The Prisoner of Arabella

by Matthew Kent

  “Shit,” I said as I took the blade hissing and sputtering from the oil.

  The steel had charred black as midnight. I finished the blade quickly, since the stats wouldn’t show until the blade was complete. I wrapped the ash handle in the displacer beast hide and bound it in knotted unicorn hair. Then I examined the weapon I had crafted with trepidation.

  You have created a Star Steel Wakizashi. Quality: BB. +10 Strength. +10 Agility. +30 Luck.

  +10 Holy Damage Damage, Scalable

  Protection from Undead: 15 foot radius

  Chance undead will be resurrected to living

  You receive a patent for Star Steel Wakazashi.

  You gain 4000 XP.

  Please name your weapon.

  Yes/No

  “What just happened?” I breathed out, looking around. “That last spell. Who cast it?”

  “I did,” came Anna’s voice.

  I looked at her.

  “This may be what we need to defeat the lich king,” I said, thrusting the finished black weapon at her hilt first so she could see what her magic had wrought. “If it works on the players, we might be able to free them.”

  I sat thinking as Anna handed the weapon over to Jamie, his eyes growing round as he examined the weapon.

  Reaching out, I took it back when he was finished along with the other blade and accepted and named them. The katana I named Peace, and the wakizashi was called Tranquility.

  System Message: Know that Peace and Tranquility have entered the realm of Arabella.

  “Shiiiit,” I heard someone say, stretching the word to multiple syllables.

  Glancing up, I saw Broderick standing close. “Did you just create two legendary weapons?”

  I nodded.

  “Yeah, two more,” I said. I turned to Anna, quirking my eyebrow. “Anna, it’s good to see you. Sorry I didn’t greet you when you got here.” I waved at the sword. “But I was a little distracted. Like I said, though, you may have helped us figure out a way to win the war.”

  Chapter 6

  The rest of the ride was uneventful. I was chased by wolves at one point but I was able to drive them off by shooting magic missiles at them. The way point lead me through areas I had not previously traveled through hills and lowlands, I had never ridden a horse in real life but the riding skill book I had used made it easy on me, it looked like I might even get out of this ride without walking around like an old man after breaking my butt on the saddle.

  I came out of the hills and checked my map, the waypoint led up a rise to what appeared to be ruins at the crest of the hill. As I drew nearer I saw that it was a tumbled down keep. The original structure was based around a forty foot square tower but from here age and distance obscured the type of stone that had been used. I dismounted about forty feet a way and walked up to the gate. It was the only part of the keep that I could tell had been repaired.

  “Hello the keep” I called.

  From Lorcan: I’m at the gate.

  From Jamie: We see you. Come on ahead.

  I walked into the keep after the gate was opened for me. I was greeted by a dwarf with long dark hair in braids, black plate mail and a huge hammer across his back. “Its good to finally meet you Lorcan.” He said offering me his hand.

  “It’s good to be here finally I’ve had a hell of a time getting here.”

  “Morner said your real life got in the way.” Jamie said with a snort as he started to walk away. “Come on let me show you the crafting area.” Around the courtyard I could see players some resting others working on what I took to be crafts. A few were talking, one group we passed were obviously gambling.

  “Is that craps?” I asked

  “Yeah do you play?”

  “No, I’ve never seen the point of gambling. I always worked way to hard for my money to just give it away to someone else like that.”

  “You sound like a Scotsman.”

  “No one hundred percent all American mutt.” I replied with a smile, Jamie simply nodded his head.

  “I have two clerics and a paladin for you to work with Broderick is the paladin, but he’s kind of touchy. The clerics are Sparky and Bubles.”

  “Bubles?”

  “You’ll see.” I sighed, it seems I was doing a lot of that lately. It turned out Bubles was a tweenager of about nineteen and had either used a true representation of her form or had the system augment her bust. I hoped to God that it was augmented by the computer otherwise her back would be broken in a decade.

  “Ok everyone this is Lorcan our new…” Jamie turned and examined me “well crafter I guess and bard.”

  “Hi” I said and waved. “Uh I have a few ideas we’ll need to experiment a bit and see what works. Do any of you have crafting experience?”

  “More than you do noob.” Said Broderick.

  “Broderick” Jamie barked. “He maybe new to the game but how many recipes have you discovered.”

  “None,”Broderick replied.

  “At last count Lorcan had seven including high quality steel and the plans for the new tongues and smithing hammers.”

  “Jamie it’s ok.” I said to Jamie. “If he doesn’t want to learn any of the recipes I’ve held back that on him. Now let me see what materials we have available.”

  “Over here. We brought out all of the guild stores and most of our members are donating items to the guild bank.” There was a small storage shed with crates where he pointed. “Bubles is a leather crafter and Sparky does potions.” Jamie said as he gave me the information I needed.

