then on he began to teach me things as he worked.

 

While he was making something, I came up with a question to ask.

 

“I was wondering… is it possible to get to watch a Senior Disciple make something?” I inquired.

 

“What’s that missy?!?! I ain’t good enough for ya anymore?!?!” Gregon questioned.

 

“Hi?!?! That’s not it!” I respond frightened by reflex due to the sudden change in tone.

 

Getting my courage back together I tried to explain myself.

 

“I just thought that it might provide some insight and inspiration if I saw highest form of [Blacksmithing]...” I explained.

 

He stood there for a good minute pondering and not saying anything while holding his beard looking down, then after coming to some sort of conclusion he turns back to me.

 

“I may be able to manage something, but don’t get ya’r hopes up. Stay here” Gregon said then walked out the door.

 

After about 15 minutes, he came back.

 

“Here is the deal missy. I spoke to one of the Senior Disciples who I am friends with. He was an Advanced Disciple until he recently got promoted. In about an hour, at best he can spare about 10 minutes showing ya how to make a dagger with his skill. But that is about it.” Gregon says while somewhat grumbling.

 

“Alright! Deal!” I insisted feigning ignorance to his grumbles.

 

“* sigh * Ya better win the competition missy!” Gregon persisted.

 

After about an hour, we walked into the Senior Disciple area and met up with the Senior Disciple.

 

“So this is the talented student ya have been telling me about?” said the Senior Disciple.

 

“Yeah, yeah, lets get this over with Flam” Gregon retorted.

 

“Okay, then I shall show ya how I smith a dagger. I will only do it once so pay attention carefully” Flam warned.

 

“Thank you very much, I’ll make sure to watch as carefully as I can” I replied.

 

He then began smithing the dagger, and I activate [All-Observing-Eyes]. The smithing technique he used in both speed and quality was definitely the best I have ever seen. But equally impressive was what I was processing with my [All-Observing-Eyes]. Prior, I had to let go of many things because I did not have enough time to process them, but this time around the information that I could process increased dramatically. I obviously could not catch everything, but I still managed to catch a lot of things I missed before.

 

There was unfortunately a limit to how much I could use [All-Observing-Eyes], so I used it mostly during the most important junctures. The most worrying thing though was that 5 minutes passed, 6… 7… 8 but still no skill increase!

 

And Fam was already almost done with the dagger… 9 minutes passed and no luck…

 

Only just as he finished in the 10^th minute did I finally get something.

 

Your skill [NP][Blacksmithing] has become Level 6

 

“So how was it missy, manage to get any inspiration?” Fam asked.

 

“Yes! Quite a lot actually!” I exclaimed.

 

“So if ya’r done we can go now?” Gregon grumbled.

 

“Yes, thank you very much!” I remarked as we made our way back out of the Senior Disciple area.

 

From then on, Gregon continued to teach me, though in a more sour mood than before. I feel sorry for Gregon as he has done quite a lot for me, but never the less I really needed that extra skill level to break through my limits.

 

When there was but a few hours left in the day, I began attempting a prototype of what I will make for the competition. This one will of course be far inferior due to lack of time and lower quality of the ores, but regardless it will net me some practice. So I spent the rest of my day smithing it.

 

After showing the prototype to Gregon, I said my goodbyes and finished my day as usual.

 

...

 

Come morning, the whole place was in an uproar as things heated up for the competition. There was a lot of chatting and everyone was super excited!

 

After breakfast, all the Junior Disciples and Intermediate Disciples gathered around and waited. Shortly after, 3 Senior Disciples came by and one of them went up front.

 

“Today, we will finally start the quarterly competition! The winner of the competition will get a personal commissioned item and 3 hours of private training from the Grandmaster himself!” announced the Senior Disciple.

 

With that, loud cheers spread through out the whole complex.

 

“I will also remind the Junior Disciples that this acts as an examination for ya as well, if ya don’t perform well, ya will be expelled as a Disciple of the guild! And if one of ya manages to win the competition, ya will get promoted to an Intermediate Disciple! Now follow me!” he added.

 

The door behind him then opened and the crowd rushed in. The area the competition took place is the same area that they held the monthly selections, aka the Junior Disciple area due to it being more wider than the others. So I was fairly familiar with it. There were also Advanced Disciples standing everywhere keeping an eye out to prevent any sort of cheating.

