Second World Online

Extremely dense heat filled the back room of the "Waterwheel" shop. The air around the forging hearth trembled, distorting vision like a mirage in the middle of a desert. The white linen shirt I wore now clung tightly to my avatar’s body, soaked through by virtual sweat that continuously flowed, wetting my back and temples.

Ting! Clang! Ting! Clang!

The ringing of metal striking the anvil echoed rhythmically, creating a rough symphony that was ear-piercing yet strangely felt extremely calming.

I raised the Novice Blacksmith Hammer to shoulder height, then swung it down with all the strength that could be exerted by my 17.5 Strength points. The iron hammer head slammed into the glowing bright-orange metal chunk, flattening its surface, forcing it to submit and lengthen according to my will.

For players with pure physical fighter classes like Warrior or Knight, swinging a five-kilogram hammer like this might feel like swinging a tree branch. But for me, a Glass Cannon whose main stats rested on Intelligence and Dexterity, every swing of this hammer burned my stamina indicator extremely greedily.

In just fifteen minutes since I began forging, my stamina bar had already plummeted into the yellow zone. I had to gulp down a Basic Stamina Potion every few minutes to keep my avatar’s body from fainting due to exhaustion.

Even so, I refused to stop. There was a strange primal satisfaction in watching raw metal change shape under my hands.

The blacksmith crafting system in Second World Online was not an automatic system where players only needed to click the "Create" button and wait for a loading bar to finish. This game used an interactive physics-based simulation system. When metal was heated until it reached forging temperature, small blinking light points would appear on the metal’s surface; these were called Sweet Spots.

A blacksmith had to strike precisely on top of those Sweet Spots with the right amount of force. The more accurate the strike, the higher the quality of the resulting item, and the greater the profession Experience Points gained.

This was where my Strength weakness was completely covered by the absolute advantage of my Dexterity, which had surpassed 40 points.

My eyes, sharpened by the DEX stat, tracked every appearance of a Sweet Spot on the glowing iron as if time were slowing down. My hammer swings might not be as strong as those of Dwarves or Orc races, but my accuracy was surgical-level precision. Every impact of my hammer landed exactly in the center of the Sweet Spot without missing by a single millimeter.

Ting!

[Hit: Perfect!]

Ting!

[Hit: Perfect!]

I dipped the iron blade that had begun to take shape into a wooden barrel filled with quenching oil. A loud hissing sound rang out together with a thick white smoke plume that smelled scorched. After its temperature dropped, I clamped it and placed it back on the anvil, then began using a coarse whetstone to sharpen its edges.

[System: Crafting successful. You have created [Standard Iron Dagger] (Normal).]

[System: Blacksmith Profession Level increased! Current: Level 3]

I wiped the sweat from my forehead with the back of a hand stained black by soot. My work table was now filled with more than a dozen Normal-quality iron daggers and short swords. These were the results of the one hundred stacks of Iron Ore I had bought from the Auction House several hours ago.

"Forging basic weapons no longer gives much EXP," I muttered while checking my profession panel. "I have to start making something more complicated, or at least make goods that I truly need."

As an archer and alchemist, I did not need heavy iron plate armor. Armor like that would only kill my agility and cancel my Stealth passive. I also did not need a large sword. The Spellweaver’s Dirk made by Vivi was more than enough for close-range combat.

Then, what did I need from blacksmithing?

The answer lay in ammunition.

Blood Oak wooden arrows indeed had dense mass and strong destructive power, yet their sharpened wooden tips still had a penetration limit when facing thickly armored monsters like Gargoyles or golem-type monsters. I needed armor-piercing arrowheads (Bodkin Arrowheads).

Besides that, I stared at the remaining Mud Bomb explosive materials on my alchemy table. The destructive power of those mud bombs was indeed fantastic, yet their effect was purely a concussive shockwave and area poison. If I could create a metal casing designed to shatter into fragments upon explosion, the bomb would transform into a shrapnel grenade, adding Physical Damage in the form of hundreds of metal projectiles stabbing in all directions.

That idea made my blood surge hard. This was territory that had not yet been explored by any player. The fusion of metallurgy and explosive chemistry.

