Chapter 622: Forge

"It is getting quite late. Can you still make my legendary-grade katana as you promised?" Katana’s voice was still quiet, but there was a clear, stubborn focus underneath the shyness.

The request had not left her mind even after the apology.

[She’s so hung up on that...]

"Naturally!" Benjamin rolled his sleeves up with confident, deliberate motions, pushing the fabric past his elbows in two clean movements. "I’ll have it whipped up in less than 20 minutes."

And the creation began.

Benjamin opened both of his palms, holding them out in front of him with the fingers slightly spread and the wrists relaxed.

The gesture was unhurried and casual — as if he were simply offering his hands to the air itself and waiting to see what it might place there in return.

He looked less like a person about to forge a legendary weapon and more like a man warming his hands at an invisible fire.

Almost at once, the palms began to emit a warm, orange light.

The glow started soft, like the last edge of sunset bleeding across a horizon that had already begun to darken.

It was gentle, barely more than a suggestion of color against the pale skin of his palms.

But then it steadily brightened, layer by layer, deepening in tone as it spread, until it cast a gentle amber wash across the pink walls, the deep pink rug, and the scattered plushies resting on the bed.

The light did not flicker or pulse. It held steady, warm against the cooler air of the room, and small motes of dust floating near his hands caught the color and turned briefly gold before drifting on.

They looked like tiny embers suspended in the space between his fingers.

The room itself seemed to lean toward the light. The shadows in the corners drew back. The pink of the walls warmed into something closer to peach.

He and Sys got to work immediately.

[You can utilize her energy and essence lingering in this room, yes?]

{Indeed, Master. Absorbing the essence of the individual Katana has been successful.}

The confirmation came clean and without hesitation.

There was no preamble, caveat, or warning of hidden costs. Just the simple, direct answer that meant the first step was already complete.

[Now we have to fuse it with my own essence as well. But let us be careful to not accidentally create a baby with it this time.]

The memory of Titania surfaced for a moment, uninvited.

{Fret not, Master. The matter with Titania was anomalous due to the sheer amount of power that came from both Master and herself. Katana does not meet such requirements.}

[That’s a relief.]

Benjamin’s shoulders eased a fraction.

The warm light continued to pour from his palms without strain, steady and unhurried, casting his face in a soft amber glow that made his features look younger than they were.

[I get the metal part; since I can form bronze, silver, and gold, I can make it work. I can burn them inside me as well. But how do we form the handle?]

{Answer: the handle will be mostly wooden, and Master has the Nature’s Ally ability. It is not a problem. However, I will suggest we mix it with some magical properties so that the wielder would find it difficult to lose it.}

[Hm? Like a symbiotic handle? Something that can either come back to her hand when dropped, or can’t even be dropped unintentionally?]

{Affirmative. If we proceed, it will take simply a small, infinitesimal amount of power and magic from Master, but it will create a magical element that will act as if it has a mind of its own.}

[Uhm, let’s try to not go overboard on this, though. And your "infinitesimal" excuse is suspicious. Losing power feels like anemia, so I’m not a fan of it. And we shouldn’t make a sword that feels too out of place in her hands or in this world.]

{Sure.}

[Hey, sure you’re sure?!]

The skepticism in his own mental voice was clear. Sys had a habit of understating the cost until the bill arrived—and by then, it was always too late to argue.

He had learned that lesson more than once.

{Initiating the handle first. Infusing Master’s and Katana’s essence for the core.}

[Since when did a sword have a core?!]

{Normal swords don’t. And that factor makes it difficult for their true potential to surface. Though this can change over time as the wielder pours magic and soul energy into the weapon, but even that is rare. Most weapons remain ordinary for their entire existence.}

[Fine. But seriously, let’s not do anything too flashy. I don’t want her swinging around something that looks like it belongs in a fantasy story book more than in her hand.]

In the next moment, before Katana’s curious eyes, debris and shards began to fly out of Benjamin’s opened palms.

Dark fragments the color of old iron. Thin silver slivers that caught the orange light and flashed. Pieces the warm brown of seasoned wood.

They spun outward in a slow, controlled spiral; nearly as if they were emerging from nowhere and everywhere at once, as if his hands had been holding them all along and had only now decided to let them go.

They began to swirl and merge in the air directly above his hands, pulling together with quiet, deliberate purpose.

The fragments orbited each other in slow, tightening circles, drawing closer with each rotation.

The sound they made was soft — like dry leaves brushing against one another in a gentle wind. A whisper of a sound. A rustle. But nothing that would go beyond the walls of the room.

The handle took shape gradually.

It looked both smooth and possessed of friction at certain angles, as if the surface itself was shifting under invisible pressure and never fully settling into one single texture.

Two halves of the same element were being fitted together by an unseen force, the seam between them disappearing as if the material had always been whole.