The ability to temporarily boost my physical stats was amazing alongside the ability to not look like a cheesy slasher villain was appreciated. Alongside the Title which would be at best a once and awhile use, or at least I could hope was still a nice cherry on top.
Also most importantly it would prepare me for the Giants, Ogres, and Yeti which sounded like the start of a bad joke. Stretching I felt like well shit, stumbling forward I walked slowly up to the secluded part of the caves. It was both painful and painfully slow to make to my place of rest. From there I slowly peeled off every piece of my armour. Sagging In relief I then proceeded to pass the fuck out.
...
Roughly Twelve Hours Later...
...
I awoke to pain, my skin was raw and angry, muscles I didn't know I had where sore. Laying there in my bed I looked down at my arms, pockets of new pink flesh were marred by pocket mark scars that were deep and a mix between beige, black, and a hint of maroon and with a thought they disappeared or more accurately disappeared from my eyes. To my nerves though they still throbbed with random sharp needle like pains.
Sitting up despite my pain and swung my feet to the floor, thankfully the soles of my feet weren't burned. Thanking out the small box of supplies and my weapons. It soothed me as I slowly and deliberately wiped away the dirt on my armor. Next I used a rock to roughly nock out some of the larger dents allowing the armour to better mend its self. Next I began to polish the metal back and forth making my reflection more and more distinguished. I looked at my face the shimmering reflection showed back my face at me, and I couldn't recognize myself. Something in the back of mind seemed to not fully get the memo of the total sum of my experiences as it whispered that this wasn't me.
Putting aside the armour I picked up something equally unrecognizable. The once mass produced baseball bat had transformed, just like me in a kinda of way. Once mortal and now something just a tad bit more. Then I began to free its rough exterior of grim and the muck of war. Then I moved down the line of my weapons, after that though my body demanded food and once again it was the bland random vegetable matter soup. After polishing off three or so bowls I went back to my bed to pass out again.
...
Another day Later...
...
I slowly sat up and this time the pocket marks of burnt flesh had healed substantially. Leaving me feeling good enough to began forging again this time though I had an idea. I began to experiment, building a stockpile of bronze I began to sketch out different types of weapons and armour pieces that I could remember.
Picking a helmet design I had seen a few times during various media interpretations of ancient Greece.
Corinthian Helmet the go to Hollywood helmet, and their was a golden reason for doing so, it was easily one of the best looking helmets of that period of Greece.
Taking an Ingot I heated it slowly, enough to make it mailable and then I slowly began to hammer it into a head shape. Then I began forging the indentation that would become the eye holes. The end result was a slightly off kilter helmet, this was easily fixed as I used [Geomancy] to form a sphere, placing the helmet on it, I began to form the rock sphere into the image of a Corinthian Helmet then began to hammer the actual Helmet to that shape.
...
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
[Star Flared Corinthian Helmet]
Rank Two Uncommon Helm
This item is forged in the image of a variation of the Hyrlunm Helm that originates from a defunct Terran Civilization. Forged from High Purity Aluminum Bronze smelted and heated by Cosmic Fire this item has been influenced by the Stars.
Effects: [High Purity Alloy], [Legacy of Corinth], and [Sapling of the Stars]
-[Legacy of Corinth]
This item is imbued with the legacy of the Corinthians, forged by one bearing their ancestry this item has the ability to temporarily reinforce Fortified positions
-[Sapling of the Stars]
The original design this helmet is based on came from the Hyrlunmi which records bled over to the infantile world of Terra combined with the cosmic energies that this item was saturated in this item has the ability bind with the user permanently giving it and its wearer the ability to grow together in power.*
*Warning once worn this item can never be removed
...
Well dam this was a nice helmet, and the tidbit about the forger being of Corinthian descent wasn't a huge surprise, my great grandmother was from Kalamata or was it Kardamyli. Either way didn't matter but it was cool. What was not cool was the whole spiel about it bonding permanently made it only viable for the Puppets.
Placing it the corner to slowly cool, I took another Ingot I began to forge something else. This was going to be something special, a began to forge a long thin metal pole with a hefty chunk at the end. Flattening the chuck into a rough axe head, I began to refine and put embellishments into the Axe head, as I forged I pushed cursed energy the dregs of my hatred to the now permanently dead undead.
Finally done with the metal place I took a nice piece of still live wood. Forming the wood around the Axe I created fine and delicate scenes of Victory and Betrayal of the fight. Finishing I felt my body protesting from the hammering and forging. Placing the Axe to the side as I decided against inspecting it for now until I could name it.
Then I moved on to producing large batches of swords and helmets finishing one part of all of them before moving on.
...
After finishing some batch productions of gear, I moved onto something else. I had a single missing part of equipment, a Shield and I needed a really good shield. Previously I had thought that my armor and some temporary shields would work but apparently not. First off I needed an alloy the best alloy possible, so I delved into my memories of chemistry class and the earth. I found a series of metal that would be incredibly rare and impossible to refine however that wasn't a problem for me.
The problem of heating was solved when Anastasia discovered a corpse of Hardwoods. After making several large batches of charcoal I finally managed to get enough. The hard part was getting the Vanadium to melt as if I remembered correctly it was roughly double the smelting point of copper. I would have to rig the crucible to have a burst of intense heat like my [Cosmic Flare] it wasn't cost effective enough to do anything beyond the very small amounts of Vanadium I would need.
With everything planned out I began to craft, it started slow I had to slowly melt the other metals together making sure to not let them cool before adding the next metal. As I got to the Vanadium I activated the blast of Cosmic fire... and it supercharged the heating enough that I could smelt the Vanadium creating the base alloy.
Now for the shape I had chosen something or more accurately some part of me whispered to me, a classical Greek aspis. I didn't know why but it felt perfect. Slowly I began to hammer the alloy into a circular shape and then began to shape the base of the handle. From there I began to slowly influence the concepts taking hold focusing on 'Durability', 'Invincibility', and 'Power'.
Then a feeling descended upon me, like a feeling of absolute but estoteric knowledge. Flipping it to the inside I formed a small peen hammer. Slowly I formed the backside of images. i created the outlines of cities, stars and of humans. It was a backdrop of what I was protecting, as this shield would protect me.
I created the points of two recognizable constellations, the Ursa Major and Orion's Belt. The Others came to me and they vaugely familiar but ultimately foreign to me.
Unbeknownst to me it took three days of labor to craft this shield to me it was all I could see the vauge outline.
Then as my eyes grew heavy and my body grew lightheaded and I could feel my bones I finished and before I could inspect I passed out.
...
Anastasia's P.O.V
...
I had watched in fascination as Kien Diligently worked on the Shield and I saw the foreign landscapes and things Kien had only described to me once it twice formed out of a golden bronze. It was beautiful sight. After Kien Passed out I had some puppets gently pick him up and carry him to his bed.
