A Blacksmith's Visit Home · The Immortal Hammer Is Forged

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After leaving Sunset Forest, Nan Feng did not return directly to Heaven Dou City.

He led Ye Lingling onto a fork in the road heading north.

We walked for most of the day through the gentle hills surrounding the Sunset Forest, along a dirt road covered with wild grass.

The road narrowed and the trees on both sides grew denser. Eventually, even the tire tracks disappeared, leaving only two tracks of trampled grass winding through the mixed woods.

Ye Lingling walked beside him. The Nine Heart Begonia Martial Soul bloomed around her, and the pink and white petals brushed against the roadside bushes, casting a layer of light in the mixed forest.

She looked at the dirt road beneath her feet, which hadn't been repaired for years, and then at Nan Feng's familiar expression.

Where are we going?

"Blacksmith Village," Nan Feng said, "The place where I grew up."

Ye Lingling paused for a moment. She looked at Nan Feng's profile. On that usually expressionless face, the jawline relaxed slightly.

She didn't ask any more questions, and followed half a step to his side as they continued walking forward.

The grove of mixed trees at the end of the dirt road suddenly dispersed.

A small valley came into view. Dozens of houses were scattered in the center of the valley, with mud-brick houses, stone walls, and wooden fences, and smoke rising from the chimneys on the roofs.

A stream flows through the eastern side of the valley. Several waterwheels are set up along the stream, and next to them are several open-air blacksmith forges, with charcoal burning in the furnaces, and the sound of hammering can be heard from the valley.

Ye Lingling was stunned for a moment. The sounds of hammering were mixed with fluctuations of Soul Power.

"Soul Master is in the village?"

Nan Feng nodded. "A dozen or so. They were all trained using the cultivation methods I left behind back then."

The two walked into the valley. Several burly men carrying iron ingots at the village entrance looked up, the ingots slipped from their hands, and fell into the dirt at their feet.

Those people were in their early twenties, with Soul Power fluctuations around level 30 and two to three Soul Ring rings. They weren't exactly experts, but in a mountain Blacksmith Village with only a few dozen households, they were already quite formidable.

"Young Village Chief!"

A burly man who was quenching iron recognized Nan Feng. He stuck the tongs into the bucket of water, ran over in a few steps, and rubbed his hands together.

"You... you're back?"

Nan Feng looked at him. This burly man was called Tie Zhu. Back when Nan Feng left the Blacksmith Village, Tie Zhu was just a little boy who followed him around picking up scrap iron.

Now, he's over level 30, Three-Ring Soul Elder. His arms are thicker than they were back then, and the childishness on his face has been replaced by the dark red of a blacksmith.

"Tie Zhu," Nan Feng said.

Tie Zhu chuckled twice, then turned and shouted into the village, "Old Village Chief! Young Village Chief is back!"

A muffled thud came from a mud-brick house deep in the valley, like something falling to the ground. Then an old but powerful voice came from inside.

"What are you shouting for! I'm not deaf!"

Ye Lingling followed Nan Feng toward the mud-brick house. The mud-brick house was older than the other houses in the village, with moss covering the walls and the stone steps in front of the door worn shiny from being walked on.

The charcoal in the blacksmith's forge glowed red-hot. Beside the furnace sat a rough earthenware teapot and several chipped bowls.

Old Chen came out of the house.

He was over seventy years old, with completely white hair and beard, and wrinkles on his face that looked as if they had been carved by a knife. His back was ramrod straight, the muscles in his arms were still there, his palms were large, and his knuckles were covered in calluses.

He stood at the doorway, one hand on the doorframe, his cloudy old eyes staring at Nan Feng for a few moments. His gaze swept from the tower to the red ribbon on his left wrist, from the ribbon to the medal on his chest, and finally landed on Nan Feng's face.

"I'm back," Old Chen said.

Nan Feng nodded. "You're back."

Old Chen snorted and turned to walk into the house.

"Come in. There's meat stewing in the pot."

The furnishings inside were exactly the same as they had been more than a decade ago. Several hammers and pliers hung on the adobe walls, and iron ingots and charcoal blocks were piled up in the corner.

