"Incredible work. I'm proud of all of you," I called as I stood in front of the dungeon gate, making sure my armor caught the light of the dawn perfectly, knowing that it would impress them, particularly after a night of fighting where I had killed more than three hundred thousand monsters single-handedly.
An absurd number that was only possible thanks to the wide area mana attacks.
I could feel even the guards looking at me with renewed reverence, showing that my extended display somehow managed to push through their supernatural discrimination.
"I wonder how long it will stick this time," I muttered after I stepped to the fourth floor. It wasn't the first time I had impressed them with my battle prowess. It faded relatively quickly in previous times, making me wonder how long it would last this time.
But, I shrugged. Among everything I had been trying to achieve, impressing them wasn't even on the list.
Speaking of benefits…
[Smith of Decay - Level 53]
[Health 3180/3180] [Mana 2650/2650]
[Vitality 265 / Strength 212 / Dexterity 159 / Essence 265 / Wisdom 159]
Meditation of Decay (Mythic) - 100 [Controlled Flow, Superior Sensing, Purification]
Mana Repair (Epic) - 103 [Advanced Observe]
Mana Forge (Epic) - 313 [Advanced Creative Forging, Advanced Mana Control]
Nurture (Legendary) - 53
Hammer of Avalanche (Epic) - 123
Blade of Bulwark (Epic) - 172
Spear of Storm (Epic) -133
Fire Bolt (Basic) - 25
I called the status screen, taking note of the changes. I had gained three levels, which was unfortunately less than I had expected. Comparatively, I had killed even more than the previous expedition that gave me seven levels, but, I had only gained three this time.
I sighed. I had anticipated a drop, but not that much. With the exponential nature of the drop, it meant that pushing above level sixty would be next to impossible … well, until the lizards got even stronger, but that would come with its own problems.
Comparatively, the improvement of my skills was more in line with my expectations. This time, I relied mostly on my sword, as its slashing attacks were still the best method to deal with larger groups without destroying their claws.
Crushing and absorbing them went a long way to refill the reserves of the dungeon, enough that helping several hundred Farmers improve their classes didn't even register as an expense. My Mythic meditation was paying incredible dividends.
But, none of them was as valuable as the observations I had made as I watched the others, one that led me to think of something I hadn't considered before.
The quality of the weapon impacted the conceptual weight of the attacks.
Even now, it felt like an absurd idea, the craftsmanship of the weapon somehow affecting the power of the attack. But, after watching more than a thousand people fight all night, each using weapons made by different people, the observation was clear.
Naturally, it wasn't a conclusion. Unlike performance, quality was not something that could be defined easily. Maybe, quality was not even the correct word to explain what had been going on there. But, the accuracy of the word didn't matter.
What mattered was to have a direction for my experiments.
I started to work with a simple, cast-iron blade, one that would shatter with a bad blow. Then, I forged a second, properly forged dagger. Third, I folded the iron almost a hundred times, turning it into a proper impressive weapon.
The following ranged attacks confirmed that the better dagger actually had a stronger presence. Significantly so. It was not a proper, statistically significant sample, but it was promising.
I forged five sets of each, just to confirm that it worked … only, it didn't. "Really," I muttered in frustration as I tested the new set of daggers, only for them to lack the presence completely.
I closed my eyes and examined the daggers, using Observe to examine their structure. The edge of the blade was the same, the crystalline structure had the same general properties, even the way the hilt and the blade connected was the same. So, what was the difference—
"It can't be that, right?" I paused, realizing that there was one big factor I hadn't considered before. For the first set of blades, I didn't use mana to take any shortcuts until the quenching process. The second set, I did. "It has to be wrong," I muttered.
It has to be. After all, why should the method of creation have any impact on the weapon, as long as the resulting product was the same? It was silly, and illogical, like believing in horoscopes. "It's absurd," I muttered in frustration.
However, no matter how absurd the idea was, I still tried it. I had forged multiple daggers, as identical as possible. But, for one group, I mined a fresh set of ore, doing everything by hand. The other, I used mana for each step.
The daggers in the first group had stronger presences without exception. And, it wasn't a slight difference either. Instead, the difference could be determined to be significant.
I frowned, wondering whether it was the mana that was responsible for it. Maybe the involvement of mana was somehow ruining the conceptual integrity of the dagger, it's touch enough to change it so drastically. Maybe it was Wisdom's function, to keep the conceptual existence strong despite the additional mixture.
Testing it was easy. I forged another two groups of daggers, this time from the mana alloy, but otherwise doing my best to keep their quality equal to the first set.
The results of that test were enough to invalidate my earlier thoughts. The conceptual weight of the first set was strong enough to rival the other handmade sets. There were some minute differences, but not enough to make it significant.
"It doesn't make sense," I growled, trying to understand what was going on. I could feel that I was close, but I failed to pinpoint it. I had a feeling that I was missing something obvious … but what.
But, instead of trying to brute force it, I decided to go for a walk to the third floor. Maybe watching the other blacksmiths operate would help.
I could have opened a gate with a thought, but instead, I decided to run the distance, which was a good way to stretch my legs while also examining my new movement style that came with Spear of Storm, testing its capabilities when it came to sharp turns, acceleration, and other technical tricks.
There was no harm in being prepared.
However, as I covered the distance, I noticed something interesting. I had come across the occasional giant insect, which shouldn't be appearing on the third floor. "Probably a consequence of all that extra mana," I decided. Luckily, the residents had long passed the point of being threatened by them. Still, I made a note to alert Harold.
Once I arrived at the third floor, I didn't approach the production line, but instead picked an empty hill that I could observe them from.
It was harder to feel the presence of the weapons from a distance, but it didn't matter. I was here to brainstorm rather than to collect data. I watched the large group of workers, their numbers already above three hundred, working intensely.
My Wisdom-enhanced memory helped me to recognize quite a bit of them had been outside, fighting to level up. Not that I blamed them. Leveling up gave them Strength, which in turn allowed them to absorb Common Forge.
Looking at what they had achieved, I had no intention of complaining. Half a dozen railroads spread from the center, steam engines pulling wagons filled with ore to the large blast furnaces to be melted, some used by the blacksmiths to forge corrosion-resistant alloys which then turned into various weapons and machines, while some had been stored, waiting for my attention to be turned into the flame resistant variants.
However, after spending a minute watching them, I slapped my head. "Of course," I growled as I returned, forging another set of daggers. This time, I didn't use mana, but automated the process through machines as much as possible.
The result was … there was no difference — at least, not one I could currently measure — between using mana and using machines to shortcut certain steps, both damaging the presence of the weapon significantly.
I paused, wondering whether I discovered something truly groundbreaking, or if I had made the world's most obvious discovery. "Either way, I have a practical benefit," I said while I started forging a new sword out of dense mana.
One, that was shaped perfectly to serve my Blade of Bulwark, which took more than two hours to forge even with the infinite mana that was provided by the dungeon. But, as I quenched it in water, water bubbling, I had a good feeling about it.
"Let's put you to the test," I muttered as I waved my sword, and a deadly arc of mana cut through the air, disappearing into the distance.
[Blade of Bulwark (Epic) 173 -> 175]
"Perfect," I muttered. I might not have made any real progress scientifically about what the concept was, but a devastating new attack was an excellent in-progress result … especially when it came with a way to hasten my skill growth once again.
I didn't return to experimentation immediately, instead forging myself a new set of equipment. It meant I would spend half a day where I could experiment, but considering I might get attacked anytime, it felt like a reasonable precaution.