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Is it Wrong to Skitter in a Dungeon? Chapter 11
🕑 Added 2024-08-20 16:01:01 +0000 UTCChapter 11: A Blacksmith joins the Team!
“Welf? What do you want with that sorry excuse for a blacksmith?” the store’s clerk asked. The shop that had sold the breastplate was open, which was good, but the clerk wasn’t being very helpful.
“We were just hoping to talk to him,” Bell said.
“Look, you won’t find whatever it is you’re hoping to find with Welf,” the clerk stated, waving them off dismissively. “He’s wasting his talent.”
“I see. Well, thank you for your help,” Bell said politely, bowing slightly before leaving.
“What will we do now?” Lili asked as they stepped out into the bustling streets of Orario.
“We could try searching through the blacksmith quarters,” Bell suggested.
“There are hundreds of smiths in the city,” Lili pointed out. “Searching them all would take a while.”
“Or we could just go to his forge,” Taylor offered.
“Huh?” Bell and Lili said in sync.
“While you were trying to talk to the storeowner, I used my bugs to investigate his paperwork and found the address to Welf’s workshop in one of the file cabinets,” she revealed. Bell and Lili stared at her with mixed emotions before eventually settling on exasperation and acceptance.
“Well, that makes it easy, I suppose,” Bell murmured. “Takes all the fun out of the detective work, though.”
“Couldn’t you have done that from the beginning?” Lili asked.
“Yes,” Taylor confirmed. “But you wanted to try talking to him, so who am I to deny you?”
“Was this a lesson of some sort?” Bell wondered. He frowned thoughtfully. “Did you want us to leverage our scouting and information gathering abilities to find Welf?”
“What? No,” Taylor chuckled. “I was letting you experience first-hand what it’s like to deal with unhelpful customer service. Though your thing isn’t a bad idea for a training exercise…”
Lili shot Bell an annoyed look who wilted a bit. Ignoring the byplay, Taylor led the group to an outer district of Orario that was close to the walls, though in the opposite direction of their church.
There were numerous forges and workshops clustered around the edges of the massive barrier wall, with smoke emerging from the chimneys in large greasy black plumes. One of them looked rather rundown and small, but the sound of hammering rang out from it.
“This is it,” Taylor said, looking up at the forge.
“Seen better days,” Lili muttered.
“Let’s go!” Bell said excitedly, walking up to the door. He began to knock on it enthusiastically, trying to draw attention from the person inside.
According to her swarm, there was a tall man inside the forge, hammering away at an anvil. The hum his power made was the whoosh of bellows and the clang of metal. When Bell knocked on the door to get his attention, the smith glanced over in surprise at the door, and after a moment got up to answer it.
“What do you want?” the man on the other side demanded as he opened the door.
Taylor blinked, taking in the blacksmith. She’d thought he was an adult based on what she saw through the bugs, but from his face he looked more like a teen around her age. He was muscular, though, his physique putting Brian’s to shame and his smithing outfit showing it off.
“Hey, there! Are you Mr. Welf?” Bell asked. He looked down at Bell, then glanced at Lili and Taylor. His gaze lingered on the parahuman, specifically her missing arm, before returning to Bell.
“I am,” the man confirmed. “Welf the blacksmith, of the Hephaestus Familia.”
“Nice to meet you!” Bell said happily. “I’m Bell of the Hestia Familia! And this is Miss Taylor, of same, and Lili of the Soma Familia!”
“Okay… and?” Welf asked.
“What he’s trying to say is that we want to discuss making a contract with you for gear,” Taylor said, speaking up.
“Seriously?” Welf demanded in surprise. His eyes narrowed. “No way.”
“Please, it’s true!” Bell begged, pulling out his white breastplate, showing it off in all its scratched-up glory. “Your work is really good! It has helped me a lot in the Dungeon!”
At that, Welf looked taken aback by Bell’s claim. He glanced at Taylor and Lili, who both nodded.
“You’re skilled, and we need somebody to handle our equipment,” Taylor said. “We can make it worth your while as well.”
“Is that really why you came here? Because you liked Pyonkichi?” Welf asked, a note of hope in his voice.
“That’s right!” Bell confirmed.
“Well… alright, come on in,” Welf said, beckoning for them to enter. “I suppose we can discuss a contract.”
The interior of the building was hot, but that was expected due to the blazing hot furnace in the corner. Welf didn’t seem bothered by the heat and he cleared off some space for the group to stand while he plopped down onto the anvil.