A large iron pot on the stove was stewing meat, and the aroma, mixed with the smell of charcoal fire, filled the entire house.

Old Chen sat down by the stove, stirred the meat in the pot with a spoon, and then looked up at Nan Feng again.

"You've lost weight," Old Chen said.

Nan Feng didn't reply. He sensed that the mortal Soul Power within Old Chen's soul had weakened to its limit.

His meridians were almost completely dried up, and his Soul Power was less than level one.

But the old man was in good spirits. There was a tenacity in his soul that supported him, a foundation forged by a blacksmith's lifetime of forging.

"That guy from the next village who's Investiture of the Gods," Old Chen suddenly said, "I mean, that kid Tang San."

Nan Feng looked at him.

Old Chen slammed the spoon against the edge of the pot, chuckled twice, and his face crinkled with wrinkles from laughing.

"I always said my son is promising. He's even more capable than that Investiture of the Gods from the next village."

Ye Lingling stood beside Nan Feng, petals of the Nine Heart Begonia drifting in the room. She looked at Old Chen's wrinkled, smiling face, and the corners of her mouth curved slightly as well.

Old Chen's gaze shifted from Nan Feng's face to Ye Lingling, his cloudy old eyes narrowing slightly.

Who is this girl?

"Ye Lingling," Nan Feng said.

Old Chen looked Ye Lingling up and down. His gaze swept from the Nine Heart Begonia Martial Soul blooming around her to the golden Immortal Mark on the petals, and then from the Immortal Mark to her clear eyes.

Finally, it landed back on the Nan Feng's face.

The old man nodded, asked no further questions, ladled three bowls of meat soup from the pot, and placed them on the table.

"Eat."

The three sat by the stove drinking meat soup. Old Chen rambled on as he drank, talking about the changes in the Blacksmith Village over the past ten years.

The simple Soul Power training method left behind by Nan Feng was treasured by the young people in the village. As they practiced it, they actually produced more than a dozen Soul Master. Tie Zhu was the most promising one among them, with his Soul Power already at level thirty-eight.

Two years ago, I went to Heaven Dou City to participate in the Soul Master certification and came back with a Soul Elder badge, which caused a stir throughout the entire Blacksmith Village.

"That kid Tie Zhu is using Soul Power to forge iron now." Old Chen slammed his bowl on the table. "One hammer blow and the iron ingot is formed instantly, which saves time. But the finished product lacks soul. I've told him so many times, forging iron requires heart, what kind of skill is it to use Soul Power?"

Nan Feng drank his meat soup without replying.

Ye Lingling asked, "Senior Old Chen, you've been forging iron your whole life, are you still forging now?"

"I'll work," Old Chen said. "I feel uncomfortable if I don't work every day. But now I'm old and can't work on big things anymore, so I work on small things."

Nan Feng put down the bowl, stood up, and walked to the anvil in the corner.

On the anvil were several small, finished items: a sickle, a few iron nails, and a small iron tower model.

The small pagoda had nine stories, and the doors on each story were carved with exquisite craftsmanship. Nan Feng picked up the small pagoda and weighed it in his hand.

The engravings on the tower were exactly the same as those on the tower in his palm. Nine layers of doors, a precious pearl at the top.

"Did you make this?" Nan Feng asked.

Old Chen walked over from the stove, stood next to him with his hands behind his back, and looked at the small tower.

"I just did it for fun when I was bored. I carved it based on your tower."

Nan Feng placed the small tower back on the anvil. He sensed an obsession within Old Chen's soul, a conviction that had existed since the day he left the Blacksmith Village more than a decade ago. That obsession solidified a bit when the old man forged this small tower.

The Nan Feng lifted the tower to its chest. The nine-story bronze tower spun around in the blacksmith's shop, and the lapis Immortal Mark on its body and the engravings on the small iron tower on the anvil both lit up at the same time.

He reached out and took the small iron tower, drawing out a stream of golden Immortal Power from its body and injecting it into the tower.

A layer of fine, Immortal Mark emerged on the surface of the small iron tower, originating from the same source as the lapis lazuli Immortal Mark on the tower body.

"I'll take this little tower with me," Nan Feng said, "As a keepsake."

