Chapter 163: The Bear Goes to Make a Butchering Knife

Chapter 163:
The Bear Goes to Make a Butchering Knife

 

HAND IN HAND, the three of us arrived at Gold’s blacksmith shop.

“Pardon us,” I said, going straight inside. Nelt was usually the one tending shop, but someone else seemed to be filling in for her today—Gold himself, blunt expression and all, polishing the swords that were for sale.

“Gold?”

“Ah, if it isn’t Fina, Shuri, and the bear girl!” When he looked at the little girls, his expression softened. He practically turned into a grandpa.

“It’s unusual for you to be tending the shop.” First time I’d seen it, probably.

“I spent too much time lazing around, so Nelt gave me a good kicking. I’m stuck polishing the merchandise now, heh.”

“Where is Nelt?”

“She went out to meet a friend in the area. What’s your business here, now? Didn’t you head out to the capital?”

“We came here after meeting with Ghazal. Thank you very much for the letter of introduction.” I’d thanked Nelt when I received the letter from her, but I still hadn’t thanked Gold for writing it.

“To think you got back already too…but I suppose you do have your bear summons.” If he could come to a workable answer by himself, I wasn’t going to correct him and say it had been the bear transport gate. It looked like he knew Kumayuru and Kumakyu, even though he’d never seen them before. Made sense—word spreads in a small town, they say.

“Was Ghazal doing well?”

“He seemed fine.”

“Was he now? Haven’t seen him in a while. Maybe I’ll go sometime with Nelt to visit,” he said fondly, stroking his long beard. “Now then, were you able to get yourself a mithril knife?”

“There were some problems, but we got some mithril ore. I was thinking you could make mithril butchering knives for Fina and Shuri.”

“You didn’t have Ghazal make them for you?”

“I asked Ghazal to make me knives for fighting, but I have a lot of ore. When I thought about the maintenance these knives would need, I thought I’d ask you. You wouldn’t want to do upkeep on knives that someone else made, would you?”

“Bah, why would I care? It’s a fine thing, to study the creation of another craftsman. How can you grow your art if you don’t learn from other peoples’ strengths and polish your skills?”

Know what? That was kind of cool. That was dedication right there.

“That said, bear, do you really want me to make mithril knives for the girls? Do you know how much mithril is worth?”

“I do.”

Fina had taught me on the way here. In detail. Loudly.

“As long as you understand. I’ll be making a knife for Fina then?”

“And then one for Shuri too, please.”

“One more time: You do really know how much mithril is worth?” He looked at me with narrowed eyes.

“I do.” I knew this wouldn’t be something you thoughtlessly handed to a child. “I intend to lend Shuri’s knife to her when I think she needs it.”

“Is that so? Don’t you want a butchering knife for yourself?”

“I wouldn’t use one even if you made it.”

“So says the adventurer, eh?”

Ugh, was I just going to get this from everyone? I guess most adventurers could butcher things. Oh, well—I had my bear storage, and I had Fina to do my butchering work. I wasn’t going to give up on that.

“How much mithril ore do you have?”

“A, uh... golem’s worth?”

I pulled out the partially destroyed mithril golem from my bear storage.

“Is all of this pure mithril?”

“Ghazal said it was a knock-off.”

“A knock-off?” I explained what Ghazal had told me. Gold listened to my explanation, approached the mithril golem, and examined a piece.

“Ghazal says some interesting things. Iron with a mithril coating. This is my first time seeing a mithril golem; I’ve never heard of such a thing.” He didn’t have anything else to say about it. “This should be enough mithril. Did Ghazal take the parts that are missing?”

“Yep. Ghazal took a bit to make my knives.”

“As will I.” Gold lifted a portion of the mithril golem like it was nothing. Jeez, dwarves were absolute tanks. “When do you need them by?”

“I don’t need them particularly quickly, but we’ll need Fina’s first.”

I wasn’t really in a rush to get the black tiger butchered. I was just happy that it could be butchered.

“Okay. In that case, we’re looking at three days for Fina.”

“Gotcha. How much will that cost?” I thought the price would be different compared to the fighting knives Ghazal was making for me, but I got an answer I didn’t expect.

“No idea. I’ll leave that to Nelt.”

Ugh, this dwarf was useless. Ghazal took pride in his work too, but he had a handle on the other aspects of his business. Gold only seemed to know the forge. I guess that’s why I usually only saw Nelt at the shop.

“Uhh, so then…what should I do for payment?”

“Just ask Nelt!”

I was having second thoughts about the whole leaving-Gold-to-mind-the-shop thing.

After that, in order to make Fina and Shuri’s knives, Gold looked at their hands and discussed what material to use for the handles. I didn’t follow their conversation. Shuri seemed about as lost as I did, so we just listened, leaving Fina to decide the specifics of the knives.

While I was looking at the weapons inside the store, someone entered.

“Oh, is that you, Yuna?”

“Nelt? Thank goodness. I have something I want to ask you.”

“What is it?”

I told her about how I had obtained mithril, how I’d come to order knives for Fina and Shuri, and how the girls were discussing things in the back.

“But Gold doesn’t know how much to price them.”

“Sorry about that. If the goods are already in the shop, he can sell them. If it’s new, though, he’s clueless. Still, I can’t believe even he would accept a job without setting a price.” Nelt let out a weary sigh.

“I trust you two on these things.”

“I’m glad to hear that. In that case, I’ll give you a bit of a discount.”

“Are you sure?”

“Well, I’m glad you’re giving that man some work.”

What would an artisan be without work? Gold had said as much. “Oh, and I have a souvenir for you.”

“A souvenir?”

“I also got this when I got mithril. I was wondering if you would like it to decorate the place.” I took out an iron golem and put it in the shop where it wouldn’t get in the way.

Nelt jumped a little. She approached the iron golem cautiously to touch it.

“It won’t move, will it?”

“It won’t.”

“It’s not damaged anywhere. This is the first time I’ve seen an iron golem in such good condition. You don’t mean to say you’re simply giving this to us? Do you know how much the raw iron alone could sell for?”

“I thought you might want to have it hold a sword and shield to decorate the shop. Something like that.”

“It would certainly be a waste to melt down an iron golem in such pristine condition, but hmm. Could we bend its arm enough to hold a weapon?” Nelt lightly tapped the golem. It was still in the same pose as when I’d defeated it. “I could try to detach an arm and make the joint movable. Hm, that might work.”

She was definitely the wife of a craftsman. But then…if she could do that, I wonder if she could remodel the other golems as well. If she did, I could give them all sorts of poses.

Nelt accepted the iron golem and promised that she would decorate it with a sword and shield. Then, she let me have the mithril knife for free, just like Ghazal had. “It’s because you brought your own mithril,” she added. “Other than that, it’s only his skills you’ll need.”

Hold on, wasn’t I paying for the skills? But I wasn’t going to say no to Nelt’s unending kindness, so I accepted the offer.

As I talked to Nelt, the girls finished up.

“Thank you very much.”

“Mmhm! Thank you very much.”

Fina and Shuri bowed their heads to Gold.

“You’re done?”

“Yes. I think they will be very nice.” Fina seemed happy.

“I hope it’ll be a nice knife.”

“Me too.”

We said bye to Nelt and Gold and left the store.