Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

"Boss Bart, don't you people hunt the beasts around here for safety reasons? Don't you harvest them for meat?"

"Of course, we do. Our hunters are actually quite good at their job. But it's simply not enough to get by." he lamented.

"Then what are you doing with the other materials? Can't you sell those for money?"

Bart heaved a big sigh at that question.

"Most of us can't show our face in the city, how would we sell this much? Even if we managed to sell the stuff, there is a high risk of our people being robbed on the way back. We have no choice but store most of it in the unused rooms." he shrugged helplessly.

This was what Seth wanted to hear. It was even better than he had expected. The party had many stacks of just meat clogging up their inventory. It was a lot more than Link would need. Since proficiency would slowly decrease if one did the same thing over and over again, they just needed to keep part of the different meats.

Trading the food for the material would help the stronghold without anyone losing out. It was a win-win situation. He discussed this idea with the other with Link being an avid supporter. The others also readily agreed.

Y-City had no problem with the food supply. Crafting materials on the other hand were always in demand. After speaking about it with his party, Seth suggested the deal to Bart. The leader of the stronghold happily agreed to trade the direly need food for the materials that were slowly gathering dust in their storerooms.

He led them to one of the four buildings that was mostly used for storage. It was the sturdiest of the four buildings and doubled as a keep. If they were ever overrun, this would be the place they would entrench themself.

Bart proudly told them, that his oldest son, Lom, was an enchanter and had further fortified this building. It had even withstood a band of Tauren warriors that had one invaded from a portal. He didn't go too much into the details, but he mentioned that they had also prepared some means to escape in an emergency.

Like a tour guide, he kept talking about the place as he led them to the storerooms. The rooms were packed with neat wooden boxes that all looked the same. He mentioned that his daughter's husband had the carpenter class and made all the boxes and shelves.

Seth knew about carpenters, but he never met one. Besides stuff like furniture, low-level carpenters were also the people making stuff like the readymade spear and arrow shafts. The storage was well sorted with several rooms of common materials for all kinds of crafting professions.

The next floor had some room with boxes full of uncommon materials.

They now had two people who would have a use for alchemical materials in the future. Evee, who had the brewing skill of a witch, and Alison who was working hard on acquiring the alchemy skill. Seth left the choice of materials to those two.

Although Alison had not yet acquired the skill, she had already studied the alchemy books at the church and roughly knew what she was doing. Her memory was something that scared Seth. Evee had the <Eyes of the Witch> which allowed her to identify and judge occult and mystic materials or items.

A door at the end of the hallway on the second floor picked Seth's interest. It looked a lot sturdier than the others and had an additional padlock.

"What's in there?"

Bart scratched the back of his head a little embarrassed.

"It's stuff we couldn't appraise. Some of it we locked it up because we thought it would be very valuable. But there are also some dangerous things we put in there for safety reasons. Since we don't really know what the things are or can, we put them away until someone can appraise them."

If they were able to separate the common and uncommon items, so the stuff in there was at least rare. Now Seth really wanted to take a look.

"Would you let me have a look? My skills are pretty good, I can appraise blacksmithing materials up to the epic level. I can also offer you better stuff than just food. I bet you have some use for better gear?" he asked and tried using his new skill to be more convincing.

This wasn't all. Seth also had Al'Zalsa with her max-level <Appraisal>. Maybe they had something good in store and he could really profit? Bart was deliberating for a moment before he nodded. He unlocked the door and let Seth enter the treasury. The room was emptier with small chests and boxes neatly organized on tables and shelves.

There was also creepy-looking organic stuff in glass jars on one shelf. The rows of jewelry chests on tables and some bigger boxes on the floor were Seth's first stop. He avoided the glass jar stuff.

"Ah, don't touch it! That one's dangerous!"

Seth had opened a red lacquered box with a big orb inside.

<Storm Sphere, Crafting Material,

Rare

Mag. Damage: 900

Durability: 1000

1.+800 Lightning Damage

2.+500 Wind Damage

3. +50% Magic Damage

4. 15% Chant Reduction

5. Curse of the Storm

The eye of a lightning bird refined into a crystal sphere with unknown means by Arch-Enchanter Mooland. The item is filled with an uncontrollable amount of wind and lightning energy.

Usage Requirements: lv. 40, Intermediate Lightning Magic, 30% Lightning Affinity 20% Wind Affinity>

"Anyone who directly touched it got hit by a strong electric shock. Some people almost died to it."

Seth explained to him that this was the effect of the Curse of the Storm. Whoever touched it without meeting the requirements would hit by a lightning discharge. Bart explained that it had been the main weapon of the Tauren mage that was part of the group that had attacked them.

It was an item and also counted as a crafting material since it could also act as the focus for a staff. The other rare weapon was a bone sword that could only be wielded by a lv.30+ Tauren warrior. The rest of the items were mostly cursed junk.

Cursed junk was the slang for blanks that could be dropped in a dungeon. They often had terrible curses and little use. It was one of the risks of dungeoneering. One would fight through a huge number of monsters and terrible traps and end up with junk because the items created by the dungeon were more or less random.

This didn't mean they were useless, but the effort needed to make use of them was often not worth the result. The best use was to give them to an enchanter. A high-ranked enchanter could recycle these items.

He listened to his private lich when it came to other items in the room, but they were of little interest to Seth or the party. The biggest surprise held a chest that had been put under one of the tables. Inside were shards of dark turbid glass ranging from black over dark brown to green. There were 50 or 60 stones in the chest.

<Volcanic Glass, Crafting Material, Rare,

Naturally occurring obsidian that has been soaked in the power of a Dragon Vein. The natural flow of magic power has kindled and strengthened the natural properties of the obsidian. It has a high affinity with earth and fire attributes.>

Among the obsidian pieces, there were also a few that were different from the rest.

<Dragon Glass, Crafting Material, Rare+,

Naturally occurring obsidian that has been soaked in the power of a Dragon Vein. The natural flow of magic power has kindled and strengthened the natural properties of the obsidian. It has a high affinity with earth and fire attributes. Dragon Glass was exposed to strong natural magic giving it an additional high magic conductivity and affinity with the world mana.>

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