Chapter 334
Clank! Clank! Clank!
The heavy, rhythmic sound of hammers beating against metal echoed through the upper eastern section of Orario, a persistent symphony of creation that resonated from the sprawling Hephaestus Familia compound.
This was the beating heart of Orario’s craftsmanship, a crucible where the finest smiths in the city resided, transforming raw ore into weapons of legend and tools of survival.
It was also Draco's current destination.
"This place is still as noisy as ever, despite the obvious destruction," Draco mused, standing at what remained of the compound's imposing gates.
The arches and fortified walls that once defined the entrance were now a patchwork of hastily erected scaffolds and newly laid stone.
It no longer looked anything like the stronghold it had been before the war, yet the palpable energy of industry and defiance remained, a stubborn pulse echoing its former glory.
During the recent, brutal war, evilus suicide bombers had desperately tried to breach these very walls, hoping to cripple the adventurers' main supply of magic weapons.
They had failed, spectacularly and tragically, but the scars of their attempts were still visible. Explosion craters, though partially filled and paved over, pitted the ground around the compound, stark reminders of the perils faced and overcome.
Repairs were ceaseless, a constant churn of construction crews working alongside the smiths, mirroring the city's tenacious spirit.
Shaking off the grim distractions of the past, Draco stepped through the makeshift entrance.
His eyes, sharp and discerning, scanned the bustling areas.
Other smiths, clad in leather aprons and smudged with soot, toiled at open-air anvils, their faces grimly determined, their movements honed by years of arduous labor.
The air hummed with heat and the acrid tang of coal smoke, overlaid with the metallic scent of fresh-cut steel.
Ignoring the cacophony and the curious glances he drew as a dragon-kin, Draco followed a familiar, winding route, his gaze fixed straight ahead.
His destination was not just any workshop, but Tsubaki private forge, a hallowed space that few met the stringent requirements to enter.
Tsubaki, a master among masters, famously abhorred distractions during her work, safeguarding her focus with an almost religious fervor.
Reaching the unassuming, reinforced door of her workshop, Draco paused.
Even through the thick wood, he could discern the rhythmic beat of her hammer, a deeper, more resonant thud than the lesser smiths' work.
It was the sound of a master fully immersed.
She was working.
Still, etiquette demanded a knock.
He rapped once, a firm, distinct sound against the heavy plank.
He waited.
No reply.
The rhythmic thud inside continued, interrupted.
He knocked twice, then thrice, each time a little louder, but the only response was the undiminished cadence of her craft.
With a soft click, he decide to turn the brass handle and push the door open.
However, a massive wave of heat immediately assaulted him, pressing in like a physical force.
It was an inferno, a living, breathing beast of heat that would wilt an ordinary person.
For Draco, a Level 5 adventurer and dragon-kin, this level of heat was less bothersome than it was concerning.
The room itself seemed to glow, as if the air itself had caught fire.
Closing the door quietly behind him, Draco allowed his eyes to adjust to the shimmering, superheated atmosphere.
His gaze swept over the cluttered yet orderly space, past racks of specialized tools, buckets of quenching oil, and piles of various metals, until they finally settled on Tsubaki.
She stood before a roaring forge, her back to him, utterly consumed by her task.
Her form was silhouetted against the blinding heart of the flames, casting long, dancing shadows that stretched and twisted with every movement.
She seemed to exist in a world entirely her own, a bubble of focus so absolute that she didn't even register his presence.
‘Well, I have some free time,’ Draco thought, a slight, knowing curve to his lips.
‘I’ll wait a while.’
He found a sturdy, soot-stained wooden stool tucked away in a corner, far enough not to intrude on her space but close enough for a clear view of her mesmerizing process.
Making himself comfortable, he settled in, content to simply watch Tsubaki work.
Tsubaki’s focus was absolute, her entire being channeled into the piece of glowing orange steel held tight within the vice of the anvil.
Her usually straight, dark hair was tied back in a messy bun, strands escaping to cling to her sweat-slicked temples.
