Chapter 623: Golden or Not?

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.

Unusual silk, fine and faintly luminous, wrapped around the forming grip in precise diamond shapes arranged downward along its length.

The silk seemed to sink into the wood-and-metal surface rather than simply rest on top of it, becoming part of the structure itself, threads disappearing into the grain.

The shape was elegant, but understated. It did not scream for attention or announce its own importance.

But it suddenly paused.

As if time itself had stopped working in that small space above Benjamin’s palms. The swirling fragments hung motionless in the air.

The orange light continued to glow from his skin, but the construction froze mid-motion, every shard and thread locked in place.

"Hm?" The unexpected stillness made Katana glance at Benjamin.

She found his blue eyes dead and distant, focused on something far beyond the walls of her room.

The warm light from his hands still painted the lower half of his face in soft amber, but his expression had gone empty of the usual presence.

His breathing remained even, and his posture did not change. Only the eyes had left.

It startled her for a second.

Then she understood immediately that he was not there with her. Not spiritually.

His body remained seated on the edge of her bed, palms open and glowing, but the person inside had stepped somewhere else — somewhere she could not follow.

"Goodness... I hope she is not causing trouble with some god over a mere sword."

Katana watched the frozen handle and the vacant look in his eyes.

The idea that he might be negotiating in the heavens over the exact details of her weapon made her lips press together.

She shifted on the mattress, pulling her legs up beneath her, settling into a more comfortable position for what might be a long wait.

A small, reluctant part of her was already adjusting her expectations upward.

"Oh dear, now I’m forced to have my expectations doubled."

The words came out as barely a murmur. She hugged the cat closer and kept her eyes on the glowing, motionless fragments.

Inside the distant space where Benjamin and Sys continued their work, the argument had not ended.

[I say gold!]

{I refuse.}

[What right do you have to refuse, you cocky system?! I use gold all the time and it cuts wonderfully.]

The protest flared hot and immediate inside Benjamin’s mind.

{Even if Master used a piece of fabric, it would cut sharply as well. I do not recommend harboring the assumption that Master is a normal individual.}

[H-How rude! I’m normal...! Just a little bit weird.]

{Allow me to explain: Gold is not an element that works well as a striking weapon. Gold is far too soft on its own. Though, it is a splendid conduit, even for magic as well. Master is a magic monster: so Master + gold = absolute severance. Using it as a blade for Katana’s weapon will mean transmitting a massive amount of magic to support the aspects that inevitably fails as a true weapon. It is meaningless and a waste of resources. Reconsider.}

The explanation was clinical, thorough, and completely without mercy.

[Ehhh? But gold is so... golden...]

Sys did not dignify the comment with a response.

Benjamin’s core ability to create gold and silver is based on [Concept Assimilation].

Luckily, Sys can very quickly analyze and replicate what happens in Concept Assimilation, which allows Benjamin to be able to create other elements like iron and copper using the same logic.

That part had always felt like cheating, or borrowing someone else’s homework and changing a few answers—which is one reason Benjamin doesn’t consider himself truly powerful.

Gold and silver are not something mortals can create under ordinary circumstances.

They are elements of cosmic violence. A star exploding in the deep dark. Two gods fighting without a care for the worlds caught between them. An absurd amount of energy applied to a single precise position in reality.

These can all allow gold and its cousins to form. The universe made gold the way it made everything rare and beautiful — through catastrophe, through forces too large for any ordinary mind to hold.

But there IS a primordial god who can easily form these things. In the same way Titania can easily form nature with her authority.

That god is the source of Benjamin’s ability to easily procure the elements he possesses.

[So we are going with steel?]

The question came out flat and resigned.

{Affirmative. But I would suggest applying some gold in the core so that it can quickly absorb and you utilize magic.}

[Oh...? Are you trying to be nice to me after I nagged about using gold?]

{Answer: Let us focus on the matter at hand.}

Once again, before Katana’s eyes, objects began to pour out of Benjamin’s palms and fall back in, moving in a fluid, continuous dance of elements.

Dark metal shards the color of old iron once again, rough-edged and angular, each one tumbling end over end in the air above his open hands.

Thin threads of pure gold that caught the orange light and flashed, spinning out like molten wire before curling back into the growing mass.

And finer particles of something that glittered like powdered starlight — tiny motes that seemed to have no color at all and every color at once, shifting as the angle of the light changed.

They spun and merged above his open hands.

The orange glow from his skin brightened for a long moment, then settled into a steadier, deeper burn.

A faint scent of heated metal and clean, living wood rose, lingered, and then faded into the background — the kind of smell that made you think of old workshops and careful hands.

"...Beautiful..." was the word that came out of Katana’s mouth before she realized she had spoken it.