The next day, the Hollows cleared two more bosses. The Ember Golem, and the Fang Tanker.

  Both bosses survived being fed potions. The Ember Golem’s skulls grew rampant, gaining an ability to shoot projectiles out of their mouths. The Fang Tanker gained a summoning skill of sorts. It pulled little fanglings from the ground as additional warriors.

  Even with the enhanced strength, the Hollows defeated both bosses easily. The other squadron bosses were simple compared to the Elder Gnoll. Aang could have defeated them alone. All together, the Hollows had no risk of losing.

  Rohan stayed home for now. Vivi asked again if he was recovering. Ven told her to not worry about it.

  So the fighting continued. Vivi was given the honor of demolishing the Fang Tanker with her new sword enhancement skill. Her dark mithril crush sword cut right through the exo-skeleton, spraying wisps everywhere. The boss died even faster than the first time.

  Neither boss dropped skills, but both dropped over a thousand wisps of ether. The wisps were saved in containers to eventually use to clear Vivi’s debts.

  Despite the good results, Lucius was annoyed that they hadn’t earned another skill. He suggested they head straight for the Mist Arachne, killing the fourth squadron boss as well.

  Aang gave him a firm no. The Hollows typically cleared one or two bosses each cycle. They’d already made an exception by killing three, including the Elder Gnoll. The Stewards would be suspicious enough, finding the Elder Gnoll two weeks weaker than usual.

  “End cycle will move slightly differently this time,” Aang said after defeating the Fang Tanker. “Vivi’s smithy is inside home base. We can’t have her away from runesmithing for two more weeks straight. Alisa and Vivi will continue operations within the hidden dungeon.” He turned to Alisa. “We will be keeping a close eye on guard patrols. You will not kill a single monster. Move exclusively within the crawl spaces, and only between home base and the exits. During end cycle, the only job in the hidden dungeon is to let Vivi continue runesmithing.”

  “Sounds good,” Alisa said. “Any complaints?”

  “I’m okay with that,” Vivi said. “Am I allowed to move without Alisa?”

  “Only in emergencies,” Aang said. “Not because I don’t trust you—you’ve learned the map well enough—but it’s always safer to move as two. Ensuring your safety is Alisa’s most important job for the next end cycle.”

  “Jeez,” Alisa said. “I’ve been promoted to a bodyguard!”

  “And it actually is a promotion,” Ven said.

  Alisa smiled at Vivi. “Guess we’ll be moving together more, then?”

  “Awwy!” Eem said, hugging Alisa’s foot.

  “Emmy is allowed to come with us, right?” Alisa said.

  “Sure,” Aang said. “Emmy can keep you company.”

  Eem’s face lit up, and Alisa smiled. They gave each other a high five.

  “The rest of us will gather our items from home base before returning to the Union’s hub,” Aang said. “Vivi will continue practicing with Ven, Rohan, and Alisa whenever she has free time.” He turned to Vivi. “All of us have our main weapons now. I can’t ask you to craft more powerful swords. However, I know craftsmen can get sick if they’re separated from their workstations for too long. From now on, you have free hands to use the smithy as you like.”

  “Aang…” Vivi said. “I don’t know how to tell you this, but the swords we wield right now are not great.” Trash, she wanted to say. Really, the swords she had crafted so far were nothing special. “We don’t have a single three-runed sword yet. My Grandpa could fit five runes into one sword. I need a lot of sleepless nights to catch up. My work from the smithy is far from completed. I’m going to need thousands more ether roots and crucibles to come.”

  Ven rolled his eyes with a funny smile. Aang listened with a serious expression. “Very well. I will leave you to the smithy. Soon, you will have to start accepting payments.”

  “I’ll have to craft a sword worth asking money for, then,” Vivi said. “How long can I spend in the smithy today?”

  Aang sighed. “Until the next collection day. Alisa, watch that Vivi doesn’t die from overwork. And Vivi, make sure you don’t forget your swordsmanship practice.”

  Vivi lowered her head. “Alisa, take me to the smithy, please.”

  ***

  Faced with her anvil, Vivi stretched her fingers, readying for a new runesmithing spree. She still heard the others chatting and moving about in the next room over. Soon, they would leave, and Vivi would have the base all to herself. Locked up in a smithy with Lucius for over twenty four hours. Her water barrel was filled, and pieces of bread and cold fishes were left for her to eat.

  “Are we finally going to craft a three-runed sword?” Lucius asked, flying excitedly.

  “We’ll try,” Vivi said. “The last time, I required months worth of attempts to successfully craft one. The second time will probably take less, but I’m rusty.”

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  “Hhmmm,” Lucius said curiously. “Three runes are a lot more powerful than two, right? The ancient dwarfs were proud of their three-runed masterpieces.”

  “Yes,” Vivi said. “Properly smithed three-runed swords are far stronger than two-runed variants. Truly powerful rune combinations are unlocked at three runes. Mass and sharpness makes for a great heavyweight monster slayer with just two runes, but adding a swiftness rune also makes the sword easy to swing. Alternatively, you can add a crush rune to pretty much any rune combination to add damage. Three-runed swords are insane.”

  “What about four, then?” Lucius asked.

  “Improvements after three are less substantial,” Vivi said. “There’s only so much ether you can cram into metal at once. But Grandpa did come up with a few ridiculous combinations. He built the classic monster slayer mass, sharpness, swiftness sword, and added a shockwave rune as the second set of veins. Every swing that the sword made came out as a projectile. Grandpa couldn’t wield the sword properly, since non-spirit wielders can’t control their ether, but he managed to cut a boulder from a range with the sword.”