“So, you said you could make it worth my while,” Welf began. “How exactly does that work?”
“Are you able to work with silk?” Taylor asked.
“Yeah. Not to the point where I can make Undine Silk or craft anything too fancy with it, but it’s doable. I tend to use the stuff as a lining between armor. Nice and soft, and thinner than wool or cotton fabric. Expensive, though, since the Eastern merchants like to charge an arm and leg for it.”
“In that case, the Hestia Familia can offer you an exclusive deal on spider silk,” Taylor said. With a thought, her swarm buzzed to life, appearing in front of Welf who jerked back in surprise.
“Whoa!” he exclaimed. “How did you do that?!”
“A Skill,” Taylor said simply.
“Wait… controlling bugs with a mysterious Skill… are you Bug Girl?!” Welf uttered in shock. Bell and Lili both snickered at the nickname while Taylor sighed.
“Yes, that’s me,” she nodded.
“I heard about somebody who could manipulate insects with her mind, tamed a Crystal Mantis and who broke the Seventh Floor by overhunting the Killer Ants…” Welf murmured, his eyes gaining a calculating look.
Louder, he said, “I don’t really work much with chitin, but I know how to make some neat armor out of Killer Ant carapace. And if you can really bring it in… yeah, I could get some good experience from practicing with it.”
Welf folded his arms across his chest. “But that won’t be all. I’ll also want to join you on any Dungeon delving expeditions you go on, with priority on any useful Drop Items.”
“That’s doable,” Taylor conceded. “Are you an adventurer?”
“Sure am!” Welf said proudly. “Been a while, but I’ve got a lot of experience beating up monsters.”
“What exactly are your goals?” Taylor inquired.
“For now, it’s to reach Level 2,” Welf stated.
“I see. Why?” the parahuman asked.
“There’s a special Developmental Ability called ‘Blacksmith’ that is necessary for me if I want to really become a great smith.”
“Really? You seem like you are pretty skilled already,” Bell commented.
“Thanks, but the Blacksmith Ability is more than just a way to improve my forging skills. It actually lets somebody craft high-grade items with superior effects than merely mundane crafting can pull off, including make enchanted weapons and armor. Clothes made of Salamander Wool and Undine Silk can also be crafted with this Ability, and the Durandal enhancement can be applied to equipment as well,” Welf explained.
Taylor was impressed, and intrigued. There was a lot more to Developmental Abilities than she’d expected.
“I’ve been trying for years to reach Level 2,” Welf admitted. “It’s not easy, but if I have a party to help me, it might be possible. Plus, with the scariest Level 1 in Orario I can probably get deeper in the Dungeon than I’ve ever gone before and get Drop Items for crafting!”
“In that case, we can agree to those requests of yours,” Taylor nodded. “Can you help?”
“What sort of equipment did you have in mind?” Welf asked, not giving an answer one way or another.
Instead of saying it aloud, Taylor’s swarm picked up a few pieces of charcoal and quickly drew out some designs on scrap paper that was on the nearby workbench. In less than a minute she had three pictures of what she wanted.
“Well, damn, that was fast,” Welf muttered as he looked them over, with Bell and Lili crowding in to take a look as well.
“That looks really good,” Bell hummed. The equipment Taylor had sketched for him was designed for taking advantage of his speed. It resembled Brigantine, with Orc Hide alongside silk from the spiders as the base and Killer Ant carapace as the armored plates. It also had a pair of bandoliers crossed over the chest in an X shape designed for holding additional daggers.
“These throwing knives… what exactly are the grips gonna be made of?” Welf asked.
“Do you know what rubber is?” Taylor asked Welf.
“Sure. That’s the flexible stuff that comes from around Telskyura, right?” Welf asked.
“Yes. It has insulating properties that lets it protect objects from electricity,” Taylor explained. “Use it for the handles of Bell’s spare knives.”
“Ah, for my Skill!” the young white-haired boy realized. Taylor nodded at that. Rubber handles would mean Bell’s clone could wield weapons without accidentally melting them.
“Wait, why does Lili’s outfit look like full plate armor?” Lili asked, surprised by the drawing Taylor had made for her equipment. It showed a pallum-sized suit of armor, strong and sturdy, but slow.
“Your Skill, Artel Assist, let’s you move without having to worry about weight,” Taylor explained. “Combined with the fact that thanks to the luggage you carry you won’t be able to leverage your agility, having heavier and stronger armor makes more sense.”
