Li Yu looked one last ti at the Void Silver Rapier before turning his back on the glowing display cases. He could not evaluate these weapons well enough. If he was going to assemble a proper formation of flying swords, he could not afford to be ignorant. He needed to understand the tools better.
Li Yu walked down the staircases until he reached the heavy iron doors at the entrance. He stepped out into the hot air of the forge sector. The two massive guards, clad in armor, stood still beside the entrance. Li Yu approached them while offering a polite and respectful bow.
"Seniors," Li Yu addressed them. "Excuse my ignorance but I find my knowledge of swords lacking. Who might I speak to within the clan in order to learn the fundantals of evaluating swords and understanding the nature of crafted treasures?"
The two guards blinked and they stared at the young man standing before them. Their expressions remained completely stoic and professional, but internally a wave of bewildernt crashed through their minds.
‘Who in the Li Clan doesn't know how to evaluate a sword?’ The guard on the left thought to himself with his mind reeling. Infants in the outer courtyards are taught how to identify spiritual steel before they can even walk. How does this boy hold an access token of that level and not understand?
‘He must be a sheltered young master from one of the distant vassal branches.’ The guard on the right reasoned internally. But still, to stand at the peak of the sword path and ask how to look at a blade... it is like a fish asking how to swim.
Despite their internal incredulity, they were highly trained guards of the inner pavilions. They were not rude, nor did they let their judgnt show on their faces. News of Canghai's son had not yet trickled down to every single corner of the vast military sectors, so they rely treated him as an eccentric junior with high backing.
"Young Master." The guard on the left spoke with his voice deep and rumbling. "If you wish to learn the true nature of the blade, looking at finished weapons will not serve you. You must go to the source. You should seek out one of the elders in charge of the active forges or find a master smith. They can teach you the language of the steel."
"Follow the main stone path higher up the mountain." The second guard added while pointing a gauntleted finger toward the billowing chimneys of the upper peak. "The master forges are located near the summit."
"Thank you, Seniors." Li Yu smiled and was appreciative of the direction.
He left the armory behind and began his ascent up the Peak of the Forge. The higher he walked, the hotter the air beca. The ambient Qi here was completely different from the serene and flowing energy of the library or the administrative courtyards. It was aggressive, crackling with the violent heat of fires and the rhythmic, deafening ringing of hamrs striking.
Near the upper courtyards where rivers of molten iron flowed through deep stone trenches, Li Yu found an elderly man holding a glowing ledger. The elder wore heavy leather aprons over his silk robes and was currently inspecting a massive crate of unrefined ore.
Li Yu approached and bowed. "Greetings, Elder."
The elder looked up from his ledger. His eyes narrowed for a fraction of a second as he took in Li Yu's features and then his eyes widened in sudden recognition. As a high ranking overseer of the inner sect's resources, he was privy to the recent events at the banquet.
"Young Yu," The elder greeted warmly while putting his ledger away and returning the bow. "It is an honor to have you visit the Peak of the Forge.”
"You are too kind, Elder," Li Yu replied humbly. "I have co seeking a teacher. I wish to learn how to properly evaluate swords and the materials that go into them. I realized today that I do not truly understand treasures that well, only if sothing is incredibly powerful or not."
The elder stroked his soot stained beard while nodding in approval. "A wise realization. To seek the deeper truth of the craft is the mark of a true cultivator."
The elder gestured to the sprawling complexes of forges around them. "Let it be known that while the Li Clan is not universally renowned for general smithing, we do not craft the greatest armors, nor do we forge other legendary weapons, when it cos to the specific art of crafting swords, our master smiths stand among the top. There is no better place to learn."
"Who should I speak with?" Li Yu asked.
"I will direct you to one of our best." The elder said with a knowing smile touching his lips. "You will find Master Zhan Tie in the third open air forge to the east. I believe the two of you will get along quite well."
Li Yu thanked the elder and followed the path eastward. He arrived at the third forge. The heat here was suffocating, it was distorting the air so violently that the surrounding stone walls appeared to ripple like water.
Standing in front of a black iron anvil was a towering figure.
The man was built like a mountain. He stood over seven feet tall with shoulders broad enough to block out the sun. Thick muscles bulged beneath his sweat drenched and soot stained skin. He wielded a forging hamr that looked heavy enough to crush a small mountain. The man was bringing it down upon a glowing ingot of steel with a rhythmic and ground shaking rhythm.
Clang. Clang. Clang.
Li Yu imdiately recognized the physical traits. The size, the terrifying physical density and the underlying aura of physical power.
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This man was not just any Zhan from another family, he was a Zhan from his own clan. Li Yu waited patiently until the man finished his current sequence. The towering smith plunged the glowing ingot into a vat of shimring quenching oil. A cloud of hissing steam erupted into the air.
The smith turned around and was wiping the sweat from his brow with a thick forearm. He looked at Li Yu, his sharp eyes taking in the young man's fra.
"You don't have the completely frail and willowy build of a typical Li Clan mber." The man rumbled. He let out a booming and hearty laugh that echoed over the roaring magma. “But you don’t have the amazing fra of a Zhan either. Yet, I can tell that you are a Zhan… you must be Tielan’s boy.” The man correctly deduced.
"I am Li Yu." Li Yu smiled while stepping forward and bowing respectfully. "And you must be Master Zhan Tie."
"That I am," Tie grinned while tossing his heavy hamr onto a nearby rack. He grabbed a clay jug of wine and took a deep pull. "I heard a half-Zhan brat had finally been revealed. It is good to et you, boy."
