After browsing through The Smith's Respite, Qing Shan left. It was only after a few hours that he came back to the shop.
Because Qing Shan walked in at noon, the short man's shop was much quieter. There was so much more space in the room that it seemed like it had multiplied in size. The room actually felt empty, yet suffocating at the same time. There were the powerful auras of the pieces on the walls, and the lack of people, or things, taking up space in the middle room.
On second thought, this was actually somewhat peaceful.
Qing Shan walked up to the front desk, and knocked on its surface loud enough to be heard in another room. Sure enough, the short man waddled out of the back room of the smithy.
"Ah, you're here. Well, come on back, I guess."
Qing Shan followed the stout man to the back room and sat in the chair indicated to him by him. Qing Shan then continued to answer multiple questions about the theories of Runic Forging, while the stout man nodded at his correct answers. Once he was done asking questions, the man spoke up.
'Honestly, I'd told my self that my apprentice was going to have to be at least in the Origin Realm, someone who could help me with the forging side of my work."
"…"
"However, none of those potential candidates could see the greatness of that ring you were looking at earlier. I told myself that I do not want apprentices who cannot even recognize a masterpiece. Speaking of, how did you even find that piece?"
Qing Shan blew out all the air he had been holding in once the small man praised him. As for that question…
*sigh*
"I actually have no clue how I found it. I was just looking around, and I suddenly felt a powerful aura flicker across my consciousness for a tiny fraction of a second. Somehow, I was able to figure out that the aura came from an item instead of a person. From there, I just had to look at all the items in the direction that the aura came from, and I eventually stumbled across the ring and recognized its greatness."
The short man frowned.
"So, you are saying that you sensed the aura of the ring?"
Qing Shan nodded. Although he had left out the fact that the flicker of aura was barely noticeable to him, and a fraction of a second as he experienced it, instead of a fraction of a second real time. Other than that, everything he had said thus far was true.
"Hmm…"
The small man trailed off into silence, deep in thought. After he woke from his stupor, the man spoke once more, finally saying the words that Qing Shan had been waiting to hear.
"You're hired! Come back here tomorrow and you can start. Please notify me if you are not able to come to work here at any given point. I have been running this shop on my own for a while, so it wouldn't be that much of a challenge. However, I would like you to tell me the reason for not being able to come."
"Alright. If that is all, I'll be off."
The small man bid Qing Shan a nice rest of his day, and waddled back over to his forge.
Qing Shan walked out of The Smith's Respite.
'That went well.'
Qing Shan looked around the city for the rest of the day. He looked through many different stores and shops, entranced by the magnificent items that he did not know could even be made. He looked at different weapons and armors.
Even though he was in an entirely new place, waiting for two different things, starting work at with the Runic Forgemaster and entering the Fallen Sky sect, was boring.
Once he finished walking around the city, Qing Shan entered an inn that seemed relatively cheap, The Ruined Inn. While the name was somewhat off-putting, Qing Shan found out this name was definitely misleading. The inside was well furnished and homey, and there were at least fifty people packed into the tables with drinks in hand.
Qing Shan walked up to the bartender, and used a bunch of his last Barren Qi Shards to rent a room for three nights.
'I really need to find a place that won't rob me if I ask for change with that Lesser Qi Orb.'
Qing Shan wanted the next day to come quickly, so he did not bother buying a drink and just went up to his room.
Before he fell asleep, Qing Shan marveled at the similarities between his room in the Dusty Heights and this one. Both rooms were quite small, had no distinct features other than a toilet and a mattress. The only differences were that the toilet was in a separate section of the room, and the stench was covered by walls. The other difference was that the mattress was thicker and fluffier.
After a nice sleep, Qing Shan sprang out of bed, and headed towards The Smith's Respite.
Once he arrived, Qing Shan was immediately brought by the small man to the back room where the forge was.
"Sir, I just realized that I haven't heard your name yet."
The small man looked confused for a second, as he presumably thought his way through their conversation the prior day.
"My bad. The name's Tang Hua. Now, show me how well you can work."
The small man went to forging, having me cover the front desk while he did. This way, he could make more goods in a small amount of time.
While this should have been boring, Qing Shan found out that he actually enjoyed talking to people. Although he had walked all around the city, these were the first people that Qing Shan had talked to other than those as$holes from the other day, the guards at the Fallen Sky sect, the bartender at the Ruined Inn, and Tang Hua.
'It is nice to meet new people.'
