[Ironworks] A Craft Observed (Marcus)

[Hadrian]

Late Summer, 510 A.V. Hadrian had not seen the Ironworks since he was a child, his father taking him by on a sort of work visit cum impromptu field trip. His father, a self-styled merchant prince, doing business with a captain of industry, Ros Vizerian. But those days were long gone, when it was assumed that Hadrian would become a merchant in his father's employ. Now he was but a humble enchanter. He couldn't quite call himself a magecrafter, although that was what he did. Once he knew a thing or two about crafting, he might go by that title, but not yet. As he watched a particular smith at work, he began to lose hope. Working metal seemed to require an amount of physical strength that Hadrian simply did not have. He was rather tall, but the heaviest thing he lifted was generally a book or three. Luckily, his family wasn't prone to excess weight or he would become one of those pot-bellied scholars in spotted robes. Careful not to get in the way -- he knew how irritating that could be -- Hadrian tried to learn by watching, though it seemed that metalworking, at least, might be beyond his abilities. He would simply have to form a business partnership with skilled smiths and combine his enchanting with their smithing if he had a call for enchanted weapons.

[Marcus Braeden]

It had been a pretty average day at the Ironworks. Marcus had been working on spearheads for the most part but they ended up needing an extra hand for some work on other tools. Marcus didn't particularly enjoy crafting tools, he just didn't get much satisfaction from creating a horseshoe as he did from creating a sword or an axehead. Marcus returned to creating spearheads after another smith arrived on the scene to take over for him. Soon he interrupted once again and was called over to help on a sword that another smith was forging. The other smith had asked Marcus to be his striker, and Marcus gladly accepted.

Marcus grabbed took one of the sledgehammers that were leaning against the wall and proceeded to do his job. Wherever his fellow smith had pointed on the sword, Marcus delivered a powerful blow to the spot. As Marcus set the sledgehammer back against the wall, he noticed a stranger whom he had not seen at the Ironworks before. The young man seemed to have his eyes on Marcus, as if he was observing his craft. Marcus returned to his station to finish the spearhead that he had not been able to finish. Once that was completed, Marcus wiped some sweat from his brow and approached the young man.

"Hello sir, anything i can do for you?" Marcus asked.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian looked up at the interruption as if waking from a mesmerized state. Blinking chlorine blue eyes at the young smith, he paused to let the question sink in before answering. He had a habit of living deep inside his head; it made socializing awkward and difficult. "I, ah... I was just observing. I didn't mean to be in the way." Another part of his brain was calculating the mathematics, the physics of this work. What were the properties of the metal? What were the properties of the metal when superheated? How much force was required in each blow of the hammer? The calculations were baseless as he didn't have the necessary information to actually compute anything. But he was supposed to be talking now... "You could show me a thing or two about metalwork," he offered, taking a shot in the dark, "if you aren't too, too busy." And then he began to wonder if he could set up a large enough circle of glyphs around a forge so that the djed of a metal item could be controlled while it was being shaped, thereby magecrafting while metalsmithing. It was intriguing to think of himself as a magesmith or something, but he wasn't sure it was feasible.

[Marcus Braeden]

"By no means were you in the way, i just assumed you may be someone looking to buy something or place an order or something." Marcus smiled. "Name's Marcus by the way." Marcus extended a hand to the young man.

Marcus raised his brow when the man asked for crash course on smithing. Marcus was not used to having people randomly ask for lessons on being a smith. And even if people were to ask for lessons on smithing, there were far more experienced smiths working in the Ironworks than Marcus. Why him? Who knows, maybe he just stuck out since he was much younger than most of the workforce in the forge. Well, why not, can't be that much harm to show what we do here Marcus thought.

Marcus laughed "Sure, why not...come this way. I'll give you the grand tour first before getting into the metalwork. Also, should probably get you an apron and some gloves, i don't think they would appreciate it if we were to have a casualty of some sort occur here." Marcus said as he grabbed a pair of gloves and an apron from a closet.

Marcus simply began to point out anything that caught his eye throughout the Ironworks, and explain what it's purpose was and all the basic stuff a novice would need to know. He started with the forge, since it was probably the most defining feature of the Ironworks. He also pointed out anvils and sledgehammers, and explained some of the basic tools one would use when forging something.

[Hadrian]

"Hadrian," he said, shaking the other young man's hand. They seemed to be about the same age, but while Marcus was shorter, he was far and away physically stronger than Hadrian, and the young enchanter suddenly felt lacking somehow. It had been the same with Torc, who was learning to magecraft, but was also huge and a much better candidate for magesmith than Hadrian himself. He forced a smile, though. It didn't matter that he had probably made some sort of a faux pas showing up randomly, staring, and then asking to be told a thing or two about the process. Surely Marcus had better things to do, but he was being kind, so Hadrian would attempt to be friendly as well. Blinking, he accepted the protective gear and smiled in amusement as he pulled on the leather apron and heavy gloves. If only everyone else he knew in the world could see him now. Then again, when his magecrafting work got more dangerous, he might need to wear stronger armor than a knight of Syliras to remain safe in the face of an accident. Not that Hadrian allowed himself to make accidents; he was a perfectionist by nature. Hadrian absorbed all the metalcrafting lore that Marcus shared, nodding with interest and asking questions here and there for clarification. The forges were indeed impressive here. Likely there was no greater forge anywhere except far off Sultros, or perhaps Ravok. His respect grew bit by bit for Marcus, who obviously knew what he was talking about. Competence pleased Hadrian. Of course, part of his mind strayed toward magecraft. It always did. He was already planning improvements on the ways he had learned to enchant a blade, for example. Changing this aspect of the charging water, or adding that sequence of glyphs to the sigil of enchantment... Now if only Marcus would have time to actually walk him through the process of smithing something simple, Hadrian could count it a day well spent learning something new.

