Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

Although Seth had a lot of plans, he had decided to spend his time leisurely. This didn't mean he was lazing around. At least not all the time. Aside from his work in the workshop, he methodically raised his level while coordinating with the other members of Minas Mar.

It wasn't hard to do both thanks to the scarcity of dungeons of appropriate levels anywhere close to Delta. Something Seth came to experience, now that he crossed level 70 and visited the dungeon along with Mina and the others, was the kind of chore dungeons became after a while.

It was safe to calculate that a player with epic armor was roughly 10 to 20 levels stronger than their base level. Although that changed a little at the later levels, when the gap in power between levels grew, it was safe to say that an epic armor allowed one to fight humanoids around the same level with a great advantage.

Even beasts that had much higher attributes than humanoids for their level were not really a threat to a party in epic equipment. At this point, the problem was not the danger of the beasts, but the rarity of the beasts themselves. There were no dungeons above level 80 in Delta. There may be some bosses in that level range, but even the few high-level dungeons did not have many mobs above lv.75.

The people of Minas Mar could kill beasts many levels higher than themselves to level up quickly, but that was only true if there WERE a bunch of beasts of much higher level. The higher the level, the fewer monsters and dungeons in that level range appeared.

Seth realized how lucky he had been to come across colonies of high-level creatures like the Titanoboas in the wild. Asking Ceres and Puffles, who kept roaming the mountains nearby, even they only rarely came across a strong beast. Thou Seth had his doubt, as their definitions of "strong" vastly differed.

What this meant, was that the dungeons were hopelessly overbooked. People like him and the other members of Minas Mar had to run dungeons close to their own level several dozen times to gain a single level. Seth didn't mind, as it helped him get used to the new skills introduced by his items in combat.

The problem with the need to book dungeons. There were a lot of people vying to go to the high-level dungeons. More than in the early days of Delta. Now one had to wait not just for dungeons to respawn, but also for a free spot in the schedule. They couldn't just run them over and over again. The downtime that came with having to share the dungeons with all of Delta forced them to take breaks, which the blacksmith used to work on his products.

Similarly, the search for materials fit for the items he wished to make for the people of Minas Mar was as hard to come by as dungeons. Befitting his divine enchantments, Seth didn't wish to use below legendary materials to go with them.

The problem was: Legendary materials were something everyone wanted, but nobody could supply. Even if one had the money to pay for one, it didn't mean they could buy it. Seth knew that there was technically a possibility for legendary items to appear in the auction house, but he had never seen one, in all his time since he regularly checked it.

Even when Seth made some concessions and settled for less, it was still not in stock. If he could get his hands on epic irons like the <Meteoric Iron>, or maybe some special epic silver he could further refine them into special or legendary grade <Bones of Seth> or <Olympian Silver> like he did when he created the Giant's Rod. He had even published an announcement that Minas Mar would purchase such items above market value.

His thoughts kept revolving around these problems when his mind was idle during the forging of the new Oath items. It was not just the new accessories. Recently he had succeeded in developing the new oath armor. With a combination of enchantments and Demonic Poems, he managed to replicate the oath-effect, while making every piece of the armor a relic.

Despite being called relics, the system made it very clear in their descriptions that they had a very low chance to become legendary items if specific requirements were met. Of course, these requirements were not further specified.

Seth would have loved to make the new armors in cooperation with Wedan, however, in that case, his own <Blacksmith> skill would fall even farther behind his <Enchantment>. Not to mention the <Goldsmith> skill.

Since he currently concentrated on the latter, it did well in catching up. Seth had already managed to raise it to 70% of lv.6 by working on the oath accessories and fine-tuning the crafting process. Although it didn't help his forging skill, <Enchantment> had also reached the 50% mark of lv.8. Since it profited from both, the armor and the jewelry, Seth had accepted that <Enchantment> was most likely going to be the first skill to reach the master rank.

"Tower Master, there is someone looking for you." someone called out to him, as he was polishing a new pendant.

"Who could it be?"

Seth had no idea who would be looking for him personally at a time like this. He was sure to have "delegated" all kinds of work to others.

"The man introduced himself as Hubert McCarthy. He insisted that you know him."

"Hubert..."

he knew that name. Who was it again?

"Oh, right! That dimensional Merchant!" Seth exclaimed when he finally remembered.

"So Tower Master knows him? Will you meet him?"

"Oh, sure, sure. Tell him to wait, I will just finish this up. I will be there right away."

…

Half an hour later the blacksmith arrived in a small reception room in the surface building of Minas Mar. He found McCarthy seated leisurely on a sofa, slurping from a cup of coffee. The merchant had not changed much. Not at all to be honest.

He had a funny-styled mustache, wore a tailored suit, and his magic monocle. If Seth was honest, then he couldn't claim to like the merchant a lot. He couldn't help to feel that the man was untrustworthy.

"Oh, Seth! I mean, Tower Master. We finally meet again!" he said jovially as he put down the cup and stood up to greet him.

"It has been quite some time. What is the cause for this pleasure?" Seth greeted amicably.

There was no reason to offend the man, just because he didn't find him to his liking on a personal level. After all, the man's skills were the real deal. If he had not forgotten about him, Seth might have approached him first.

"Ah, that's what I like. Let's get straight to business," he laughed. "My sources suggested that you might be looking for something and I wanted to offer my services."

Just as Seth had thought about it, the merchant had brought it up. It was quite obvious that the "sources" he spoke of, were a fancy way to say that he saw his announcement. He also regularly visited the auction house to check for materials. It didn't take a genius to have the idea, that he was searching for something.

"Legendary Materials."

Since the merchant was so open with him and got straight to the point, Seth thought he would do so, too. The two words wiped away the man's practiced smile like a slap to the face. McCarthy almost spat out his coffee.

"L-legendary materials? … Wait, doesn't that mean you can already work with legendary items?! That's big news. That could change everything..."

"I'm sure a professional merchant like yourself knows a thing or two about trade secrets. It would be best, for both of us, if you didn't go around announcing it to the world."

The merchant wasn't stupid, he recognized a threat when it threatened his livelihood. He also understood that he had much more from this information if he monopolized it.

"So, can you acquire legendary materials for me?" Seth pushed.

The merchant started to sweat a little, but he stayed calm and professional.

"I- Well, maybe? It's all a question of the price and chance. There are a lot of mighty figures in the cosmos that offer things through dimensional trading. I am sure to have a better chance to offer legendary materials, than the auction house," he guaranteed.

"Oh, really? Why are you so sure?"

" Since you shared a secret, I will do so too. I was chosen by a god of trade, which one I won't say. Also, I have a much further reach than the system's auction house. Though, it may take some time..."

"Why?"

"It's a little embarrassing, but not everyone has such a high skill level as you. I can't trade for thing above epic rank, yet..," he admitted.

That the merchant was actually honest with him, got him some points in Seth's book. Since he was ready to take a step when it came to the auction house, he also decided to give Hubert the chance.

"Then, how about this? Try to keep your eyes open for me, for epic materials that have the space attribute, and special forms of iron or silver. I would be willing to purchase those from you."