"By the way, what are you planning to do with the cores of those high-rank Monsters you've been collecting?"
Aura asked as she kept watch around us.
"I'm going to use them to make a new type of Golem. We need insurance for when those two go to the Royal Capital, right?"
The two of them tilted their heads since they didn't know how Golems were made, but they seemed to figure there was no point dwelling on it, because they didn't ask anything further about the process.
There are generally two methods for creating Golems.
The first is to make the core using stones imbued with Magic Power — magic cores, Magic Stones, gems, and the like.
The second is to make the core out of metal.
Each method has its pros and cons. The first method makes it difficult to carve magic circles onto small cores, and if you fail there's almost no chance to redo it, plus repairs are difficult — but Golems made this way have high versatility and consume relatively little Magic Power, so they tend to be used for a wide variety of purposes.
The second method allows you to freely shape and size the metal, making it easy to carve magic circles. It's also simple to redo if you fail and repairs are easy, but such Golems can only carry out simple commands and consume large amounts of Magic Power, so most are used for simple tasks, or have many commands carved into their magic circles to make them specialized types.
The difference in Magic Power consumption between the two hasn't been fully explained yet, but the leading theory is that it comes down to the distinction between natural and artificial materials.
When making the core, two things you mustn't forget are specifying the body's material and registering the master.
The material is most commonly inscribed as earth or stone, and if you have room to spare you can increase the number of components. If you don't inscribe this, you won't be able to form the body when summoning the Golem, rendering it useless.
Master registration is a measure to prevent anyone other than the creator from using it, though for mass-produced Golems it's sometimes left uncarved.
"Orcs incoming!"
What emerged from the bend just ahead were High Orcs, and there were six of them, so I charged in alone and dispatched them in an instant.
"Whoa... that was fast!"
Jeanne and Aura stared with stunned faces at the High Orcs that crumbled to the ground in the blink of an eye... Come to think of it, this might have been the first time they'd seen me fight seriously...
Mulling that over, I stored the High Orc corpses in my bag and pressed onward.
We encountered Monsters several more times after that, but they were all Orcs and Kobolds — no sign of the ones we were looking for.
Jeanne and Aura had been startled at first, but they seemed to be gradually getting used to it, so I pushed deeper while having them train on High Orcs I'd weakened several times along the way.
We broke through floors 39 and 40, which was fine, but since no Monsters above B-rank were showing up, I was considering pulling back for the time being when I found a place shaped like a dome.
"Finally, there you are... one, two, three... three B-rank equivalents in total... There are over a dozen more reactions, so Jeanne and Aura, focus on protecting yourselves by coordinating with Shiromaru and the others!"
Without waiting for Jeanne and the others to reply, I dashed out into the open area.
What emerged upon sensing my presence was a massive scorpion, nearly three meters in length.
The scorpion had large pincers and a sharp poison stinger, plus sickle-like claws at the tips of its legs, and its body's surface looked like stone. There were three of them, each raising their pincers to threaten me.
As a warm-up, I launched an Air Bullet at the scorpion directly in front of me, but it only left a scratch on the surface — it didn't seem to take much damage.
I selected an Adamantine sword as my weapon, then brought it down with full force against the scorpion that was closing in on me with swift movements.
The scorpion crossed both pincers to guard its body, but with a loud crack, both pincers snapped clean off.
The scorpion spewed green ichor even as it raised its tail to thrust its poison stinger at me.
Getting hit by that would definitely be bad, so I leaped far backward to dodge, but the remaining two scorpions came charging toward my landing spot.
"Stone Wall!"
I summoned a wall of earth magic to block the scorpions' path.
The scorpion closer to the wall crashed into it and appeared to take damage, but the other scorpion had enough distance that it leaped over the wall and lunged straight at me.
"Hah!"
With a shout, I swung my sword at the scorpion trying to crush me.
To my surprise, the strike landed with a sickening thud, splitting the scorpion's abdomen vertically and sending down a rain of green fluid.
"Their abdomens are soft compared to their backs, huh..."
Muttering that, I brought my sword crashing down on the head of the scorpion that was still trying to attack even after being split open.
I successfully crushed its head with a wet crunch, but the scorpion was still moving. Thinking it would die eventually, I kept my distance and looked at the other two — the one whose pincers I'd broken was trying to flee, while the other was maneuvering to get behind me.
So first, I decided to trap the scorpion trying to escape inside a box made with earth magic and reinforce the surroundings, then deal with the remaining one first.