  “Excellent Sparky I’m going to teach you the formula for the brain tanning solution, then bubles can use it to make leather.”

  I rummaged through the materials to see what we had to work with. I found plenty of bones, iron ore there was a little bit of coal, but I didn’t know if it would be enough and there were some of the crystals I needed. As for the high quality materials I found a few skulls of rare animals a unicorn horn, which seemed strange. Lots of jewels, silver wire filigree and various other items. I was going to have to experiment but first I needed metal.

  “Broderick I need pots this high” I said holding up my hands about eight inches high.”And clay also alot more coal. Is there a kiln or foundry?”

  No Kiln but there is a foundry.” Jamie said “What have ye in mind?”

  “Good.” I said smiling/ “What I have in mind is star steel and high quality iron and steel.” I said taking mental notes. “What I think we can do is combine some of the cleric and paladin divine spells into the rafting.”

  “And that will do what” Broderick asked, I could hear curiosity in his voice.

  “I’m hoping it will make weapons that will kill the undead easier.” I couple of weeks ago before my incarceration, I had discovered a recipe for star steel. It was basically a Nichol-iron steel with a high carbon content. I’d made it like crucible steel.

  “What we will do is take the highest quality iron ore and cabornium crystals. We pack them into the ots with coal and some bone.”Then we fire it in a foundry or kiln with coal piled around it and my own special contribution then bam, Star steel.”

  Jamies mouth was open. “Thats it? Thats all it takes?” I nodded and shrugged.

  “That and a willingness to experiment and lose your materials.”I looked at each of my assistants smiled and rubbed my hands together. “Lets get started first things, first. Lets find some pots.”

  It turned out the first thing I did was teach Sparky the brain tanning solution then showed Bubles how to use it, while Broderick pissed and moaned about finding pottery and coal. He brought 7 pots but he did find clay from somewhere. With it I was able to make some simple slab sided vessels. We loaded three of them up with the materials, and after I sealed them I poked a hole in the top to let the build up of gasses vent, that way the pots wouldn’t shatter.

  Then we set the in the foundry all close together then put in the coal and wood waste that we had/ Finally I had Broderick and Jamie back off and I
readied a mana potion. “I don’t know what gods to call on in the game to pray for success.”

  “Thas alright lad I be prayin to Durin and the maker for ye.” Jamie said.

  I closed my eyes and drew in my concentration, raised my hands up and began to cast burning hands. Fire shot from my finger tips, splashing onto the heaped coal and wood, instantly it was alight. I focused all of my mana on the fire and then before my mana ran out another stream of fire washed over the jars. I turned and looked and saw BarbieQ. The stream of fire she put out was impressive it roared and was a bright actinic white. Then she let her spell do. The heat ahd been incredible. “Wat was that?” I found myself asking.

  “Dragons breath spell.” She said with a smirk. I wasn’t the only one looking on in stunned disbelief. “Now just let that cool down.”

  “Hey wow I got the recipe” Broderick said in surprise.

  “Aye, lad I think we all did”

  You receive 200xp for teaching apprentices the recipe crucible star steel

  “Interesting” I said “I just got experience for teaching apprentices.”

  X - X - X

  “So jamie who do we make the weapons for first?” I said as I bounded one of the crucibles in my hand. After the pile had cooled we found that two of the 3 jars I had made had shattered so we had eight billets of star steel. You had to love the game mechanics. BarbieQ’s dragons breath spell had helped refine it even more that my original pieces. What I held read as

  Star steel: Quality AB Crafting ingredient +15 to finished quality

  We were going to make a sword for Morner first. He favored a katana style blade so I thought we would do a matched set Katana and Wakazashi. Going through the stores I found some marine bronze, I would use that for the tsuba and set a protection spell in those. Then the handle I decided to use the skin of a displacer beast, hair of a unicorn and polished gems in the handle with a folded star steel blade. I thought that the weapon would help with dps and allow Morner to escape from close combat while dealing some holy damage due to the unicorn. At least thats what I wanted to happen.

  The problem was I didn’t know exactly what each of the materials did or how they impacted the final piece. “Jamie could you figure out weapons priority and what weapons I need to make.” I blushed a little.”This is all guess work as to what the materials will do unless anyone else has an idea.” I said looking around at everyone.

  “Aye I’ll have a list for ye after ye make Morners new swords.” Jamie said as I nodded and started to craft. I left the others to make leather and Broderick to get me steel.

  “Broderick stay close I’ll want you to cast a few spells on the blade as I’m shaping it. Then I pulled out my hammer and tongues, pushed the first of the star steel blocks into the forge and began. The secret to the katana is the folded steel blade, not the steel itself. The blade is folded over and over untill there are thousands of layers, each of those layers helps to form the cutting edge. A Japanese swords smith will spend days shaping the blade. The game mechanics cut those days down to under an hour. Then came the final shaping and polishing. Then the quench, I wasn’t sure where they had found it but there was a trough of holy oil. “Broderick when I tell you I want you to cast Bless and protection from undead on the blade.”

