Blacksmith vs. the System

However, it was true that misery loves company.

I wasn\'t the only one struggling. Eleanor was more of the same. As I watched her, she shuffled in discomfort, meditating as she tried to somehow attune herself to mana. She was a woman who was used to resolving her problems through action, not inaction.

"Take a deeper breath —" I started.

It worked the opposite way. She exhaled sharply, the tension in her shoulders betraying her frustration. "I\'m trying," she muttered, cracking one eye open to glare at me. "This isn\'t exactly my thing. Can\'t I just kill monsters until I get a new perk like you did."

I chuckled. "Technically we can, but we only have two shots in that. If you\'re willing to waste that opportunity…"

"Fine, be reasonable," she said as she closed her eyes again, her jaw set in a stubborn way that told me she was far from giving up. Unfortunately, it was also not helpful … or at least, I assumed it was not. I leaned back, watching her intently as she once again pointed at one of the four pipes.

Wrong one. Again.

I didn\'t feel like she was making any progress. Unfortunately, I had no idea whether it was the wrong method, or it was the lack of time. I sighed as I returned to my calculations.

"How about we take a break," she asked a minute later. "I don\'t think I have sat down like that for a long time. A visit to the town is a good way to stretch my legs."

"Sure, a little movement would do you good."

"Do you want to come?"

"Tempting, but I should visit the outpost instead. I trust Harold to keep things under control, but my presence should make it easier. We don\'t want them panicking."

"Good point," she said as she stood up, but didn\'t start walking immediately. "If Maria returns, should I have a talk with her alone?"

"That\'s going to be a fun talk," I said.

"Yeah," Eleanor said. "She has a tendency of … overreacting when surprised."

I was tempted to ask her to handle that discussion. Very much so. Unfortunately, I feel like I owed Maria enough to have that talk face-to-face. "No," I still said. "I\'m the one that chose to keep it a secret. The best thing I can do is to be the one to explain it to her."

"Do you think that\'s a good idea?"

"Hell no," I answered, making her chuckle. "But I still need to do it."

"Your call," she said as she prepared to jump.

"But, I won\'t say no if you soften her up a bit," I added. She just smiled before she hauled herself away with a big jump, pushing herself faster than I expected, but rather than picking a direct path, she landed, and started killing the monsters on her path.

She must have been even more frustrated than I had realized. Suddenly, I felt pity for the wildlife around the town.

I went the opposite path, approaching my guild outpost. I expected a tight, tense environment. I trusted Harold, but with all but one other guild pulling back from the dungeon immediately after the mysterious death of multiple guild masters and more than a hundred members, it was the most rational outcome.

But, as I got closer enough to distinguish their mood, I realized I had misread the situation significantly. Instead of the dark and morose atmosphere I had been expecting, I met with people running around with purpose. Calling them cheerful would have been a stretch, but being excited and dedicated certainly would fit the bill.

The people saluted me as I approached, and I gestured for them to stand down. As I approached, Harold arrived from the gate, probably alerted by the guards about my arrival. "Guild master," he greeted as well.

"Follow me," I said as I moved some distance away from the crowd.

"Sir, may I ask what had happened in the dungeon? The official news says that—"

"I know what exactly the official news says," I said, as I was the one who suggested the official story about another dungeon swarm trigger, this time enhanced. It was an obviously fake story, but there was no real point in examining it. "A few people tried to assassinate me and Eleanor, and failed. Simple as that," I said.

"It\'s good to see everything is well, sir," he said.

"What about the guild?" I asked. "They look enthusiastic. I expected them to be stressed out after all the deaths."

He chuckled. "The opposite. The other guilds had been posturing a lot for a long time, so they were expecting the attack. Now that those posturing guilds suddenly … encountered a misfortune, they are even more confident about their position."

"Really? They were expecting to be attacked, and still volunteered?" I asked, surprised by it. After all, it was not a simple decision. For me, it took almost three years to finally change my attitude.

He shrugged. "They are Farmers. They know that this is the best opportunity they have to level up, and actually developing proficiency in a combat skill is a bonus. Combined, it\'s the best offer they could get."

"Still, all of them…"

Harold smiled. "Sorry to be harsh, sir, but you don\'t know what it\'s like to have a production class. For them, any chance to level up is a treasure. Either they need to pay a fortune for dungeon access, working for a whole year to just visit it once or twice, or they need to join an expedition. And, the ones that hire Farmers are more likely to use them as disposable scouts than anything else."

"Good point," I said, smiling at his assumption that I didn\'t know the plight of the production classes. But he still had a point. Even without my most recent bout of luck, my situation had never been that bad. Blacksmiths were not the luckiest class, but our situation was nowhere as bad as the Farmers.

For a moment, I was surprised by the general attitude, but then remembered every Farmer that had joined the camp was a volunteer, determined to seek their fortune. In such a situation, death was to be expected … and there was nothing if that expected death visited their enemies rather than them.

"Would you spend some time with them, sir? I\'m sure your presence will be appreciated."

"I can\'t stay for long, but give me a tour of the latest changes," I asked. Since they seemed to believe that I was responsible for their deaths — not wholly accurate since those transformed men were responsible for most of the mayhem, but the difference was academic — showing them that I was walking around strongly should help.

As Harold guided me through the encampments on both floors, I was already making plans to scale our operations up. Now that the secret was finally out and I didn\'t need to hide the truth from Eleanor, I could actually arm them with proper anti-corrosive alloys rather than the weak variant that only worked on arrows.

With a ten-foot spear and proper plate armor, even farmers should be able to dominate the first three floors with ease, especially if we set another beachhead on the fourth floor, and use the water to grow the trees fully and create safe zones to avoid the occasional giant variant.

Yet, I didn\'t hurry to implement that, for two reasons. First, I wanted to finish the experiment with Eleanor. I could already help them by bringing their Nurture higher, which would trigger better classes. Even a partial stat bonus like Strength would have been a treasure.

As for unlocking their Essence…

I had to actively stop myself from imagining that. I didn\'t even know if it was possible for Eleanor, let alone integrating that at a mass scale. And, more importantly, I had a bigger impediment facing me. Maria\'s reaction was still a mystery, with a whole spectrum of possibilities from glad to furious.

It was also why I wasn\'t using the time to forge a thousand spears to arm them. I wanted to ask for Maria\'s \'approval\'. I knew what her answer would be, but sometimes, letting the leaders make the obvious decisions was the best way to keep their mood upbeat after doing something to challenge their authority.

Luckily, Maria wasn\'t a particularly invested leader, so I didn\'t expect that to be too big of a problem. The personal sense of betrayal was the likelier reaction, the fact that I saved Eleanor\'s life would be enough to prevent her from feeling betrayed.

Should… Hopefully… Because, I had just seen Eleanor at a distance, accompanied by a robed figure, her redhead distinct even from a distance.

"Make sure to keep an eye on everything," I said to Harold as I started walking away. "I might not be around for a while."