The sound of horse hooves soon came from the front of the house, signaling that the Roths had left, and with their departure, Anna felt it was safe enough to bring Lucas out to the backyard to see just what had happened.
Noticing his wife and son approaching, Drake quickly composed himself, shaking off the frown on his face as he smiled at the pair and called out, "Lucas, Anna, I didn't realize you were both home. What are you doing here?"
Pursing her lips, Anna stared at her husband for a moment before bluntly replying, "Everything has been thrown into chaos by the arrival of the Roths. I came home to check on how things were going here."
"Oh," Drake clearly had a hard time keeping his smile up, but he didn't seem to want to worry his family, so he did his best to not show how distressed he was feeling.
"Dad," Lucas called out, "You don't have to worry about me. You can tell us what happened."
Anna nodded firmly in agreement with her son. Whatever the problem was, they would deal with it head on.
Wrinkling his nose, Drake struggled internally for a few seconds before coming to the conclusion that even if didn't talk about it now, what transpired inside his forge would become obvious soon enough.
Letting out a long sigh, Drake began explaining, "You both seem to know that those men belong to Roth Duke Family, so it probably shouldn't surprise you that the armour and weapons they use are significantly better than what you can find around here."
Lucas and Anna nodded, easily accepting this fact as it was quite obvious that even the weakest guards and soldiers of the second strongest noble house in the Rockwell Kingdom would have high quality equipment.
Having this simply truth pointed out, Lucas quickly came up with a theory and asked, "They came here to repair or maintain their weapons and armour, but your forge somehow wasn't good enough to handle working on them and was damaged?"
"En, that's right," Drake acknowledged, "Most of the things they brought weren't an issue as they were made from a type of Mid-Rank Mortal Grade Tier 2 metal, but there was one sword with a chip in it that was refined from Meteor Steel, which is a Mid-Rank 3 material."
"Meteor Steel is much tougher than ordinary iron or steel and requires very intense heat to shape properly. My forge is only rated for working with Tier 2 metals, so it couldn't take the heat and cracked."
Anna clenched her fists tight when she saw the depressed look on her husband's face, cursing viciously, "Damn them! Wasn't the one who used your forge a Core Formation Practitioner? How could he not have known what would happen?"
Shaking his head, Drake flashed a wry smile, "What makes you think that smith didn't know what would happen?"
If not for him already experiencing the unreasonableness of the Roth Family's people earlier in the day, Lucas might have been surprised by this statement; but now, he could only grind his teeth and mutter, "He knew your forge would be damaged, he just didn't care."
Nodding, Drake sighed again as he cast a glance back towards his smithy.
"They at least compensated you for the damage, right?" Anna asked indignantly.
"Sort of," Drake replied in a listless manner, "They paid for the use of the smithy, and I also managed to bargain for some additional compensation for the damage, but that man was only willing to give me enough to repair the forge rather than replace it."
Tilting his head, Lucas didn't understand what the problem was at first, but with his intelligence, he soon realized what was wrong, "There's no one in Redwood Town who is better at smithing than you, Dad. So, there's no one who can repair your furnace. The only option is to replace it."
"That's right," Drake continued, "A forge capable of handling Tier 2 metals isn't something rare or even that expensive, so in any major city, like Amherst where the Roth Family lives, it wouldn't be an issue to have a broken one repaired within a day or two, or replaced within 5 days. Out here in Redwood Town though, it's a very different story."
Redwood Town had a population of roughly 3,000, which was too small for it to be considered even the smallest of cities. If Lucas' father wanted to replace his now damaged furnace, he only had 2 options, order one from a merchant caravan, or travel to Herald City and get one himself.
With Redwood Town's newly improved relationship with the Rising Sun Merchant Guild, asking them to deliver a new Tier 2 furnace wouldn't be an issue, but the soonest Drake could put in an order with Warren's caravan was when it returned about a month from now. After that, he would likely have to wait another month before the new furnace was delivered.
There were about 30 smiths and apprentices in Redwood Town, which along with regular imports from the nearby Harold City was just enough to cover the people's basic needs. Among the local smiths, only 5 could work with Tier 2 metals, and of those 5, Drake was undoubtedly the best.
Many of the hunters and adventurers in the Vein Opening Realm depended on Drake to maintain their weapons and equipment, not to mention the large number of tools he crafted and repaired for the ordinary townsfolk.
If Drake was forced to close down his shop for 2 months, it would be a huge problem for Redwood Town, especially in the middle of harvest season where many farming tools were chipped and broken each day. Even when Drake had closed down his shop for 5 days last year during Lucas' coma, it had put significant pressure on the other smiths in town as they tried to pick up the slack.
