thomasdarkrose
patreon
Fabricator v2 - Chapter 7
🕑 Added 2023-06-28 14:46:02 +0000 UTCAs he got to the scooter, Azazel called out from where he was still standing, “I know this is probably the worst timing ever but, you wouldn't happen to be interested in joining the Grigori would you?”
The question from Azazel was so unexpected that Junichiro froze for a moment as his brain registered the oddity. He quickly finished making his way to the nearby Vespa and sat on it. As irrational as it was, being on the vehicle capable of only going sixty-five kilometers and hour gave him some comfort and security. Logically, there was just no way in hell he'd be able to actually outrun Azazel if he gave chase.
Still, the false comfort and security helped clear some of the fear and allowed Junichiro to actually speak to Azazel, “If I say no?”
Azazel gave a lazy shrug then slowly lowered his hands, “Then I leave and you likely never see me again.”
“You won't send others after me?”
Azazel shook his head, “Nah kid, I prefer to work with people that actually want to be around. Trying to force stuff never works as good.”
“Why did you even come looking for me? Nothing I sold was that interesting.”
Azazel arched an eyebrow at that, “Is that what you think? Granted there's not much magic in the various blades you've sold so they don't really even qualify as magical. However! It's the technique! I don't know how you do it kid, but I've never seen a technique like yours to impregnate mana into mundane metal. Usually only magical metals can hold mana within them for any period of time.”
Junichiro blinked in confusion. According to the knowledge in his head, what Azazel just said was the single dumbest thing he'd ever heard. So dumb it blew away all of his fear and had his mouth running before he could stop it, “That's dumb! Yeah, magical metals are easier to imbue with more mana, but those magical metals started as mundane metals! It's only exposure to a large amount of mana over a long period of time that changes mundane metals into magical metals. So of course mana can be imbued into any mundane metal with the right technique. Someone as old as you saying he's never seen it before is stupid! No way no one else didn't figure out something so simple!”
Azazel shrugged his shoulders, “No idea what to tell ya kid, I've never seen anything like it before. Even magical metals haven't been worked in such a manner. Believe me, I would know. I've seen some of the most powerful weapons made by man and god, none used a similar technique. Usually it's just a ton of magical power being dumped into a well made sword, or whatever, that's been excellently forged. Either that, or used to do something ridiculous like slaying a dragon and gaining dragon slaying attributes.”
Junichiro sputtered, “But! But! That's so inefficient!” He actually looked a little horrified as he continued, “That's such an abhorrent waste of power and effort! Stop talking! You're destroying my vision of those weapons! I don't need to know that swords like Excalibur are just jumped up hunks of steel with tons of magical power thrown at them! I don't!”
Azazel chuckled a little, “Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that's essentially right. Granted, the spells and such used to imbue the special abilities of Excalibur are proprietary Fae secrets. Others were lost to time, or just magical swords used to do something extraordinary and gaining abilities from those extraordinary actions. I take it you think your method is superior?”
Junichiro narrowed his eyes at Azazel, all fear forgotten as Azazel poked his 'reverse scale.' There wasn't much he could be proud of in his life, in fact he could only be proud of what he'd done since he became an Artificer. Everything he'd made was done with effort and growing skill, of course he was proud of all his effort! So, filled with righteous indignation, he glared at Azazel and hissed, “Of course my work is superior! If I had the power, materials, and a proper workshop, I could forge weapons, armor, and other magical items to boggle the mind and crush toys like Excalibur!”
The instant he finished speaking was the instant Junichiro knew he'd fucked up big time. If there was one thing you did NOT do, it was brag about how you could make weapons superior to Excalibur to the leader of any faction. That was just begging to be kidnapped and put to work! Or worse, being tortured into revealing all of your secrets! Junichiro immediately began to hyperventilate as he realized the depth of his mistake, his previously dismissed fear coming back in full force.
Seeing Junichiro being to shudder in fear again, Azazel held up his hands and made 'calm down' gestures, “Easy kid, easy. Seriously, I'm not going to do anything to you. I promise. Just. Take a few deep breaths and try to calm down alright?”
