Chapter 89: Forge Once Again 2

Elaria added:

"And like last time..."

Adam finished:

"I keep my mana compressed throughout the entire session."

"Yes."

"I’m starting to learn the rule."

"Good."

They left the office and went down to the workshops.

The further down they went, the hotter it became.

The steady sound of hammers echoed through the walls.

When Elaria opened the large door to the forge, Adam was immediately greeted by familiar surroundings.

The hearths.

The anvils.

The tools.

The various tempering vats.

Elaria gave him an apron and gloves.

Adam put them on.

Then he checked his mana compression one last time.

Stable.

Elaria placed several pieces of metal on a table.

A hammer.

A small blade.

A simple sword.

A spearhead.

And several unfinished samples.

"Until now, you’ve mostly learned to work with metal without any complex objectives."

Adam nodded.

"Heating. Shaping. Maintaining the correct temperature. Understanding the overall structure."

"Exactly."

Elaria picked up the finished hammer.

"Today, you need to begin to understand that an object isn’t forged the same way simply because it uses the same metal."

Adam examined the different pieces.

"Because their stresses are different."

A slight smile appeared on Elaria’s face.

"Exactly."

She picked up a metal bar.

"Imagine three pieces made from similar steel."

She pointed to the hammer.

"This one has to withstand repeated impacts."

Then the blade.

"This one has to maintain its edge." "

Then another, thinner piece.

"And this one must be able to flex without breaking."

Adam understood immediately.

"Same base material. Different final properties."

"Yes."

She placed the three objects down.

"So blacksmithing isn’t just about choosing a good metal."

She pointed to the bar.

"You also have to decide what you want that metal to become."

Adam nodded slowly.

Elaria started with the objects that would have to withstand impacts.

"Let’s take a hammer."

She placed one on the table.

"If its head is too soft, it will deform after repeated blows."

Adam nodded.

"But if it’s too hard..."

"It can become brittle."

"Exactly."

Elaria lightly tapped the head of the hammer with another tool.

"For this kind of object, you generally want good impact resistance and sufficient hardness on the striking surfaces."

She then picked up a blade.

"A blade has another problem."

Adam looked at its edge.

"It needs to be hard to hold its edge."

"Yes."

Then she very slightly bent a thinner training blade.

"But a completely hard blade becomes much more likely to break under a significant impact."

Adam understood.

"So you have to balance the properties."

Elaria nodded.

"This is where blacksmithing really starts to get complicated."

She placed the blade in front of him.

"For a sword, for example, you might want an edge hard enough to cut and hold its shape..."

She indicated the middle section.

"While still having a softer core, capable of absorbing some of the stress without breaking immediately."

Adam studied the weapon closely.

"So the same sword can behave in several different ways depending on the area."

"Yes."

He smiled slightly.

"It’s looking more and more like engineering."

"Because it is a form of it."

Elaria then took several samples.

She explained the difference between a piece designed primarily for flexibility, one focused on impact resistance, one where hardness was the priority, and another that had to withstand numerous repeated stresses.

Each choice changed the process.

The heating time.

The hammering method.

The cooling rate.

The part of the object that needed more treatment.

And above all...

The tempering.

Elaria indicated two vats.

"Water."

Then another.

"Oil."

Adam already remembered that they didn’t behave exactly the same way.

Elaria took a heated piece.

"Rapid cooling drastically alters the metal’s structure. But the more abrupt the change, the more you increase certain internal stresses."

She placed the piece over the water bath without soaking it.

"Water removes heat very quickly."

Then she moved on to the oil bath.

"Oil is generally less harsh."

Adam looked at both.

"So water isn’t simply better because it cools faster."

"No."

Elaria set the piece down.

"In blacksmithing, ’more’ is almost never automatically ’better.’"

Adam smiled.

"That sentence should be written somewhere in the workshop."

"It probably already is in a manual."

The practical session truly began.

Adam picked up his first piece.

He heated it.

Dark red.

Cherry red.

Orange.

The color already seemed much easier to recognize than during his first session.

