Dreadflame Family (3)
Dreadflame Family (3)
I unpacked my things in the room Eriel had guided me to.
Unpacking didn't take long—all I had were a few clothes I hadn't stashed in my subspace.
'...This is a room?'
Feeling somewhat dumbfounded, I swept the interior with Observation.
It was large and spacious, far beyond anything you'd call a room. It could pass for a separate house.
The furnishings were gleaming, too—evidently quite valuable items.
The mansion itself was vast enough to qualify as a castle, but were all the guest rooms this spacious?
When I asked Eriel, she indicated that wasn't the case for every guest room.
That made sense. Scanning the whole mansion, I hadn't seen many rooms of this size.
"This is a room for precious guests—maybe one or two per generation. The Chonggwalju has also stayed here before."
[I see.]
I nodded at the explanation.
Chonggwalju Choi Ji-yeon was not originally from the Calamity Flame Family.
She had been a reasonably successful hero from outside before marrying the current head, Hong Jin-seon, and becoming part of the family.
She also discovered an unexpected aptitude—not for combat, but for administration and management—and leveraged it fully, rising to the post of Chonggwalju and now overseeing all the family's affairs, great and small.
...Though from what I knew, the Chonggwalju position chewed people up and spat them out.
Given the sheer scale of the Calamity Flame Family, the workload placed on its chief administrator was staggering.
I'd been certain of it the moment I saw the mountain of paperwork piled in her office.
Which was why Choi Ji-yeon harbored an undisguised, perpetual desire to step down from the post.
Yet in the original story, even after Hong Yeon-hwa became family head, Choi Ji-yeon still occupied the Chonggwalju seat...
I finished putting my things away while listening to her explanation.
After thinking for a moment, I asked Eriel.
[Could the verification be conducted this afternoon?]
"I'll schedule it before the evening dinner."
[Please do.]
Eriel nodded at once.
I'd only asked because dragging things out seemed pointless, and it looked like it could be done quickly.
'Hmm...'
I checked the time. There were still hours left until evening.
[Would it be all right if I looked around the grounds?]
I could just sit here and sweep practically the whole estate with Observation alone... but it was probably better to go in person if I could.
"Yes, of course."
Eriel's answer was immediate.
I nodded and rose to my feet.
.
.
.
The defining trait of the Calamity Flame Family was always, first and foremost, combat power.
The family head himself ranked among the strongest heroes even within the top-grade tier, and under his command were numerous combat units capable of penetrating the Demon Realm and conducting solo operations.
It was a natural feature of a clan whose inheritable Unique Ability was so aggressively specialized for battle.
And the place where that trait became most apparent was in the requirements for becoming the head of the Calamity Flame Family.
The essential prerequisite for becoming the family head was martial might.
Knowledge, wisdom, prudence—those were nice to have, but without overwhelming strength, ascending to the headship was impossible.
That was how much the Calamity Flame Family valued martial power.
But combat wasn't the family's only strength.
—Clang! Clang! Clang!
The sound ringing in my ears was startlingly intense.
It had been audible from far off, and the closer I drew to its source, the fiercer it became—so fierce that prolonged exposure might well leave a person deaf in one ear.
I swept Observation over a building situated on one corner of the vast, sprawling Calamity Flame estate.
A massive structure built in rough, utilitarian fashion.
The thick iron doors at its center were massively heavy, and from the tall chimneys dotted across the rooftop, black smoke curled lazily upward.
A smithy.
The instant I registered the sharp clanging in my ears and the building's appearance, the word surfaced in my mind.
I'd already received permission to enter.
Rather than the thick central iron doors, I stepped inside through a small side door tucked into a corner.
—Whoosh!
The moment the door opened, a blast of heat slammed into my entire body.
My clothes fluttered as the searing heat seeped through. It was the kind of heat that would likely burn an ordinary person on contact. I wasn't burned, but my whole body flushed, and the sensation was uncomfortable in more ways than one.
A bead of sweat rolled down my cheek. I wiped it with a hand and casually observed Eriel standing a few steps behind me.
Her composure was undisturbed. I didn't sense any magical measures, either.
She might be retired, but it seemed the caliber of a former top-grade hunter hadn't faded.
'Hmm...'
Should I neutralize it with magic? Or wrap the Sky Wing Feather around myself to block it?
I debated briefly but didn't act on either thought.
Without taking any other measures, I simply bore the heat and stepped inside.
The sound of my footsteps was buried beneath the denser, more forceful ringing of hammers.
The loudest noise was the hammering. Next came the distinctive roar of fierce flames.
I'd already confirmed it with Observation, but quite a few people were inside.