Qing Shan enjoyed his morning, even though he was just talking and taking people's money. He really enjoyed the moments when his skills came into account, like when he was asked about the enchantments on a weapon.
Once the lunch break came, Qing Shan and Tang Hua forwent lunch to forge. Tang Hua was impressed by Qing Shan's practical skills. Other than applying Qi, Qing Shan could do everything very well. Making the herbal poultice for runes, and coming up with good mixes of runes for a nice effect were his best points.
After having Qing Shan forge a simple sword. Tang Hua actually whistled.
"Wow, if you can create something with so much detail just during the lunch break, I cannot wait to see what you can do with a lot of time. I may even have to start having you forge the weapons while I put the runes on them."
Qing Shan continued working at the front after the lunch break ended, and resumed the conversation with Tang Hua after the shop closed.
"…Are you sure that I won't negatively impact your business?"
"Oho boy, absolutely! People like my shop because it is cheap, not because of the beauty of my goods. My best goods are covered in rust! Actually, with some practice, I feel that it would not really take you long to become just as good at the forging part of runic forging as I am!"
After finally being convinced to try Tang Hua's suggestion the following day, Qing Shan went back to the Ruined Inn.
Once in the inn, Qing Shan decided to get a drink. Surprisingly, Qing Shan found that he missed his drinking buddies. It was really much less fun to drink alone.
Qing Shan nursed his alcohol silently. Unfortunately for him, no one tried to approach him kindly.
Qing Shan woke up the next morning with the recognizably terrible feeling of a hangover. While he really wished he could just go back to sleep, there was money on the line. In top of that, he had an important role at the Smith's Respite today.
Once Qing Shan managed to drag himself to the Smith's Respite, he went over what he was going to do today.
"Alright, Qing Shan. Today you and I will be switching roles throughout the day. You will perform the actually forging of the items and prepare the necessary herbal poultice for runes. You have full choice in choosing the runes. While you are doing that, I will be manning the front desk. Once you are finished with that, I will go back and add the runes while you man the desk. We will be switching constantly today, so I expect your best work."
"Of course Mister Tang!"
"Haha, great enthusiasm! Let us have a productive day!"
As the customers began flooding in, Qing Shan was busy forging in the back room. Because he and Tang Hua were more focused on efficiency, Qing Shan could not spend all of his time making super detailed pieces. However, even while rushing, Qing Shan was confident enough that he could make items that were above average.
'Let's start with a simple longsword…'
Qing Shan got to work with his forging. Although forging was supposed to be quite time consuming, Qing Shan had the help of Tang Hua's super-expensive Runic Forge. Despite the name. It was not a forge specially created for runic forging. It had this name because it had runes that easily controlled the heat output of the forge. With this, Qing Shan did not have to spend large amounts of time finding the right heat for the forging.
Soon enough, Qing Shan had already created the general shape of the sword. It looked like a regular longsword except for a long diamond shaped figure on the side of the blade. Qing Shan made this because it looked cool, and also functioned as a good place to engrave runes onto the blade. Once he was done with the blade, it did not take long for him to create a hilt and place it off to the side.
Qing Shan then needed to choose which runes to apply to the blade. Tang Hua did say that he could choose, after all. Because this was the first blade he was helping out with, Qing Shan decided to only choose a simple rune. The rune he chose was 'weight reduction' which was one of the simpler air-element runes. Luckily, the attribute of the rune did not matter to Runic Forgemasters; after all, they all used a special method to imbue pure Qi into the rune, which then allowed them to use herbs that leaned towards certain attributes to harness that attribute with the herbal poultice.
Because Qing Shan was using an air-attribute rune, he had to use air-attribute herbs, such as Sky Root. Qing Shan soon created the poultice and placed in next to the forge, he quickly drew out the rune on a piece of parchment so that Tang Hua would know which poultice he prepared.
Qing Shan exited the back room.
"Preparations are made."
He then took over the front desk, leaving a frowning Tang Hua to walk to the back room.
'He finished all of the preparations in under two hours. While that is amazing, I hope he did create a ruined product from rushing…'
Tang Hua walked into the back room, preparing to be let down by Qing Shan's work. However, once he saw Qing Shan's work his jaw dropped open.
*gasp*
'he made a sword like that in a mere two hours! Wow, this craftmanship is amazing. I did not think that the kid was this skilled! And he even added in a designated slot for the runes. This kid really is amazing!
Like this the rest of the day continued.
Qing Shan was satisfied with his work, although he was confused by the excessive praise that he was getting from Tang Hua.
'I could have made that longsword even better if I had more time…'