“I’ve also seen the way you fight, and while keeping your distance is useful, it’s not perfect,” Taylor continued. “As such, I want to make sure we take advantage of everything we can. And in your case, you are woefully underutilizing your talents.”
“What about Lili’s fighting style?” the supporter asked.
“You can still use your wrist-crossbows, but with Welf’s help we can do better. I’m thinking two wrist-mounted crossbows, bigger and stronger than the ones you currently have. Perhaps with repeating functions?”
Taylor quickly sketched out a Chinese repeating crossbow, which immediately had both Welf and Lili intrigued.
“Those wouldn’t be very powerful unless you use Dungeon materials,” Welf mused. “And the range would kinda suck… but you could definitely fire off a bunch of bolts far faster. Good for the cramped confines of the Dungeons and horde suppression against the smaller, weaker monsters.”
“The firing mechanism isn’t all that great either. Crank powered won’t work very well,” Lili added. “Though the ability to hold and fire more bolts would be nice.”
“We could probably streamline the firing and reloading mechanisms if we added small gears here and here,” Welf suggesting, annotating the diagram with a few markings of his own. “Make it stronger.”
“It would make it more complicated. And more complicated means harder to fix and easier to break,” Lili warned, though she was still rather excited.
“True, but what if we made the parts uniform, so they could be swapped out whenever they need repair?” the blacksmith mused. “Modular, I think the term is.”
“Lili likes it!” the pallum exclaimed.
Welf and Lili then shared a look, both clearly eager to build something new for themselves. Taylor watched them, amused, while Bell inched over to his Familia member’s side.
“Lili looks so excited,” he murmured. “I like this genuine happiness better than the fake smiles she was always wearing before.”
“Oh, so you could also tell she was wearing a mask to hide her emotions?” Taylor asked.
“I might not be the sharpest knife in the kitchen, but I can figure out when somebody is pretending everything is fine.” At that, Bell gave her a knowing look, and Taylor snorted.
“I am fine.”
“Have you taken any time at all to relax or to cry?” Bell asked softly. “To grieve the death of your world?”
Taylor shot him a sharp look, but he just stared back resolutely. There was no judgement in his eyes, just genuine concern and a desire to help her. She immediately looked away, unable to meet his earnest gaze.
“I’m fine,” she repeated. Bell clearly didn’t believe her, but he didn’t push, and instead rejoined Lili and Welf as they discussed equipment.
“So, what do you think?” Taylor asked, and the blacksmith looked up in surprise, having forgotten she was here.
“Alright, yeah, I think we can work something out,” Welf finally said. “I’ll draw up a contract, but I won’t sign immediately. I want to see how well you work together in the Dungeon. That’s the most important part.”
“Very well, you can come with us to the Dungeon tomorrow, and we can see how well you fight as well,” Taylor told Welf, who nodded.
“Right, can do.”
“How deep have you gone before?” Bell wondered.
“Floor Twelve was the lowest I’ve ever gone,” Welf replied.
“What’s the strongest monster you can kill in a single hit?” Taylor inquired.
“I can cut an Orc in half,” Welf smirked proudly. That was quite impressive, and Taylor was eager to see that in action.
“Then we will aim to reach the Tenth Floor tomorrow,” Taylor declared.
“You guys can already head that far down on your own?” Welf whistled, impressed.
“Lili thinks Welf will be very surprised tomorrow,” Lili snickered.
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“You know, I’ll admit, I wasn’t expecting you guys to be this good,” Welf admitted as they emerged onto a plateau overlooking the Tenth Floor the next day. “I mean, nobody expects newbies who haven’t even been delving for a year to be able to get below the Fifth Floor. But here you are, already on Floor Ten.”
He glanced at Taylor. “I also wasn’t convinced you’d be able to keep up, Bug Girl. I mean, only one arm? That’s a death sentence down here. Sure, your armor is cool and creepy and made of a material I have no idea about, but it likely couldn’t protect you from a War Shadow, or Orc, or even a determined Kobold.”
Welf then looked over at the seething horde of Killer Ants and Purple Moths that was spilling out of the stairwell behind them, as well as the dozens of them already pouring over the ledge ahead of them.
“Consider me convinced, though. And a little bit terrified. And excited. I’ve never gotten through the Upper Floors so quickly before!”
“Glad you approve,” Taylor drawled. “Come on, I want to see you bisect an Orc.”