"An elder directed here." Li Yu said. "I am surprised to find soone from the Zhan Clan acting as a master smith for the Li Clan."
Tie chuckled while wiping the wine from his beard. "The cosmos is a strange place, Li Yu. I ca to the Li Clan territories many centuries ago to test my physical arts against their sword formations. Instead of a rival, I found a Li Clan woman whose sword was as sharp as her tongue. I married her and I stayed."
Tie grinned broadly. "Tielan and Canghai were not the first to bridge our two clans and they will not be the last. The blood has mixed before, even if so of the more conservative elders prefer not to talk about it."
Because Li Yu was half-Zhan, Tie took an imdiate liking to the boy.
"You said you ca to learn." Tie said. "What is it you want to know?"
"I want to understand weapons." Li Yu answered honestly. "I want to know how to evaluate a sword, how to understand its materials and how to judge its true worth without relying purely on the spiritual pressure it radiates. The latter is easy enough to tell when a sword is incredible. I want to be able to tell if a sword, or any weapon in fact, is good or great and anything in between."
Tie nodded slowly while listening. The jovial smile faded from his face and was replaced by the serious and intense focus of a master craftsman.
"Then you must first unlearn one of the greatest lies told to young cultivators." Tieyuan stated with his voice dropping to a heavy tone. "You must understand that there is absolutely no such thing as a perfect weapon."
Li Yu tilted his head. "No perfect weapon? But what about the Ten Great Swords of the Li Clan? Are they not perfect?"
"They are perfect or near perfect for the specific task they were created to perform." Tieyuan corrected him sharply. "But if you take one of them and hand it to a brute who only knows how to smash shields. That supre weapon becos worse than a standard iron club. A weapon is not a standalone entity. A weapon is crafted with a singular purpose in mind when it is forged."
Tieyuan walked over to a nearby weapon rack and he picked up a spiked war hamr forged from dark iron.
"Look at this." Tieyuan said while holding the heavy weapon out. "You do not craft a sword with the purpose of shattering a heavily armored tortoise into a bloody pulp. The edge would chip and the spine would warp before the blade would snap. You craft a war hamr if your purpose is to smash and crush the physical laws of your opponent."
He tossed the hamr back onto the rack and picked up a beautifully carved wooden staff that pulsed with natural Qi.
"Just like you wouldn't try to cleanly slice a man's head off with a staff." Tieyuan continued. "Form dictates function. A staff is for sweeping and creating distance while delivering concussive force. A sword is an instrunt of severing. It is ant to pierce defenses and slice through flesh to kill with precision."
Tieyuan walked back to the anvil and picked up two different pieces of raw ore. One was a chunk of bright crimson tal that radiated intense heat. The other was a piece of pale and frosted silver that caused the moisture in the air to instantly freeze.
"Once you understand purpose, you must understand resonance." Tieyuan explained while holding the two ores out. "Materials play a monuntal role in the foundation of a weapon. Tell why in the Heavens would you wield a sword forged from Deep Sea Yin Silver if you cultivate a fire art? Your entire Dao is built upon reducing your enemies to ash so that makes no sense."
"Because the elents would conflict." Li Yu answered as his mind absorbed the logic.
"Exactly!" Tieyuan barked approvingly. "The elents would go to war with each other before the blade even touched the enemy. The water affinity of the silver would actively resist and smother the fire Qi you pump into it. You would lose half your energy just fighting your own weapon."
Tieyuan tossed the ores back into their bins. He leaned against the anvil and looked Li Yu directly in the eyes.
"This is the fundantal truth of the craft. The best weapon is never the one that glows the brightest on a display rack. The best weapon is the one that perfectly fits your specific needs, your physical body and your overall style. It needs to match your elental affinities and your fighting style."
Li Yu listened intently while his thoughts drifted to the Celestial Star Sword Formation. He had been blindly searching for swords that simply radiated overwhelming power. He completely ignored how those swords might actually interact together.
"It is incredibly tough to find sothing like that out in the wild." Tieyuan sighed while crossing his arms. "You might spend ten lifetis searching the Myriad Realms for a pre-made blade that perfectly aligns with you. Most people find weapons that ‘will do’ and get them 80 to 90 percent of the way there. That is why the top tier experts do not rely on scavenged weapons. That 10 percent will make the difference in combat."
Tieyuan gestured around the roaring forge with pride radiating from his massive fra.
"When a cultivator reaches the peak, they have a weapon custom forged for them." Tieyuan said with his voice filled with reverence. "They spend decades or sotis centuries traveling the dangerous domains. They gather the exact spiritual tals and the specific beast cores, alongside the rare elental catalysts that perfectly suit their purpose. Then they bring those materials to a master smith."
Tieyuan pointed a thick finger at Li Yu's chest.
"We take those materials and we forge them into a weapon that is an exact and flawless reflection of the cultivator's Dao. It becos an extension of their very soul. That is what makes a weapon truly supre. It is not the aura it projects to others. It is the absolute and unbroken harmony it shares with its master."
Li Yu stood in silence while the heat of the forge washed over him. The realization settled deep into his bones. His previous thod of evaluating weapons had been incredibly shallow, relatively effective for his needs but shallow. He had been looking for trophies instead of tools.
He now understood that to complete his formation, he didn't just need powerful swords. He needed swords that resonated with himself and fit his purposes. He could shape his formation to use specific types of swords, perhaps a mixture of ones or perhaps 100 of nearly the exact sa sword. Li Yu wasn’t sure exactly which path he would take with it but it was a mind opening lesson for him and it was just the start.
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