Azazel quickly looked around the place for a way to distract the clearly distraught kid. While he preferred to stay away from kids, that didn't mean he didn't know how to handle them. You pick up a lot of skills and knowledge over thousands of years of life. The place was actually pretty nice for being in the middle of a junkyard. Three three-by-three meter sheds took up the majority of the space. One was clearly the kids bedroom but the other two were just as clearly work spaces. The first had a couple of tables with smaller more delicate tools while the other held a smelter, forge, and larger power tools. All of which ran off of a combination of solar panels, re-purposed batteries, and a generator.
Seeing all of that, Azazel decided to be honest and see if that helped, “I gotta admit kid, for a homeless street urchin you've got a rather sweet set up. It just shows how much potential and ingenuity you've got. Though, I gotta know, how did you get all of this stuff? I know that some of it you have to be an adult to purchase.”
The distraction seemed to work as Junichiro muttered deprecations about being a shota and the unfairness of age criteria when shopping. He took a few deep breaths and eyed Azazel. So far he hadn't been kidnapped so, that was good... right? He took a deep breath and thought about his answer before deciding to take off his improved notice-me-not bracelet and toss it to Azazel. The effect was so weak Azazel hadn't even registered it at all.
Azazel's hand shot up and caught the bracelet. He examined it with a smile, “Oho, how interesting. A minor enchantment that gets people with weak magical power to ignore you? So... mostly only effective on mundane people? Interesting.” His mind whirred with possibilities for a bit before he spoke once more, “With something like this you could just walk into a place and walk out with whatever you wanted, right?”
Junichiro nodded, “As long as I don't do anything to draw attention to myself to break the effect. I have another that just makes people disregard my age as well.”
Azazel let out a low whistle, “Pretty impressive considering the conditions you're working in.” He glanced around once more before looking at Junichiro again, “If you're willing to join the Grigori you'd have access to a fair amount of resources. I'd really like to see what you could do with proper facilities and materials.”
Junichiro fidgeted for a bit before mustering enough courage to say, “No.”
Azazel seemed to pout a bit, “Why not? I thought I made a decent offer.”
Junichiro looked pretty torn before he simply decided 'fuck it' and made his feelings clear, “Because of the three Abrahamic factions, I think the fallen angels are the absolute worst. Not that anyone is a saint, not even the saints, in your trio. It's like all three of your factions are racing to the bottom.”
Azazel blinked at that, though he was hardly offended by the opinion of a thirteen-year-old. Still the response made him curious, “Why do you say that?”
Junichiro leveled a bland gaze at Azazel before he answered, “Because every last fallen angel is a traitor. Worse, you all betrayed your families and then proceeded to turn around and murder other members of your family. I can only think of a few crimes worse than betraying family.”
“You think that's worse than what devils have done?”
Junichiro scoffed, “I'm not implying devils, or even angels and the church, are good. But in the case of devils, they are biological weapons created for the sole purpose of waging war. That is literallywhat they were created for by Lucifer and Lilith. The fact that they're trying to rise above their base instincts and genetic programming speaks volumes about their current leading faction. But despising devils for being deranged mass murderers, would be like despising a tiger because I punched it in the nose and it decided to maul me.”
He shook his head, “As for the angels, well they're all a bunch of ignorant children who can't keep in control of daddies people. The church is rife with corruption. Everyone knows just how bad it's gotten and the prevalence of priest and little boy jokes is entirely their fault. None of you is anywhere close to innocent or good.”
Junichiro knew there was probably more to it, he was also very certain that the first angel after Lucifer to fall, was likely slaughtered on God's orders. Honestly, all three sides of the Abrahamic faction were fucked up.
Azazel pondered Junichiro's words. He didn't agree with the kid, not at all, but he could see where he was coming from. That was the thing about discussing something in a mature manner, people could disagree and didn't have to be overly offended by it. Obviously the kid didn't have all the facts and had come to an incorrect conclusion, but he wouldn't hold that against him. It was far from a simple black and white situation and no one involved looked good. Azazel just nodded his head and addressed Junichiro once more, “So, not interested at all then?”