  “I’ll do that”came an unfamiliar voice. I looked up and I saw a cleric I wasn’t familiar with.

  “Thankyou”, I said as I cast my own spells over the blade.

  Heat Metal

  Enchant Weapons

  “Now cast” and suddenly I saw three spells go off in succession.

  Bless

  Protection from undead

  Holy weapon

  I thrust the glowing blade into the consecrated oil its hissed like a cat. But the blade cooled quickly and glowed with faint power. I looked up to see who all had cast the spells. There was the unknown cleric a paladin I wasn’t familiar with and sparky. “Let me finish this.” I said and I finished assembling the blade. What I was doing was crafting based on medieval symbolism. I used ash to form the basis of the handle; to the vikings it would bear more weight than it should, in england it was a symbol or purity, and in central Europe it was the wood believed to help destroy vampires. The unicorns hair; purity, healing and a few other things I couldn’t quite remember.

  When finished the sword was four feet long perfectly balanced with a grey hilt wrapped in white strands of braided unicorn hair. I sighed and then I checked the information on what I had just created.

  You have created a Star Steel Katana; Quality AB +15 Strength +20 Agility +10 Luck

  +20 Holy Damage damage Scalable

  Protection from undead 15 foot radius

  Wielder is blessed

  You Receive a patent for Star Steel Katana

  You gain 4000xp

  Congratulations you are now a Master Weapon Smith

  Please Name your weapon

  Yes/No

  Sighing I said “I think Morner should be pleased.”

  Jamie took the sword from me then whistled. “Holy crap.” He looked at me and smiled ”there is just something wrong with you.”

  “That I can’t deny but its in a good way.” I smiled “Now to get started on the second piece.” Once more I began with the steel, Just then I heard the gates clattering open. I watched as a small group came in. Women dressed in armor, robes and an looking mean and like they meant business in the center I could see Agent Dubrowski, she was clad in a chain-mail surcoat with a shield on her back. Now that my minder was here we could really get started I thought. Thats shift in attention nearly proved disastrous as the star steel was white hot as I turned back to it.

  Due to my inattention the steel had gotten to hot I had to try to save it so I worked quickly started hammering it out on the anvil folding ans shaping. It was strange though no mater what I did the steel stayed hot. I started casting spells on it.

  Cool metal

  But even that only kept it barely within control. Working at a frenetic pace I prayed for the game mechanics to aid me. I shaped the blade quickly it was to be a wakazashi so I place the total length at thirty inches. “Quickly I need you all to cast your spells” I said as I cast enchant weapon on the brightly glowing blade.

  Enchant Weapon

  Protection from undead

  Holy weapon

  Resurrection

  The blade flared with the last spell to an almost actinic white. I plunged it into the consecrated oil and as I did the metal chimed like a bell had been rung. “Shit I said as I took the blade hissing and sputtering from the oil. The steel had charred black as midnight. I finished the blade quickly since the stats wouldn’t show until the blade was finished. I wrapped the ash handle in the displacer beast hide and bound it in knotted Unicorn hair. Then I examined the weapon I had crafted with trepidation.

  You have created a Star Steel Wakazashi; Quality BB +10 Strength +10 Agility +30 Luck

  +10 Holy Damage damage Scalable

  Protection from undead 15 foot radius

  Chance undead will be resurrected to living

  You Receive a patent for Star Steel Wakazashi

  You gain 4000xp

  Please Name your weapon

  Yes/No

  “What just happened?” I breathed out “that last spell who cast it” I said looking around.

  “I did” came Anna’s voice. I looked at her.

  “This may be what we need to defeat the Lich king” I said thrusting the finished black weapon at her to see what her magic had wrought. “If it works on the players we might be able to free them” I sat thinking as I handed the weapon over to Jamie his eyes growing round as he examined the weapon.

  Reaching out I took it and the other blade and accepted and named them the katana I named peace the wakazashi was called tranquility.

  System message: Know that Peace and Tranquility have entered the realm of Arabella

  “”Shittt” I heard someone say looking up I saw Broderick standing close. “Did
you just create two legendary weapons?” I nodded.

  “Yeah two more” I said “Anna its good to see you” I said quirking my eyebrow. “Sorry I didn’t great you when you got here.” I waved at the sword. “But I was a little distracted. Like I said though you may have helped us figure out a way to win the war.

  Chapter 7

  “I can’t believe you had us waste five hours crafting weapons,” Anna said.

  It would take me time to think of her as Synon, her character's name.

  “I know, but we needed these weapons to fight the undead PCs in the dungeon. I just want to know how you got to your level. Yours is one of the highest levels I’ve seen so far.”