A Ghost-Possessed Face
Hm-hmm~
Early evening, the sun slipping down the sky, and Dohyeon was on his way home with a tune wandering out under his breath.
"Funny how it shook out. Just like Byeongsu-hyung said — turns out all I really have to do is work hard."
Only two days ago, the question of how to grow the business had left his head pounding, the weight of it surging up on him again and again. An opportunity he had never seen coming had since cleared about half that worry away.
"If I'm actually going to run a business, I need to push Black Iron Rule as high as it will go."
Black Iron Rule had already carried him to his first goal. But the skill's potential was anything but ordinary, and he wasn't about to grow smug over having it and turn his eyes straight toward opening a shop.
"And if not now, I won't have any real time to raise the level."
Training Black Iron Rule took a workshop, iron, and fire. Once he founded a business and hung out a sign, he would never be able to spend his hours on nothing but leveling.
"Byeongsu-hyung ought to be off by now, right? Heh. He's going to make such a fuss."
Remembering how subdued Byeongsu had looked at their last round of drinks — nothing like his usual self — Dohyeon called him.
"Hyung! You're off, right?"
"Huh? Off, sure. But why do you sound so cheerful?"
Whether the day had worn him thin or not, Byeongsu's tired voice came through the phone thick with fatigue.
"Hyung, today I refined— no, never mind. Let's talk in person. Drinks are on me tonight!"
This was a skill the whole rise and fall of the business hung on. Talking it through over the phone alone felt like a waste.
"Haa... I can't drink for a while. Is it that important?"
"It is important, but... hyung, what's wrong with your voice?"
At the sound of Byeongsu, as if the life had gone out of him, the excitement that had been bubbling in Dohyeon sank.
"Maybe it's going days without a drink or a smoke. There's no joy left in living."
"You're quitting smoking and drinking? You couldn't quit even when your wife was ready to beat you to death."
Dohyeon knew perfectly well how dearly Byeongsu loved his liquor and his cigarettes, and the man on the other end of the line felt like a stranger.
"Health checkup came back a wreck, and the wife hit the ceiling. Shook me a bit, too, I'll admit."
"...Is it bad?"
Byeongsu was staring down forty. Dohyeon couldn't ask it lightly.
"You should see how much junk is caked up in my blood vessels... They say I've basically got the body of a man in his mid-fifties."
"Guess you could pal around with the mid-fifties crowd, then."
The words had slipped out of Dohyeon without a thought, and Byeongsu, as good as admitting it, let a sheepish little laugh leak out.
"Heh. You're telling me. So drinks are going to be tough. Anyway, what did you call about?"
"Mm..."
Byeongsu was older than him, but Dohyeon had always thought of him as a friend — and sometimes, when it mattered, as a big brother. Seeing that weakness in him set Dohyeon's thoughts turning.
I owe Byeongsu-hyung a lot... When I got out of the army and he introduced me to Cheongeun Workshop, I never even thanked him properly. He looked out for me all through my years at the company, too.
"Hey, Lee Dohyeon! You called, so talk, damn it."
"It's nothing. I'll call you again later, hyung. Take care of yourself."
"Hey, you. If something's going on—"
Click.
Letting Byeongsu's chatter spill out unanswered, Dohyeon ended the call.
"And I've got a new skill now, besides."
It wasn't as if he had anywhere in particular to be. Still, this was his first time, and there was no telling when he would finish. He had better get moving.
"I'll give you the honor of receiving my first piece, hyung."
Something made by his own hands, from the first step to the last. There was no one better suited to receive it than Byeongsu.
The little workshop Dohyeon had set up at home.
Calling it a workshop was generous. It was only a single room, a desk, and a pile of enchanting supplies.
"Lucky Black Iron Rule can make accessories, and not just equipment."
Black Iron Rule Lv. 1
A technique that governs the properties of matter, its transformations, and the principles by which form is made.
As the skill level rises, its power grows, and the inherited knowledge expands.
The description of Black Iron Rule did not say refining. It specified a technique that governed the principles of matter.
On the off chance, Dohyeon had wondered whether he might be able to make accessories as well, and fortunately Black Iron Rule was operating exactly as it should.
"Hm. As expected, Lv. 1 won't let me make anything complicated."
If Byeongsu had been a hunter, Dohyeon would have made him equipment without a second thought. But although Byeongsu was awakened, he was not a hunter. He was an enchanter. Because of that, what Dohyeon could make for him was limited to accessories.
"Earrings... hyung doesn't wear those. He's already got a gold chain, and the only ring he puts on is his wedding band..."
Ruling things out one by one left very little.
The pencil whispered across the notebook. When the rough sketch was finished, Dohyeon nodded, pleased with it.
"A bracelet ought to be safe enough."
