As time went on, the rate of melting grew faster and faster.
Most of the compartments in the mold were filled.
It was only when the temperature inside the furnace slowly began to drop that the preliminary fusion of the Red Dragon Alloy was complete.
At this stage, the surface of the Red Dragon Alloy was a vibrant crimson, though slightly duller in color than the original Red-Faced Square Gold.
Kuntu walked over to the mold and took out all the metal inside.
Shaped like iron ingots, there were four and a half bars in total.
“Looks like things went smoothly,” Kuntu said, picking up one of the bars, tapping it with her knuckle, and bringing it to her ear. “Next, we forge the dragon patterns.”
Kuntu scooped up all the alloy ingots and shoved them back into the furnace to heat them up again.
Then, she peeled off her outer jacket, revealing the tank top underneath.
Her exposed arms and shoulders showed well-proportioned, adorable muscles that radiated health and vitality.
She reached out and grabbed a massive hammer nearly as large as herself, casually testing its weight.
Taking one last puff from her pipe, she leaned it against the wall and exhaled a stream of white smoke.
“Brat, open the furnace.”
At Kuntu's command, Li Xiuman hurriedly opened the furnace door.
With one hand, Kuntu grabbed a pair of tongs and precisely pulled an ingot out of the scorching heat.
With tongs in one hand and her hammer in the other, she began to forge.
As the hammer fell, the outer layer of the alloy began to flake off.
A faint shroud of mana wrapped around the hammer head, and with every strike, magic was driven deep into the alloy, adjusting its internal structure.
Her control over mana was nothing short of breathtaking.
The alloy cooled at an incredible speed, shifting from fiery crimson to dark red in almost the span of a breath.
If she continued hammering after that point, the mana wouldn't penetrate the alloy's core and would instead damage its internal composition.
Because of this, she had to land as many strikes as possible within that single breath, injecting and regulating mana at the precise moments of impact and release.
Kuntu's hammer blurred into an afterimage as sweat began to bead on her skin.
Every strike burst with a gorgeous flash of magical light.
“Open!”
Hearing Kuntu's shout, Li Xiuman swiftly opened the furnace. Kuntu immediately tossed the hammered piece back in and seamlessly pulled out another piece.
Wasting no time, she raised her hammer and struck without delay.
Smoothly and methodically, Kuntu transformed into a precision machine, hammering rapidly and perfectly.
When the first round of forging was complete, she lowered her hammer and wiped away her sweat.
Once the heat was right and the ingots glowed red again, Kuntu grabbed her hammer and launched into the second round.
Then came the third round, and the fourth.
The intervals between each round grew longer, and Kuntu's strikes required visibly more effort.
As the forging progressed, the alloy's strength continuously increased.
It took much longer to heat it to glowing crimson, and its rising hardness made every strike exponentially harder.
By the later rounds, faint scales could be seen etched across the surface of the metal.
At this point, the Red Dragon Alloy had met all standard quality metrics, but Kuntu still wasn't satisfied.
And so, it continued until the twelfth round.
Upon the twelfth round, as the final blow descended, the Red Dragon Alloy violently repelled the hammer and the mana inside it, bursting with a brilliant red glow.
The dragon scale patterns on the metal were distinct and sharply defined.
The entire ingot had shrunk by a full size compared to its original state.
【True Red Dragon Alloy】An alloy imbued with the power of red dragon fire. Indestructible, magic-resistant, fire-resistant, and fire-empowering, it is an exceptionally rare and superior material for forging high-tier magic items, weapons, and armor.
Kuntu went on to forge all the remaining alloy bars.
The four and a half bars of Red Dragon Alloy were stacked neatly together.
Every piece featured crisp dragon scale patterns, looking almost as if they had naturally grown right out of the metal itself.
Clang!
Kuntu slammed her giant hammer heavily onto the ground and rubbed her shoulders, clearly thoroughly exhausted.
Then, an unexpected anomaly occurred.
The bright crimson color of the five bars—four large and one small—began to dim, bit by bit.
“Is this... normal?” Li Xiuman asked, looking at Kuntu.
“It might be... because that tray fell in...”
“Didn't you say it wasn't a big deal?”
“...It shouldn't be,” Kuntu muttered. “Even though that tray was an alloy, the materials in it shouldn't have caused any reaction.”
Clink, clink, clink.
Kuntu picked up her pipe and tapped the Red Dragon Alloy, producing a crisp metallic ringing.
Immediately after, the alloy flared with light once more, knocking the pipe right out of her hand.
The five bars flashed with radiant rainbow light, shifting endlessly through seven colors.
Finally, the four large bars settled into silver, dark red, purple, and blue.
The small piece turned bright pink.
“...”
The two looked at each other in silence.
Li Xiuman cast Appraisal on them; none of the alloy's attributes had changed at all.
It seemed to have merely changed colors.
What kind of paint-job service was this?!
Perhaps now they ought to be called Silver Dragon Alloy, Red Dragon Alloy, Purple Dragon Alloy, Blue Dragon Alloy, and Pink Dragon Alloy.
“They actually... changed color,” Kuntu said, staring in disbelief at the five pieces before her.
“What do you mean?”
“As a high-tier magic material, the color of Red Dragon Alloy should be unchangeable. This color shift was likely caused by whatever materials were in that tray. If you asked this old woman to replicate it now, I wouldn't even be able to reproduce it myself. In other words... these five pieces are now one-of-a-kind variant Red Dragon Alloys.”
Li Xiuman understood what Kuntu meant.
In short...
His bars of Red Dragon Alloy had become the only five variant Red Dragon Alloys in existence.
To put it in plain terms: absurdly expensive!
“Master Bal, you really are a good person,” Li Xiuman praised without holding back.
“Alright, which piece do you want to use to forge your sword?” Kuntu's question drew Li Xiuman's attention back to the alloy bars on the table.
“This one,” Li Xiuman said, picking up the large silver bar.
“Silver, huh? It does match that wolf fang pretty well.”
Kuntu accepted the silver bar, looking reasonably satisfied. She didn't want a weapon she crafted to turn out abstract just because of a client's bizarre aesthetic taste.
“Forging a sword takes a bit of time,” Kuntu said. “Today, we'll just knock out the rough blade.”
Flames soared in the furnace once again, heating the alloy back to a glowing crimson.
Since the Snow Wolf God's Fang was too short, the first step of the forging process was to draw the fang out into the shape of a blade.
After that, it was forged together with the silver Red Dragon Alloy.
They continued hammering late into the night until a long, jet-black bar took shape.
It didn't look like a sword in the slightest.
When Kuntu informed him that this was the rough blade, Li Xiuman lost most of his expectations for his treasure sword's final appearance.
“You can leave now. Come back in a week to pick it up.”
With the rough blade finished, Li Xiuman was unceremoniously shooed out the door, as if their interaction had been strictly business and nothing more.
Rate on N.U.
