CH181

“Make sure you hand off my letter to Pelenia,” Falk said to both Ben and Thera as they prepared to leave.

“And mine as well,” Sonya told Thera as she pulled her into a tight hug. “The town’s going to feel so much emptier with all of you gone at once.”

“It’ll only be for a bit more than a month aunty, we’ll be back soon. I doubt I’ll be able to handle my parents for much longer than that anyway.”

“Mmh, if your mom does anything so rash again let me know. If need be I’ll rush down to straighten her out.”

“I’ll send a letter if she does anything too over the top,” Thera told her aunt, grateful to have her for support.

Sonya gave Ben a hug as well and asked him to look after Thera while Falk gave him a firm pat on the shoulder, and with that the two of them went off, walking in the woods to the left of the road and hoping to find anything they could.

Thera was at the ready, staff in hand and carrying a magic tool that Ben had produced specifically for their long trek. It was a lantern of sorts, the flame within being created through a fire enchantment being mixed with the level six charm that Sonya possessed, to create an alternative to the one that naturally came off of Thera. While less powerful since it didn’t have her overwhelming mana attached to it, the higher level compensated for that fact while the fire at its core served the purpose of getting rid of any bugs that were drawn to it so they wouldn’t be surrounded by a constant swarm. While he’d given it another effect as well, it wouldn’t become relevant until night fell.

As she tried to focus around her, at the ready for anything that might be drawn out to attack, she couldn’t help but be distracted by whatever Ben was doing, seeming to be paying attention to the surroundings but had his hands full with two knives and something else in each as well.

“Okay, I give. What’s going on? Are you just that excited to fight or something?”

“What, this?” He asked, wiggling his very full hands. “It’s part of a little idea I had to make sure this quest isn’t too much of a waste of my time. I’m just working on making some magic weapons since we’re going to be out here for a couple weeks and I didn’t want to miss out on the job experience,” He got the feeling she only had more questions, so he explained in a bit more detail. “Alright, so you know how my current job is magic weapon maker, right?”

“Yeah, I was there when you took it.”

“Cool, so it follows that what gives my job the most experience is creating magic weapons right?”

“That’s what I’d guess from the name.”

“Excellent, well if you look to my hands, I’ve got two ordinary sets of both knives and brass knuckles. Well they aren’t actually brass but whatever. I add a little enchantment to each and…” The edges of the knives burst into flame as he poured mana through them and knuckles lit up from the light spell that had been applied to them. “Now they’re magic weapons. Remove the enchantments that are on them and repeat, and I’m spending the next two weeks making magic weapons over and over again.”

“Does that actually work?” She asked curiously. “The job name makes me think you need to actually make the weapon.”

“I don’t doubt that I’m getting less experience this way compared to if I was able to work at the forge, but as long as I keep varying the enchantments as I do and make them as complex as I can I should be able to get a constant stream of experience. After all, I am turning normal weapons into magic weapons. The four at once is just to try and maximize the amount I get, though it’s a bit of a trade-off because they’ll be made slower than if I focused on just one. I only wish I thought of doing this sooner, there’s no reason I couldn’t have squeezed a few days off of my last job if I had.”

She could only shake her head. “Well, do you think you could dedicate just one hand to holding that very fancy knife you made before? I can only imagine you getting attacked with hands full of weapons you can’t do anything with.”

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“It’s sheathed in my pocket, worst to worst I’ll just drop these and pull it out. I just need you to keep me safe if anything comes at me.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to just be at the ready?”

“I mean, maybe? It’s not like I’m much of a fighter and doing a quest like this where I can’t just set some traps and wait is kind of a huge weakness for me, right? Since my gun idea was a bit of a bust as far as ease of use goes I should really try and find a different way to keep myself safe. Maybe I could work on something that could attack automatically? But then how would I make it work, or for that matter distinguish between friends and enemies?”