Nothing ornate about it. A simple form, a few wide, flat links of metal joined together. Worn with a suit, it wouldn't catch the eye, and it was something a man could put on every day for work without it becoming a burden.
"With a design like this, I should be able to make it somehow."
"Next is what enchantment to put on it..."
Byeongsu was a B-Rank enchanter, but a management post had pulled him off the floor quite a while ago. He himself didn't seem to carry much lingering attachment to enchanting, and he looked content enough to have left the field — but fallen from the work or not, a B-Rank was still a B-Rank.
"Slapping an ordinary rune on it just feels wrong."
As a C-Rank enchanter, Dohyeon did not have many enchantments he could use. Set aside the combat runes hunters relied on, and the choices shrank further still.
"Nothing but the Rune of Vitality would even mean anything, would it?"
Dohyeon scratched his head and let out a sigh.
He had never expected the enchanting side, rather than the refining, to be what tripped him up.
"Hm. Scribble long enough, and an idea usually turns up."
And so, filling the notebook with doodles that meant nothing in particular, Dohyeon saw the night through.
The next day, having watched the night through without closing his eyes, Dohyeon arrived at the training hall early.
I've got the general direction. First, I should ask permission.
He knocked on the office where the instructors kept themselves.
"Come in."
"Excuse me."
At Master Choi Gwangcheol's answer, Dohyeon stepped inside.
"What business brings you at such an hour?"
"You're here early yourself, Instructor."
A full hour remained before the lecture began, yet Master Choi Gwangcheol sat drinking tea, no different from any other day.
"Sleep thins out, when you grow old. But you..."
"Ah. I'm Lee Dohyeon. I'll be taking part in the first session of the Government-Funded Crafter Training Program."
"...I know who you are. Did we not speak only yesterday?"
Something about the man felt a touch less prickly than the day before, and Dohyeon tilted his head.
Was he putting a wall up yesterday because we were in the middle of class?
"I came because there's a favor I'd like to ask."
"A ghost-possessed face."
"Pardon?"
Master Choi Gwangcheol, who had been studying him in silence, cut him off and let out a short breath of a laugh.
"A bit of jargon among craftsmen. Set yourself on making a thing and turn it over in your head all night, and every one of us ends up with a face like that."
As if Dohyeon's expression amused him, Master Choi went on.
"You came because you need a space. If you wish to use the practice room, then use it."
With a soft clack, he drew a single key from the drawer and held it out.
"Thank you!"
Permission had come far more easily than he had expected. Dohyeon all but bounded forward and took the key.
"When it is finished, show it to me."
"Will you be evaluating it?"
"No."
Master Choi lifted his teacup.
"You're here early, hyung."
"Hey. Come on in."
Dohyeon had only just shut his eyes in the classroom when Baek Jincheol came over.
"You didn't sleep last night?"
"Ended up that way."
The details were hard to explain, so he left it vague, and Jincheol nodded as if he understood.
"You've awakened a refining skill. Of course you couldn't sleep."
"Huh?"
"Heh. Do you have any idea how shocked everyone was yesterday, when Master Choi Gwangcheol called you aside?"
"I got lucky."
Yesterday he had been hammering, gotten carried off by the thrill of it, and stayed long after practice ended. He hadn't had a spare moment to look around at the other trainees.
"You already had enchanting, and now you've picked up refining too... That's a much rarer combination than people think."
"Not sure I can pull the kind of performance that would justify it."
Even with Jincheol making a fuss, Dohyeon stayed even. Stuck groaning over a single bracelet, the supposed greatness of it didn't feel real.
"Aw, have a little confidence, hyung."
"Yeah. Thanks."
Things had been going well for him lately. It had been a while since something refused to work, and the weak words seemed to be slipping out because of it.
"Is it important enough to stay up all night?"
"Hm?"
The hollow look of Dohyeon's face, so unlike his usual self, seemed to be bothering him.
"Figured, now that I've got the refining skill, I'd make a gift."
"Aha. Not going well, is it?"
"...Is a first piece usually like that?"
How many works of his own had Jincheol made by now? How many had A-Rank Master Choi Gwangcheol? Dohyeon was stuck on his very first, and thinking of people who had spent decades in the trade showed him plainly how far short he fell.
Getting Black Iron Rule was no excuse to go strutting around.
"Me, I turned mine out clean. Not a snag."
"...You were talking like you understood."
Dohyeon felt a small stab of betrayal.
"The people around me got stuck a lot on their first pieces."
"I'm not even sure I'm stuck, exactly..."
At Jincheol's needling little smile, Dohyeon's lips pushed out in a pout.
"Come on, hyung."
"Yeah?"
"You stayed up all night. Didn't you?"
"..."
"Then you're stuck."
Dohyeon wanted very badly to flick him on the forehead.