Drake had a strong sense of responsibility, and he deeply cared about Redwood Town as it was the first place in his life he could really call home, so sitting around and waiting wasn't even an option to him.
That left going to Herald City, but that option came with its own difficulties.
Herald City was a 3-days journey by carriage from Redwood Town, each way, and it wasn't exactly a bustling metropolis with its population only reaching about 30,000 people. The number of ready-made products available in such a city certainly wasn't high, especially when it came to items as big and bulky as blacksmith furnaces.
After traveling to Harold City, unless he got very lucky and happened across someone selling an appropriate item, Drake would have to put in an order at a big workshop, then wait until the new furnace was finished before loading it onto a cart and returning.
Under the most ideal of circumstance, it would take 7 or 8 days to complete this round trip, but there was any number of things that could go wrong and delay Drake. There could be no available Tier 2 furnace, the workshops could be fully booked with orders, a sudden storm could blow through making the roads impassable, and so on and so forth
It wouldn't be a surprise if Drake had to spend an entire month acquiring a new furnace for his smithy.
Still, 1 month was shorter than 2 months, so it seemed Drake was going to have to take a trip to Harold City in the near future.
Just thinking about all the time and expense he would have to go through made Drake seethe inside, with Anna and Lucas not feeling much better themselves.
Frowning deeply, Anna proposed, "Do you want to file a formal complaint? I'm sure Sasha and Charles would be more than happy to help."
"Heh, you're joking, right?" Drake gave his wife a blank stare, causing Anna to blush slightly. She knew it was a ridiculous notion even before she said it, but she just couldn't stand the fact that they were being bullied so blatantly without any way to fight back.
There were indeed laws in the Rockwell Kingdom that everyone was supposed to follow, and there was also a set of standards that nobles were supposed to uphold, but nothing in life was ever that cut-and-dry.
Duke Roth's men had broken Drake's forge, which was technically the crime of property damage, meaning he was well within his rights to lodge a formal complaint to the kingdom's Ministry of Justice.
However, seeing as how the Duke's men had offered compensation for the damage done, it would likely wind up costing Drake more to lodge a complaint than to just accept the situation as is. That wasn't even taking into consideration that the chances of him winning any compensation after filing a complaint against the second most powerful noble family in the kingdom was basically non-existent.
"Haa…" Letting out a long breath, Anna grumbled aloud, "Those damn nobles, why can't they all be like Sasha and Charles."
"Charles and Sasha are oddballs, most nobles are stuck-up and arrogant when dealing with us commoners," Drake joined his wife in complaining, as there was really nothing more he could do.
Lucas also nodded, adding from the side, "That's right. Even their subordinates are like that, like the guard who attacked me…"
""WHAT?!""
"Ah…" Lucas was taken aback by the abrupt reaction from both his parents.
A moment ago, Anna and Drake were both looking deflated and grumbling about the unfairness of life, but now they had become incredibly fired up, turning to their son and demanding he explain.
Tilting his head slightly, Lucas hesitantly asked, "Didn't I mention this to you already, Mom?"
"No you did not!" Anna roared as she stomped forward and grabbed Lucas by the shoulders, shaking him violently as she demanded, "Talk! Now!"
Scratching his head awkwardly, Lucas tried to downplay the situation, "Um, at Senior Farah's shop, there was… a small incident."
"Oh? And what exactly happened during this 'small incident'?!" Drake pressed, leaning in from the side with a dark look on his face.
Pinned down and knowing that escape was impossible, Lucas began describing what had happened at the butcher shop..
By the time Lucas got to the part where the Roth Family guard drew his dagger, both Drake and Anna had gone red in the face from both fear and anger. The fact that their son had been attacked so unreasonably, and even had a weapon drawn against him, was enough to both terrify and enrage the pair.
Thanks to their relationship with Sasha, Anna and Drake already had a bad impression of the Roth Family before today, but that opinion plummeted into the abyss once they learned that one of this family's guards had tried to harm Lucas.
Releasing her son, Anna turned around, gripped the sword hanging at her waist tightly, and prepared to storm off to do Heavens knows what.
Lucas saw this and latched onto her arm, holding on for dear-life as he pleaded with her, "Don't do anything rash, Mom!"
"Rash? Rash!?" Anna erupted, making no effort o contain her fury, "I'm going to demand justice from those bastards!"
Realizing it would be impossible for him to convince his mother in the state she was in, Lucas turned to his father, the more level-headed of the pair, and called out for help, "Dad! Say something!"
Unfortunately, after what just happened in his smithy, and learning what had happened to his son earlier today, Drake wasn't in the most forgiving of moods. Instead of helping calm his wife down, he actually egged her on, "Your mother is right, we may not be nobles like them, but we can't let these damn people walk all over us!"