Junichiro rubbed his arms and chewed on his bottom lip as he thought. He didn't hate Azazel, though he definitely feared him. Azazel always seemed like the 'cool uncle' in the show, from what he could recall. Oh, he knew Azazel was a total pervert and capable of cold blooded murder, but that didn't put him off too much. There were very few beings in the supernatural world incapable of murder and worse. He finally came to a decision, “No, I definitely wont join the Grigori. However, I wouldn't mind being able to buy and sell things with you all. You'd probably be able to help me with other things too, like setting up a home and a proper work area. I have some money saved, or I can barter with some of the stuff I've made. It's all kind of low end, but once I get more materials I can make better stuff, eventually.”
As Azazel pondered the offer, who was he kidding? There was no way he was going to let someone so interesting just disappear from his sights! His unique method of infusing mana into metal was already very interesting. However, if the kid could do more with better materials? It could give him some hints and ideas towards his own project of creating his own Sacred Gears from scratch. Not to mention the small trinkets like his bracelets. While useless against any but the weakest of supernatural beings, they would still be very helpful against the mundane. Seeing as how the mundane outnumbered the supernatural by a few billion, that wasn't exactly a small demographic.
“I wouldn't have any issues with that, kid. There anything else you might be interested in? Just out of curiosity and all to know what I have to offer. I'd also like to see anything else you've made. Like that method you have for teleportation. Most methods I know use spell circles, yet yours didn't.”
Still nervous and a little fearful, yet feeling a bit of hope, Junichiro nodded, “Yeah, I can think of two things off the top of my head.” At Azazels 'go on' gesture, he continued, “Well, I don't know anything about spell casting, so some beginners primers on that might be nice.”
Azazel looked rather surprised at that admission, “Then how did you try to teleport?”
“I'll explain that when I explain my skills. The second thing I can think of is... I've heard you like to collect and experiment with Sacred Gears. If you have a spare Sword Birth laying around, or come across one, I'd be very interested in trading for it.”
Azazel looked slightly surprised at the knowledge the kid seemed to have on him, “How'd you know that?”
Junichiro sighed, but he had an excuse ready, “Living on the streets as a semi-supernatural being you can hear quite a few rumors. I try to skirt around any supernatural communities. There was a small one in the last city I lived in. I learned a bit, mostly how utterly weak and fucked I am if I came across anyone even remotely strong. So, I fled that city and made my way around until I found one that I couldn't find any supernatural community in.” He eyeballed Azazel, “Which is why seeing you scared the piss out of me. There should have been nothing in this city to attract the attention of the Governor General of the Grigori. Finding out you were here for me? If I was older I might have died of a heart attack.”
Azazel looked a little abashed, “Sorry about that kid, I really didn't mean to scare you so badly.”
Junichiro continued to eyeball Azazel. He had no idea if the fallen angel was being honest or not. It could, conceivably, have been an honest accident. However, it could also have been very deliberate and geared to manipulating him into speaking without thinking. He had revealed some things he really didn't want to in his fear. With Azazel it was impossible to tell if he was being honest or manipulative.
“If you say so.”
“Back on topic then. I don't currently have any Sword Birth sacred gears laying around, but I can keep an eye out for one for you. If you don't mind me asking, why that one? It's not particularly strong.”
Junichiro shrugged, “Utility. I've heard it can make all kinds of swords with built in enchantments. Seeing as how enchantments are kind of my thing, it seemed like a good fit.”
Of course, with a balance breaker, it was possible to make things other than swords. Kiba made full on suits of autonomous armor. Meanwhile Jeanne from the Hero Faction could make a full on metal dragon with the counterpart to Sword Birth, Blade Blacksmith. So clearly, with a decent Balance Breaker, he wouldn't be limited to just making swords with it. He could potentially make an entire army like a knock off Annihilation Maker, just not nearly as good.
