Forging Rank Test

Cen Yue picked up the form Tang Wulin had filled out, turned, and headed farther inside.

"Come with me."

Tang Wulin answered and followed him.

The so-called testing room was actually a private forging workshop. In the end, a Blacksmith's rank assessment came down to what his hands could do. Once inside, age, background, and the identity of his teacher all had to be set aside. Only hammers and metal had the final say.

As soon as the door opened, some of the tension that had kept Tang Wulin wound tight began to ease.

The layout wasn't quite the same as Mang Tian's workshop, but everything he needed was there. The Forging Platform, Temperature Control Panel, Material Rack, Cooling Trough, Pressure-Resistant Floor—even the faint metallic scent in the air felt familiar.

Compared with the academy, the dormitory, and the unfamiliar streets of Eastsea City, this felt more like somewhere he could truly find his footing.

An Evaluator was already waiting in the room.

She was a middle-aged woman with short hair, a businesslike expression, and a clipboard in her hand. Clearly well acquainted with Cen Yue, she smiled as they came in.

"You brought him here yourself?" Her gaze settled on Tang Wulin. "The front desk just told me he's nine. If he were a little younger, he'd really be challenging the president's record."

Cen Yue didn't pursue that remark. He simply said:

"Let's test him first."

The Evaluator nodded, then looked at Tang Wulin.

"The rules are simple. There are fifteen kinds of metal here. Choose one yourself and purify it through hammering. I'll score you based on the metal you choose, your process, and the finished product. Anything over sixty points counts as passing the rank-one Blacksmith assessment."

"Yes," Tang Wulin answered promptly.

He walked over to the Material Rack.

Fifteen kinds of metal stood in a row, nearly identical in size, each a one-foot cube. Their colors, luster, and densities differed. On the surface, he was merely choosing a piece to hammer, but in reality, his eye, judgment, and grasp of his own limits all came into play.

Tang Wulin swept his gaze over the pieces without lingering long. Soon, he reached into the middle of the row and lifted out a block of silvery-gray metal.

"I choose heavy silver."

The heavy silver settled onto the Forging Platform without the slightest clunk.

The Evaluator's gaze immediately grew more serious, and Cen Yue's eyes sharpened as well.

A one-foot cube of heavy silver weighed nearly three hundred kilograms. For a nine-year-old child, even lifting it steadily was no easy feat, let alone forging it.

"You're strong." The Evaluator looked at Tang Wulin. "Not everyone dares to choose heavy silver."

Tang Wulin didn't respond to that. He merely asked:

"Grandmasters, may I begin?"

"Go ahead," the Evaluator said. "You have one hour, starting now."

Tang Wulin immediately got to work.

Start the furnace, regulate the temperature, load the metal.

The heavy silver slowly sank into the Forging Furnace as the temperature climbed bit by bit. The association's assessments never left room for shortcuts; even heating the metal and judging its temperature were part of the test. Once someone's rank was certified, he might take on work independently. The association couldn't let someone who knew only how to swing a hammer, but couldn't even judge the heat, go out under its name and smash its reputation.

While the temperature rose, Tang Wulin loosened his shoulders and back, then slowly took two deep breaths.

He hadn't chosen heavy silver to show off.

He had chosen it because he knew it.

Back in Aolai City, the last piece of metal he had truly worked through had been heavy silver. That had also been the first time he had truly touched the threshold of Thousand Refinement. He remembered its weight, its rebound, the points where it yielded, and the feel of its contraction with perfect clarity.

But—

Tang Wulin's fingers tightened slightly.

He hadn't forgotten Mang Tian's words.

After coming to Eastsea City, he wasn't to use the Star-Sinking Hammer for forging, at least in public. If he could avoid using it, he should. Especially in front of strangers, he couldn't let too many people see what was unusual about his current martial soul.

That was why he had brought his pair of Thousand-Refined Tungsten Steel Hammers this time.

