The next day, Matt brought up his cash shop and checked out some of the crafting manuals, there was a lot of stuff in there it ranged from single weapon crafting recipes to full collections of everything in a bundle, that would be cheaper than buying everything one by one. There were many weapons and armor categories, he did have that golden hammer that he got so he probably should get some weapon crafting skills first, but wouldn’t he need something to sharpen the blade, was that hammer enough?
*What’s a crafting abode?*
He searched for the term in the store and raised his eyebrow at what he got.
*Well this doesn’t explain much, the abode can be opened? Does it put me in some kind of pocket dimension so I can craft in there? … well, that would be neat! Or does it spit out some kind of house out in the open instead?*
Matt wasn’t sure about the opening part of the explanation, he sure wanted to get that noobie bundle though even though he could only make the lowest of low items. Being curious he decided to buy it not like he had to use it right away. He looked as his points dwindled once more, spending points on skills was one of the more exciting things that a gamer could do, but it also was a chore to choose if you had limited points for it.
He waited for the crafting knowledge to invade his brain and give him a migraine once more, he closed his eyes and tried to focus on good things but the pain didn’t come and he didn’t feel any knowledge of smithing.
*Did I get scammed?*
He poked on his status screen and he soon spotted a new icon there, it looked like tongs and a hammer, crossed with each other. He hovered his finger over the new prompt being uncertain if he should click it or not. He looked outside the window, the night was dark and he couldn’t see much outside. The place didn’t have any electricity so there were no street lights around, people in this world used either fire or special magical treasures that produced light. But this village had none of that, besides simple candles and fireplaces.
Matt gulped and went for it clicking the icon and was greeted by a clung of a hammer on an anvil before a bright light filled the whole place. People could see a bright flash in his window that vanished as soon as it appeared. He felt a buzzing sound in his ears as he got momentary blinded, after rubbing his eyes he opened to find himself in another room. The walls looked like medieval castle walls, there was a giant furnace that was bubbling with liquid metal. There was a big anvil in the middle of the room with the furnace next to it, he spotted all the classical blacksmith utensils around, but they all looked kind of shabby.
*Okay, so I have my own pocked dimension to smith stuff, neat.*
There were no windows around and the room was lit by torches that were attached to the walls, plus a lot of candles here and there, the whole place had that middle-age vibe to it. He pulled his golden hammer that was supposed to have some crafting related bonuses, he swung it around hitting the anvil in the middle just to hear a nice ding sound.
*Well… shit, what am I supposed to do in here, I didn’t learn any crafting skills*
He could see some iron ingots lying around the place, but not much besides that. Matt scratched his head and brought up his window, which was a bit different as it looked like the crafting space had its own window. He could see the list of recipes that he probably previously got in the bundle listed there, it was mostly for regular weapons like daggers, swords, maces. But there were other things like fans, robes and some tools. Guess it included all the basic craftable items that were in the bundle, though they were in there and not in his head for some reason.
Matt selected a regular looking iron dagger, wondering if it would do anything and as he clicked he saw that there was an iron ingot next to the dagger picture now. As he was looking at that a little clip played of a caricature of a blacksmith picking up an ingot and placing it in the large smelting furnace and then hammering on the anvil.
*Is it showing me to place one of those ingots in the furnace? Well, not like I have anything to lose at this point.*
He shrugged and picked up an iron ingot from the pile by the wall, and slowly placed it in the furnace. After this something weird started to happen, the smelting furnace began glowing and music began playing. He then looked at the anvil in the middle of the room as an enthusiastic voice could be heard coming from it.
“Get Ready! 3………2…….1……GO!”
He was bewildered as a slab of red glowing metal appeared on the large anvil, a catchy tune began playing and some glowing green prompts started appearing on the slab.
*God damn… this is a rhythm game!?*
He had the golden hammer in his hand and started hitting the glowing green spots that turned red if they were out of sync, the whole thing took about 2 – 3 minutes and as he kept hitting the hot block of iron it started turning into the shape of a dagger.
He looked at the dagger on the anvil while some confetti got tossed in the air and then vanish soon after, he picked it up and swung it around and sure enough it was a real dagger and it was quite sharp too. Matt was a bit surprised by the whole thing but that explained why he didn’t get any direct knowledge about crafting, it just put it in the game like system and depending on how well he did in the rhythm game, the quality of the item would be decided.
*Uh… I’m not good at rhythm games…”
He sighted while tossing the dagger into his inventory, he decided to chug another ingot into the furnace and now being prepared he run up to the anvil before the countdown started. A different tune than before started playing which made him frown but he was more ready than the last time as he started hitting the spots with his golden hammer, the slab of iron glowed quite a bit as he managed to land a perfectly timed hit but this was just his second time and all things considered he did quite well though he missed here and there.
He took out the first dagger and compared it to the other one, the high grade one was shinier and it looked sharper than the first one he made. He poked at the tip with his finder wondering how sharp the thing was, but the dagger wasn’t able to inflict any damage on his superior body, that had a high body refining technique and common grade items couldn’t damage him.
“Well, I guess this is an interesting way to do it… at least It’s fast I just need to gather materials and the rest thing is automatic. I wonder if I can add some special effects to these items…”
He started playing with the crafting interface and he figured out that he could add other items to the ones that were required, the prompt only showed him the minimum required items needed.
“Wonder what will happen if I add one of those beast cores…
He had the big rabbit core on him and also the smaller crimson wolf cores that the villagers gave him previously. So he decided to test it once more, going for a regular sword now, it used up one more iron ingot then the dagger. After adding one of the cores he started hammering the now bigger slab of metal in the middle of the anvil. He started getting better and better at the game but he wasn’t perfect at it quite yet, but after getting the finished product he got surprised.
“Hm, don’t need to get a perfect score to get the highest grade item? Maybe if you add high grade materials it lowers the requirements for the items.”
Afterward he went on a weapon creation frenzy and used up all the iron ingots and cores to create perfect grade common weapons, he made a Spear, a two-handed Hammer, a Greatsword, an Axe and a Jian Sword there were all in the crimson series and looked nice and menacing as the added cores gave them a style upgrade as well.
“I need cotton fiber or leather for clothes, so I guess I’ll try those later… don’t think the hammer game will play for those though.”
He didn’t see any tailoring equipment, it looked like a forge mostly for weapons and maybe metal armor, though people in this world didn’t really wear those as they used a plethora of colorful robes and clothes. Guess you don’t need iron armor if you can make your body as hard as a diamond.