Limitless Path

"Anyway," Old Tom said, tossing the sword onto a bench to do the finishing work on later, "what exactly can I do fer ya three? Ya all smiths?"

"Sera and I are," Beth said, gesturing at herself and her fiancée. "Blood is a leatherworker, but she might be able to pick something up if she watches."

"That's fine, I've taught all kinds," Tom said, moving around the shop. "I can teach the three of ya fer six months based on that token. Ya want any more than that, and ya lassies will have ta pay, and my time ain't cheap."

"I think six months is more than reasonable," Beth said. "Besides, we just hit Expert, so there's only so much I think we can even learn right now."

"I can show ya a lot in six months, even if'n yer Apprentices," Old Tom said, gesturing at her with his hammer. "So, how much do ya know 'bout smithin' with runes? Ya lot covered that at all yet?"

"We've gone over it, and we practiced a bit of incorporating some simple runes right when we got to Expert, but we're a long way from competent," Sera said. "We've had a number of instructors all the way up to a Sage trying to coach us, but we're still really early on."

"A Sage, huh," the dwarf said, rubbing his beard. "Well, far be it fer me ta get in the way of that, but I think I can do ya one better."

"Just what is your level of skill?" Beth asked, curious at the dwarf's hints.

"Well, Old Tom don't like ta brag," he said.

"Here comes the bragging," Sera cut in.

Tom glared at her before hoisting at his belt and continuing, "Well, I don't really talk meself up that much, but I got ta Smithing Legend just a century ago."

"A Legend?" Sera asked, exchanging a look with Beth. "I haven't even heard of there being a Hero in the galaxy right now. Not for smithing, anyway."

"Well, some of us ain't gotta go screamin' it from the rooftops, ya ken?" he said.

"Well, that's true, sure," Sera said, shaking her head.

"I wonder," Beth muttered before pinging Erosh. The big man simply appeared in the smithy, looking around with some curiousity.

"That's a neat trick, lassie," Tom said, scratching at his temple with a corner of his forging hammer as he examined Erosh.

"I've got a couple Ascended, uh, linked to me, let's say. It's all a little complicated," Beth explained.

"Now, now, I ain't askin' questions," Tom said, gesturing at her with his hammer. "You a smith, boy?"

"Been a long time since I've been called boy," Erosh grumbled, gesturing at a mana steel bar. The bar floated over to him and Erosh broke it down in air, infusing the bar with runes while he remolded it into the form he desired. When he was done, the blade of a carpenter's plane, including the hardware to lock it in place and adjust the angle, were hovering in front of him. It didn't look like anything special at first glance, but it was expertly crafted and would easily maintain its sharpness for long stretches between adjustments while slicing through extremely tough woods.

"Yepper, yer a Sage, alright," Tom said, gesturing at Erosh. "Still, ya ain't gotta be teaching these kids to give up on usin' their hammers. Most people get so damned focused on crafting through more 'advanced' methods that they forget the classics, forget their roots. Always good to bring it back to basics, even at our level." He had made some air quotes when he said advanced while waving his hammer around.

"People usually give it up because they can't grasp the better techniques," Erosh said, shrugging. Seeing Beth and Sera give him a questioning look, he explained while Tom hummed non-committally, "People who want to keep beating on a piece of metal with hammers and get beyond Grandmaster usually, and that's usually, mind you, can't really wrap their heads around the more advanced techniques to forge with runes by just manipulating the basic properties and mana of the materials. So, people get trained to start crafting the way I just did, because that guarantees they can move up to Sage, and they give up hammering at the metal. A lot of people never backtrack and work the metals by the old ways again after they hit Sage."

"And it's a damned shame!" Tom cut in, waving his hammer at them all. "People always forget what makes a smith a damned smith. Same with a leatherworker or an alchemist or a damned carpenter. How can you hone yer craft when instead of cutting and carving the wood and fitting it together, ya use yer mana to levitate the damned stuff and then break it down at the damn molecular level? Ya can't, that's how! Kids these days learn to craft with runes, which is all fine and good and ya need ta do it ta get beyond Grandmaster, but they ain't ever get back ta their roots and then they never make it past Grandmaster[2]. Gee, I wonder why that shite happens?"

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Beth had noticed that Old Tom's dwarven brogue tended to get thicker when he was excited, but she didn't mention anything about it. Instead, she said, "Why don't you give as an example?"

"An example?! Why, I'll do ya one better, lassie. Ya take this, and this, and ya craft this," he said, handing her a different hammer and a bar of metal before laying a simple paper on the workbench that had a drawing of a corkscrew. The plan was rather simple, but it had a set of instructions on how to work and hammer the stock that Beth read quite carefully before getting to work. Tom and Erosh just watched on, the Empyrean with his massive arms crossed while Tom waved his hammer about and gave endless commentary.

"This doesn't seem much different from what I normally do," Beth said after a few minutes.

"Cuz ya ain't hammerin' it right, lassie," Tom said, demonstrating that he certainly had quite a few stats and skills as he grabbed the cherry-red metal with a bare hand and repositioned it. "Watch my strike, lassie. Ya have ta fold in the metal without stretching it, like this."

Old Tom proceeded to slowly but powerfully hammer the metal, giving plenty of time for the rest of them to observe his actions. Despite using relatively simple movements, the way he hammered the metal and the way he controlled his mana while he did it were far more profound and complex than they seemed. Even Blood, who was rather disinterested and dispirited from being in the hot forge was paying close attention, watching Old Tom's every move. Even Erosh was rather interested, and Beth suspected Tom's comment, likely intentionally, cut the Empyrean rather deeply, considering Erosh was several thousands years old and very interested in smithing and was only a little way into Sage. Tom didn't try to hide or obscure his techniques, and he explained what he was doing while he did it, at least some of which Beth actually understood. She felt like she got some new inspirations just watching him craft, and she made sure to take a bunch of notes on her communicator as thought of new questions and ideas.

