Chapter 16: Cru Town 06 - Are You Leaving Cru Town...?

She wanted a sword.

Ye Chuqi held the black dagger she had gotten from Ed. After fighting with it, she was quite pleased with the little thing.

"Craftsmanship like this would do, with materials just a little better." She felt the workmanship was good enough; the materials fell a little short.

Jun Ruofeng raised an eyebrow again.

Ye Chuqi thought that if he did not have such good control over his forehead, that eyebrow would run away from home sooner or later.

"You have a good eye," Jun Ruofeng said, offering rare praise. "The forging technique behind this dagger is excellent. Ed went to great lengths to get it, but it has one fatal flaw. Do you know what it is?"

Ye Chuqi nodded. "It's too heavy." She had noticed as soon as she picked it up. For such a small blade, it weighed almost as much as an ordinary sword. It was not suited to a thief at all.

For Ye Chuqi, though, that made it a better fit. She had always been strong, and even her swordsmanship was hardly light and nimble. Her eldest senior brother had worried that she would rely too much on her strength and turn into a brute who only knew how to swing wildly. That was why he watched her practice her footwork every day.

Jun Ruofeng's meaning was clear. "If you forged a sword with the same technique and similar—or even better—materials, you still couldn't overcome the problem of its weight. It would only be heavier and harder to handle."

That was why the finished piece had been only a dagger, yet it had still ended up in such an awkward position.

Ye Chuqi swung her arm a few times. "I think it suits me just fine."

Jun Ruofeng remembered then that the girl before him was nowhere near as delicate as she looked. The sight of her lifting the Black Ghost Stone was etched in his memory. He could not help laughing. "Then why not forge a Greatsword outright? It might have a remarkable effect."

Ye Chuqi said, "That's... not impossible?" Then she caught herself. "Wait, does the vice-captain know who forged this dagger?"

Jun Ruofeng nodded.

Ye Chuqi asked cautiously, "Is he expensive?"

Expensive. Very expensive. And even money might not be enough to buy his services.

Beverly was the Empire's foremost Artifact Forging Grandmaster and its only Ninth-Rank Artifact Forging Grandmaster. As an Attendant supported by the Empire, he could refuse anyone he pleased. Neither money nor threats of power could sway him.

If you wanted him to forge something, it depended on whether he was in the mood.

He had forged this dagger only because he had acquired some new materials and wanted to try his hand at them. The result was this painfully awkward dagger. The old master had shut himself away afterward and still refused to see visitors!

Yet even this dagger, which Beverly considered a failure, had been bid up to a staggering price. Ed was Beverly's devoted admirer. He often lamented that he had been born too late: Beverly rarely forged anything himself these days, and the works still circulating were all from his early years. Ed had spent every coin he had and borrowed a considerable sum from Jun Ruofeng to buy the dagger.

Ye Chuqi stared. "Something that important, and he gave it to me?"

Jun Ruofeng glanced at her, plainly unimpressed by her foolish expression. "Perhaps Red Beard matters more to Ed?" Beverly might have been Ed's idol, but Red Beard ranked above him. Giving Ye Chuqi the dagger had been Red Beard's decision. Besides, she had saved Red Beard's life. Ed might not say it aloud, but he was probably wondering how to repay her. The dagger was valuable, yet it was a loss Ed could bear if he gritted his teeth.

A thought flashed through Jun Ruofeng's mind. When Red Beard told Ed to give Ye Chuqi the dagger, had he already realized it suited her better?

Ye Chuqi, meanwhile, was thinking that if the dagger really was so precious, returning it would not be her style. She would have to find something good to give Ed in return someday.

Master Beverly lived in the Imperial Capital and had rarely gone out in recent years. He spent every day at home, though no one knew what he did there. If Ye Chuqi wanted him to forge a sword for her, she would have to visit him in person. The most Jun Ruofeng could do was introduce her. Whether Beverly agreed would depend on Ye Chuqi herself.

When asking someone for a favor, of course she needed a gift—one that would strike the right chord. After all Beverly's years at the top, what treasures had he not seen? Unfortunately, the things in Ye Chuqi's storage space had been lost in the Space-Time Turbulence. Otherwise, some novel little trinket might have made a fine gift for the old master.

"Don't worry, Qiqi. Find some brush, ink, and paper, then write out a basic Artifact Forging technique from memory," San San said, knowing exactly what Ye Chuqi was thinking and immediately offering her a solution.

Ye Chuqi's eyes lit up. Beverly had not left home in years. Apart from wanting to avoid trouble, he had probably hit a bottleneck in his forging. Why else would he have shut himself away like that after his attempt with the new materials failed?

Artifact Forging techniques from the world of cultivation had their own novelties and strengths. If she exchanged knowledge with Beverly, she might give him fresh inspiration.

"Good idea!!"

Ye Chuqi did not know how to forge artifacts herself, but San San had a wealth of theoretical knowledge. San San had her find and read every book they could, saying it was all preparation in case she ever wanted to learn. Writing one of those books out now would only take time.

"Heh-heh, I'm clever, aren't I?"

"San San is the cleverest!"

With a solution in hand, Ye Chuqi brightened so much that even the colors around her seemed to grow more vivid. Jun Ruofeng suddenly found her dazzling and narrowed his eyes. What had the girl thought of to make her smile like that?

No one knew what agreement the Red Wind Mercenary Group had reached with the town mayor, but for the past two days they had been working together to search Kru Town from top to bottom. Jun Ruofeng had also spoken with Duke Fulton's people and managed to calm them down. The companions who had pursued the trail into the Lost Forest had sent no word back. That was not a good sign.

The Red Wind Mercenary Group seemed to have a special way of finding people. They soon identified two people in town whose movements were suspicious and took them into custody. The interrogation of Gree had also made new progress.