Golden Artificer c4 (Patreon)

After filling up the tank with water, Marcus went to work on his weapon. For a while, he thought about how he should do it. 

Instead of settling on the final product immediately, he decided to go with something like growth type.

But this growth won’t be simple. Since he was in a world that imitated MMOs, why not use MMO weapons?

That right. He will make a weapon which can improve. It will have the ability of refinement. Well, it's not the weapon’s ability. More like the forge itself.

His weapon, his Katana, will be able to send sharp waves of energy. Since it will be runes, there is more space for other abilities. From his calculations he should be able to add at least two more before the blade would crumble from the sheer mana.

But this is where his refinement forge comes into play. For this to work, he needs lots of mana.

To counter the mana upkeep, he will use the mana stones he could find in the Dungeon.

With ideas ironed out, Marcus created a mould for his weapon and started to melt the steel ingots.

After the steel melted, he poured the liquid metal into the mould. 

The liquid metal took the shape of a single-blade sword. After inspection, the Alchemist began creating runes for the blade on the spare fabric he had. He used charcoal to write on it.

He needed a couple of tries to get a reaction. Runes like these were nothing for someone who, in his previous life, programmed an AI through nothing but runes.

But even so, the world he was in. It made him annoyed how much he had to carve to make even basic effects.

With runes finished the Alchemist went to create a handle. 

Now…

It was the hardest part.

He needed to select a colour for the handle and the guard.

“Hmm…”

For a couple of minutes, he pondered. He even ended up sitting on the ground as he crossed his arms.

“Well. It will be something I will be using for a while. Hell, maybe even for the rest of my life.”

As he realised that that meant the weapon had to be looking good. Something he won’t lose interest in.

At that moment, he recalled one blade, which was amazing.

“...Yamato…Yeah… I can dig that.” Marcus nodded to himself before pulling out another fabric. He started to draw the guard. 

It has been a lot of years since he played Devil May Cry. A lot of years.

After a couple of tries, his memory got triggered, and he drew two half-circles, which will be the guard. He added parts, which will be in gold, and the handle, which is supposed to be white.

With that done, he grinned as he proceeded to make some gold and, of course, more moulds.

He needs to make the guard as authentic as possible.

A while later, as the blade guards were cooling off, Marcus proceeded to sharpen the blade with mana-infused rocks.

He took his time as he needed to make sure the blade was very sharp.

Then he took his time to balance the blade, and eventually, it was time to add runes. 

For that he took the blade to his runic table, where he proceeded to once again take his sweet time carving those runes.

Without even realising a couple of days have passed. But the blade was finished. What has left the guards and the handle, which, once again, he didn’t rush and took his sweet time.

And so his weapon was finally done.

Marcus looked at Yamato, his sword.

On the blade, there were a few rows of letters. Though six of them were in English. It was the word ‘Yamato’.

The name of the Katana.

After inspecting and checking the balance, it was time for a test run. Marcus left the house and looked at one of the walls. He took a stance—the water stance, with the blade, lifted and ready for swinging.

Mana poured into the katana. The letters glowed on the blade the moment he swung. A sharp, wind-like sword slash rushed at the wall, cutting it deeply.

“Beautiful…Finally, all that work paid off.” The alchemist smiled, but then he looked at his hands, which were trembling from the strain.

“But it appears my body is not ready yet.”

Marcus wanted to get to dungeon diving soon. But the katana was too heavy for his body. He might swing it a couple of times, but it won’t be useful for prolonged battles.

“In that case, It’s time to build a gym.”

After inspecting his sword for one more time, the Alchemist returned to his house.

It was time to build some more.

~~~

“Hmm…” The silver-haired girl continued to stare into the distance.

“What is it? You have been staring at that place for days now.” 

“I do think I found an interesting kid.” She turned around and looked at him.

“Hmm?”

“A kid with an eastern sword has been practising inside a barrier.” She said with an intrigued tone.

“...A barrier? Where?”

She pointed at slums.

“...There?”

“Yes. while it's strong. Nothing like I have seen in a while. It only got stronger recently. If not for my preparations, I wouldn’t have noticed it.” Alfia said with a small smile. Before telling the most interesting part.

“The thing which intrigued me the most is that there are no adults around him. He is doing everything by himself.”

She explained what had intrigued her.

If this kid continued like this from such a young age, then he should surpass them.

Regardless, the pair had nothing to do until they got a signal from someone. In the girl’s case, she decided to continue to watch what this kid would do.

However, his action only made her more baffled.

The kid expanded the house—in the most literal sense, he built an extension to a house. She had never seen magic used in such a way before.

After a few more days, she decided that her curiosity couldn’t be denied anymore.

So she simply strolled in.

~~~

Marcus' eyes perked up as he saw an image of a girl with silver hair. His security system reacted. He saw a girl in his mind dressed in Goth-like clothes, and her eye colours… Heterochromia…

“How the fuck she strolled through my barrier like that!?” The alchemist and Inventor mumbled to himself as he grabbed Yamato and walked out.