[Marcus Braeden]

Marcus answered Hadrian's questions as best as he could. He wasn't an expert on the craft and he slipped up a few times, but he quickly corrected himself in those instances. Marcus was inclined to ask someone more experienced than himself teach Hadrian, but everyone seemed either busy or angry, and something intimidated Marcus about a man with a hammer who had lost his temper. Marcus walked back over to his work area whilst waving Hadrian over.

"Well today all i have been forging are spearheads" Marcus said as he picked up one. "These particular spearheads are pretty simple to forge." Marcus grabbed a bar of iron that was ready to be hammered. "First we need some iron then we can begin."

Marcus decided to explain what he was doing as he worked. First he began to hammer one end of the bar of iron in order to shape the bar into a point. He hammered on all sides of the bar of iron. Once he was pleased with the point, he put the iron back into the fire and then pulled it back out. He then hammered the sides just below the point he had created, to give the spearhead the look of a spade. After that was done he put the iron back into the fire once again. After taking it out, he bent the sides of the metal furthest from the spear point in order to create a place for the wooden shaft. Once that was done all he had to do was put it back in the furnace for a final time to weld the bends together.

Marcus wiped some more sweat from his forehead and said "well that about does it, you wanna give it a shot?"

OOCSorry if this seems a bit confusing. I was going off of the pictures of an article that was in German.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian listened and observed like a good student. Though he had graduated from the University of Zeltiva, he knew that he would never stop learning and so he came to each person with more knowledge to him with respect. Out of curiosity, he invoked his auristic Sight, wanting to see what it looked like on another spectrum, on the level of the djed. This discipline was still not Hadrian's forte, so he couldn't quite make sense of what he was seeing, but it was still interesting to see how the djed reacted to the intense heat, how Marcus' hammer blows altered the forming spearhead in more ways than just shape. The young enchanter realized that he too was sweating from the heat of the forges. And then Marcus asked him if he wanted to try. "Me?" he asked, blinking until his Sight stuttered and returned to the normal spectrum. "Are you sure? I'll probably break something. I'm not strong, nor coordinated."

OOCNo worries. I just thought it'd be cool for both of us to get a little XP while our boys meet and get to know each other.

[Marcus Braeden]

"Well perhaps your right, maybe creating something from scratch isn't quite appropriate for a newcomer like yourself. But however, that doesn't mean i can't use you as a striker. I remember seeing an abandoned axehead somewhere. It would be the perfect thing to practice on, since it won't matter if you break it or something." Marcus said. Marcus searched around for a few minutes, then he came upon the axehead he was looking for.

Because Hadrian doubted his strength, Marcus grabbed a 10 Lb sledgehammer rather than one of the heavier ones. He handed the sledgehammer to Hadrian and walked over and heated the axehead in the forge. He then lay the axehead along the anvil.

"Alright, this is pretty simple. All you need to do is hit the spot on the axehead i tap with my hammer as hard as you can." Marcus explained, "Oh and also, try to wait until my hand and hammer are out of the way before striking" Marcus grinned.

[Hadrian]

"A striker," Hadrian repeated, remembering what Marcus had said of the striker and their function in smithing. "All right, all right." When Marcus brought back the axe head, he began to go over everything Marcus had said that might be pertinent to this endeavor, which was basically everything. He had to take a deep breath, letting it out slowly, the most basic of breath-based meditations, in order to keep his nerves from spiraling into something terrible. A part of him was offended when Marcus brought him the "little" sledgehammer, but it was heavy enough that he knew he would need to make an effort to wield it without smashing fingers or knees on accident. "All right," he said, taking another deep breath. He blinked once, bringing his augmented Sight back to the fore, and looked at the axe head, the sledgehammer, Marcus, and everything. The djed seemed part of everything, and he hoped that he would learn something about the magic in everything as well as the basics of metalsmithing or, perhaps, blacksmithing from Marcus with this. "I'll be careful," he promised.

[Marcus Braeden]

"Alright have at it" Marcus said.

Marcus began to tap his hammer on various locations on the axehead, making sure to remove anything that resembled his fingers from the scene before Hadrian attempted to strike the axehead. Marcus tended to phase in an out of reality when he was smithing, and although he was working with a total newcomer, who needed Marcus' attention no doubt, Marcus could not help but daydream, even if just a little bit.

He enjoyed his usual daydream, a life of adventure as a Syliran Knight. He pictured himself with the perfect sword at his side, riding off into the wildlands to face the dangers of the land. Marcus was interrupted by the sound of yelling from other smiths in the Ironworks, which brought Marcus spiraling back into reality to tend to Hadrian.