She eyed his massive weapon as she said this. It was a big, broad, single-bladed great sword that was slightly curved at the tip. A swing of it could tear through a monster, killing it in one hit. He was strong, too, as he could carry it in one hand with ease.
The only downside was that the size of it was hard to manage in some of the narrower stretches of the Dungeon, but Welf’s fists were enough to kill pretty much anything in the previous floors in a single hit so that problem was effectively negated.
He also wore an interesting outfit that was distinctly Asian in appearance and style, with a chainmail vest underneath and armored bracers and leg guards.
“Lili found an Orc!” the supporter called out, her bag already bulging with loot.
“Right. Welf? You’re up.”
“Awesome!” the blacksmith grinned, cracking his knuckles as he descended towards the ground. An ugly pig monster was snorting and squealing as it was surrounded by Killer Ants, hemming it in.
Welf charged in without hesitation and swung it downwards, letting the sword cleave the monster in twain from shoulder to groin.
“Whoa!” Bell said, applauding as the Orc collapsed into ash.
“You’re going to make an excellent party member,” Taylor praised, already thinking about the best ways to incorporate him into their party’s line-up.
“Lili agrees!” Lili said. Sure, it meant a smaller cut of money when dividing up the valis from the loot, but an extra person made the whole thing safer, and who knows? Maybe they’d be able to acquire better Magic Stones and Drop Items with Welf’s help?
“I’m going to move away a bit and let you handle any monsters that we come across since we gain Excelia by killing monsters, and having me reduces the amount you three can gather,” Taylor announced, and everyone nodded in agreement at that. With a Killer Ant and Blue Papillion sticking by their side, the parahuman would know if they were in danger and the latter could provide limited healing.
With that, the party began to explore the Tenth Floor, wandering around the eerie grey landscape. It was a strange place, and Bell was learning to navigate it quickly, despite being used to the winding labyrinth of the upper floors.
They also learned that Lili’s crossbow proved to be in dire need of an upgrade, as while it was useful in killing Bad Bats and Imps, it did nothing to Orcs, not even tickle them. The best she could hope for was blinding them, but as Taylor had learned, the pig-like monsters’ sense of smell was more than able to compensate.
“What is this stuff?” Bell wondered as he bent down to examine the ground, plucking a few strands of grey grass out of the dirt an hour into the trek. They had just defeated a pair of Orcs, and were taking a quick break.
“It’s called Carbon Grass,” Welf replied, bending down as well and grabbing handfuls of the stuff. “Not really grass, though. It’s a coal-like material that ‘grows’ down here. Burns better and cleaner than coal and any steel made with it is always better compared to steel made with regular coal. It’s what I used to make Pyonkichi, in fact.”
“Should we gather some?” Bell wondered, looking around at the vast, flat landscape.
“Nah, no need. Not yet, at least,” Welf said with a shake of his head.
“And the trees?” Bell inquired.
“Some kind of stone. Usually flint,” Welf said. “Imps use the branches as knives or spears. Orcs prefer to use landform weapons made of a tougher material. See those boulders and stalagmites scattered around? Smack ‘em a bit or give ‘em tug or two and they’ll break away into a club or other weapon-like shape. Made of something akin to granite, though I’ve heard rumors that lower down, you can find rare marble or diamond landform weapons.”
“If the trees are flint, could we use them to make fire if we needed to camp down here?” Bell wondered, and Taylor, who was listening in via the monsters near the group, was also curious.
“Not easily,” Welf said with a grimace. “All this mist make it hard to light anything on fire, even if you’ve kept it safe and dry on other floors.”
“Lili has heard of people wrapping objects in Undine Silk to keep them from getting wet,” the pallum claimed.
“If they’re rich enough to afford to use Undine Silk as wrapping paper, then they don’t have to camp on these floors,” Welf snorted.
“What’s Undine Silk?” Bell asked, which was another thing Taylor wanted to know as well.
“It’s a type of material that is typically made from Arachne silk, Mermaid hair, or the mane of a Kelpie but certain Developmental Abilities, like Blacksmith, can create it out of regular silk,” Welf said. “It’s hydrophobic. Ah, that means it repels water. Great for keeping things dry. And something necessary on the 25th through 27th Floors. It also makes you swim faster and breath underwater, though the latter is a rumor, I think.”
Welf then raised four fingers. “There are three other materials like that in the Dungeon that an adventurer absolutely cannot live without. Salamander Wool, which is made from Almiraj fur or Cerberus hides, grants a heightened resistance to fire and heat when worn.”