“There you are. I wanted to meet you.” 

The inventor immediately realised that he was dealing with annoying kind of females.

‘This little girl… what should I do with you?’

“Don’t look at me like that.” She said that while not even looking at him.

The inventor realised that this girl stopped looking at him after walking inside his barrier but she can still understand that he is looking at her.

‘So she is a magic user. Not that I care.’

“What is it you want, girl?”

There was a reaction from her. She didn’t like his attitude at all.

“Someone needs etiquette training.”

Now Marcus' eyebrows twitched.

“Indeed. For one, just because you can pass my barrier doesn’t automatically translate that you are in all clear. Let me teach you what happens when you enter Grand Sorcerer’s home, Little Girl.” As the inventor said that he motioned with his hand.

Alfia’s eyebrows rose. She wondered what he would do, but at that moment, she felt that her body had become heavy.

“What is this?” She looked confused for a second. There was no chant!

“Oh? So you are that strong? Amusing…”

At that moment, her eyes widened as she dropped to her knees.

Then she felt like her organs were going to erupt!

‘I can’t move my body! No way!’

As she was struggling, Marcus walked over as he pulled out his sword.

“Now then…”

Before he can comment an armoured guy with a sword lunged at Marcus with impressive speed.

Marcus simply made him slower while he became faster. This allowed him to dodge the armoured guy easily.

“Damn! What the hell are you, kid?”

The guy was surprised to see how effortlessly his attacks were dodged.

“Get lost.”

With casual motion, the guy became weightless before being blasted away from the barrier.

His actions were seen by the girl, who slightly moved to the side. She lay on the ground properly as she felt that her spine and leg bones would break soon.

“To think that you can survive gravity of ten times that of Earth. You people of this world are quite strong.” Marcus said that as he noticed her moving.

“... ’This world’?” 

The girl immediately understood that this guy was similar to Gods who descented from Tenkai.

“Precisely…Hmm, I know… I will keep you.” He said with a realisation.

This was perfect! He will have someone to talk to, and she might also help him maintain his place.

“...I am not a property…” She struggled but showed him a fearless look.

“Haah… for someone who has nearly blown organs to bits, you sure talk big.” He chuckled before walking over and collecting something from his house.

He walked over and showed her a collar.

“...No… don’t you dear put that on me!” She struggled but was able to move into a sitting position.

“Gospel.”

Marcus reacted immediately as he slapped her attack aside. What she did was sound attack. It was a wave…

“Now that is just cute… you are using waves… that’s like the most disadvantageous thing you could possibly do.” He chuckled as he got close.

“I studied waves for over a hundred years.” He said that as he made her float in the air.

She tried to get her feet on the ground while in the air, but her legs could not reach the ground.

Alfia struggled for a bit before she realised that this was even worse than being pinned to the ground.

The girl tried to say something, but no voice was leaving her mouth.

‘T-This kid…’

With no voice coming out, she can’t chant!

As she tried to think of ways of getting out, Marcus looked at her from several angles.

One thing is for sure: this girl is a beauty. While he tried to lower the amount of interactions he was doing in his previous life. It was what led him to die alone in space.

“Hmm. Since you don’t want a collar, girl. What about becoming my maid? I will even make you strong since you are quite weak. Sure, your durability is not bad, but that is just one thing.” He said with a pondering tone.

He allowed her to talk after saying that.

“...Strong? Don’t mock me!”

She got snappy all of a sudden, but this was where Marcus decided that he had enough games.

He summoned his aura, which became visible to the naked eye. He used his aura alone to make him drop to the knees as he was no longer making her float.

“For someone who is a frog in a well. You sure are arrogant.”

He grabbed her hair and brought her face closer to his.

“This is your last chance, girl. It has been several hundred years since I considered some sort of company. But since you don’t want to, I will kill you and then reuse your body to make some sort of maid.”

At that moment, she actually felt fear washing her over as she could not even speak as those glowing eyes made her realise that she just jumped on someone more terrifying than an Evil God who was not hiding his Arcanium.

“F-Fine… it's not like I have much to time to life…” She said that after the pressure has lessened.

“,,,Huh…” He channelled his mana into her as he scanned her whole body.

“I see. I forgot that you humans are quite fragile. Imagine having diseases.” He chuckled while letting her go.

After shaking his head, he spoke to the confused girl, who realised that she had gotten into something crazy…

“This is what I said, girl. You are weak. I will prepare a ritual which will remove whatever pesky thing you have.”

“... It's an inborn disease. There is no cure to it.” She said with a frown.

“As I said, let me prepare a ritual, and who said about curing. If you can’t cure it, then just remove it.” His eye rolled.

Alfia looked at him walking away, and she could hear him complaining about living with cavemen.

‘What did I get myself into?’

Seriously, as someone who was at the peak of the world not long ago, she got humbled…bad…