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nTranslator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales

nAbel felt something biting his leg. As he looked down on the ground, he saw Black Wind playfully gnawing its teeth on his pants. He picked up the puppy, held his arms around it, and began to caress it on its soft, furry back. Black Wind looked like a miniature dog now. While it was still small enough to be picked up, the money that was spent on its feed was already the same as that of an adult horse.

nAfter being disturbed by the Black Wind, Abel no longer had the motivation to practice with his Power of the Will. Pretty soon, he picked it up and went straight to bed. While Black Wind wanted to play, it just kept on struggling while it was in Abel’s arms the entire time. It didn’t get to escape until Abel was completely asleep.

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nIn the afternoon the next day, Abel felt an itch near his face and opened his eyes. It was Black Wind, and it was licking Abel’s face with its little tongue. As Abel opened his eyes, it greeted him by barking at him twice. As the two were bound by soul, Abel could tell that Black WInd was looking for some feed. Usually, the servant would come to feed Black Wind in the morning, but Abel had slept in today, so no one bothered to knock on his door.

nA maid came in after Abel pulled on the bell near his bed. Usually, Abel wouldn’t have any servants to accompany him because of how busy he was. Besides, he was just a child, and all the other maids got their own tasks to do. If he was living in another family, he would have his own personal maid, and it’s usually someone who was young and pretty.

nAfter ordering the maid to look after Black Wind, Abel washed for a bit and called for the butler Lindsay.

n“How can I be of service, Sir?” the butler Lindsay greeted Abel with a bow.

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n“I want you to do something for me,” Abel said, and handed over his bag of 2000 coins, “I want you to buy me the best carriage you can find me.”

nLindsay looked kind of perplexed for a second. The castle was not in a shortage of carriages. One of the two carriages was reserved for the Knight of Marshall, and the other one was a spare. “If you need a carriage, we do have one available right now,” he said.

nAbel explained, “Oh no, this is for a project I’m working on. I need to get my hands on a luxury carriage as soon as possible. I need to get it done in ten days if you know what I mean.”

n“Ten days? Oh, okay. Yes, Sir. I’ll have someone prepared”

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nLindsay smiled as he had understood what Abel meant, “Yes, I will arrange for someone to buy it, and it will be quietly delivered to your workshop.”

n“Thank you, Lindsay,” Abel thanked Lindsay as he left to prepare for the Knight of Marshall’s birthday present.

nAfter the housekeeper had left, Abel stretched his waist and punched the air a few times. He was pretty much recovered by this point. As long as he didn’t use any combat qi, his body would mostly be in good shape. With the amount of stamina he had, he decided that he was going to test an idea he had before. He was thinking about forging a super ice magic sword.

nAbel came to the blacksmith shop inside the Harry Castle. After greeting everyone, Master Bentham included, he went inside his personal workshop and started drawing his blueprint.

nThe door to the workshop was closed. Ever since Abel came a Master Blacksmith, no one was to enter this place without his consent. Yes, not even Master Bentham. Abel was a figure of respect now. While everyone would distance themselves from interfering with his work, they wanted to receive his guidance in their craftsmanship.

nMaster Bentham actually wanted to have a talk with Abel today. When he saw the Knight of Marshall carrying two new swords on his back this morning, he knew Abel had just made some more masterpieces. Knowing the Knight of Marshall, if he was willing to carry two large swords on his back, the quality of the swords themselves must be high enough for him to use them to make fun of others.

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nMaster Bentham had a lot of questions, but when he saw how stressed Abel was when he greeted him, he decided to let his former student focus on his work. From what it looked like, Abel was at the peak of his craftsmanship.

nAs the rumors had it, whenever someone becomes a Master Blacksmith, there would be an outbreak of high-quality weapons for a period of time. This phenomenon was commonly known as the “outburst after accumulation” phase, with better and newer technologies coming out at once simultaneously.

nThe “outburst after accumulation” phase was probably what Abel was having. That’s what Master Bentham thought, at least. As it was a one-time glory thing, he didn’t want to ruin the young blacksmith in the midst of his prime, despite the fact that Abel was only thirteen years old.

nRight now, Abel was making a lot less of the purer swords of a hundred skills. The magic bases he used to make them were rough and were mostly half-finished products with grooves inside of them. He didn’t bother to draw any runes for them, either.

nAbel took out three ice rune inks and placed them inside the Horadric Cube. The resulting product was one intermediate ice rune ink, one which was glowing with a blue arc of light.

nAfter making his magic sword base, Abel dipped his rune pen in the ice rune ink. Luckily for him, he finished drawing the rune right before he ran out of his Power of the Will. Things were pretty easy after that. After resting himself for a bit, he was pretty much recovered.

nAbel examined his Power of the Will for a bit. Apparently, there was a very subtle increase in his total capacity of the Power of the Will. If it wasn’t for how much he had exercised his abilities, Abel wouldn’t have been so sensitive to such a change.

nAfter making sure that no one was around, Abel took out his perfect blue gem and inserted it into his card slot. He then stabilized it with some tools that he had. While doing this, he was very careful not to put too much force into the gem.

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nWith his Power of the Will completely recovered, Abel read into the rune so that blue gem’s energy path was identical to that of a perfect piece. As he had his fair share of gem forging, he knew that he had to be very careful when he was doing this.

nThe more energy there was inside, the faster the energy would travel inside the gem. One bad move and everything would fall apart.

nAs the gem was close to becoming a complete piece, a blue ray of light began to flash out of its inside. A chilling power rushed towards Abel’s conscience. While there was a bit of distance between Abel and it, he could already feel his life being threatened. Forget about making direct contact, Abel wasn’t going to let his Power of the Will touch the thing. Instead, he was just going to let it chase after him as the rune was being activated.

nAbel was sweating like a cow right now because of how anxious he was getting. The speed of his Power of the Will was traveling at two times of its normal speed. The chilling energy behind him, too, wasn’t slowing down any time soon.

nAbel guided his conscience into the rune’s center. As the energy, too, followed him to the exact same location, it was suddenly trapped by the rune itself and became less volatile by the second. Eventually, after waves after waves of direct shock, it was stabilized and held still on the spot.

nAnother blue light flashed by. Just when Abel had thought that it was a success, the sword of a hundred skill started crackling up from multiple spots. It was almost like the chilling energy was too much for it to contain.

nAs he heard the sound of the sword crackling up, Abel threw the ice magic sword into his Horadric Cube right away. While he wasn’t trying to fuse it with something else, everything that was thrown inside a cube would lose its flow of time.

nAbel touched the cold sweat on his forehead. He was betting his life on the line here. If a normal gem would knock him unconscious when he was making the explosion sword, imagine the amount of damage a perfect blue gem (made from nine of its original copy) was capable of.

nWhat kind of shield could block dynamite? What about a wall? The more that Abel had thought about it, the less he thought his chance of survival was if he just let the sword break apart.

nFor crying out loud, it a sword of a hundred skills. It was made by the most resistant materials Abel knew of, but it was not strong enough to without the impact of a perfect blue gem. Speaking of which, should Abel just let the sword stay inside the cube? If he decided to take it out, he would have three seconds to guard his body with something.

nThree seconds wasn’t short, but it wasn’t that long, either. Abel had thought about digging a giant hole before, but he didn’t think it was going to work this time. If the explosion was too strong, even the flying soil and rocks could break his face within seconds.

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