Old Chen's chin twitched. He turned around with his hands behind his back and took two steps toward the stove.

"Whatever you like." The old man's voice was still the same, but the last syllable was slightly softer.

Nan Feng spent the entire day in the blacksmith's shop.

He had Old Chen relight the blacksmith's forge and pulled out a fist-sized ingot of immortal iron from the corner of the wall. It was a scrap of Chaos Stone that he had brought back from the Heaven Dou Imperial Palace's treasury, which he hadn't used up yet.

The iron ingots glowed red-hot in the furnace. Nan Feng held pliers in his left hand and picked up Old Chen's hammer, which he had used for most of his life, with hammer marks all over its surface.

"Use my hammer?" Old Chen watched from the side.

"Use your hammer," said Nan Feng.

With a single strike of his hammer, the immortal iron ingot struck the anvil with a deep thud. Golden Immortal Power seeped into the ingot from the hammer's surface, causing the dark patterns on its surface to glow for a moment.

Old Chen watched from the side, his cloudy old eyes brightening. He saw the dark patterns rearranged under the hammering, condensing into cyan-gold Immortal Mark.

Nan Feng hammered for an hour. Each strike was infused with Primordial World Immortal Power, and each strike rewrote the internal patterns of the immortal iron ingot.

The iron ingot took shape under his hammer. From a square ingot, it was stretched, flattened, and rolled up, finally becoming the shape of an iron hammer.

The hammerhead is round and heavy, with a nine-story pagoda pattern engraved on its surface, surrounded by Primordial World Immortal Mark. The handle is carved from a piece of century-old ironwood treasured by Old Chen, and hemp rope is wrapped around it.

The Nan Feng delivered its final blow. The hammer bounced on the anvil, and the tower and Immortal Mark on its surface lit up for a fleeting moment.

The entire iron hammer gleamed with a warm, cyan -Golden Immortal, and Immortal Power was concentrated in the hammerhead.

Old Chen walked over from the side, reached out and picked up the hammer, weighing it in his hand. The hemp rope on the handle was positioned perfectly on the calluses on his palm, and the hammerhead was neither too big nor too small, almost the same size as the hammer he had used for most of his life.

"It's made of Immortal Iron," Nan Feng said. "It can ward off evil spirits and also be used as Soul Tool. The tower pattern on the hammerhead, when infused with Soul Power, can trigger Power of Mountain Suppression, preventing Soul Master below the Foundation Establishment from getting within three steps of you."

Old Chen examined the hammer for a long time, turning it over and over. The tower pattern on the hammerhead shone in the furnace fire, and the Immortal Mark spread from the hammerhead to the handle, blending with the calluses on Old Chen's palms.

Old Chen's chin twitched again. He slammed the hammer down on the anvil, the sound of the hammer making the small nails on the anvil jump.

"Okay," Old Chen said, his voice a half-tone deeper than before, "I'll use this for blacksmithing from now on."

He turned around and walked towards the stove, waving goodbye to Nan Feng and Ye Lingling with his back to them.

"It's getting dark, let's stay here. We'll leave tomorrow morning."

That night, Nan Feng slept on the earthen kang (heated brick bed) he used to sleep on as a child. The kang was heated, and the bedding had just been aired, carrying the smell of sunshine and charcoal fire mixed together.

Ye Lingling slept in the empty room that Old Chen next door had cleaned up.

Nan Feng closed his eyes in the darkness. He sensed that Old Chen in the next room turned over and soon began snoring.

The embers in the blacksmith's forge had been sealed, but the residual heat still lingered in the room. The newly forged, Immortal Mark iron hammer on the anvil sat beside Old Chen's pillow, its pagoda-like patterns gleaming with a bluish-gold light in the darkness.

The light connected with the silver-white Soul Power patterns on Nan Feng's left wrist red hairband, and with the tower in his palm.

It also connects with the cyan-gold light emanating from the Blue Silver Grass Fields outside Holy Soul Village. In the night of Blacksmith Village, these lights resonate together.

Nan Feng opened his eyes and looked at the beams of the adobe house in the darkness.

Hanging from the roof beam are several pieces of iron he made when he was a child, crooked and twisted, Old Chen has kept all this time.

He smiled.