I immediately turned toward the Auction House terminal. Ordinary iron ore would not be hard enough to pierce armor or create deadly fragments. I needed steel. I spent 10 Gold Coins from my wealth to bulk-buy fifty stacks of [Refined Steel Ingot] and five bottles of [Liquid Flux] to ease the metal-joining process.

It did not take long for the materials to appear in my shop’s mailbox. Those steel bars were dark gray, feeling far denser and heavier than ordinary iron.

I added more Coal into the hearth, turning the air-pumping wheel with my left hand until the previously orange flames changed into a dazzling bluish-white. The heat now truly scorched the skin.

I clamped a pure steel bar and put it into the core of the fire. Steel required a far higher temperature than iron to be forged. I had to wait until it reached a perfect cherry-red color. If too cold, the steel would crack when struck. If too hot, the carbon inside it would burn away completely and make it brittle.

The moment the color was right, I pulled it out and placed it on the anvil.

First project: Bodkin Arrowheads.

Unlike ordinary arrowheads that were flat and wide like leaves designed to tear flesh and cause bleeding, Bodkin heads were shaped like long, extremely sharp four-sided nails. This aerodynamic design and concentrated pressure point were created specifically to pierce and penetrate the gaps of chainmail or steel plates.

I raised my hammer. My concentration narrowed until only I, my hammer, and the tip of that glowing red steel bar remained.

Ting! Ting! Ting!

My strikes were now far faster and more measured. I struck the four sides of the steel alternately, forcing it to taper into a deadly elongated pyramid shape. Because of its small size, this metal cooled quickly, forcing me to repeatedly put it back into the hearth.

My DEX worked at maximum. Every angle of that arrowhead I shaped with nearly perfect symmetry. After the form was complete, I used a small chisel to create a socket cavity at its base, the place where the wooden arrow shaft would later be inserted.

The quenching step for steel was far more complicated. I did not use water, but instead dipped it slowly into thick oil. The goal was to make the outer part extremely hard for penetration, while the inner part remained slightly flexible so the arrowhead would not break when striking a hard target.

I spent two hours nonstop, repeating this process until ten steel Bodkin arrowheads were created.

[System: Crafting successful. You have created [Steel Bodkin Arrowhead] x10 (Rare).]

[System: Blacksmith Profession Level increased! Current: Level 5]

I took one of those arrowheads, staring at its sharp and cold gleaming tip. I touched the tip of my finger to its pointed point, and the system immediately gave a warning that my finger had received 1 point of damage. Extremely sharp. If this was combined with the kinetic thrust of the Titan’s Ironbark Longbow, no monster armor under Level 30 would be able to stop it.

I wiped the sweat that soaked my eyes, gulped down a bottle of stamina potion, then switched to the second project, my true masterpiece: the Shrapnel Casing.

I took a larger steel bar and heated it until it glowed brightly. This time, I did not strike it into a pointed shape, but instead slammed it hard and flat, flattening it into a steel plate shaped like a square with a thickness of only about three millimeters.

This process was extremely draining. My arms felt as if they were filled with molten lead. The Novice hammer in my hand even began showing a drop in Durability from continuously being used to strike solid steel.

After the steel plate was flat, I took the steel chisel I had prepared. This steel, still in a hot condition (around 700 degrees Celsius), had to be scored with precision.

This was where the genius of the design lay. I did not leave the plate smooth. Using the hammer and chisel, I carved cross-hatch grid lines in the form of small squares across the entire inner part of the steel plate. The depth of the carving had to be exact: not too deep until it leaked, and not too shallow.

These lines were structural fault lines. When the explosive pressure from inside the mud bomb expanded, this steel plate would not shatter into random pieces. That pressure would tear the steel precisely along the lines I had carved, creating hundreds of small sharp-angled steel squares (shrapnel) that would shoot outward at bullet speed, tearing anything within a ten-meter radius.

I worked with extreme care, ensuring every line was drawn straight. This was a test of hand agility that drained my Intelligence concentration.

After the inner carving was finished, I reheated the plate. Now came the hardest part. I used a round cast-iron mold and a wooden mallet with a rounded tip. I struck the steel plate in circular motions, folding and curving it slowly until the flat plate transformed into a hollow steel ball that wrapped perfectly. I left one small hole at the top as the place for the fuse to enter.

