“Pardon,” Garrett instinctively muttered, as his brows furrowed in confusion. “Forgive me, but are you not an Apprentice Mage? I’m sorry to ask, but it’s just… Ashfall & Sons considers it our responsibility to guide our customers to the blade that is most suited to them.”
“I am a mage,” Lucan answered. “One that is going to the Imperial Academy soon. As you might be aware, mock battles are encouraged in the academy and there is no distinction made between Mages and Aura Knights. If I am to be fighting the latter, I figured that it would be best to understand how it is they fight.”
“Of course, of course,” Garrett replied, his eyes lighting up with interest. If he was bothered by Lucan’s infamous reputation, he didn’t let it show in his expression or tone as he continued, “How insightful for one so young. To acquaint yourself with the techniques of future opponents, how interesting. I would be honored to guide you to your longblade. I’m assuming you’re looking for a standard one, without any alterations.”
Lucan nodded.
Garrett led him to the section of the wall he had eyed earlier, where three Longblades of the same length rested— carrying the length and heft of a longsword while maintaining the thickness of a dagger.
“The lightest of these longblades weigh five kiloweights, so without a physical augmentation spell it will be impossible for a regular mage to wield it effectively,” Garrett explained. “The first is a full Bronzium Longblade, forged for the average knight on a budget looking for a serviceable blade. Bronzium Ingots have a low melting point, making it an easy metal to forge, it has good Aura conductivity and it’ll last a year of a Gathering Stage Aura Expert using it continuously in battle without deforming, though it might need repairs sooner depending on the kind of challenges it’s up against.”
“Interesting.”
“The second is a Bronzium blade with Nightsilver trimmed edges. Compared to Bronzium, Nightsilver is stronger, can be forged to be sharper, holds up much better to stress while having a Aura conductivity that is one and a half times more than Bronzium. The problem with working it lies in the fact that is has a high melting point, making it harder and far more costlier to forge and its poor resistance to corrosion. Even moisture can corrode a Nightsilver Blade, so it needs constant maintenance and cleaning with disinfectant oils if it is to last.”
“Is that why you’ve used it as a trim in the second longblade?”
“Yes. Few are willing to buy a longblade forged entirely out of Nightsilver, both because of the towering costs and the high maintenance requirements, but by using it as a trim, the Bronzium Blade is sharper, carries Aura far more smoothly and just maintaining the edges is a far less daunting proposition. It is our number one product in terms of sales,” Garrett explained, his passion carrying through in his words and making a mundane conversation one that Lucan found fairly interesting.
“And the third?”
“The third…,” Garrett trailed off, a slight frown appearing on his visage. “It is an abandoned commission, in all honesty. Fell Iron is a metal seldom used in forging longblades these days. Its properties are similar to Bronzium, except it offers a similar durability at half the weight. The problem is that its melting point is even higher than Nightsilver’s, which caused it to warp when father was trying to trim its edges, so it required multiple attempts. The end result is functionally solid, otherwise we would not try and sell it, but as you can see it’s quite ugly.”
“It is ugly,” Lucan agreed, noting how the Nightsilver had bled into the dark gray Fell Iron unevenly at random intervals instead of coating its edges in the way it was supposed to, creating irregular wave-like patterns where the nightsilver had bled into the fell iron. “The uneven pattern also makes it harder to maintain than merely cleaning and oiling the edges. But you’re saying it’s functionally solid?”
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“My father tested it himself, sliced right through the trunk of a young tree perfectly, without leaving any scarring. Fell Iron is almost always more effort to forge than it’s worth, but the client wanted a blade as quick as the wind herself but didn’t have the budget for the more exotic ores, most of which were not capable of forging ourselves. Took my father six months to forge this one in his free time, so we couldn’t bear to see it go to waste.”
“Why hasn’t anyone bought it yet?” Lucan asked, intrigued. “For a little extra maintenance, it seems like a fine weapon, even if it won’t last forever.”
“It’s the heft,” Janis said, as he peered at the blade with an intrigued expression. “The blade’s an attempt to mimic an enchanted blade, one enchanted for lightness. Except the lightness enchantment reduces the weight a wielder feels, not the actual heft of the longblade. That’s what makes any enchanted blade worth a city’s value in gold. In this case, this Gathering Stage Longblade has sacrificed its heft for speed, which makes it a novelty at best. Being quick doesn’t mean much if it scratches a mana beast instead of bisecting through it.”
“Well assessed,” Garrett replied, not having taken the slightest offense from what his tone and expression said. “Indeed, its main purpose is far more suited to training or duels instead of actual combat, so it is unlikely we’ll find a customer for it anytime soon.”
“How much does it weigh?”
“Three kiloweights,” Garrett answered. “The Nightsilver coating is half a kiloweight, while Fell Iron, if nothing else, is light.”
“I’ll take it.”
“Pardon?”
“This fell iron blade. Sell it to me.”
“I… should not— such a crude blade is not befitting your status,” Garrett protested, clearly caught off guard by the proposal. It seemed like he was only telling him about the blade because Lucan had stated his purpose to be that of learning how Aura Knights and the weapons they wielded worked.
“I am a mage,” Lucan replied simply. “Even three kilograms is too much for me to wield around for more than a few minutes and besides, my goal is to simply study it to satisfy my own whims. Commissioning an actual blade for my purposes will keep your expertise away from a knight who needs it and the other blades are far too heavy for me to even lift, are they not? This is the ideal solution.”
“I understand but… are you sure?”
“Would the people knowing that a Velmoria visited your store and walked away with a blade for whatever reason not bolster your business? Or do you want me to look elsewhere?”
“No, of course not,” Garrett emphatically shook his head as he refuted the proposition. “Very well, I shall pack it immediately for you. The price we have set for it is twenty five imperial gold coins, discounted from the original hundred and five that it was commissioned at. We have already received a cancellation fee of fifty Imperial Gold coins.”
“I cannot accept discounts in my position,” Lucan replied. “I’ll pay the full hundred and five gold.”
“Understood,” Garrett replied, not protesting on this point because he knew why Lucan had offered. The Velmoria’s could not be seen to be showing favoritism to any storefront in the Sky Exchange, for that would be seen as a violation of the very principles that governed it. That was why Lucan always had to pay full price for everything he bought from any merchant in Lingdon, whatever the price might be.
That went better than expected, for once, Lucan thought as Garrett rushed to pack it with gusto. I bet he’s going to do a thorough job of packing it, both to keep the people guessing as to what I bought and to hide the blade itself, if he’s this embarrassed at selling it to me. I’ll never actually be able to use Aura in it’s true sense, but the Iron-Blooded Berserker’s incomplete inheritance contains the secret to using compressed mana that can mimic it’s effects to a degree— the Runes of the Runeweaver Shamans are more mysterious than anything else in my memory bank to the point where even Silvas Anderle was shocked when the Iron-Blooded Berserker, one of the war heroes of the Kingdom of Nostura, revealed that he was from the central regions, a Runeweaver Shaman that specializing in physical combat who had been banished from his lands. The very same Runeweaver Shamans that killed my oldest brother are the only option I have if I want to fight like an Aura Expert in his lifetime without crippling my Mana Core— how ironic it all is.