  Lucius was brimming with excitement. “Let’s make that!”

  Vivi sighed. “It had four runes, Lucius. I’ll struggle just to fit three.”

  She squeezed the first ether root between the vise’s jaws and gathered her tools. She had around thirty ether roots in total, four of which Vivi could consider rare. The rest of the roots were average or cheap. For her first attempts, Vivi picked up an iron root to use as the core of her work.

  Spending rare roots for difficult projects that had a high chance of failing was rarely worth it. Even Grandpa only used cheap roots for his five-runed swords and six-runed attempts. The difference in power between ether roots wasn’t that massive. At most, an adamantite root could be ten percent more efficient compared to a more simpler iron root.

  Vivi got to work shaping the veins. The exact vision wasn’t clear in her head yet, but she knew she wanted to craft another, stronger, skeleton cutter greatsword.

  The core rune will distribute a strength or a mass rune, Vivi thought while the main stalk of the iron root grew. The first ether root was always the easiest part, but Vivi already had to plan ahead, leaving enough space for the next two roots to accompany the core. Space was often the limiting factor when it came to three-runed swords. Three ether roots worth of veins had to be crammed closely together without interfering with each other.

  A few hours later, Vivi completed the core root. She nodded, satisfied. So far, nothing had gone catastrophically wrong.

  She carved the hole through the bottom of the core root’s hilt, exactly as she’d do with a two-runed blade. In essence, the techniques used for the three-runed veins were the same as with two-runed swords. Three-runed swords just had to fit a third ether root, and as a result, were a lot more difficult to craft.

  As the stalks of the second root joined the core root, Vivi leaned close to her work and focused. She’d chosen a simple green mithril root to use for the crush rune.

  She guided the green mithril stalks to coil around the core stalk. The mithril stalks resembled a coiled spring weaving around the straight core root.

  Branches extended outward from the coils. For the crush rune to be effective, its powers needed to be spread evenly toward the sword’s blade. The branches had to extend as far outward as they could, while also leaving enough space for the third ether root to fit. Leaving the crush branches short meant the rune’s effects would be inefficient. However, if the branches spread too far or wide, fitting the third ether root would be difficult.

  Grandpa made the process possible with a technique he called looping. Vivi had learned the technique during the last two years. The name was quite literal.

  Vivi twisted each mithril branch up and around, leaving a circular loop. Each loop was large enough to fit an ether root’s stalk through. The loops had two purposes: to further spread the branches to use space to the maximum, and to leave a hole for the third root to traverse.

  The loops were also ridiculously difficult to shape properly. If one was made slightly too small or large, ether would be asymmetrically distributed. Asymmetry was death when inside carving. A sword with asymmetrical veins would likely snap in half.

  Vivi had to juggle two mithril stalks at the same time on each side of the sword, often shaping two loops at the same time. She had mere seconds to work on one loop before the one on the opposite side required attention. To fill a full greatsword with branches, Vivi required at least ten branches on both sides. Each branch required a loop.

  That meant Vivi had to prepare over twenty loops in total. Each one required concentration, and there was little to no margin for error. She worked with absolute focus, knowing that the slightest error would mean starting over.

  There were no breaks. After the ether root was initiated, Vivi had no choice but to finish her work or give up. She shaped the loops and branches with perfect focus, while also guiding the mithril stalks up their correct paths.

  She wasn’t practicing in Grandpa’s smithy anymore. Whether she succeeded now could be the difference between winning or losing a fight. Losing a fight could mean losing a friend. Vivi didn’t have time for failures anymore.

  That fact made her nervous. She shaped the branches, guiding the loops with years of practice behind her back. But her hands were shaking. Her body was filled with pressure. The closer she got to success, the more nervous she became. She had to focus. She had to succeed. She had to—

  Her hand slipped. The crochet hook fell from its hold, slipping slightly out of place. She quickly fixed her mistake, but the damages were done.

  “Ahh,” Vivi said, staring at her veins. She bit her lip and stepped back.

  Lucius blinked, looking surprised. “What happened?”

  “The sword is ruined. You can stop pouring ether,” Vivi said.

  The mithril root continued to grow aimlessly at the pace of a snail until Lucius reluctantly stopped the flow of ether. The root cauterized, never to be reignited again. “But why?” Lucius asked. “What happened?”

  “Look at that loop,” Vivi said, pointing at the seventh branch on the right side of the veins. “It’s not circular, and it’s slightly larger than its opposing loop on the left. I can see the difference with my eyes.”

  “What’s the big deal?” Lucius asked. “It’s just a loop. Surely, we can continue?”

  “No, if we finish this, the sword will break,” Vivi said. “Sometimes, the veins snap even if everything looks good. If there’s an error that’s visible to the eye, it’s definitely ruined. The veins are asymmetrical. There’s nothing we can do. This sword failed.”

  “That’s it?” Lucius asked. “The sword failed just because you made a miniscule error with the loopy loop?”

  “Yep,” Vivi said. “That’s all it takes. Vein-shaping is insane.”

  Lucius floated there in bafflement, staring at her. “What do we do now, then?”

  Vivi untied the ether root from the vise and tossed the veins aside. The first root was ruined too, as it had combined with the failed second root. After the process had started, the veins couldn’t be separated.

  She picked up another iron root and twisted it on the vise. “We start from scratch, and we try again.”

  way more difficult to describe than I imagined. Let me know if you feel like you got an image on how the process goes. If some paragraphs or sentences were confusing, I will gladly clarify and improve the descriptions.

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