 

Though technically speaking, there is only so many ways one can cheat when the system tells you who made the item. Not to mention, a skilled blacksmith can tell quite a lot just by looking at the complete item. Though there are shortcuts you can take such as bringing in a [Steel Ingot] instead of starting from scratch. There might also be other ways but I haven’t really put too much thought into it...

 

Unfortunately when everyone rushed in, I wasn’t able to keep up and ended up in the last spot. It doesn’t matter too much, but it means I have to travel further than others to get to the forge, thus losing some time here and there.

 

“Now then, ya have until 19 o’clock! Let the competition begin!” announced the senior disciple.

 

I took out my high quality [Iron Ore] and [Coal Ore] and began smelting! Due to the high difficulty, I spent almost 4 hours smelting them into an ingot. I knew working with materials of this level was not going to be easy…

 

After barely finishing it, I began to finally smith the dagger. The process was even more difficult and frankly put far beyond my abilities. Regardless, I still did my best to give it my all! It took me the entire 8 hours to finally finish it, and overall… I was a bit disappointed in the result due to all the quality that I have lost…

 

Congratulations! You have completed the class quest [Creationist: Weapon creation] +1 PER has been attained   Class quest [Creationist: Weapon creation], has been reset.

[Creationist] Weapon creation Produce 10 tier 1 weapons with at least a quality score of 2 and/or 10 tier 2+ weapons with at least a quality score of 1.   Type: Continuous 2/10   Status: 0/10 Reward: 1 [PER]

 

With that, the competition came to a close, everyone put their item under the provided cover for suspense and the rankings began.

 

“Well then, lets get the show on the road! I, Senior Disciple Tagon will act as the judge for this competition. The first entry is from Junior Disciple Maron, we have here a [Bronze Dagger] with a quality score of 5.1! Congratulations Maron, ya are currently our top contender!” proclaimed Tagon.

 

The audience laughed and cheered at the obvious joke, but soon they were quited down and the grading continued. After going through a few Junior Disciples, it did not take long for an Intermediate Disciple’s turn. From then on, no Junior Disciple could compete as Intermediate Disciples showed off their Iron and Steel creations.

 

“Now then, next will be our last quarter champion! Let us see how the specialist class [Steelsmith] Algon has improved!” Tagon reported.

 

Steel Dagger of Greater Strength   An exquisite dagger made out of steel   +32 STR +160 ATK   Bonus: +3 STR   [Made by Algon] Durability: 1602/1602 Quality 8.0114/10.0000

 

“...”

 

* gulp *

 

The entire room gulped down in awe and were completely speechless… I was no exception… frankly put, I don’t think I currently have the ability to make steel with such high quality score, even if I was given materials with a quality score of 9 to work with. Not to mention in terms of combat stats, his weapon surpasses mine… I droop down my shoulders in disappointment.

 

“As expected of Algon the [Steelsmith]! Ya’r skills have pretty much doubled since last competition! I don’t think there is a disciple who grew even half as fast as ya did during these past 3 months! Or have ya been holding back on us all this time? Ya should definitely take an exam to become an Advanced Disciple already! At this point ya are just pickin’ on everyone else… I mean seriously… I just might have a chat with the Grandmaster about this!” Tagon declared.

 

From then on, he continued rating the disciples until he came to the last contestant… me. I tensed up due to all the pressure…

 

“Oh! The little catkin missy… I was waitin’ for ya’r turn. Old Gregon has gone senile and bet 25 platinum coins on ya winnin’. So I was wonderin’ what ya will have in store for us! I hope ya gave it a ‘good whack’...har-har-har” Tagon divulged with a laugh, followed by everyone suddenly staring at me...

 

WHA?!?! He is joking… right?

 

Not waiting for me to pull myself together, He then reached under the cover and looked at my dagger… soon after he frowned, but said nothing...

 

“S-So how is it?” I asked, quite nervous of the result.

 

With my beckoning, he pulls himself together and turns around towards the dwarf Advanced Disciple standing near by.

 

“Joran, Did the little missy really make this herself?” questioned Tagon.

 

“Uhm… I did not see anythin’ that could constitute cheatin’… So as long as the missy’s name is on it… it should be the case...” said Joran.

 

He then turns back to me staring intently.

 

“Did ya really make this?” Tagon asked.

 

“Uhm… Y-Yes… i-is there something wrong with it?” I replied shrinking back from the intense glare.

 

“What’s the matter?” asked another Senior Disciple as he comes in and looks at the dagger.

