A Wolf's Howl, A Fairy's Wing

Chapter 928 927 - Forging weapons [2/2]

First, he grabbed some of the higher-quality weapons he'd taken with him—specifically, those weapons that possessed multiple affinities. These were the same weapons he'd researched to improve his work on the spear he'd just finished.Now he looked over these weapons again, but also explained—in detail—-everything he did and found to Astrid. Both surged their energies through the weapons several times, carefully inspecting every rune and sigil carved onto its surface, as well as the way the materials blended together.

When they were done with that, Erik presented some books and data-slabs. These held information about the fusing of existing weapons, which was an obscure but well-documented practice. For the next few hours, they focused on these. Erik had read most of these already, but he discussed everything he'd found with Astrid. This way, she would learn more about the art of forging, and he'd have a sounding board to bounce ideas off.

At first, Astrid still pretended to be disinterested, but this didn't last long. By the time Erik presented the books, she already had sparkling eyes of curiosity. Erik looked at this with a grin of satisfaction. This was the first time he saw her interested in anything besides sex and battle. With every moment that passed, he realised more how similar he and Astrid truly were… because fighting, sex, and forging were his favourite pastimes as well.

Eventually, the only thing left to do was actual experimentation. Astrid took her place by the forge once more, and Erik stepped back over to the anvil with two weapons in hand—both standard-sized swords, but with different affinities.

First, he placed them on top of each other on the anvil, then he wove some sigils in the air that would bind the two weapons together. Though he was nothing compared to Elora when it came to sigils, he did know a little—after all, a runesmith used them during forging all the time.

Next, he sent the bound swords into the forge to heat them up. Then, he began to work… or so he'd hoped. After nearly fifteen minutes of waiting, Erik pulled the weapons out again with a wry smirk. "Well… I guess that won't work."

Astrid looked at the surprisingly even-temperatured swords with a frustrated pout. "Why not give it a little longer…?" she grumbled. "I don't believe I can't heat those damn things to forging temperatures!"

Unfortunately, Erik shook his head and chuckled as he looked at her. "Don't blame yourself, love. Though the magic of these weapons has degraded, they were still forged with materials far above our ranks, in forges that were likely tens, if not hundreds of times as hot as this forge can even handle."

He took the weapons back and put them away. "We already expected this, anyway," he sighed. "I just wanted to test it."

Astrid watched the swords go with narrowed eyes filled with the promise of a rematch. In the forge, the tiny sun flared with heat at Astrid's emotions. To her, this felt like a second defeat in the same field. It wasn't that long ago that she'd tried the same on the strange alloy that Audumla's medallions were made of, and she'd failed then, too.

In fact, this defeat felt worse because she'd gone up a rank since last time!

Erik smiled at her behaviour, but didn't comment on it. Rather, he took out two other swords. "Fortunately, Elora and I gathered plenty of mostly-useless weapons during our time on Söl. I'll just use these."

He repeated the process of before… This time, he pulled the swords out almost immediately with a wry smirk. Glancing at Astrid, he could see she'd decided to take out her frustration on these swords, with great success.

Seeing the red-hot glowing swords, she snorted with only somewhat relieved frustration.

Shaking his head and chuckling, Erik then quickly pushed distractions away and began experimenting.

Though he'd realised this before, it became immediately apparent that 'fusing' was a very different process from 'forging', and it took him a number of tries. The first pair of swords quickly broke, and the second pair had their runes destabilise and explode. Fortunately, Erik, Astrid, and the room they were in were all plenty sturdy, while the swords were relatively weak. Thus, everyone was fine, and they quickly continued.

They worked for several hours, but eventually it was time to rest. At least, from forging. Erik still had one duty to fulfil before he could truly rest. Thus, he took Astrid to their thermae for relaxation and the vigorous reward she wanted.

Later, they fell asleep in each other's arms only to continue their work in the morning.

With every attempt, he got a little closer. A good thing, too, as he was quickly running out of weapons from Söl.

It took him two days, but eventually a wide grin spread on his lips as his hammer rained down on the anvil. Below him, two swords existed in a half-merged state. He used magic and special techniques to blend the non-metal parts, hammer and heat to blend the metal, and his own runes and sigils to either replace or combine the existing ones.

This time, he could feel it. He was close. Suddenly, with a strange slurp, the final, unmerged parts sank into each other. The fusing was done.

Unbothered by the heat, Erik grinned widely and picked up the sword. Unsurprisingly, it was larger and heavier than either of the swords had been separately. But that wasn't the interesting part. What he cared about were the sigils, runes, and affinities. Fortunately, a few moments of testing told him all he needed to know.

"Alright… I think it's time for the big one," he grinned, tossing the fused sword into his storage.

With that thought in mind, he waved his hand to produce several ingots of varying metals. To be precise, two kinds of metal. One shimmering with icy energy, and the other crackling with electricity.

Over by the forge, Astrid raised an eyebrow. "You're… starting from scratch?" she asked, a little surprised.

"Sure," Erik grinned, before glancing fondly at the hammer on a table behind him. "That hammer's served me well… but it's no masterpiece. I've learned a lot since I made that one, so it's time to make another… and immediately prepare it for fusion."