I dipped that steel ball into cold salt water to perform rapid quenching, making it extremely brittle and hard. That brittle nature was exactly what I wanted so the ball would easily shatter when hit by an internal explosion.

[System: Crafting successful. You have created [Scored Steel Casing] (Rare).]

[System: Blacksmith Profession Level increased! Current: Level 7]

The high difficulty level immediately boosted my profession level by two ranks at once!

I set down my hammer, whose handle was now cracked. My hands trembled heavily, and my breathing was ragged. Yet my red eyes stared at the steel ball the size of an adult’s fist on my table with an unstoppable hunger.

This was not finished yet.

I hurriedly moved the steel ball to the alchemy table. I took one [Medium Mud Bomb] that contained a mixture of gunpowder and swamp peat gas. Using a small scalpel, I broke open that organic mud bomb, carefully transferred its contents, and packed them tightly into my steel ball through the small hole on top.

Sulfur, peat charcoal, and poison extract united inside the steel belly. I ensured the density was exact, leaving a little space so the gas could expand before the steel shattered. Finally, I inserted a long fuse that had been coated with oil so it would burn easily, and sealed the hole gap using red beeswax to protect it from moisture.

When the last drop of wax dried and covered the steel cavity, an extremely bright golden light radiated from my alchemy table, accompanied by a system bell chime that thundered in my ears.

Ding!

[System: You have successfully perfectly combined the Blacksmith and Alchemy Professions!]

[System: You have created a Cross-Discipline Masterpiece!]

[System: Blacksmith Profession Level increased! Current: Level 10 (Title Unlocked: Apprentice Blacksmith)]

[System: Alchemy Profession Level increased! Current: Level 16]

A giant holographic screen appeared above the dark gray steel ball that now looked extremely intimidating.

[Frag-Grenade: The Iron Maiden – Rarity: Epic]

A crazy innovation that combines raw gunpowder with a scored steel casing to create a storm of shrapnel.

Type: Consumable Weapon (Thrown/Arrow Attachment).

Base Damage: 1200 Fire Damage + 3500 Physical Penetration Damage (AoE).

Explosion Radius: 12 Meters.

Special Effect 1 (Shrapnel Storm): Steel fragments automatically penetrate most mid-tier armor, applying the [Heavy Bleeding] effect that drains 50 HP per second for 10 seconds.

Special Effect 2 (Lethal Shrapnel): There is a 10% chance that fragments hit the enemy’s vital points, causing the [Maim] effect that reduces the enemy’s movement and attack speed by 40%.

Crafted by: Syl.

I stepped back, bumping into the edge of the forging hearth, completely ignoring its heat. My eyes widened staring at the item description in front of me.

"Three thousand five hundred Physical Damage... in a twelve-meter area radius?" my voice sounded hoarse, half-whispering in disbelief.

My previous large mud bombs only dealt around one thousand points of damage because they purely relied on explosive thrust. But by adding this scored steel plate casing, I had transformed the wasted explosion into propelling energy for hundreds of small steel bullets that pierced flesh and armor.

This Frag-Grenade was not something I could use carelessly. If I threw it and did not manage to take cover or run twelve meters away, its steel fragments would immediately tear my thin HP bar down to zero in one second. This was an absolute weapon of mass destruction.

The time showed four o’clock in the afternoon virtual time. I had spent more than six hours nonstop in front of the forging hearth. My linen shirt was no longer white, but blackish-gray from coal dust and sweat. My stamina indicator could no longer be recovered with ordinary potions; the system notified that my avatar’s body had reached the Fatigue Limit and needed sleep at an Inn or a log out to recover it.

However, today’s achievement was priceless. I had successfully broken through Level 10 Blacksmith, unlocking the Apprentice title that would allow me to begin forging magical metals and astral silver going forward. I possessed ten steel armor-piercing arrowheads, and the first Epic shrapnel grenade prototype on this server.

I extinguished the fire in the forging hearth. The roaring sound of the flames was slowly replaced by the silence of the shop’s back room. I wiped the dust from my face, staring at the row of deadly weapons and ammunition neatly lined up on my table.

A satisfied, sharp, and ambition-filled smile was painted on my lips.