The scorpion that had been trying to flank me locked eyes with me, gave up on circling behind, and charged straight at me instead.
This one was different from the other two — rather than snapping with its pincers, it relied on swinging its tail to attack.
It was probably the strongest of the three, but after each tail strike it left an opening, so I attacked during one of those windows and cut its tail off with surprising ease.
I pressed the attack on the scorpion as it writhed in pain, systematically crushing its pincers, legs, and head in order, and managed to defeat it without any trouble.
By that point, the first one I'd crushed had also stopped breathing, leaving only the single scorpion still trapped in the box.
When I approached the box, I could hear something banging against it from inside — it was probably trying to smash its way out with its tail.
It looked like it would break free eventually, but I figured it wouldn't matter since I'd be killing it shortly, so I opened a hole in the top of the box and fired a Blizzard spell inside.
I kept the Blizzard going for roughly five minutes, and by the end, the scorpion was completely frozen solid.
I used Appraisal on the scorpion, and it came back as an Earth Scorpion, B-rank — exactly the rank of monster I was after.
I tossed it into my bag along with the other scorpions and headed back to Jeanne and Aura, only to find the two of them standing there with stunned expressions on their faces.
It didn't seem like any monsters had come after Jeanne's group, but there were still over a dozen monster reactions in the surrounding area.
I had no idea what those monsters would do, but for now, I decided to press onward.
Taking a fresh look at the space, I saw that it was dome-shaped, roughly two hundred meters across, with a ceiling that had to be about twenty meters high.
Solomon was in high spirits, darting freely about the open space — a rare luxury for a dungeon — having a bit too much fun exploring.
After that, I advanced cautiously, but none of the detected monsters launched an attack, and we passed through without incident.
"For now, let's take a break, find a nearby warp zone, and head back to the surface."
As usual, I set up a rest area, pulled out a bed and a table set, and asked Aura to prepare some tea.
While waiting for the tea, I tried to think up a recipe for a certain food, but...
"No good... no matter how I think about it, I just can't figure out the ingredients for ramen noodles or curry roux..."
To be precise, it was the combination of the kansui added to the noodles and the spices for the curry.
I had made udon noodles before in my previous life, but for ramen, it was always easier to just buy them than make them, so I'd never actually made them from scratch. I only knew the rough method and the ingredients.
Curry was even more of a problem. After all, in my previous life, curry powder, curry roux, and even retort curry were all readily available from top-quality brands, so I only knew a handful of the spices actually used as ingredients.
"But I don't want to give up! If I go to the Royal Capital, maybe I'll find some clues..."
Since the Royal Capital was said to be the central city of this country, I figured there might be something similar—or even the real thing—so I decided to give up on reproducing it with Seigen... Besides, I didn't have that kind of time anyway.
Just as I reached that conclusion, Aura began setting out the tea, so I decided to put out the leftover snacks too and turn it into an impromptu tea party... The policy being not to worry about the weird location...
"Tenma, what were you thinking about just now?"
Jeanne, who seemed a bit more at ease but was still awkward, asked me that, so I decided to ask Jeanne and Aura if they knew of any dishes similar to ramen and curry.
"I don't know of any such dishes... Aura?"
"I've never heard of anything called kansui, but... a dish that uses many different spices, like... curry? I think I heard about something like that long ago. Among them, there might be something similar to what Master Tenma has in mind."
She told me this with a somewhat uncertain air.
For now, even just knowing that there were dishes using spices was helpful information.
As for the noodles, it was the same—apparently the only thing she could think of was pasta noodles.
It would be a long road, but I made up my mind that someday I'd make it happen.
After that, I headed outside through a nearby warp zone, then flew back to the secret base and set to work on crafting a golem.
First up was dissecting the Earth Scorpion. I wasn't sure which parts could be used for what, but the carapace of this scorpion looked like it had high durability, so it would be best to peel it off and store it.
The venom might come in handy for something, so if I collected as much of it in bottles as possible, it would probably be useful eventually.
As for the meat, I initially thought about trying to eat it, but even after dissecting it, I couldn't tell if it was edible, so this time I disposed of it by incineration.
The magic core of this scorpion was roughly five centimeters in size, and one of them was unfortunately cracked.
But the color of this magic core had a luster reminiscent of black pearls—it could easily have been mistaken for a gemstone.
This time, I intend to take a hybrid approach, combining the best aspects of the two previous methods for crafting the new Golem.
That means combining a Magic Core with metal, and then engraving magic circles onto both components.
