A Dragon Idol's Reincarnation Tale

Bang, bang, bang

Aye, the sound of colliding metal. It was music to the ears of a blacksmith.

“Master Grimnir!”

I stopped my hammering and placed the orange glowing piece of metal back into the furnace, causing hair-frying air to blast at my sweat-drenched forehead. I turned around to that young man’s voice, raising my head as I saw him running up to me.

“The fingers are done. How far are you with the shoulder plate?” this boy, Daichi, asked me.

As I inspected his craft, I noted how much smaller and fragile the metal fingers looked in contrast to my large, fat ones, a trait most taz dwarves shared. It was why we made terrible artisans for detail-focused crafts. If I were to use these metal fingers for a gauntlet, most beastmen women or some human men could probably wear it without an issue, but in my palm, I would crush them with my grip.

Still, even though it felt awkward for me to create them, I still treated them like the delicate creation that they were. Like a hawk, my eyes inspected every small crevice, looking for any malformation or bad heat treatment that could compromise the defensive stat of the end product. Even though I had rejected [Blacksmith’s Eyes] from Bleidla, I had gotten too accustomed to working with “naked” sight that it felt more natural for me to inspect equipment this way..

“Don’t forget, if you’re making a commission for a specific person, you need to ensure the armor isn’t neither too large nor too tight. Armor that rattles around makes it uncomfortable to wear and risks loosening joints. Armor that is too tight to wear loses its effectiveness against blunt attacks. The shockwave will send damage to the chainmail underneath,” I gave my criticism to my second apprentice. “I know we’re working with somebody without an arm, but don’t let bad habits grow!”

“Yes, Master!” the young man replied, but the fire in his eyes suggested he was ready to defend his work. “However, considering the situation, I expected larger fingers would be better for this use-case. It will look asymmetrical when worn, but the larger grip will help one wield physical weapons better. I accounted for that when I made them.”

“Good!” I nodded, smiling at his answer. It wasn’t the perfect answer, nor did I like him speaking up like this, but I was fond of him thinking like a journeyman instead of an apprentice. “Sometimes the client is wrong, or your initial plans put you on the wrong path, but this is exactly what you have to do. Think outside the box! As blacksmiths, our duty is to create gear that assures they live! No shame is tougher than our efforts resulting in their death.”

“Yes, Master!”

This snot-nosed brat had been nothing more than a rude rat when I first met him. His excessive ass-kissing, like I usually saw from those damn Bleidla fanatics always looking to find some excuse for their god, struck a nerve with me. I preferred blunt people, those who wore their emotions and thoughts on their sleeves. Makes them easier to drink with.

Still … when I saw him beg me to become an apprentice, I couldn’t help but accept him. I had told the boy I hadn’t remembered him in an attempt to distance myself from him, but that look in his eyes still remained in my mind. A seeker who did not know what he was looking for. Somebody who required guidance before his flame died out.

‘My name is Daichi Mikami! I am a nobody who has lost his way! I am a worthless little pawn, unable to think by himself! But, looking at you right here, has awakened something in my heart! My desire to create! So, please, teach me! I will do anything to learn from you! Teach me how to love creating again!’

What an idiot …

“However, listen to this.” I pulled up my metal file and rubbed it against two fingers, letting the lad listen to the two different sounds. One sounded dull—full—while the other felt slightly light, as if the file was folding against the metal. “You hear that?”

Daichi’s face paled, grimacing. “… I fucked up the heat treatment.”

“You damn did.” I broke the light sounding finger in half using my hammer, revealing the metal inside before pointing at the discoloration of the metal. One was lighter than the other. “You see this? Lad, when you infuse monster materials into metal, you gotta remember the material will raise the necessary temperature before a quench. You don’t heat up a blade made with the lass’s scale with your usual flames, you throw in some of her scale-dust and let it scorch your hair! Stop wasting the materials we painstakingly got from the Event! Reforge this one!”

“Yes, Master! I will do better!”

“Bladdarg! Turn the metal around! Don’t let it sit all the time. You need to keep the heat even! Feel the fire, watch the color!” I reiterated to this numbskull. “Don’t fuck up the second time!”

“Never!”

He rushed away, back to his anvil while my mouth wrinkled into a smile.

Lad is growing …

He found his passion. No longer trapped in the need to constantly prove himself, he could learn and do what he needed to. No distractions. Even if I was his master, I didn’t think I was the only cause; I was not arrogant enough to think I could change other’s lives. Just like Broggi and I, you needed the will, ambition, and strength to work on your craft everyday without rest. That couldn’t be given or learned, that could only be earned through effort.