Eventually, Tom finished much of the hammering, but handed the piece back to Beth, who tried to copy what he had done. She had limited, rather mixed success, and Tom talked her through what she was doing wrong. Watching, and listening to, the old smith was one thing, but taking action on what she had seen and heard was entirely another, and she struggled for a while to get it right. She might have been very good in some respects, such as her affinity for spatial magic and skills, but she was an all-around genius, and smithing was just something she was passing good at. She wound up creating the corkscrew piece, but it was a bit subpar, at least in her opinion, and Old Tom used it as an example to explain to them all what she had done wrong and how to better improve her technique. Rather than be upset, Beth took his lessons to heart, making sure to take copious notes as he turned the piece over in his hands and pointed out all kinds of little things, from small flaws to little mistakes to solid parts that were well done.

After that, it was Sera's turn, with both Old Tom and Erosh reminded her, almost speaking on top of each other, to not work with her dragonfire for now. Tom wanted to see what they could do without any outside power added in apart from their natural skills as smiths, and he walked Sera through making much the same thing in the same way. Sera didn't really get much of an advantage in terms of having watched Beth's attempt and the dissection of the results, as the techniques and ideas were far to high-level to pick up in just thirty or forty minutes. Her efforts came out about the same as Beth's and Tom was just as critical, though he was also the same level of thorough in dissecting the flaws and strengths of the piece. Blood, unfortunately, couldn't really participate in the same way, but it was still rather educational for her to be there and just watch the process.

Beth asked a few questions and then Old Tom got some metal out and started working on a new piece, taking his time to demonstrate and explain what he was doing. He said a piece like that would normally take him about two hours to create; it wasn't something that was pushing his skills, but it was still something that required a bit of time. With explaining and demonstrating, it took him almost twice as long to get it done but watching him work was really fascinating. Even Erosh was picking some things up, though he kept to the back and just observed, sensing that this was much more the girls' opportunity than something for him to take advantage of. Tom was content to work for days on end, and the girls watched him go through several different project, but eventually their brains were fried. They took a handful of hours off, just to rest and get their heads put back on straight, and then they returned to the forge and started doing some work themselves. Old Tom was skilled enough he could work a project that he was doing for a bit of money or just for a small order and still give them pointers or inspect their work at the same time.

They spent a few days just working on simple things, which was the best way to go about it; Old Tom was so much more advanced, even his simple teaching would take them a lot of time and effort to absorb. Tom was willing to teach them for at least half a year, and Beth wasn't really in a rush to try and get everything out of him in the first week. Anyway, that would likely lead to getting less, not more, as rushing wasn't going to make the lessons really stick. Working steadily and taking advice as and where they could to slowly improve was going to be the best thing for them in the long run. Beth let her pocket Ascended participate as much as she could or Tom was willing to tolerate, but their questions and ideas would be so much more high-level than the girls could process that they limited their activity. Tom, fortunately, wasn't upset in being pestered by Grandmasters and Sages, especially if they kept their questions short and didn't tax his time too much.

Beth checked her skills after a week and was rather surprised to see that she had gotten a level in smithing in just seven days. She was in Expert now and expected that bracket to take quite a while; she supposed getting training from somebody who might be a one-of-one in the entire galaxy was going to see them getting a huge amount of progress in no time at all. The first week was a level, and the first month was another, and Beth felt like, even though she was getting levels, she was also building up a massive accumulation that would seeing her getting to Master in near-record times. Old Tom was not just an incredibly skilled smith that had honed his craft beyond even an art, he was also a very skilled teacher that was quite good at explaining high-level concepts in ways that the girls found rather easy to understand. He seemed to enjoy the process of teaching, and even enjoyed the conversations with Beth's pocket Ascended discussing much more advanced techniques.

The girls were also getting some training that, while not entirely unique, was probably not available unless they left the galaxy. Tom's knowledge of how to use older techniques and traditional methods while still incorporating runes and modern mana techniques was significant and incredibly valuable. Beth was glad that he was so willing to share the knowledge with everybody and so willing to entertain them, as well as that they had gotten access to somebody with such incredible knowledge so early in their crafting journey. It took Beth months just to start to really absorb Tom's lessons, and even then she wasn't sure she was really understanding everything that he had to teach. Fortunately for them, she had her pocket Ascended, all of whom picked up far more than one new trick from Old Tom just by watching him smith a little bit and a handful of off-hand conversations. Erosh could explain an awful lot of Tom's techniques now that he had observed him for more than a month and had quite a few conversations with him, so Beth would be carrying an awful lot of the Legend's knowledge with her after they left, even if she herself didn't absorb it all.

That wouldn't be for a while yet, as they had months left to go before Tom might kick them out, and they might even be able to stay beyond that time. Beth and Sera just concentrated on learning as much as they could while honing their skills, while Blood spent more time studying and working on her own projects. A lot of Old Tom's lessons weren't directly applicable, but the broad knowledge of how to use traditional methods and still incorporate more advanced runes and rune-crafting applied broadly across many disciplines. Again, the other Ascended had been learning, taking notes, and trying to understand the new techniques, which meant Blood would have somebody much more skilled than her with leatherworking knowledge that could help her incorporate the new techniques even after they left Tom's place. It's not like the knowledge was a secret or anything, but it was a lot different to read about the techniques versus having somebody who constantly used them teaching rather skilled people how they worked.