“Next is Adamantite. It’s a super-hard darkish grey metal that can be found as raw ore, or in all sorts of Drop Items. Just melt them down to extract it. Practically every top-quality piece of gear incorporates some Adamantite into it.”
“And last but not least is Mithril, a silver hued metal that is extremely rare and even harder than Adamantite, but vital if you want to make high-end magical items or enchantments. Heck, it could be considered the most important metal in the world, since Mithril is what allows magic tools to turn the energy inside a monster’s Magic Stone into fuel it can use. Every oven, lamp, and the like up above in the city incorporates a tiny bit of Mithril in it.”
“Sounds important,” Bell hummed.
“Oh, it is. There are only a few places it can be found. Either as Drop Items from Spartoi and other monsters on the 37th Floor, or from within the Jack Bird's egg on the First. I’ve heard rumors of places it can be mined from the Deep Floors as well.”
“Jack Bird? You mean that rare monster that always drops a golden egg worth at least a million valis when killed?!” Lili gasped.
“Yeah, underneath that golden shell – which is made of Orichalcum by the way – is a ‘yolk’ made of pure Mithril. But the Jack Bird is a rare monster, so maybe one egg a month ends up being found at a time,” Welf said. “I’d love to get my hands on some Mithril to experiment with, but it’s too expensive for me. Someday, though. Once I reach Level 2, my next goal is getting my hands on some Mithril!”
“Whoa!” Bell said in awe. Taylor was no different, and she already had a number of ideas running through her head. Some of which she’d bring up to Welf later.
‘For now, I should warn them about the five Orcs coming their way,’ she mused.
“Everyone, be on guard, a group of five Orcs is approaching, all armed with landform weapons,” Taylor announced, speaking through her swarm. Without the absurd number of insects of the city above, Taylor had decided to hide as many bugs as possible in Lili’s backpack. So, when the hundreds of flies and roaches boiled out from behind Lili like a black mist, it naturally spooked their newest member.
“Oh, shit!” Welf exclaimed, jumping to his feet in shock.
“Yeah, she does that sometimes,” Lili said, her tone deadpan. “You don’t get used to it.”
“Five Orcs?” Bell asked, focusing on the important part.
“Yes,” Taylor confirmed. “Should I interfere?”
“No,” Bell said, standing up. “I want to test my Skill.”
“You have a Skill?” Welf exclaimed. “Aren’t you a newbie? It took me a year of hard work to get my first Skill!”
“If you keep being surprised by everything, you’ll just get whiplash,” Lili warned.
Meanwhile, Bell summoned two lightning clones, their burning white forms charring the grey grass underneath their feet and causing the mist to sizzle and steam. They then burst into motion, moving fast towards the approaching monsters.
The Orcs were able to see the two glowing bodies getting close, even through the thick mist, and raised their weapons, only for one clone to leap over one of their swinging clubs. It landed in the middle of them and immediately exploded, allowing torrents of lightning to wash over the Orcs, electrocuting it. The five Orcs sank to their knees, flesh cracked and burned, but still alive.
But before they could do anything else, the second clone clotheslined one Orc onto their back, and snatched up their club. Even with only a third of the stats Bell had, the clone was still equal to a mid-ranked adventurer and lifted the weapon with ease, before bringing it down onto the stunned monster’s skull, splitting it like a watermelon.
The other Orcs weren’t going to put up with this, yet when one punched the clone, it exploded like its brother. The Orc who did the punching lost its arm while the other three were further electrocuted.
And then suddenly, one of the Orcs collapsed, its throat slit by the Hestia Knife. Bell had snuck up on them, ambushing the remaining monsters and cutting their necks open without mercy.
‘The clones distracted them, and then the smell of burning fat and flesh overwhelmed their olfactory ability, letting Bell approach without being detected,’ Taylor noted, impressed by his stealthy tactics.
“I did it!” he cheered, holding up the Magic Stones and strips of Orc Hide that had dropped. It was really disconcerting to see him so cheerful while streaks of blood marred his hands and part of his hair.
“Huh… okay, you know what? I’m not sure who the scariest person on the team is anymore,” Welf muttered.
“Preach,” Lili nodded.
Taylor chuckled to herself before sending her Killer Ants to eliminate a horde of Imps that had been trying to circle around and ambush the blacksmith and supporter from behind while the Orcs had approached from the front. But they didn’t need to know that.