For the design, I planned it as a necklace. I bought the chain and fittings at a specialty shop, where I also looked at other necklaces for reference.
For this Golem creation, I planned to engrave the image of a soul onto the Magic Core and the image of a body onto the metal, with a mechanism on part of each magic circle to link the two together.
On the Magic Core, I finely engraved the linking mechanism and Magic Power circuits into the magic circle, allowing it to absorb ambient Magic Power to some extent.
For the metal, I used Mithril, engraving the magic circle while it was still hot. This was a race against time. I worked with fire magic to keep the temperature from dropping too quickly, but I failed several times.
Each time I failed, I re-melted it with added silver to try again. Because of this, although I originally intended to make two, I only had time to complete one.
Incidentally, for the metal's magic circle, I used earth, stone, and iron for the body material, shaping it like a scorpion just like the Earth Scorpion. This was because I thought this form might be compatible with the Magic Core, and also because in actual combat, the scorpion proved excellent in both offense and defense, possessing considerable speed, which inspired me.
Today, in about five hours, I completed the magic circles for two Magic Cores and one decorative base piece. The remaining adjustments and a test run were scheduled for tomorrow.
When I returned to my room, I found Amy, Ii-chan, and Shii-chan waiting outside, so I told them about my future plans.
"Huh? Sensei, you're leaving here?!"
She was surprised, but...
"I'm not planning to vacate this place completely. I'm going to the Royal Capital, but I intend to return here... And that's what I wanted to discuss. I'd like to prepay to keep this room reserved for about six months."
I still wanted to challenge the dungeon, so securing this room was a must.
"I'll go ask Mom!"
With that, Amy ran off toward home.
Ii-chan and Shii-chan stayed behind here, nuzzling up to Shiromaru and Solomon.
After a little while, Amy returned, bringing her mother, Karina with her.
"You'd like to prepay for six months?" Karina asked.
So I explained that I still wanted to challenge Seigen's dungeon and needed to secure the room, and also that Jeanne has relatives in the Royal Capital but doesn't get along with them, so I wanted to have this place as an evacuation point just in case.
"I understand the situation, but paying for six months upfront comes to 42,000 G…"
"Will this do?"
With that, I took the money out of my Magic Bag and handed it over.
"…Come to think of it, you really are quite the adventurer, aren't you, Tenma? My apologies."
Karina brought out the contract she had brought from the house, verified the money she received, filled in various details, and handed it to me.
I gave the contract a quick once-over, signed it, and returned it to Karina.
"Very well, I've confirmed it. I'll hold the room for six months starting from when your current contract expires. Just let me know when you come back."
With that, Karina bowed and headed back inside. Amy, while stroking Shiromaru,
"…It's going to feel kind of lonely, isn't it…"
she said, but I promised her that I would absolutely come back.
"Oh, right… Amy, while we're gone, could you air out the room every few days? This is an official request. Payment will go on your tab."
When I said that, Amy,
"Yes! Got it, sir!"
raised her hand in acknowledgment.
Just before heading into the room,
"Ah! I forgot to buy groceries for tonight's dinner!"
Aura shouted. There should have still been ingredients in the Magic Bag, but according to Aura,
"Today is the big sale day at the usual shop!"
she said, clearly fretting about the time, so there might still be something worth picking up, and the whole group headed out to shop.
That shop was a branch of the Jey Trading Company, one where I had shopped before, and inside it was overflowing with people — or rather, housewives.
"Well then, I'm heading out!"
Since I still couldn't bring myself to go inside, I decided to wait outside while keeping Shiromaru company, when—
"Oh my? Isn't that you over there, Tenma?"
A voice I'd heard before called out my name, so I turned around.
"Jeyman?"
Standing there was the slave merchant I'd helped once before, when he was being attacked by bandits.
"I knew it! I thought that was a familiar-looking wolf!"
He laughed as he said that, and since I was curious about why he was here, I asked.
"This shop is actually a branch run by my brother's chain. Oh, here he comes now. Let me introduce you—my younger brother, Jake."
Jeyman introduced a man who bore a certain resemblance to him. The man called Jake looked at me, seemed to notice something, exchanged a few quick words with Jeyman, then came over to introduce himself.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Jake, Jeyman's younger brother. I've heard rumors about you, Tenma. I hope you'll continue to favor us with your patronage."
Just as the introduction was wrapping up, Jeyman asked Jake about those rumors, and after hearing about Solomon and the Marquis Samons business, Jake's eyes went wide.