Azazel stroked his little goatee, “Alright, so you want a home, trade between you and the Grigori for materials and such, beginner spell knowledge, and a Sword Birth sacred gear. Obviously it'll take a while for you to afford the last one and for me to find one I can trade. But the rest should be a piece of cake to do. Now, I just need you to show me what you bring to the table.”
Junichiro eyed Azazel before giving him a curt nod, “While it's not much, yet, I can make items and enchant them with weak effects. Not just things like the bracelets, but also weapons.”
He reached behind his back and pulled out a well made clip point Bowie knife. The whole blade was highly polished giving it the appearance of being brand new, which was fair seeing as it was only a couple of moths old and hadn't seen much use. On both the handle and blade were small sections that had been deeply inscribed and filled with gold that now looked to be a part of the weapon, all in the shape of various runes, “I made this a few months back for protection. The runes reinforce the enchantments meant to keep the edge sharp and undamaged.”
Azazel made a show of leaning forward and squinting at the blade over the distance separating them. Seeing the ploy for what it was, a way to get him closer, Junichiro flicked his arm and launched the blade through the air to pierce the ground near Azazel's feet. He wasn't worried about losing the blade, it wouldn't do fuck all to protect him from Azazel anyway, so instead of getting closer to the fallen angel, he'd just gotten the knife closer.
Giving a little huff of amusement, Azazel picked up the knife and did give it a closer look, “Hmmmmm not too shabby. Decent craftsmanship. Useful, if somewhat weak, enchantments. Given your current limitations, this is rather good.”
With a flick of his own wrist, Azazel returned the Bowie knife to Junichiro in the same manner he'd received it. Junichiro flinched as the blade buried itself tip first into the ground at his feet. He quickly retrieved it, cleaned the dirt off on his sleeve, and slipped it back into the sheath hidden under his skirt on his lower back, “If I had a larger mana reserve I could have done better. I'm limited by both my materials and my personal reserves of power.”
Azazel shrugged uncaring, “I'll be sure to include common methods of expanding a mana core in the spell casting materials.”
Junichiro blinked, “There are methods for that?”
“Oh yeah, quite a few. They have limitations, of course, and only work for human mages, but they can help a magical core grow a bit with dedication and some time. Most mages just ignore it though and only grow through exercising their cores with casting spells. It does take a fair amount of time for them to do all the calculations for each spell, and even longer to get good enough at them to cast the spell quickly.”
Junichiro considered that and nodded his head. What he knew of DxD spell casting for humans was pretty limited, but he did remember they needed to do mathematical calculations of some sort. Something about doing the calculations to make their spell circles to cast their spells? He never really payed much attention to that as the Imagination Magic of devils was much more prevalent and interesting. Still, given how much math they needed to do for each spell, combined with the sheer amount of practice they must need to do it instantly, it made sense they used that practice as their main method of growing their cores instead of dedicating even more time to another pursuit for that purpose.
He, on the other hand, didn't care so much about actually casting spells. He wanted the primers so he could learn how it was done and possibly use the information in his work to make new things. What things? He had no idea. He didn't know nearly enough to even speculate beyond 'spell things'. Even so, that was no reason to ignore a possible avenue of research!
“Aside from enchanting, I can make single use spell scrolls. That's what the teleportation spell I tried to use was, a scroll.” He gave Azazel a hairy eyeball, “That one scroll took me a long time and a lot of mana to make.” He went back to giving Azazel a bland look, “It all depends on how powerful the spell I'm trying to put on the scroll is. Though, the teleport is about as powerful as I can get with just plain parchment. For the really potentially crazy shit, I'd need things like dragon skin, or angel feather quills, or kraken ink, stuff along those lines. You know, natural magical shit.”
Azazel looked rather surprised, “Wait, you can put spells onto a piece of paper and then cast them? Isn't that just the talisman magic that lots of eastern human groups use?”
