With the monsters cleared from their immediate surroundings, the ballistics team performed more test fires. The durability and reliability of the slingshot launcher was further stressed, and the accuracy was calculated.

  Neither scored particularly amazing. The smaller parts of the slingshot launcher tended to break on just about every launch. The barrel itself already received deep scrapes on the inside from each launch. Freyven guessed that something would break catastrophically in about twenty launches from now.

  Missiles did shoot in the rough direction they were pointed at with tremendous speeds, but they tended to wobble around during flight ever so slightly, which made the flight path unreliable. The maximum reach of the missiles seemed to be between two and three miles, before the wobbling eventually led the missiles to the ground, where an explosion went off as the missile crashed to the ground like a slipped knife-stroke of an outside-carver.

  “We’ll have to deal with the wobbling effect somehow,” Vivi said. “With that, the accuracy should be fixed, right?”

  “The missile will require spin,” Freyven said. “I believe that will fix the stability issue even without fixing the wobble. Grooves in the barrel could work, though the missile will most likely rip through any rifling we attempt. We’ll have to get creative.”

  They continued testing from there. Vivi watched for some time before noting that her presence wasn’t all that useful. The scientists and ballista makers knew what they were doing. If Vivi wanted something made—something that didn’t require precise vein-shaping, they’d get it done.

  So for the time being, she left them to work, trusting they’d figure out improvements on their own, and headed back to the city. She moved at a moderate jog, her legs fueled by around three hundred wisps. Ether still mostly worked with her muscles. At low amounts, ether could actually help prevent exhaustion instead of causing it.

  The city gates were still firmly closed, and they would probably remain closed. With monsters wandering all across, crossing the Shivell mountains to the rest of the fifth level simply wasn’t safe. It would probably take some time before people accepted that they’d be stuck in Shivenar for a while, hopefully calming down then.

  The northern portcullis was lifted for Vivi, and she quickly moved to the Lowmoor district. On her home street, she spotted Senith as well as two servants. Not outside her doors, this time, but outside Grandpa’s. They looked troubled, discussing amongst themselves.

  “Did something happen?” Vivi asked, walking up to them.

  Senith’s head perked up at the sight of Vivi, though she wasn’t smiling. “We’re not sure,” she said. “It’s, um, your grandpa. He’s not answering the door. We’ve knocked four times throughout the day now.”

  Vivi paused. “You mean… He’s just been in there? And not responding?”

  “Oh, don’t worry, he’s alive!” Senith said hastily and with a laugh, seeing the concern on Vivi’s face. “Lortel attached some sort of monitor to track his heartbeat from the outside. He’s very much alive and healthy. But he’s not accepting food, and he’s not giving us any info on progress. Is this… normal for him?”

  That did sound like Grandpa… Vivi sighed. “You have a spare key to force your way in, right?”

  “Of course,” Senith said. “But we have been strictly informed not to bother him while he works.”

  “Give me the key,” Vivi said. “I’ll handle it.”

  Senith did so nervously, and she followed Vivi down the stairs to Grandpa’s cave-like smithy. Vivi slid the key in and opened the door quietly in case Grandpa was actually just focusing. Grandpa was usually calm when talking to her, but disrupting him in the middle of a good attempt, especially after he had already failed attempts beforehand, was one of the few things that could make him furious at Vivi.

  The hinges creaked ever so slowly as the door opened ajar. Vivi slowly opened it further, and peeked into the room.

  The floor was filled to the brim with veins. Half-shaped ether roots—some with three completed roots and a failed fourth, others with just one or two roots, even a few with five completed veins and a failed sixth. The floor was absolutely filled with failed veins to the point that Vivi struggled to place her foot down. Each failure contained adamantite or other high tier ether roots, easily worth tens of thousands of ether, maybe a hundred thousand ether, in failures alone.

  Vivi heard a pained grunt, followed by a twisting sound, then a crash as another set of veins flew across the room, hitting the wall.

  She forced her way into the room. “Grandpa!”

  There was a deep scowl on his face, which turned to surprise as he spotted Vivi. Then he turned back to his cluttered workstation and said, “I believe I’ve requested not to be interrupted while I work!”

  Vivi was at a loss for words as she took in all the chaos around her. If she wanted to step forward, she would need to lift veins and throw them aside. How many failures was this? Close to a hundred?

  “Grandpa…” Vivi said quietly. “What is this?”

  “You should know what you’re looking at,” Grandpa said, his voice gradually getting louder, until he yelled, “considering you’ve been a runesmith for fifteen goddamned years!”

  Stolen story; please report.

  Vivi stood there, utterly baffled by his demeanor. Senith listened and watched from behind the doorstep.

  Grandpa met her eyes and paused. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to yell.” He groaned, stretched, and tossed a failed set of veins aside from the ground, further to the corner, and moved to his water barrel.

  As he stood, Vivi felt something odd. A smoke-like tendril rose from Grandpa’s hands. She felt a slight presence in the ethereal realm.

  What was that? she asked.

  Lucius looked confused as well. “It looked like a wisp rose from his hand?”

  Vivi eyed him oddly. Grandpa didn’t seem to react to it. He calmly drank a mugfull, then said, “My body has turned into an inoperable, useless, inaccurate piece of trash. Never in my life have I had consistency as poor as this.”

  It must be nothing, Vivi thought. She, again, looked around herself. “Of course your consistency will be bad if this is how you work. When have you last stepped out of the smithy!”

  “Not much stepping out to do under those fucking facets, Vivi,” Grandpa said. “My lungs struggle to breathe in this desert. Inside, at least, it’s nice and cool.”

  The forge was not active, Vivi realized. The temperature was cool; way colder than Grandpa would have ever tolerated at home. His hands were shaking as he sat down, a pained expression on his face.