Elaria watched.

"Just a little more."

Adam waited.

Then removed the metal.

"Now."

He placed the piece on the anvil.

Clang.

Clang.

Clang.

His first blows were too forceful.

Elaria intervened immediately.

"You’re not fighting the metal."

Adam slowed down.

"A recent habit."

"Selene?"

"Selene."

Elaria took his wrist.

She slightly adjusted the angle.

"Let the hammer do more of the work."

She demonstrated the movement.

Clang.

The blow seemed almost lighter than Adam’s.

But the deformation was more even.

"The goal isn’t to hammer the material haphazardly." "You guide it."

Adam continued.

Clang.

Clang.

This time, he made better use of the rebound.

"Better."

He continued.

But after several strikes, Elaria stopped him.

"Put it back in the fire."

Adam examined the metal.

"It’s still red-hot."

"And already too cold for the deformation you’re trying to achieve."

He placed the piece back in the forge.

"I understand why a good blacksmith spends so much time simply looking at the color."

"With experience, you’ll look less consciously."

Adam smiled slightly.

"Another thing that needs to become automatic."

"Exactly."

During the first part of the session, Elaria had him work with several simple shapes.

A point.

A small hammer head.

A flat piece.

Then a very basic blade.

Each time, she slightly changed the objectives.

"This one needs to remain more flexible."

Adam adjusted his hammering technique.

"This one needs to withstand impacts."

New objective.

"This one needs to maintain a hard surface."

New method.

Several times, Adam chose the wrong temperature.

Once too low.

Another time slightly too high.

A third time, he worked for too long without putting the piece back in the fire.

Elaria corrected him systematically.

Never just with a sentence.

When Adam didn’t understand immediately, she picked up her hammer.

"Look."

She struck several times.

Clang.

Clang.

Clang.

Then she stopped.

"Now, compare."

Adam looked at his own sample.

Then at Elaria’s.

The differences became obvious.

Distribution.

Thickness.

Regularity.

The edges.

The overall direction of the deformations.

"You strike less hard than I do."

"Often."

"But you get better results."

"Because I strike in the right place."

Adam sighed.

"Selene says exactly the same thing."

Elaria smiled slightly.

"Then listen to us."

They then moved on to the quenching process.

Elaria laid out several small, identical samples.

"Same steel."

She heated the first one.

Then quenched it in water.

A harsh hiss filled the forge.

A large amount of steam rose.

The second went into oil.

The cooling was different.

Less abrupt.

The third was left to cool using a different method.

Once the pieces were sufficiently cool, Elaria placed them side by side.

"Visually, they look alike."

Adam focused his attention intently.

"But their properties have changed."

"Yes."

She then had him test some of the differences in a simple way.

Resistance to deformation.

Behavior under light impact.

Flexibility.

Adam quickly grasped the principle.

"So, a bad temper can ruin all the work done beforehand."

"Very easily."

"Nice."

Elaria ignored his comment.

"And the liquid’s temperature matters too."

Adam looked at the tank.

"Hot water and cold water don’t give exactly the same result."

"Yes."

She continued:

"The temperature of the piece before quenching matters. The temperature of the bath matters. The liquid matters. Movement during quenching can matter. The geometry of the piece matters."

Adam raised a hand.

"I’m starting to understand. Everything matters."

"That’s a good way to sum it up."

Adam looked at the row of tubs.

"And the special solutions?"

Elaria pointed to the cloudy liquid he had already noticed during their last session.

"Later."

"Why?"

"Some solutions use alchemical components or mana to further alter the process."

She closed the lid.

"To use them correctly, you first need to understand what a normal quench does to the metal."

Adam nodded.

"Otherwise, I’d just be able to follow a recipe without understanding why it works."

"Exactly."

She also pointed to the enchanted furnaces.

"Same goes for advanced methods using mana."

Adam looked at the runes.

"Not today."

"Not today."

"Nor tomorrow?"

Elaria thought for a second.

"Probably not."

Adam sighed.

"At least you’re honest."