Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

Seth's eyes almost fell out of his face. This jacket alone rivaled the performance of the serpent armor! And he could combine them. The smooth metallic fabric felt cool under his touch. The inside was lined with a different warm making it unnecessary to wear any clothes below the cloth armor.

He equipped the jacket and was almost unable to feel its weight. Even so, it was weaved from metal with several layers and quilted, it felt no bit heavier or more cumbersome than his ordinary clothes.

The hems were intricately weaved and immediately gave Seth the idea to maybe embed gemstone into the cloth armor.

"Oh my god..." was all Seth could utter after staring at and feeling the armor for a long time. N?del had a self-satisfied smile on his lips, watching the joy of his client. This jacket really rivaled his best works, mostly because it was hard to get his hand on such materials.

"How...how much?" Seth stuttered. He had not expected this. He had no idea what this kind of quality work would cost him.

"Nothing. I have more than enough money. Getting the chance to work with this kind of material was already work my time." he said friendly.

Seth incredulously looked at him and then understood. N?del was similar to him. He had made a lot of money from his skills. But unlike Seth, he had a hard time finding materials, no matter how much he was ready to pay. This meant his skill stagnated. Having the chance to work with an epic-rated material, for free, was more than worth the time he invested. His reward was the proficiency gained. Next N?del put a few bundles of thread on the table. It was the material he had not needed for the armor, about a third of what Seth had given him.

"Maybe there is one thing. Do you have any more of this thread? It was my first time working with this material, I think if I had another chance, I could make an even better one."

Now that he mentioned it, the old man's skill level had increased after finishing this. Maybe the next one he made was epic rated? Unfortunately, despite Puffles making more thread in his free time, it was nowhere near the amount they had brought the first time.

"I gave you all the thread I had at the time. I only have a little more." he told N?del honestly.

"But you have some more?" as answer Seth took out the bundle that Puffles had produced in the time they had stayed in Ora. It was just a fracture of what Seth had given him before.

"At this rate, you would have enough to make another one in a few weeks. But, are you even interested in another armor made by me? Of course, it would be free again!" he reassured. He was really eager to keep working with Seth. Even more so, after knowing that Seth had a source for the material he needed so much.

It would have been stupid not to take this chance. Having a high-tier tailor owe you a favor was worth a lot. Even more, than Seth imagined. He immediately agreed. He packed up the rest of the thread and promised to come back once he had enough for another cloth armor like this.

It was afternoon. Seth had still time. There was something he definitely wanted to try right now.

He did not return to the inn but went straight down to the workshop.

At the counter was Marn happily smiling away.

"What′s up? Why are you smiling so much?"

The elf brought out several stakes of gold coins. "We had customers today and yesterday! The first in weeks. I sold one of your daggers yesterday and today a party came and bought 4 weapons at once! 3 of yours and one of the new ones I made. I′m so happy!"

This explained the sudden sunshine mood of the half-elf. He had no business in weeks and suddenly great success in two days in a row. Seth answered him with a smile and bagged the gold coins. This was his shop after all.

He continued to the smithing room, where Cerberus was still tirelessly working on making scales. After telling the golem to take a break Seth took his place on the anvil.

The first thing he brought out was his Superior Sword. He was tight on uncommon souls and he wanted at least an uncommon one for this. It was unfortunate, but now that he knew that he could salvage souls from a broken weapon, this became necessary. With the help of Cerberus, they broke the Superior Sword apart.

From the broken pieces, Seth was able to collect the uncommon orc soul. It looked slightly damaged, so this way was not the ultimate answer of how to get back souls. From the raids in the past week, he had gained another 50 souls.

The orc soul was medium-sized, so Seth started to fuse the small souls, ending up with 4 medium-sized common souls. And fused those into the orc soul. After absorbing them the soul had not only healed but also grown in power, but the description had not changed from <Soul(medium) Crafting material, Uncommon>.