Junichiro dug into one of his expanded pouches and pulled out a rolled up piece of paper. He unrolled it so Azazel could see the weirdly drawn picture that looked vaguely humanoid, “Your art is crap kid.”
Grumbling to himself, Junichiro sent a pulse of magic into the scroll. The scroll, and Junichiro, both vanished from sight after the Scroll of Invisibility was cast. Azazel let out a low whistle of appreciation, “Nifty trick against mundanes, but you're still pretty easy to detect.”
“Yeah well, this is just meant to work for a short time as an emergency escape from mundane police.”
Speaking broke the spell and Junichiro faded back into view, though the scroll was completely gone, “Improved materials would lead to an improved effect.”
Azazel froze for a short moment before his eyes glazed over and he drifted off into his imagination. As he spoke, Junichiro could just hear the perversion in his voice, “So... you mean to say... with the right materials, you could make a more powerful version that worked on stronger beings?”
“And enough mana. I have to impregnate the mana into the scroll as I'm making it.”
Azazel, still dazed, nodded, “And enough mana...”
There was an awkward silence as the perverted fallen angel continued to fantasize about abusing invisibility. After getting annoyed at the delay, Junichiro cleared his throat and moved on, “I can also make wands.”
Azazel shook his head and focused on the present, “Not as interesting. Mages are always making wands and staves to help with their spell casting as a focus.”
Junichiro smirked and pulled out his recently completed Wand of Fireballs. Even to his nascent senses, the wand gave off a rather powerful feeling. Azazel instantly eyed the highly polished and gold decorated piece of wood with sudden interest, “That doesn't feel like I expected it to.”
“That's because my wands are different. They're not a magical focus, but rather a spell storage device. They can store a limited amount of mana and be programmed to fire off a single spell. The number of times the spell can be used depend on its cost and how much mana the wand can store. The only down side is, they can't be recharged. Each use degrades the wand a bit and once the last bit of mana is used, it becomes useless.”
Junichiro looked up while pondering aloud, “It has its upsides though, since the mana is stored in the wand itself, it uses none of the caster's own mana. I could also create wands that are just programmed for a certain spell and use the caster's own mana instead of stored mana. They would still wear out, just not as quickly.”
“Anything else kid?”
Junichiro shook his head, “Not yet. I mean, I can do all sorts of things with enchantments, as long as I have the materials and mana. In the future, after some research, I'd like to make things like staves for spell casting, but that's a ways off, I think.”
He looked Azazel in the eyes, “My priorities are a home I can safely work at, materials to improve my craft, and a proper trading partner than can afford and use my magical items. The informational stuff like mana core improving methods, human spell casting primers, and other such things we talked about are less important, but still things I would very much like to learn. The more I know, the more I can do with my skills.”
Azazel smiled brightly, “I'm certain we can work something out kid.”
-----Line Break-----
AN
So, I think that went pretty well. Let me know if my depiction of Azazel seems off or wrong in any way. I tried my best with him and he's not too hard to write, I don't think. Also, did the interaction between the two seem natural? If there's anything off in the dialog or anything else, please let me know.
Also, this does NOT prevent Junichiro from making connections with the Yokai faction and Yasaka in the future. So, his plans there aren't changed.
Thanks for reading!
Comments
King hand axe
I really enjoyed the interaction and how the related to each other. My suggestion is that he offers to make a future project or even an amazing Mana infused metal for free, yes free, for Azazel to use as a base for a stupidly strong sacred gear as well as future comparing of notes etc in exchange for Azazel not telling his people/faction obout him. Azazel gets another craftsmen to chat to, interact with and the MC's secret identity/location doesn't spread amongst the fallen angels and then everyone else as that would happen. It would give him a good relationship with the faction leader, and potentially help the fallen angels long term with Azazel getting nudges for the next few years. Like the direction it is heading and hope to read more.
Cody S.
Thanks! I really was worried about that.
Dave
Really looking forward to see what Junichiro will be able to make with all the new options opened up to him. I thought the interaction was great, showing different sides to both characters.