Her powerful arms, corded with muscle from almost a lifetime of swinging a hammer, moved with a deceptive grace.
She wasn't merely striking the metal; she was conversing with it, a silent, intense dialogue that only a master could understand.
The heat in the workshop was very inconvenient, a warm furnace even for Draco.
For Tsubaki, who stood directly before the roaring forge, it must have been unbearable.
Beads of sweat pearled on her forehead and upper lip, tracing rivulets down her soot-smudged cheeks and neck.
With a grunt of exertion, as she paused to adjust the glowing ingot on the anvil, she seemed to shed her outer layer of clothing without conscious thought.
Her heavy, thick smithing tunic, stained with soot and darkened with sweat, was shrugged off her shoulders and allowed to fall unceremoniously to the floor beside her.
Beneath, she wore only a tightly bound sarashi, the simple white cloth doing little to conceal the powerful swell of her chest or the defined musculature of her abdomen.
Her arms, thick and sculpted, now gleamed starkly in the firelight, crisscrossed with old small scars and fresh sweat.
She ran a hand through her damp hair, pushing it back from her brow, and the movement sent a fine spray of moisture arcing in the fiery air.
Draco, watching from his perch, felt his tail unconsciously twitch once, a subtle indicator of his heightened awareness.
His gaze, though respectful, noted every detail of her uninhibited state, a silent appreciation for the unvarnished intensity of her dedication.
There was no artifice, no pretense; only the pure, unbridled passion of a creator.
Each swing of her heavy smithing hammer was precise, landing with a specific angle and force that Draco could feel even from his distance, a faint thrum in the air.
His tail, at some point, began tapping a slow, rhythmic beat against the wooden leg of his chair, perfectly synchronized with her deliberate blows.
The hammer's face was perfectly flat, ensuring the blow transferred pure, undiluted force, spreading the steel without marring its surface.
Tsubaki then heated the blade-to-be to a near-liquid state in the roaring forge, the carbon within the steel aglow and ready to be reshaped.
Then, with tongs in one hand and hammer in the other, she pulled it forth and began the real work.
The rhythmic melody was the sound of progress, the sound of a master trying to create a masterpiece.
She was drawing out the tang, thinning the steel to form the hi—the groove that would run down the blade's back, reducing its weight and increasing its structural integrity.
Her eyes, narrowed in intense concentration, tracked the flow of the metal, watching for any inconsistencies in the color, any subtle sign of stress within the steel that might lead to a fracture.
As she worked, lost in the crucible of her craft, sweat continued to stream down her face.
A particularly large bead gathered on her brow, pausing at the arch of her eyebrow before beginning its descent towards her eye.
Without breaking eye contact with the glowing steel, her tongue darted out, a quick, almost animalistic swipe, catching the salty drip just before it could sting her vision.
It was a purely instinctive, unthinking act born of absolute focus, a survival mechanism against the oppressive heat and the urgent demands of her art.
Draco’s slight smile deepened.
He found himself utterly engrossed, not just in the smithing, but in the untamed spirit of the woman performing it.
This raw, untamed glimpse into her process was a privilege, a window into the core of Tsubaki Collbrande.
He crossed his arms over his chest, captivated, his senses drinking in the heat, the smell, the sounds, and the sheer, physical poetry of her labor.
‘How naïve I was, to think of learning smithing as a side gig in the past. Looking at her passion makes it feel as though I am lazy’ Draco mused, watching as she moved to the next step.
The heat treat came next, the most critical stage.
She quenched the blade in special oil, a controlled shock to the system that would lock in the structure, hardening the edge to a terrifying degree while leaving the spine of the blade flexible, absorbing the shock of impact.
A deafening hiss filled the air, thick steam erupting from the trough as the incandescent steel met the dark, shimmering liquid.
The sharp, acrid scent of hot metal and quenching oil momentarily overwhelmed the other workshop smells.
