Chapter 36 - Become a Blacksmith 01.
Chapter 36 - Become a Blacksmith 01.
[Chapter Size: 2600 Words.]
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Third Person POV
Winterfell, 101 AC.
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It could be said that Jon tried not to draw any more attention to himself after what had happened that morning. While everyone was still trying to protect themselves outside and even inside the castle, he went straight to the hall.
Unsurprisingly, he found Lord Stark hurrying out with his guards to see what was happening around the castle. Jon hid in a corner, letting him pass. Then he approached the high table and sat down as if nothing had happened, while more and more people ran around commenting to other servants and guards. Jon heard everything from the high table.
"What is this wind out of nowhere? We just got out of winter!!"
Their complaints were immediately voiced out loud.
At the entrance, two people appeared in the hall. Jon saw Lyra rushing in with her mother. Both were wearing fur coats, the same ones he had given them from the bear hide. Speaking of the bear's head, it was behind him, displayed in the main hall like a trophy, while the servants used oil on it every day to preserve it and keep it from deteriorating.
Lord Stark had always shown great pride in it, telling every visitor that it had been slain by his protégé.
"Jon, are you here? Aren't you cold!?" the girl ran up to him.
"Not really..." he murmured, a little embarrassed, as if he were hiding something. But she did not notice.
"Didn't you see the wind outside? I woke up with my window slamming shut when a cold draft invaded my room. I had to rush to put on one of the fur coats they made from your bear hide and gave us!" she complained as she sat beside Jon.
"Good morning, Jon. Shouldn't you put something on? Today suddenly became quite a cold day," Alys commented to him.
Jon seemed to shrink further and further as they spoke, clearly consumed by guilt. "No, I'm fine. I'll put something on before the maester's lesson," he murmured. Despite having a natural resistance to the cold, he only said that to try to change the subject.
"Alright. Just take care of yourself, okay?" she said, sitting beside her absent husband's chair while they waited for the rest of the family.
Soon afterward, almost the entire rest of the family arrived at the table as it gradually filled up.
"Where are Rickon, Grandma, and Father?" Lyra asked, noticing that three people were still missing.
Bennard, who had received the question directly from his sister, looked at her and replied in a dry tone, "Grandma, Father, and Rickon are outside helping people. It seems the cold front caused some problems, even though it has already eased up a bit."
Jon shrank even further into his corner, but since no one noticed his strange behavior, he said nothing. He simply ate in silence, despite Lyra being quite stubborn about trying to talk to him.
"I'm going to my room to get a coat." It was all Jon said, using that as an excuse to leave the table.
He went to his room, grabbed the cloak made from the wolf hide he had hunted, and headed to the library, where he read until it was time for lessons.
Afterward, he went to the maester's room, finding Rickon, Bennard, and Lyra already there.
Although all the children were of varying ages except for Jon and Rickon, the maester still taught the four of them together. While general knowledge was shared among all of them, Lyra should technically have received a different education because she was a lady. However, since she was the only girl in the household, her father and grandmother had decided to place her with the other boys, though she also had lessons with Alys Stark, her mother.
"Where have you been? Didn't you see the hurricane that formed inside Winterfell?" Rickon immediately asked him excitedly.
"I heard a lot of people talking about it during breakfast."
"You heard? Some people said they saw you leaving early this morning," Rickon said at once, giving him a suspicious look.
"It's true. I went to the Godswood." He had to admit it.
"Then it was you!" Rickon declared. "You must have summoned the Old Gods, because the icy hurricane only appeared over Winterfell. Even the people in the town could see the wind surrounding the castle all by itself!" Rickon said.
Meanwhile, Bennard snorted beside them. "Don't talk nonsense, brother," he said in a dry tone.
But Rickon merely shrugged. "You're no fun, Bennard. Always so serious..." Rickon said, mocking his younger brother, while Bennard shot him a murderous glare.
In any case, Jon turned his attention back to the lesson, ignoring Lyra, who wanted to play with him during class. He gave her a look that told her to pay attention to the maester and do her own assignment, which was different from his.
"So boring..." she pouted.
But Jon ignored her as they finished the lesson.
"Hey, let's go to the yard!" Rickon turned to Jon.