With the soul powered up, Seth started to forge it with Charon′s Obol. With the jacket in mind, he forged a breastplate with long faulds to get close to the shape of the jacket. He didn′t really know if it mattered that the shape of the soul armor fit the equipment, he inserted it. Maybe it was already enough as long as they would take up the same equipment slot? No matter what, he didn′t want to take a chance here.

<Soul Armor

Uncommon

Mag-Def.: 230

1. Grants 1.7x damage against enemies with less STR

2. +310 Mana

An uncommon piece of soul armor. Can be worn as is or infused into a physical bracer. >

What Seth bet on was that he could use <Soul Infusion> to enchant equipment that could not be enchanted with engraving, inlays, or forging ballads. Namely cloth and leather pieces that could normally only be enchanted using spells. Seth took the soul engraver and started engraving a circuit for strength increase. To power the enchantment to increase the strength, the option of mana increase had lowered.

<Soul Armor

Uncommon

Mag-Def.: 230

1. Grants 1.7x damage against enemies with less STR

2. +280 Mana

3. Increase STR +15

An uncommon piece of soul armor. Can be worn as is or infused into physical armor. >

15 increase in strength was the best he could do with his current skill. There was still a lot of bonus mana left. Just one enchantment was not able to harness the full potential of the soul armor. Once his <Enchantment> skill was higher, Seth would start plastering the armor with enchantments for ALL attributes. And all the resistances. And the effect could be greater, too. But for now, his skill only sufficed to do this.

His proficiency for <Blacksmith> and <Enchantment> increased by 4% and 7% respectively.

Of course, he could have also simply worn the two separately, but he wanted to test whether he could infuse the soul into cloth armor. He could still wear them separately if it failed. Seth brought out < N?del's Golden Jacket> and started to infuse the <Soul Armor>.

It was very different from infusing a soul into a piece of armor. He could feel the soul slowly sinking into the different strands of thread the fabric was weaved from. It was similar to how he stretched the soul into different parts to infuse into the separate parts of a weapon. Just that it was the different threads that made up the cloth now.

Infusion of the soul into many different parts cost a lot of concentration and took much longer than his previous tries. Only very slowly did the soul armor start sinking into the golden jacked and matched its physical form.

Again, he could feel that at this point he could take the soul back out with <Soul Capture>. He didn't. Putting it in had cost him a lot of energy, taking it out just to see what happens was not an option. Instead, he took the jacked and dunked it into the Water of Styx to fix the soul and finish the item.

<Ding! Skill: Soul Infusion lv.3 has become Soul Infusion lv.4!>

He noticed a new perk that was added after looking at the skill's perk list. It was no wonder that he had felt like he could infuse souls into cloth and leather. the new perk was literally infusing souls into cloth and leather items.

Not only did his <Soul Infusion> level up, but he was also notified that he had created a unique item!

<Snobbish Brutes' Jacket

Unique

Phys. Def.: 500 Mag. Def.:365

1. Strengthen Defense by 45% for 10s Manacost: 70

2. Weight of the armor is halved- No cost.

3. Grants 1.7x damage against enemies with less STR

4. +270 Mana

5. Increase STR +15

Durability:3000

A high-quality cloth armor made by the experienced hands of a Tailor Craftsman N?del. Excellent weaving and sewing techniques imbued this item with overwhelming performance and effects. Special treatment by an aspiring blacksmith has boosted the performance once again. >

Now, this was an item Seth got excited about! Just the fact that it had 5 different magical effects were already awesome, even so, some of them were more useful than others. He put the jacket into his inventory and wore it via quick-equip.

Unlike increasing his strength with attribute points, he did not feel his muscles suddenly bulging as he wore the jacket. But he definitely felt more powerful having his strength boosted past 80.

In preparation for tomorrow, Seth also decided to enchant the 2 soul rings he had made before giving himself another +15 buff on strength and agility. He decided on another strength buff to take advantage of the new armor's options.

The only flaw on this awesome item was the weird name. Anyways, with this item, he felt fully prepared for the upcoming exam!

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