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Among the many stands, there was one blacksmith that caught my attention.

This was extremely interesting to me. For someone to ‌handle items of unique tier and above in the business of crafting means that their character’s level has reached ‘master’ tier level. Although you can always improve your proficiency in crafting skills as much as you can, it’s still extremely difficult to raise your levels at the same time. The ones who can reach high levels pretty quickly are the ones that are supported by the guilds to farm experience for them, but there are cases where users who leveled up that way may leave the guild to join another one with better conditions for signing up with them. It means that effectively, no guild that’s not giant-sized would ever lay their hands on crafting. Although they say there are rare players who strive to achieve a high level in crafting while still being a solo player…

“Wow, a master tier blacksmith? There’s only like ten players in the whole server. I wonder who it is?”

Thankfully, Katalina’s interest in clothing and jewelry shops was over and was looking towards the smithy I was looking at. Naturally, Katalina and I went towards the smithy.

Well, I say a smithy, but it was nothing but a slightly larger stand with a temporary anvil and slightly more crafting tools than average. It seems like they planned to only take care of simple repair jobs or alteration here, while they do the more serious job that requires a lot more tools to be used back at their own smithy place.

“Let’s visit them!”
“Okay.”

We went towards the smithy. Although the street was quieter than the average in the market, every shop always has at least one or two users standing inside the stall, but for some strange reason, this smithy had no one inside.

It felt a little strange to me, but I soon pushed away that thought.

“What do you need?”

The smithy’s owner asked us, with a tone that’s much more professional and strict than other shops.

As I got closer, I realized that the owner of the shop wasn’t a man as I guessed from the tone, but ‌a woman, as evident from her slender neck, small shoulders and sloppily tied hair, though her attire didn’t look decorated at all. She was definitely not a beauty to look at, but still had a pretty decent average face, and the wrinkles ‌apparent around her eyes made it clear that she was around 30 years old. It’s hard to tell the age of a foreigner, so she may ‌be in her late 20s.

“Are you able to alter appearances?”

Katalina asked, with an equally stiff reply.

“It’s possible, but I am planning to take commissions of only crafting new equipment starting today.”
“Then you should probably change your shop’s sign.”
“I suppose I should.”

Hearing that she was no longer willing to alter appearances, Katalina had lost all interest as she replied with a frown on her face. But the owner replied in her usual manner with no apparent changes in her expression.

It seems at this rate, she’ll turn around to go look at more clothing and jewelry shops instead.

“Then you’re saying you can take commissions for crafting new equipment, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”

Although the way she talked grated on me a bit, I couldn’t really blame her because it may just be her personality. I just could understand why there weren’t many customers around here.

I wasn’t exactly advocating the phrase ‘the customer is king’, but I know the obvious that you would get more customers if you had at least some courtesy when dealing with customers. It made me feel ‌sorry for her since it looked like she was destined to just ruin her own business this way.

“But why did you put up the sign saying that you’re only dealing with equipment at unique tier and up?”

As I was conversing with the owner, Katalina butted in.

“Well, I have mithril and orichalcum, and to make use of them I need to make sure it’s for items of unique tier and up, otherwise it’s impossible.”
“Just how much of those two materials do you have that you are trying to use them all up?”
“Quite a bit. Enough to make at least one set of armor.”
“!!!”
“!!!”

Katalina and I were surprised. It would be understandable for mithril, but orichalcum is definitely not an ore that’s easily obtainable.

If you were to put orichalcum on the tiers of rarity for items, it would be registered as legendary. Since just a minuscule amount of it is found from boss monsters, orichalcum is only used as auxiliary materials for crafting equipment. Because of its minuscule amount and exorbitant price, it means ‌it was difficult to gather any amount of it to make even one piece of equipment. So, saying that she can make a complete set of armor is extremely surprising.

“How about it, want me to craft?”

The owner offered, with joy on her face. Even her way of talking changed as she asked. I had some interest in having items crafted, so I thought it may be okay to have them crafted at least once.

“How much would the price be?”
“1 billion gold for a whole set.”

Although it was over 100 million gold, if it’s made of orichalcum, it’s well worth the price.

“However, you must pay for the price of orichalcum separately. The price I’ve just said is all the costs that go into paying for the things I need to craft the set. Those being tools that allow me to smelt orichalcum.”