Then came the tempering, drawing the temper with careful heat to reduce the brittleness, a delicate dance between hardness and resilience.
During this meticulous, almost reverent stage, as she manipulated the blade over a gentle flame, her shoulders rolled back with a deep, full-bodied stretch.
Her sarashi-clad back arched, revealing the elegant curve of her spine and the taut lines of her muscles.
It was a movement of pure, unthinking release, a silent groan of effort and satisfaction that settled deep within her bones, but came off to Draco as seductive, so he briefly turned away.
After what felt like an eternity of this intense, focused work, the rhythm of the hammer finally changed.
The blows became lighter, more delicate, less about brute force and more about finessing the final, subtle curves.
The final, shaping strikes.
Tsubaki’s breath, which had been held in a steady rhythm throughout the most demanding phases, now released in a long, controlled exhale, a gust of warm air that stirred the dust motes dancing in the light.
She placed the hammer down on the anvil with a soft, final thud, a sound laden with accomplishment.
Her hands, still gloved in thick leather, carefully lifted the still-glowing blade from the anvil.
She carried it over to a trough of her special quenching oil, the surface mirroring the light of the forge, shimmering like dark silk.
With a hiss that sounded strangely like a sigh of relief, the steel was submerged.
For a long moment, she simply stood there, staring into the dark depths of the trough, watching the last violent bubbles subside.
A heavy, almost reverent silence fell over the workshop, broken only by the distant sounds from the outer compound.
Then, she reached in with her tongs and lifted the blade out.
The vibrant orange glow was entirely gone, replaced by a dark, matte finish that seemed to drink in the light, absorbing it rather than reflecting it.
The shape was perfect.
The line of the blade was clean and lethal, a predator’s grace etched in steel.
She ran a gloved thumb along the spine, feeling for the subtle curves she had painstakingly hammered into the metal.
Her eyes, a moment ago narrowed in intense, almost painful focus, now softened.
A genuine smile touched her lips, a radiant, almost vulnerable expression of satisfaction.
It was a look of a challenge met, a vision realized.
The blade was alive.
It was heavy, perfectly balanced, and radiating a latent power that promised death, swift and inevitable.
It was, in her eyes, a masterpiece…..though a quiet sigh escaped her as she thought of her goddess’s divine crafts, ever seeking to reach that impossible perfection.
And in that moment of quiet contemplation, as she pondered how best to test her new creation, the world outside her forge finally intruded.
A flicker of movement in her peripheral vision.
Her head snapped up, the momentary vulnerability of her smile instantly replaced by a wary stance, though the lingering pride in her eyes hadn't quite faded.
Her gaze, sharp and assessing, locked onto Draco, who was still seated calmly in the corner, having watched the entire, uninhibited ordeal.
Her eyes widened for a fraction of a second in surprise, before narrowing with a complex mix of annoyance, curiosity, and a faint, tell-tale flush that crept up her neck and across her cheeks, highlighting how exposed she truly was.
Her voice, when it came, was as sharp and clear as the newly forged steel in her hand.
"Draco," she said, her tone clipped, yet laced with an undertone of something akin to incredulity. "How long have you been sitting there?"
Draco uncrossed his arms, a slow smile spreading across his face.
He pushed himself off the stool with an easy grace that belied his powerful frame.
"Long enough, Tsubaki," he replied, his voice a low, warm echo that seemed to cut through the residual heat of the forge.
"Long enough to witness a masterpiece in the making... and more."
His eyes flickered subtly, taking in her sweat-slicked form, the exposed expanse of her powerful shoulders and chest, the discarded tunic on the floor, the lingering dampness on her lips where she’d licked away the sweat.
A/N: Hi readers, sorry for the long boring slice of life bits. Just trying to build some foundation for the romance bits while expanding a bit on the target characters. Really made things difficult for myself with the whole Draco having to leave Orario bit ?. Normally he would have had a lot of time to slowly slither his way into their hearts, but I sabotaged myself with the 3 month time limit ?.
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