When Jeyman was about to say something to me about that—
"Hey, not to interrupt, but are you all just gonna ignore me?"
A man who had been standing behind Jake joined the conversation.
"Ah, sorry about that, sir. Tenma, this is Ganz, the blacksmith. He's said to be the finest blacksmith in the whole city, you know."
Now that he was pointed out, I could see that the man introduced to me was short in stature but powerfully built with bulging muscles, and he wore a thick, scruffy beard on his face—a member of what was commonly known as the dwarf race.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Tenma."
"Oh, I've heard all about you! I'm Ganz—pleasure to meet ya!"
He thrust out his hand, so I shook it. The blacksmith then spotted the gauntlet fitted on my arm,
"Hey, did you make this?"
He suddenly dropped his voice and asked, so I said yes, and then—
"Are you making a mockery of armor?! You went and made something this shoddy, and all that precious Mithril is crying!"
He started bellowing at the top of his lungs. His voice was so loud that even the customers inside the shop came outside to see what was happening, but since the center of the commotion was an adventurer and a dwarf, they figured it was just another usual scene and headed back in.
"I-Is it really that bad...?"
Feeling thoroughly intimidated, I asked, and—
"First, the balance is off. Second, the sizing is wrong. Third, there are problems with the joints. And fourth, the surface finishing is sloppy."
He rattled off a list of flaws at first glance. I said that aside from everything else, the size was at least correct, to which he—
"It's because you're too skilled for your own good. Weaklings like those wouldn't have given you much trouble. Combined with Mithril's high durability, you ended up compromising without even realizing it against nothing but fodder opponents."
"Oh... is that so..."
"Come to my workshop tomorrow! I'll fix it all in one day!"
With an overwhelming force that left no room for argument, he pressed a map with his workshop's location into my hand, and the master craftsman left.
"Well, getting yelled at was rough, but you're lucky, Tenma. Master Ganz only takes on people he likes... It's rare for him to say that much to someone he's just met for the first time."
That's what Jake said, but I wasn't sure if I should believe him.
As if reading my thoughts—
"You can trust that master. After all, he's the kind of stubborn old-timer who'll even make enemies of nobles if he doesn't like them."
Though, apparently, he has even more allies than enemies.
If even Jayman's brother says that much, it might be worth paying him a visit.
After that, we made small talk for a while, and when the two of them said they wanted to see Solomon, I called for him. He climbed out of the bag warily and moved onto Shiromaru's back.
Both of them were awestruck by the dragon—the first they'd ever seen—but they looked disappointed when Solomon refused to let them touch him.
"Lord Tenma, the shopping is finished."
Just as Aura and Jeanne returned from finishing their shopping, I greeted Jayman and the others and decided to leave.
On the way back, I decided to change tomorrow's plans and visit the dwarven workshop, so I told them this and thought perhaps they could help advise on equipment for the two of them, so I decided to have them accompany us.
Incidentally, the things we bought were placed in the Magic Bag entrusted to Aura, so there was no mention of carrying luggage or anything like that.
The next day, I decided to visit Master Gantz's workshop early in the morning.
The location was in the central part of the East District, about an hour's walk from our place, with no carriages or other means of transportation.
As we approached the East District, even though it was morning, we could hear quite noisy sounds.
It seemed there were many blacksmith workshops along the road we were taking, with the sounds of metal being struck and the heat from furnaces overflowing from all around.
About twenty minutes after entering the East District, the master's workshop came into view, but—
"...Is this really the place?"
"It seems like it..."
"The map does show it here..."
We wanted to scratch our heads because it was just an ordinary house. We had imagined a more sturdily built workshop with the sound of metal being struck echoing from inside, so we wondered if the map was wrong.
Just to be sure, I surveyed the interior with my detection skill and found the reactions of Master Gantz from yesterday and several others, so I boldly opened the door, and—
"What are you doing! The furnace temperature is dropping!"
"Your iron-striking rhythm isn't consistent!"
"You idiot! Why are you losing focus in the final stage! Are you planning to ruin everything?!"
""Sorry, Master!""
From outside, unbelievably loud shouts were echoing.
"Oh, if it isn't Tenma! Hurry up and get your armor out!"
The master who noticed me waved me over while wiping away his sweat.
"The more I look at it, the rougher the craftsmanship! You'll never become a first-class smith at that rate!"
"No, I'm an adventurer, and I made this during a break between quests..."