The owner handed me a crumpled piece of paper. It was a scroll that contained technique in smelting, with the important parts covered and only the items required for the smelting still readable.

As I am not someone well versed in materials, although I recognized some of them as being expensive, I couldn’t really determine the value of all the materials. I handed it over to Katalina, as she must be at least more knowledgeable about finance than me.

“Let’s see.”

After pouring over it for a long time, Katalina nodded her head.

“If they are aiming for around 5 million to 10 million profit off this, then it’s a completely appropriate price.”
“Is that so?”

I handed the scroll back to the owner.

“So, will you take the offer?”
“How much will the orichalcum and mithril cost? We’ll decide after hearing it.”
“It’s a complete set, so you’ll have to give me at least 3 billion gold.”
“3 billion gold.”

Although I didn’t check the entire safe I have back in the castle so I couldn’t know for certain, but I don’t think that even I have that much in there. But if that’s the case, then it’s worth that price, wouldn’t it?

“How much is the probability that you’ll succeed?”
“It’s a business secret, so…”

Seeing her mumble her words, Katalina frowned.

“It should be at least around 30%. Right?”
“…”

She neither confirmed nor denied it.

“Ellie. Don’t take this deal, you’ll lose money.”
“If you aren’t willing to take the offer, could you all leave already?”

Just as we leaned towards not taking the deal, the owner’s tone of voice changed to their original tone right away.

“Mmmh…”

Even though I was still enticed by the idea of the armor, Katalina spoke with a cold tone in her voice as if she was angered by her order telling us to leave.

“I’m guessing your username is ‘Jasmin’, isn’t it? 2nd in the unofficial ranking among blacksmiths. I heard that recently you had lost all your assets because an acquaintance swindled you. Were you trying to deceive a customer one last time to make money before you completely give up on the game or something?”
“I am the person you’ve guessed, but I had no intention to swindle or deceive a customer.”

Was that true? I started understanding why Katalina was against this now. Even if you put all your effort into raising a blacksmith character to its maximum potential, the moment all your materials are gone, it would be hard to continue playing the game. It’s understandable why she would want to ‌maximize the amount they get for their last remaining materials before giving up on the game.

They would reassure themselves, saying that it’s compensation for the amount of money they lost by the swindling, so they wouldn’t think of it as a crime that they’re committing.

If that was the case, then I could totally understand why Katalina was reacting so strongly. However, I also experienced being swindled heavily and losing a lot in the past, so I couldn’t say that I only had contempt for the shop owner. I felt a mixture of emotions like regret and pity for her.

And that emotion was doubled by the user Jasmin’s bitter yet confident tone. If she was someone who usually swindles people, unless she was a great swindler, she could have flown into a rage by Katalina’s accusation. If Jasmin’s expression right now was purely acting, I would commend her superb acting skills, but she is someone that had been swindled already. Why would someone who’s so great at swindling people be swindled themselves?

“If that’s the case, if I take the offer and leave you with an ancient tier defense equipment, do you have any gold or goods to put up as assurance?”

Even as those thoughts ran in my mind, Katalina was already continuing to snap at Jasmin.

“Well…”

Of course she doesn’t have any, since she had lost it through being swindled. Like a mute who can’t say anything, Jasmin couldn’t continue her sentence.

“Just say the truth, that you were going to say you failed the crafting, take the money and material and run.¹”
“Let’s just stop.”

Katalina was flying into a rage, angered by Jasmin’s scheme to swindle us. I could barely grab Katalina and pull her away as she became clearly enraged, right out of the luxury goods district. It seems like we won’t be doing any window shopping today.

“Why did you stop me? Swindlers like her need to be taught a lesson!”
“The guild war is going to start soon, do you want to give that up and just go fight that swindler again?”
“Well, no, not exactly.”
“It wasn’t like we were cheated out of our money yet, so let’s just forget it and go, okay?”
“If you say so, Ellie.”

What a strong-minded girl. I was really worried about who could marry this kind of girl.

“You just made fun of me in your mind, didn’t you?”
“Nope.”
“Hmm, really~?”

Katalina made a peculiar smile as she pulled her face close to mine. I flinched in my mind, but I kept my confident expression outside.

She can’t read my mind, right?²

1. Robinxen: I didn’t get that impression at all…but maybe that’s because I was expecting something more than a chapter dedicated to this entire one off interaction?
2. Robinxen: Maybe?