For the next few hours, Eisen continued making the steel bones and tempering them inside of the tempering oven with the help of Kiron and Alnico, who were both doing quite well overall. Sometimes they placed the metal into the forge too early or too late and made everything stutter a little bit, but it wasn"t an issue big enough to mess anything up overall.
Stahl spent his time practicing some magic together with Caria and Melissa, and even Fafnir took a liking to the unusual effects that the two monster girls could cause and tried to start manipulating the little bit of Dragon fire that he was now able to use as well. Of course, it didn"t work just yet, and Eisen had to stop working once or twice to make sure that the small Living Dungeon didn"t accidentally burn everything down, but overall, the four of them seemed to have a pretty fun time on their own as well.
At the end, when the s.h.i.+p got close enough to the harbor, Eisen chose to stop with everything for now. They managed to finish about three fourth of the whole steel skeleton base, although none of it had been enchanted, so far. He would try and continue with the rest after Eisen and Stahl came back from their small hunting-trip, although that just depended on how long it would take them to set out with the s.h.i.+p again.
While Eisen and Stahl were waiting on the main deck, the old man swiftly talked to Komer. "Alright, so you please take care of everything again, yeah?" He asked with a smile, and the young merchant immediately nodded his head.
"Aye, Aye, Cap"n!" Komer exclaimed with a salute, and Eisen replied with a light chuckle. "Stahl and I will be out hunting for a little while, so please send me a message about an hour before we depart again," Eisen said with a smile, and once more, Komer nodded his head.
"Will do. Have fun out there then. But is it just you two going?" Komer asked a bit concerned, but Eisen didn"t have any worries about that. "Yeah, just the two of us. The monsters in this area are all at most rank 1 or 2, and I can handle that even without a weapon. But I"m taking my Zweihänder with me as well, and if I need to, I"m sure I can scare some of the low-leveled monsters away with my demonic form and my different t.i.tles." He explained before Komer scratched the back of his head.
"That"s not what I mean; I"m more worried about Stahl. I know the type of expression he has right now; he looks like he just wants to run away somewhere." The young merchant answered so Eisen looked at Stahl before inevitably nodding his head. "I get what you mean, but that"s exactly why we"re doing this. And we"re going on Cabarum, so even if he levels up a bunch and puts "literally" every single one of his stat points into Agility, I"ll be able to catch up pretty quickly. I doubt I"d even need Cabarum for that." Eisen said with a smile before he turned around and looked toward Stahl, who was waiting for the skeleton sailors to properly stop the s.h.i.+p so that he could get off it.
"Anyway, please just message me before we set off again," Eisen told Komer again, before the young man nodded his head, and Eisen made his way over to his Grandson, who was wearing a backpack on his back, had his sword in a simple leather sheath, and his s.h.i.+eld strapped to his back, hanging onto his rucksack. Eisen thought that Parc and Rouge did a pretty great job at making the sword, sheath, and s.h.i.+eld, and he didn"t have anything to complain about in the slightest.
The old man himself swiftly grew to t.i.tan size as he pulled Cabarum over to the exit area for the s.h.i.+p and then bound his Zweihänder, which seemed like a relatively thin shortsword in Eisen"s hands now, in cloth and put it into a part on his leather ap.r.o.n meant for different knives. It was still a little large for that, but it was better than having to hold it continuously, in Eisen"s eyes.
Before Eisen knew it, Jyuuk"s Skeleton Sailors docked the s.h.i.+p and a few of the workers at the harbor bound it into place so that it couldn"t drift off. "Alright, you ready?" Eisen asked his grandson, who quietly nodded his head before he and Eisen made their way off the s.h.i.+p and through the relatively small ocean-side town toward one of the gates. When they left the town, Eisen and Stahl swiftly sat down on top of Cabarum"s back and made their way to a good hunting area in a nearby forest to start things off.
And soon, they found an area with a few Rank 0 wolves, and Eisen jumped off Cabarum"s back before Stahl did the same. "What now?" Stahl asked as he looked at the beast that was bearing its teeth at them, although slightly hesitant to approach due to Eisen"s presence.
"Seems like it"s a bit scared of me. Just use that chance and go for it. It"s alone, so before any of its pack notice that it"s fighting, try to finish it off. It"s just like real life, so going for weak points such as the head or neck is the best choice to finish this quickly." Eisen explained, and Stahl slowly nodded his head before taking his backpack off and handing it to Eisen so that Stahl could freely move before he put his s.h.i.+eld onto his left arm and then tightly grasped the sword with his right hand.
Approaching carefully, Stahl continuously held the small kite-s.h.i.+eld forward before the wolf had enough of it and began to ran at the young man, who bashed his s.h.i.+eld forward against its head and staggered the wolf. Immediately afterward, Stahl swung the sword downward in a straight line and hit the wolf"s neck, although he only managed to cut into the side, but not deep enough to fatally damage it. The wolf was bleeding a good bit, but it didn"t start barking or howling, and just jumped at Stahl again.
And this time, the young man stabbed his sword forward and hit the chest of the wolf, piercing right through the heart. Immediately, the wolf collapsed on the ground, and Stahl stabbed his sword through its neck, finis.h.i.+ng it off.