When I said that, the master stopped in his tracks.
"What?! You're an amateur?! No wonder it's so shoddy!"
He made a surprised face, then burst into loud laughter.
It seemed this master had mistaken me for someone aspiring to become a smith. When I asked why, he explained: the metal equipment I was wearing had clumsy craftsmanship, so he figured I'd made it myself. On top of that, I had the skill to work mithril, so he assumed a relative or close acquaintance of mine must be a smith who'd taught me. He concluded that an adventurer who knew how to work mithril and could make their own equipment was roughly at the level of an apprentice smith.
"Hey, you lot! Come here for a second!"
The master called over three dwarves who appeared to be his apprentices and showed them my equipment.
"Any of you know how to make something like this?!"
He asked his apprentices, but they all shook their heads in unison.
"An amateur — and not just any amateur, a child with no connection to smithing — knows how, and yet what have you lot been learning?!"
He shouted at them. The apprentices flinched at his intensity and shrank back, but—
"Oh well. I'm in a good mood today, so I'll make a special exception and show you the forging method!"
With that, he led the apprentices and started walking toward the back of the workshop, but then—
"What are you doing? Aren't you two coming as well?"
He called out to us too, and we headed further into the back.
"...Well, let's just follow him for now..."
Jeanne and Aura both nodded at my words and followed behind me deeper into the workshop.
The back room was lined with tools that looked even more well-worn than those in the previous room, and they all seemed larger than ordinary ones.
"Alright, then let's get started! Hey, you said your name was Tenma, right? First, I'll need to measure your arm."
With that, the master began touching my arm, carefully examining its size and shape.
"There's quite a bit of reworking to do, but well, the overall form is there, so it should be finished in about three to four hours."
Saying that, he started heating up the gauntlets after removing the lining and taking them apart.
Once the gauntlets were heated until they glowed red-hot, he plunged them into molten silver that had been melted to a liquid state, then began hammering to re-forge them.
The master's technique was impressive, as expected—heating, then hammering, and once it cooled, heating again and dipping it back into the silver before hammering once more. He repeated this cycle for about an hour and a half.
"Now for the opposite gauntlet!"
Without taking a single break, he dove straight into the next one.
He followed the same process as before and finished it in about an hour.
"Now all that's left is to polish the surface and assemble them, and we're done!"
As he said that, he polished the surface, knocking off soot as he went.
"Oh, if you've got anything else you've made, go ahead and line it up on that table over there!"
At his words, I placed the Kogarumaru I had forged, along with the gauntlets for Jeanne and Aura, onto the table.
Glancing at those items, the master called out to his apprentices.
"Hey, you guys! Try polishing the surface on these at least!"
He handed the mithril gauntlets to his apprentices and walked over to the table.
"Oh now, this is an unusual-looking sword… the craftsmanship is passable, I suppose…"
He drew the Kogarumaru from its sheath and inspected the finished product.
Watching him like this, I realized I had been tensing up without even noticing.
"Well, compared to the gauntlets, this is on the better side… but your hammering technique is sloppy!"
and was scolded.
As the smith said this, he began heating Kogarumaru and hammering it.
"The shape's unusual, but the basics of a sword should be the same!"
He reforged it without distorting its form.
"See? All done."
This was also completed in under an hour.
As I polished Kogarumaru and honed the blade, the color of the sword body seemed somehow deeper than before. When I asked the smith about it,
"That sword's material is a metal dragons possess, right? Metals of that type, when forged thoroughly, seem to condense in color, becoming deeper!"
He laughed heartily. Then, holding the demon iron gauntlets,
"Are these yours, miss? I'll reforge these too, but today's no good for that. Come back tomorrow!"
He said this and handed them over, so I put them in my bag and went to pay, but,
"I did this on my own initiative—I can't take any money!"
he protested. However, I couldn't accept that, and we ended up in a tug-of-war.
In the end, since he wouldn't yield on not needing money, I forcibly paid with three kilograms of Mithril and ten kilograms of silver.
He said three kilograms of Mithril was too much, but I told him it was for the lesson and for Jeanne's gauntlets, so he reluctantly accepted... though his expression showed a faint, pleased smile. Perhaps as a blacksmith, being able to freely work with Mithril made him happy.
After thanking the smith, who was now staring at the Mithril and muttering about what to make, I left the workshop.
Incidentally, Jeanne and Aura, probably finding the inside of the workshop too hot, had mostly retreated to the guest room, occasionally coming in only to bring drinks.