The center of the first floor was a kind of communal workspace.
Private workshops occupied the second floor, but the first floor was crowded, too.
People who were clearly blacksmiths.
In front of each stood a solid anvil, and beside them, all manner of smaller work implements were arrayed.
When they brought their heavy hammers down, the red-hot metal caught between anvil and hammer sang out in varied tones and changed shape.
It was exactly what you'd picture as a forge and a blacksmith at work. But some sights defied typical, common-sense expectations.
I headed toward a blacksmith working in a corner. I didn't speak to him—just stood a little distance away so as not to disturb his work.
The blacksmith was an old man.
His hair was streaked with white, his face lined with the marks of age.
But his build was not merely sturdy—it was outrageously muscular.
The arm muscles swinging the hammer were impossibly thick, and even before the blazing flames, he shed sweat but let out not a single groan. The force behind his hammer never wavered.
A furnace stood right beside where the old blacksmith worked.
Flames surged and churned ceaselessly there, melting metal. Another blacksmith reached a hand toward it.
—Whoomph!
In an instant, the fire swelled and swallowed the outstretched hand.
A sight that would make most people reel in panic, but no one around paid it any mind.
To them, it was an unremarkable, everyday occurrence—nothing threatening.
—Whoomph...
The flames subsided.
The fire that had billowed up, as if answering the blacksmith's touch, gradually settled and fell under his dominion.
It was a feat possible only with a superior affinity for fire and mastery of its control.
The flames visibly calmed. The blacksmith checked the fire, now burning low and non-threatening in gentle ripples, and nodded.
Then, from the blacksmith's hand, flames erupted.
An intense blaze poured into the furnace.
The low-burning fire churned as if feeding on the offering, swelling with a force unmistakably greater than before.
Yet it remained under the blacksmith's command. Gauging the fire's intensity, he slid a metal ingot inside.
The ingot could not withstand the onslaught of flames and slowly began to melt.
'Calamity Flame.'
The fire churning in the furnace was Calamity Flame. And the fire that had issued from the old man's hand was Calamity Flame as well.
Come to think of it, most of the fire flickering through this space was Calamity Flame.
Combat power was the Calamity Flame Family's defining trait, but a trait to rival it was their metalsmithing.
Working metal required fire, and Calamity Flame—reputed to be the mightiest flame in the world—was perfectly suited to the craft.
I'd never properly learned any crafting techniques. At most, I could dabble on my own with a bit of sewing or woodworking.
Even during the Blank Period, I'd only nibbled at a bit of theory on crafting.
So I couldn't fully parse the work being carried out in this workshop.
All I perceived was the process: metal melting, red-hot metal struck with hammers, quenched in water, melted and hammered again, refined while controlling the equipment.
Every bit of it was captured by Observation. It wouldn't fade into fleeting memory—it would remain as reference material I could pull out and review anytime.
"And what is it you see with those closed eyes?"
The old man I'd been observing spoke up abruptly. It wasn't a question about my identity.
Even facing the blazing heat, his hammer never paused.
[I'm not sure.]
[I can only feel it.]
"Better than the trinkets some people carry around."
I didn't offer any explanation about having a detection ability.
But the old man nodded as if that alone told him enough.
He asked nothing more and moved his hands. He brought the hammer down, struck the metal, changed its shape.
The other blacksmiths throughout the forge did the same. Gripping their hammers, swinging them down, smelting metal.
The information I perceived was completely different.
The hammer the old man swung was unlike the others'. The process was different. The results that followed were different.
I could tell through Observation alone: this old man's touch was on another level entirely.
[May I keep watching?]
"Do as you please."
His tone was somewhat brusque, but it was still an affirmative answer.
I nodded and crouched nearby, sharpening my Observation to its finest detail.
Then I kept studying the old man's movements.
I understood almost none of it, yet simply watching his motions raised my comprehension of metalsmithing and crafting techniques.
Quietly observing the blacksmiths at work here was already a solid lesson.
My head tingled. I nodded at the sensation of one branch of All-Rounder growing.
'So it really is him.'
I'd been fairly sure, and it turned out my guess was right.
With a peculiar expression, I continued observing the old man who did nothing but swing his hammer.
Tanhwaju, the Birth Fire Master—Hwa Byeok-un.
A figure who possessed metalsmithing skills counted among the finest in the world.
He was the Calamity Flame Family's foremost blacksmith, having crafted the personal armaments of the current family head and several heads before him.
I crouched beside him and quietly studied the old man's movements.
* * *
[Unique Ability «All-Rounder» has grown.]
[Unique Ability «Mana Affinity» has grown.]
[Unique Ab?lity «?» has grown.]