"Nice, I leveled up!" Stahl exclaimed with a smile, before looking at some other notifications. "Oh, and I got two skills as well! s.h.i.+eld Arts and Swordsmans.h.i.+p." The green-haired man explained to Eisen, who nodded his head curiously before squatting down onto the ground in front of the wolf.
"I see, then maybe ask Brody about those later. Or you can go straight to Horan, Brody"s Demon companion. He also uses a sword and a s.h.i.+eld, almost exclusively, so he might know a good bit about it as well." Eisen suggested, and Stahl nodded before looking at his grandfather.
"What are you doing there?" He asked, and Eisen lightly chuckled as he pushed one of his knives into the flesh of the wolf to skin it, before telling his grandson that he was doing just that.
"I"m gathering the materials from them. The skin can be turned into leather for some simple items, and the fangs and claws are good materials for potions." He answered before Stahl slowly nodded his head.
"Ah… I got it… So are you going to do that for everything?" Stahl asked, wondering if this wouldn"t take a lot of time off hunting, but he was relieved when Eisen shook his head.
"I"m only taking the skin from this one. As a little souvenir, I guess." The old man chuckled, before finis.h.i.+ng the skinning and folding it up before placing it into a bag meant for these materials. He swiftly pulled the most essential fangs out of the wolf"s mouth and then pulled out all the claws that were in good condition, before he was ready to move on.
"Alright, let"s get the next one. When you hit Level 15, let me know. That seems about the right time where you should be able to fight against Rank 1 monsters." He explained before Stahl slowly nodded his head, taking a look around. Swiftly, he noticed a small group of three wolves and looked at his grandfather to see if it would be a good idea to go for them, and Eisen just nodded his head.
"Go ahead. If anything goes wrong, I"ll take care of them." Eisen said as Stahl sprinted toward the wolves and began his next fight. For a good while, Stahl and Eisen continued walking through the forest, fighting any wild and aggressive animal they came across until the green-haired boy finally hit level 15.
Triumphantly, he turned around and looked at his Grandfather. "Level 15! Now I can fight actual monsters, right?" He asked excitedly, and Eisen nodded his head with a smile.
"Yes, you can. I was told there are some Spider Monsters around here. You don"t mind spiders, right?" Eisen asked just to confirm, and Stahl just shrugged. "I don"t mind them, no. But if you mean spider monsters, do you mean spiders the size of dogs?" Stahl asked, and Eisen nodded with a light chuckle.
"Yeah, I do. At least that"s what Sky and Bree told me, so I"m guessing it should be true." He added before Stahl scratched his neck. "Well, I"m sure there won"t be many players around these parts then, huh?"
"Most likely not," Eisen confirmed before the grandfather-grandson team made their way deeper into the forest that became darker and darker around them. And when the silence was becoming near-to unbearable, Stahl spoke up.
"Grampa… Why… didn"t you tell me about Dad?" He quietly asked before Eisen looked at Stahl with a conflicted expression. "I"m sorry that I didn"t, but it wasn"t my right to tell you. Your father was the only one that should have done that, although maybe a few years earlier." The old man answered, and Stahl slowly began to grip his sword more tightly as he began to get angry.
"You think?" Stahl asked sarcastically, "Who"d have thought that telling your son that you"re criminal sc.u.m as early as possible was a good idea?" He muttered, and this time, Eisen became angry. He grabbed Stahl"s shoulder and immediately twisted him around.
"Don"t you dare talk about your father that way without knowing what happened," Eisen told Stahl, who ripped himself away from his grandfather"s grip.
"Without knowing what happened? Are you f.u.c.king with me? I can"t talk bad about the fact that my father "literally" lied to me about who he is for my whole life?" Stahl asked with slightly teary eyes, and Eisen shook his head. "Your father never lied to you. He"s the same person that you have always known him as. Maybe he hid his past from you, but that was just because he was scared about how you would react. He hates himself more than you ever could, I know that, but he was scared that you could hate him even more." Eisen told him and squatted down in front of Stahl. For a few moments, it seemed like Stahl was alright, but soon enough he turned away and just sprinted into the other direction, deeper into the forest.
"Hey, stay here!" Eisen yelled after him because he knew that there was probably monsters deeper down in the forest that were too strong for him to handle, but Stahl just didn"t stop. So, Eisen ran after him.
Overall, Eisen caught up to him pretty quick, but because of his current size he just had to shrink down to normal again so that he could run through the forest that was getting denser and denser by the step.
And soon, monsters appeared as well. It seems like Stahl had managed to avoid them perfectly, but then they all went after Eisen, which cost him a little bit of time as well.
For a whole ten minutes this game of cat and mouse continued, until Stahl suddenly stopped in the center of a large clearing with the only bit of light in the whole area.
"Finally! What the h.e.l.l are you doing running off like that?" Eisen asked angrily, and he was just about to give his grandson a knock over the head before noticing that Stahl was staring at something above them. Seeing that Eisen had caught up to him, Stahl continued to run back in the direction they came from, and Eisen began to grind his teeth and yelled at Cabarum to bite into the boy"s collar to pull him to safety if necessary because Eisen currently had to deal with something else.
There was a giant spider whose size was comparable to that of Bolremgar or Aylrentyrth, and who had swiftly blocked every possible entrance or exit after Stahl retreated.