I turned back to my own work, taking the heated metal out, but shook my head when I saw it wasn’t even pink enough for me to consider hammering it. Using the leftover adamantoise shell for it made it so this metal required extreme heat to have it glow yellow. I needed more heat.

I took a deep breath before throwing some coal into the furnace. Using the air blower, I fed the fire air before unleashing a flame breath, growing the inferno until some of the flames touched my face. The sizzling of my sweat could be heard as I cleaned my face with a rag, before putting the piece of metal back into the fire.

I am Grimnir Luedbrumdar, the imperial blacksmith of the third dragon princess of Kargryx, Hestia Atsuko Kargryxmor. This is my passion. This is my life and duty. In honor of Goddess Chihiro, I am her [Grand Arcanatechnician], her Saint to teach the word of what the Goddess of Change, Ingenuity, and Ambition! To assure my party, Aurora, will survive anything, I dedicate every sweat and hammer swing to my craft!

Still …

“Watch me shine!” My mistress, my princess, and my party leader reached out her arm into the air, before the music began once again along with the booming roars of the audience inside this giant dragon nest—the Obsidian Orchestra.

I was no longer swinging my hammer; instead, I and my two apprentices had laid down our tools to watch our dragon lass perform on stage.

To be frank, I wasn’t particularly a big fan of her more “cutesy” songs, as they always felt lacking in substance. Those love songs she sometimes sang felt so … shallow, like the ones the damn bards always played whenever they had nothing else to sing. That was my true feeling about them, but considering how much I know Hestia loved them, I couldn’t say anything to her. I was her friend and this was just an issue with my music taste.

… But that didn’t mean I didn’t enjoy her concerts.

“If you asked me if I remembered that day ♫

I would say, yes, for it was the day that we met ♫

The hope and warmth that I felt, the memories that we made ♫

So I smiled. Together. ♫

With every day that passed, I just want to wonder ♫

Will this all last ♫

The peace we have is so fleeting ♫

I worry about what could happen, I don’t want all to be gone ♫

But you smiled. ♫

You say, “Don’t worry, so don’t stop moving” ♫

“Life is all about cherishing the present” ♫

So, I kept my head up, and moved forward ♫

Even if you aren’t there ♫

I can’t stop now, stop now, I will grasp my chance ♫

Leaving behind my sad self now ♫

No way, no way, no way, I will not become that weak me again ♫

Stand proud, stand proud, to live my life to the fullest ♫

There is so much that I’ve given up ♫

No way, no way, no way, those memories give me strength ♫”

Guurrgk … Argh, always my damn damp eyes. Bladdarg.

Some of them did open my heart up. The same could be said about the kids around me.

“You’re doing amazingly, Hesti-chan!” Kohaku shouted.

“Woo!” Kyouya cheered, releasing one of the light bulbs to celebrate the concert.

No matter if I was working or not, I would do my best to always attend the lass’s performances, as I knew this was her love. How much she would gush about standing on the stage and living the life of an idol when I first joined the party surprised me at first, but I guess I got used to it. Listening to her was Far better than to just wallow in my sorrow and drink myself to forget about all the sins I committed in the past.

My cousin’s death had sent me into a spiral of depression, but when Hestia and Tasianna approached me on that day to create something for them, I couldn’t help but feel motivated. It was such a small job, but I took the chance when the light shone in the darkness. I had us charge into a dungeon just to find that one ore I needed to forge my new hammer. To our surprise and chagrin, that whole accident with those cultists from the Church of Danterno happened.

But, I didn’t care. My life was in the lass’s hands now. I owed her for saving me and dragging me screaming out of my pit, and this is where everything led me to. I found the truth behind Broggi’s thoughts towards me, I found out about his father’s plots, and, somehow, I even “redeemed” myself after everything I did.

No longer was I a “zuekluk,” even if I thought it was all worthless anyways. I couldn’t care less if people thought of me fondly or not. At the end of the day, I would continue working under the lass’s banner, and I would continue adapting her, Daichi’s, and everybody else’s ideas into actual items.

I guess another important thing about this concert too; there was the fact it was done a day after celebrating Origdiviel Arashan. What more appropriate way could I thank the gods than to be at this party? Celebrating it with everybody, raising our cups as we drank and ate was something I fondly remembered during my childhood. I was no longer in contact with my parents, but being here with my new family was good enough.

“Wruf!” The sound of wolves once again filled the inside of the [Room] subspace.

And I guess another reason to celebrate it was the fact Saori had finally returned after such a long trip, in addition to the week it took her, the lass, Tasianna, Asaka, and the twins to bring the beastmen back to their home by train. It didn’t change much aside from having one of my drinking buddies back, but it was still nice to have her back. Well, I guess I have more people wanting equipment now.