 

“...”

 

Holy-Steel Healing Dagger   An okay quality dagger made out of holy-steel   +7 STR +7 DEX +7 AGI +7 VIT +2 INT +2 WIS +159 ATK   [Healing Stream] +5 HP every minute (5 holy power is consumed per minute)   Bonus: +1 STR   Holy Power: 60/100   [Made by Shiro] Durability: 1274/1274 Quality 3.1854/10.0000

 

“This is...” murmured the Senior Disciple.

 

Not getting a proper answer of where I stand leaves me even more nervous. I understand my dagger is pretty good for a Junior Disciple… but it falls behind on combat stats. On top of that, they consider what materials you started with and the difficulty of said result… In the process of making this dagger, I lost over 4 quality score which is pretty major. In comparison, Algon’s result was beyond perfect as the result surpassed the materials and he managed to make it focus on 1 attribute, and even more, he managed an extra large bonus.

 

While my [Holy-steel Healing Dagger] is something that even I may have a 1/10 chance of repeating again. The dagger he made in terms of difficulty, my chance of replication at this point is 0...

 

Not being able to take it anymore with the silence and staring going on, I plead once again..

 

“S-So how well did I do? Was it not good enough?”

 

“How well did ya do? Are ya seriously askin’ this question missy? Do ya even know what ya did?!?!” queried Tagon.

 

Did I maybe do something wrong?

 

“Uhm… No...” I replied with hesitation.

 

“Missy, do ya even know what Holy-steel is or how it is normally made? In terms of difficulty it is harder to make than Enchanted-steel! The process of making holy-steel requires a pure environment to work in, that is because holy elemental mana is prone to corruption from other mana. So making Holy-steel is at least twice as difficult as makin’ Enchanted-steel if not more. But to make Holy-steel in this environment is… unheard of… Maybe the [Sacred Blacksmith] or a few others may be able to pull it off, but it has never been tried due to the ridiculous difficulty needed to do that, which borders on the line of impossible!” Tagon explained.

 

“Oh...” I mutter not fully being able to comprehend what just happened.

 

I mean it was extremely difficult and all… I spent every morning and night using [Light Magic: Holy Light] on the [Coal Ore] filling it with Holy Power. The process was pretty darn hard to do. Luckily my penalty only constituted for healing purposes, but using it to push the Holy Power seemed to work with little loss in efficiency.

Then when I got here, I started smelting the ingot and it got even harder as the holy power threatened to escape. And I began to lose quality trying to keep the holy power in check. While I couldn’t exactly see mana, I used my [All-Observing-Eyes] and my senses to predict its flow and whack it back into place. This process got even more harder when it came to actually making the dagger as the mana felt like it wanted to explode and go wild! I barely managed to contain it in by paying a large price in quality.

 

But to say it is border line impossible is a bit overstating things… I don’t think what I did was that difficult, and someone who has a skill to see mana should have been able to replicate it or better with ease… It was more like a really hard game of whack-a-mole if you ask me...

 

Or could it be that [Pure Mana Affinity] somehow simplified the process without me knowing?

 

I really need to learn more about magic once my financial situation improves…

 

“Well I guess it is time to wrap things up! Congratulations Junior Disciple Shiro! You are the winner of this competition!” yelled Tagon.

 

Eh? Seriously?!?! I actually won?!?!

 

Cheers and applaud spread through the room and it was a bit embarrassing, but at same time felt pretty good...

 

“YAHOOOOOOOOOO!!!! DRINKS ARE ON ME!!” came a loud shout overshadowing all other noise, looking at the source Gregon is jumping around and dancing with a large smile on his face.

 

From then on, everyone began to party like crazy drinking alcohol and dancing. During this chaos, Tagon came up to me.

 

“Tomorrow, after breakfast, come by the Senior Disciple ward. I will arrange for ya’r promotion to Intermediate Disciple and set ya up with the Grandmaster” Tagon informed.

 

“Yes! Thank you very much!” I replied with a beaming smile.

 

Finally! I will be able to sell my stuff and gain levels much faster! Not to mention, stealing the skills of the Grandmaster is the icing on the cake!

 

After Tagon, many others came to congratulate me for my victory, including Gregon who was already somewhat drunk.

 

Since I can’t exactly drink alcohol, after everyone was done giving their blessings, I head to eat dinner, then off to bed in excitement for the days to come.