At that thought, Tang Wulin actually felt steadier.

The furnace temperature continued to rise.

He stood before the Forging Platform, his eyes on the display. His breathing grew increasingly even, and little by little, his whole body settled into stillness.

Cen Yue watched from behind and to one side.

What first pleased him wasn't the choice of heavy silver, nor the strength that had set it so steadily onto the platform, but the look in the boy's eyes.

Such genuine focus.

His gaze didn't wander, and his seriousness wasn't an act. It was the state of someone who had truly gathered his mind inward, allowing his whole being to settle naturally.

For a nine-year-old to achieve that was already rare.

At last, the temperature was right.

Tang Wulin pressed the button with his left hand, and the heavy silver slowly rose from the Forging Furnace. It glowed a perfect red, neither scorched nor overheated. His judgment of the heat was precise.

The Evaluator immediately made a note on her clipboard.

Eight or nine out of ten people working with heavy silver for the first time would misjudge the temperature. Too early, and they couldn't work it through; too late, and they damaged its grain. Tang Wulin had pressed the button at exactly the right moment. That meant he hadn't merely seen heavy silver before—he had truly worked with it.

Tang Wulin didn't rush to strike.

He crouched, opened the backpack beside him, and took out a pair of short, jet-black hammers.

Thousand-Refined Tungsten Steel Hammers.

The hammers weren't large, but the instant they entered his hands, the boy's entire bearing visibly changed. Both short hammers rested steadily in his grip without the slightest strain, as though they belonged in his palms.

Cen Yue's gaze immediately fixed on the pair.

Faint forging patterns were just visible on their surfaces, with a restrained sheen held beneath the blackness, neither superficial nor diffuse.

These weren't ordinary practice hammers.

The Evaluator noticed as well. Her expression shifted slightly, but she didn't speak.

With both hammers in hand, Tang Wulin grew even quieter.

His left-hand hammer first touched the heavy silver's surface lightly.

"Clink."

Once.

Then another tap followed.

"Clink."

Both test strikes were very light. They weren't blows, but probes.

Cen Yue's gaze shifted to Tang Wulin's ears. As those two clear notes rang out, his outer ears moved ever so slightly.

He was listening.

Listening to the answer the heavy silver gave him.

At that, Cen Yue's expression turned completely serious.

Knowing how to make test strikes was nothing special. Knowing what to listen for during them was where the real skill lay.

And at that very moment, Tang Wulin's first hammer had already swung out.

Shoulder, elbow, wrist—all in one seamless motion.

Not a single unnecessary movement.

"Bang!"

The right-hand Tungsten Steel Hammer slammed into the edge of the heavy silver. The sound was deep and solid. The metal's surface shuddered, and its edge was immediately pressed down a fraction.

The hammer had barely rebounded before the second strike from his left hand followed.

"Bang!"

Its landing point was slightly offset, perfectly adjoining the load-bearing edge left by the first strike.

As the two strikes landed, echoes filled the testing room.

And at last, Cen Yue's expression truly changed.

Those weren't ordinary steel-forging hammers.

They were—

Thousand-Refined Tungsten Steel Hammers.

He stared at the pair of short hammers. The first thought to flash through his mind wasn't, This child can actually lift them, but, That fellow Mang Tian actually gave him something like this to use?

He knew all too well what that meant.

Tang Wulin, however, seemed utterly oblivious to the two evaluators' reactions.

He had already immersed himself.

After those two strikes, the light in his eyes became completely steady, and his entire rhythm settled with it. The third strike, the fourth, the fifth—blow after blow fell, unhurried yet closely spaced. Hammer marks quickly began spreading evenly over the heavy silver's surface. None were deep, but every one was precise, as though its placement had been calculated in advance.

Cen Yue said nothing.

Neither did the Evaluator.

Because by this point, both of them had clearly understood one thing—

This nine-year-old child hadn't come to try his luck.

He truly understood forging.