Now that all of that was handled, the lass was now going on a “tour” or whatever she called it, wanting to travel from one city to the next to perform, spreading her music to everybody. So, Aurora was back on the road, traveling inside our “RV”—my wagon, honestly—on our way to the capital of the Groushia Duchy, Gia-Mara.

“How are you doing? Comfortable?” The lass spoke to a giant white-black virgarcuga, checking over the harness equipped on him.

[“All good, Master!”] Rajah, that little rascal, answered Hestia, wagging his tail around to the point I thought he would destroy our newly rebuilt RV.

The entire motor idea the lass had prior was, sadly, a long term idea, as it would take a while for the railroad guild to build it, in addition to the fact we had to pay for it. It wasn’t my place to say, considering I spent a sizable amount of our funds on ore and blood for runecrafting, but we were pretty deep in debt. We had no money for something extravagant.

As such, our RV had to be pulled like always. Saori’s wolves used to do it, but Rajah decided that he would do it from now on, as he was large enough. Slightly to the fenrir’s chagrin as they did think of pulling the wagon as an honor.

Now on the road, the otherworldly kids decided to renovate the place, as we’ve moved Tasianna’s indoor garden into the subspace. As they did so, I returned to my workshop.

“Master, it’s done,” Ellaine stated as she showed me an octagon-shaped blue crystal. Metal fittings were attached to its side, making it feel smooth on the edge and perfect to be inserted into a magic item.

This was one of my arcane crystals, created through [Core of the Mechanoid]. Ellaine had turned it into an actual mana battery, although slightly fancier due to the fact it wasn’t an industrial one. Technically, we were breaking the rules as only certified dwarves were allowed to make batteries, no matter with what ingredient, but were exempted mostly as long as we documented the batteries and handed them to the artificer guild.

Thank Goddess Chihiro for making me her Saint. That extra religious influence allowed Ellaine to make them, although the poor girl did complain she disliked having to go through all of this. In my opinion? Pah! Who cared? We got equipment to forge.

Inspecting this new mana battery, I patted my first apprentice’s shoulders, proud of her. Although she was more Broggi’s apprentice since she learned from his scrolls and books, I still couldn’t help but enjoy this light feeling in my chest whenever I saw her improve. If she wasn’t such a wine drinker, I probably would have invited her to a bar!

“Good, now it’s time for Tasianna to fix it up, give it some skills and imbue it like a catalyst,” I stated. “Don’t forget to remove the metal fittings.”

Ellaine nodded and went on her way, while Daichi and I returned to our work.

The trip down to Gia-Mara took us a day. Hestia and Saori went to greet Duke Groushia with some of the kids while I stayed inside, already having seen this city far too often before my exile. Two days passed before the promotion and concert preparations were finished, and a third passed before Hestia got on stage to perform her concert here. Ha, even after that pretty exhausting concert, and the later “fan meeting” where a few of her Firwood fans went crazy from excitement, she still told us the tour had to continue. We were back on the road almost immediately.

We ended up passing through a number of towns and villages, where Hestia would perform quick concerts for people’s enjoyment while allowing our bistro and restaurant some time to function. More money in the bank. I probably would have joined in earning us some money if I wasn’t already fully occupied with our party’s needs.

In fact, I had to occasionally return to Inkoran-Tazul through the nexus to speak with the railroad and artificer guild about the war. Since I was Goddess’s Chihiro’s Saint, both guilds were interested in my arcane crystal creation and what they could do with it to improve the current state of mana batteries. This was why they allowed Ellaine to create her own, as long as they were made from my crystals. Those freeloaders wanted to steal my apprentice’s ideas! The nerve!

Ahem, in any case, after lending Duke Groushia a set of [Room] stones for us to fast travel to, it also meant I had to make some more with the lass. We were running out of them, to be honest, and it took a day minimum to make since I had to prepare the forge in advance and then spend the rest of the day in a strenuous crafting session where the lass was obligated to join. She was the only one with [Room], after all.

“More heat, lass!” I shouted as she sprayed some blood on the rune I was creating.

“Get ready!” she replied before snapping her fingers, creating a fire to grow the inferno inside my furnace. “Sheesh, sorry for not doing this enough and having to do this on short-notice!”

“Always glad to do it with you! Hahaha, don’t tug your tail in between your legs, let’s just enjoy this!” I slammed my hammer down. “Back to singing!”

“Ahaha, you got it! As I open my hand, releasing the sound of searing hot metal. ♫

But I tighten my grip, the pain that follows me with every single thought. ♫

Regretting it all would only taint my efforts, or the dream that we hold. ♫

Of course, brush it aside! ♫

These tears will dry, and this rage will cool ♫

As I realized that the world ain’t stopping for me. ♫”