The stars above the illusory village shimmered faintly, artificial yet no less beautiful. The night air was cool, scented with coal and embers still smoldering from the day's work. Eron lay on a rough straw mattress in the small wooden cabin given to him—sleep refusing to come.
His eyes were open, fixed on the cracked ceiling above, but his mind was replaying the clang of hammer on metal, the hiss of cooling steel, the way the rare-grade blade had taken shape under his fingers.
I really did it, he thought. Heheh.. Not bad
Most beginners barely managed to fuse two metals without them cracking. But his work—the blade he'd spent 18 straight hours on—glowed with a faint silver sheen, its edge crisp and its balance smooth. It wasn't just luck. He had felt it, every strike, every contour. His hands still throbbed with dull pain, but it was the good kind, the earned one.
A smile broke across his face in the darkness.
"I'm really going to be a blacksmith," he whispered to no one.