"I'd like to, but only this afternoon. I want to do something first, Rickon," Jon told his friend.
"Seriously? What could be so important that you'd skip sword training?"
"I want to go to the castle forge."
"You're going to talk to the blacksmith? Why?" Rickon asked, making a face.
"I don't know. I just want to look at a few things there." With those words, he walked away while Rickon mocked him, saying that maybe he would already get beaten in the training yard for not warming up by the end of the morning.
As much time as they spent together, there was something Jon had discovered about magic. His dreams were quite convincing that he truly could master the abilities of that Jon Arctic.
And that was exactly what he wanted to test.
Later, recalling some of his visions, he entered the forge, but there was no one there, leaving him somewhat disappointed... He wanted to ask a few questions, but Jon stepped inside anyway.
"Could Sellin have already gone to lunch?" he murmured.
Sellin was Winterfell's official blacksmith and worked on maintaining the guards' weapons, as well as forging new swords and armor. Although the North did not have the custom of using heavy armor, he still produced the metal frames, which were later covered with leather by another craftsman.
Jon observed the empty place. The fire was still quite hot, while he watched the molten iron resting in its mold.
'He stopped in the middle of his work... no, he's using this free time to let the molten iron settle perfectly in the mold...' Jon thought.
Sometimes, Winterfell's workers ended their activities a little earlier, since the food would already be prepared by then, even at that moment, and the servants could eat. Although the main meal would only be served an hour later, when the Stark family usually dined, many preferred to do the same. Blacksmiths like Sellin, however, generally ate lunch earlier precisely so they could return to work more quickly.
Jon could not help but look around the place, seeing the tools hanging on the walls, the forge, the pile of swords in one corner, iron and steel ingots, as well as the various molds.
To tell the truth, that forge was quite inferior compared to what he saw in his dreams. After all, the other one smelted lava itself to heat the metal. It was far more organized, working with all kinds of metals from across the world. Even the famous and magical metal known as Valyrian steel was created elsewhere and sent to that workshop, called the King's Forge, where that man worked exclusively on his creations.
Jon could not help feeling somewhat excited as he observed the place. He wanted to test something. An incredible desire related to blacksmithing had blossomed in his heart after what he had done with magic.
He felt that he could become a great blacksmith. Even if Lord Stark tended not to teach such trades to either his son or his protégé, Jon still believed he could learn and intended to ask him. He could forge his own weapons. He could become a better blacksmith than anyone else in this world... And he felt that he loved it, despite never having touched a hammer before.
It was not his first time there, obviously. He knew Sellin as well as the other blacksmiths of Winter Town. He and Rickon used to come there often, and Jon also spent time talking with Sellin, even learning about the blacksmith's life story and his family.
Jon saw Sellin's working hammer resting on the table. An indescribable urge made him take a step toward it. Then he carefully extended his hand and grabbed it.
The moment it happened, Jon felt something as he looked at the hammer. His mind was suddenly no longer inside Winterfell's forge.
Abruptly, he found himself inside a massive cavern, with lava flowing down many corners of the walls like waterfalls. At the same time, there were stone structures assembled beneath his feet, and a gigantic furnace fueled by the lava itself illuminated everything around it.
There was a shirtless man, but his height was tiny, like a dwarf, with a very sturdy body and his arms crossed, watching another shirtless man at work. The fire did not seem to affect him. The dwarf beside him appeared quite satisfied with what he was seeing.
Jon was no longer seeing through that man's eyes. He possessed his own ten-year-old body there while observing the two men from behind.
"Hello?" he tried to call out carefully. Neither of them seemed to hear him.
"Hello!" He tried once more, moving closer. Despite the flames, he extended a hand to see whether the heat would burn him, but he felt nothing.
Then he approached the anvil even more and watched the two men, trying to get their attention. Neither paid him any mind, as though he simply did not exist in that place.
"What's going on?" he murmured, feeling a little afraid.
How had he ended up there?
In any case, his eyes soon fell upon the sword the man was forging. The hammer echoed like an explosion with every strike. To many people, it would have looked like nothing more than hard labor, but to Jon it was like a symphony.
He became fascinated by the transformation of the metal, watching as each blow shaped it further and further.