  “Is… everything okay?” Vivi asked.

  He considered his words for a moment. “I know now why you called your shop the Lost Raindrop. This city could really use some rainclouds.”

  Vivi said nothing. She eyed him with genuine worry.

  “I’m doing fine,” Grandpa said. “Focus on your own practice, Vivi.”

  She crossed her arms, forming a slight frown.

  Grandpa sighed. “I do need rest, I admit. That’s enough attempts for today. Back to vine roots it is, then. Tell your manager company that if they want to help out, I would appreciate a cleanup of the failed veins.”

  The failed veins can probably be cut and used for rune-strings, Vivi noted. The frown stayed on her face, however. “Grandpa, the storms are so bad that the city can’t even evacuate. It would be too dangerous to move to the sixth level. We’re forced to defend. And we could really use your swords.”

  “I hear you’ve been dealing with the little critters just fine,” Grandpa said. “The real issue is the tougher monsters. The godslayers, the colossi, the ether whatevers. For those, a top-notch sword is required. A sword to slay a god.”

  “That’s just an excuse to keep throwing in attempts,” Vivi said.

  “Perhaps,” Grandpa said. “And I will keep throwing in attempts.” He glared at her. “I will craft my masterpiece, and this storm season will not stop me, nor will your cute pout, Vivi. Get out.”

  Vivi stayed put. “I didn’t know you were this impossible, Grandpa! Really, now is not the time to start attempting masterpieces. You’re still recovering, remember?”

  “No,” Grandpa said. “I’ve recovered. This is as good as I’ll get.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m an old man,” Grandpa said. “Over seventy now. I felt healthy back in Fellwater. But it’s getting hard. Lortel told me my lungs were permanently scarred from the daze powder.”

  Vivi’s hands fell back to her sides, frown disappearing. “But you’ve kept care of your health, haven’t you? You’ve always been healthy.”

  “Sure,” Grandpa said. “And I’ve come a long way. And this is the end of it. I’m no longer getting better. My hands are losing accuracy by the day. I’m old, and only growing older.”

  “You’re just tired, Grandpa,” Vivi argued. “The same happens to me, and I’m seventeen. If you overwork yourself, your consistency will fall. It’s as simple as that.”

  Grandpa let out a laugh. “Wise words. I’ve taught you well. And perhaps you’re right. I’m heading to sleep now. And next time, if I don’t answer, don’t barge in, Vivi. You might interrupt that very attempt.”

  She watched with a pout as Grandpa made his way to the door at the back. “Good night,” he said, disappearing.

  Vivi’s stare stayed on the closed door. “The facets are still bright, you know…”

  A chuckle came from behind her. Vivi glanced at Senith, and saw that the woman was smiling, amused.

  “What?” Vivi asked.

  “He certainly reminds me of you,” Senith said.

  Lucius appeared from Vivi’s core, hearing that. “He’s exactly like Vivi.”

  “How?” Vivi asked. “How am I even slightly similar to him?”

  Lucius and Senith shared a funny look, as if Vivi was missing something. Then Senith said, “Nothing. We’ll bring your Grandpa more tools. He insists he can complete this project. Although, he did say he would complete it today.”

  “He’s attempting a six-runed sword,” Vivi said. “He’ll require months.”

  Vivi knelt down to examine one of the failed veins—one that had reached the sixth root. Looking at it, Vivi almost had the urge to apologize for scolding Grandpa’s efforts. The veins were tight. To the blind eye, Grandpa’s handwork looked near perfect. From the very first branches of the first ether root, Grandpa left zero margin for error. His work was beyond just art. It was almost mathematically perfect.

  She examined the sixth root more closely. The failure point. Grandpa had been a third of the way to completing the last root, where the eighth branch of the sixth root collided against an earlier root. At first glance, it was hard to tell which root it had even collided with.

  That was when she spotted something. A loop within the sixth ether root.

  Vivi blinked, thinking she saw wrong. She traced the root back to its starting point, confirming that it was, indeed, a part of the sixth and failed root.

  Why was Grandpa forming loops for the sixth ether root? That one was just supposed to get through?

  He’s not trying to create a perfect six-runed sword, is he…? Vivi thought in horror. Just an ordinary six-runed sword wasn’t enough for him. He wanted to create a mathematically perfect six-runed sword. The loops would take more space, finalizing the sword further.

  Another possibility crossed Vivi’s mind. A seven-runed sword.

  No way, she thought, dismissing the thought immediately when she looked at the sword again. There was no space. Even Grandpa wouldn’t fit a seventh root through that. The loops must have been there to take more space, not to accommodate a seventh rune.

  Vivi stood and sighed. “Clean up the mess. And offer all the failed projects to the scientists, please. They can cut ether roots into pieces and make use of them.”

  “Yes, I’ll relay that,” Senith said with a curtsy.

  “Thank you, and Lucius, let’s go,” Vivi said, while he was examining the failed veins as well.

  While leaving, another thought tugged at her head. She had, in a way, invented great runes. With the rune-strings, it was possible to add all three power-runes into one ether root.

  Vivi wanted to tell him and ask for his thoughts. But not right now. Grandpa’s dream was to create a six-runed sword. Telling him now about a new discovery would have ruined all the hard work he had placed for practically his whole life.

  Telling him about a new discovery right now would be like telling him the world had run out of ether roots. Interruptions during a runesmithing marathon, when determination was at its highest, was depressing. Vivi knew from experience.

  Not to mention, Vivi still hadn’t tested whether the great runes would actually be useful for runeswords or not. She intended to do that later, perhaps after storm season.

  For now, she pushed the thought aside and said, “I still want to visit one more place today.”

  Lucius flew to her core, and Vivi headed up toward the mountain, to Shivenar’s levelstone mines.

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