Jon even forgot the gravity of being there. He simply watched the man work.
Then he noticed something. The young man was no older than fifteen.
Jon recognized him immediately; it was Jon Arctic.
But why? Why did he look so much like him?
He had the same eyes, the same hair color. Although he was about five years older than the current Jon, he could clearly see that he would grow up looking exactly like that.
Even so, his eyes remained fixed on the hammer. The sound that could have been deafening to many people seemed like music to him.
He watched the blade, glowing red from the intense heat, yet it did not appear to cool at all. Jon could see that the man was using magic to keep it hot while trying to create a blade sharp enough to cut through anything, yet durable enough not to break on the first impact.
"Damn... you've already been working for two hours and you're still keeping the same pace. For a human, it's always been difficult to understand your strength from the moment I met you." The small man, whom young Jon already knew was a dwarf because of his dreams, spoke sarcastically.
The fifteen-year-old boy did not care about the comment. He continued striking with the hammer while merely forming a faint smile.
Young Jon watched all of this for a long time. He did not know what any of it meant, but he kept staring at the sword, enjoying the moment.
Until, suddenly, he no longer saw the hammer striking the metal.
He blinked a few times and looked up.
Now, the man and the dwarf were staring at him.
That made ten-year-old Jon take a step back in fright.
The dwarf snorted. Meanwhile, the older Jon smiled faintly and stepped forward. Then he touched the younger Jon's shoulder.
The surprise was so great that the boy became completely frozen.
"Here. This should be enough for you to get started." The older Jon spoke calmly.
With his other hand, he raised a finger until it touched the younger boy's forehead. 1
At that moment, the world began to spin. Jon started to feel countless images, experiences, and thoughts flooding into his mind all at once.
Everything was related to the art of blacksmithing.
It all came at once.
Knowledge.
Memories.
Techniques.
Years and years of experience.
Everything was related to the art of blacksmithing. Jon received the knowledge of decades of work: ore identification, furnace control, smelting, quenching, metal treatment, the crafting of weapons and armor, as well as the ability to understand the balance, durability, and quality of a piece simply by observing or touching it. It was as if thousands of hours spent before an anvil had been poured directly into his mind.
But they were not merely ordinary techniques. Among those memories existed rare and nearly forgotten knowledge, including secrets tied to magic in the forge and the principles behind Valyrian steel. He saw master blacksmiths, dwarves, and himself working with fire, blood, enchantments, and extraordinary metals...
Jon could not help but feel a severe headache as he absorbed that avalanche of information.
He watched all those images pass before his eyes.
All directed toward a single purpose.
To become a blacksmith. To become the greatest blacksmith this world had ever seen.
'Become what you once were...'
Everything came at once. Until, suddenly, everything went dark. And Jon felt his body simply fall.
When he sat up, waking with a start, he suddenly found himself in his room. Someone dragged a chair closer upon seeing him wake like that, drawing a deep breath as though he had been holding it for a very long time.
"You're awake, lad?" A woman's voice came from beside him.
Jon looked over in surprise and saw Sara, one of the castle servants, apparently sitting beside his bed sewing with needle and thread. She quickly moved closer to check on him.
"Are you alright?" Jon blinked a few times, still feeling his head throb.
Jon looked at her, confused. "I am... What happened to me?" he asked as his memories began to settle.
"You were found unconscious in the forge. Some guards passing by the entrance saw you lying on the floor with a hammer in your hand. Then they brought you here. The maester said he didn't understand why you fainted, but he said you were fine. You just seemed tired, mentally exhausted. Lady Stark asked me to take care of you. I'm glad you're awake."
Jon raised a hand to his head. Despite the pain, he felt filled with information he had never seen or heard before.
The woman gathered the needles and the cloth she had been working on atop the bed.
"I'll go call Lady Stark. Wait here a moment, my boy."
She said it with a small smile before leaving through the door. Jon knew Lyarra would arrive shortly afterward.
After all, Sara was a servant directly attached to Lyarra. When she mentioned "Lady Stark," she was clearly referring to the elder Stark woman and not Alys.
Jon continued to feel a pressure inside his head, as if he were carrying an enormous weight at that moment.
"What just happened?" Jon could not help but murmur.
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