Picking his way through the stores of Steel Alley Wu Hao rembered sothing that Old Qin had once told him, when he'd been younger. He'd thought he'd forgotten most of it, but now that he was back in ti he was finding that mories like dregs kept drifting up from the sea of his mories.
Old Qin had said that when a good rchant went to market, it was always with an idea of what he was there to buy. There could be haggling over the details ike the exact cost or how much to buy, but there was always a reason to be there, sothing that you had expectations for buying. Without sothing like that, Old Qin had said sagely, you were likelier to get scamd.
It might've been good advice or not, but either way Wu Hao had realized that he wasn't actually sure what he wanted to buy. A weapon, yes. What weapon?
Thinking back, he tried to make a short list of what arts he knew so far. Of the Earth-tier, he knew a fist art, the Heavy Fist. Of the Sky-tier he knew the Rending Dagger Art, the Titanic Mace Art, the Storm-Cutting Saber Art, and the Five Beasts Claw Art. All of those had at least three moves that he knew except the mace art, and that was one that he probably wouldn't get back to getting the next pieces of soon. Maces were rare weapons, it seed.
Then there were the Heaven-tier arts. Obviously there was the Sky-Severing Saber Art, the Hound's Snapping Jaws that used daggers, and then there was the Stream-Cutting Slash Art. He'd actually successfully used the Sky-Severing Saber Art - he'd killed his way to freedom with it just a week or two ago. He also knew the Demonic Art of the Flayed Body which was also at the Heaven tier, but he wasn't going to use that.
Especially not here. The people around here probably wouldn't take the presence of a Demonic art all that well, and while there were apparently ways to conceal the demonic qi Wu Hao had never learned those and intended to never need them, either.
Also he had at so point acquired an art that had to do with needles, but that didn't seem all that relevant.
So. In terms of weapons, that ant he could use daggers, sabers, claws, and in a pinch his fists. For all that he'd considered himself able to use any weapon, that was a shorter list than he'd thought. There were holes in his knowledge, too - weapons for which he had a Heaven-tier Art but no Sky-tier Art, or the other way around.
He could acquire more, but that'd require finding soone who'd kill him. He had to pick his target carefully, too - if they knocked him unconscious instead of killing him outright, then that'd be a disaster.
Right now, he still had the option of simply returning back in ti to after he'd killed those bandits in Wei Mingku's village. Or the Jin Clan, but that was an option he'd still rather avoid if he could.
And, actually, now that he was thinking about it, this was a good opportunity to test his revivals. If he bought a sword here, would the technique that he got be based around the sword that he'd bought or would it be made to counter the technique that he'd been killed by?
Shaking his head, Wu Hao dragged his thoughts back onto track. He could use daggers, but he'd never liked daggers that much. He'd just used them because he had to. The sa kind of went for sabers - everyone at the Jin clan had used sabers. It'd been far simpler to fall in line, and even then he'd wound up using his daggers and his fists sotis.
Although he wouldn't be using the dagger he bought here to engrave arrays on and tossing it out to explode, the way he did with his kitchen knives and the like. He wasn't made out of money.
What did he actually want to use, then?
There were the Four Weapons, as martial artists called them, which were the sword or the Gentleman, the staff or the Grandfather, the saber or the General, or the spear or the King. Those were all popular, which ant that they were widespread enough he could find people who used them.
Most of these stores around here mostly sold swords, with spears in second place. One store sold only sabers but that had the emblem of the Jin clan imprinted proudly next to the store's signboard, so Wu Hao decided to avoid that one just in case.
He didn't consider himself a gentleman, that was for sure, and if to punctuate that he nearly smashed into a woman who was talking shop with another housewife and barely stopped himself from bowling her over. When she turned and cussed him out, he walked away without listening. Wu Hao wasn't shy about admitting it: he wasn't at all noble or polite and neither did he know anything about classical literature.
Staves were kind of out, too, because those were usually cut to the sa height as the user and he was going to grow. He'd grown before and, hopefully, now that he was starving less then he'd be growing more and not end up a scrawny runt. Admittedly, there were smaller staves but if he wanted one of those then he was better off grabbing a mace or sothing, since he had an art for that.
For the sa reasons spears were out, as well.
That ant all of the four major weapons weren't fit for him. Damnit.
Besides, one advantage of his knives were that he'd been able to smuggle them along wherever he went because they'd fit beneath his clothes pretty easily. That was sothing that he wouldn't be able to do with larger weapons, unless he wanted to walk everywhere with a spear shoved beneath his shirt. That'd be comical. He'd look like a scarecrow.
What then, though? A sword after all?
By the ti he'd visited the fourth smithy, he still hadn't been able to decide, and the fact that he hadn't was making him a little sour on the entire walk. The fourth of the smithies was the fanciest of the ones he'd visited yet, with a signboard that proclaid this to be the Sharp Sword Pavilion, specialized in swords as the na implied.
Swords were everywhere. From every wall racks hung, spanning the width of each wall, and they'd been stuffed full of swords. There were long swords ant to be wielded with two hands by strong, adult n; there were lighter, thinner swords ant for elegant techniques which were shorter. There were swords with large hilts, swords with tassels ant to be attached to the wrist to keep hold of the sword, there were swords with unsharpened parts near the hilt which Wu Hao didn't know the use of.
Moreover, so of these swords were made of simple steel, but others weren't. They were made of more intricate materials, carrying a certain subtle scent of qi that had been expertly hidden using a series of cuts into the pomls. What the patterns did, Wu Hao wasn't sure, but it was an interesting idea to apply arrays to the poml instead of the steel.
He could see the benefits of doing it like that. Carving into the poml ant that the steel itself wasn't compromised but instead was left whole and sharp, while the poml was otherwise just decorative anyway. Interesting, even if it'd be harder to try and do that for his knives.
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Wu Hao walked past the array of swords, checking each out to try and see if he could find one that spoke to him. He snuck a few glances at the few other custors, who seed to be studying the swords in the sa way as him or were talking to the man at the counter. When he got a suspicious glance in return, he stopped, realizing it must've looked like he was trying to check this place out for a robbery.
That would've been foolish, though. Not only were the swords emblazoned with a distinctive mark on the poml and the blade both, there were also arrays carved around the racks that seed defensive in nature. Wu Hao's knowledge of arrays and his qi sense allowed him to more or less guess what they did: a very thin film of qi ran around the back of the rack, which would be disturbed if the swords were touched.
What'd happen afterwards... well, Wu Hao had an idea there, but he didn't feel the need to test that at the mont.
He'd have to weigh the swords' benefits from a distance, then.
Finally, though, the people that had been talking with the man at the counter wrapped up their purchase and left. A little while later the salesman walked over to Wu Hao. He was a short but pleasant-looking sort: smiling eyes, a honest sort of face, and a naturally loud way of speaking combined to make him a natural salesman.
"How can this Zhang Huai help you?" the salesman said. He was a martial artist, though only at the very lowest step of the third-grade.
"Looking for a weapon," Wu Hao said bluntly, and Zhang Huai chuckled politely to himself.
"Ah," he said. "Yes, odd tis. You know what I an, of course."
Wu Hao just nodded, deciding he'd find out later.
"You've co to the right place, then, sir. We of the Sharp Sword Pavilion pride ourselves on the quality of our swords, whether they're for veterans seeking a new companion to travel the world with or a journeyman setting his first steps onto the Dao."
That had rolled off the man's tongue so easily that it sounded like a prepared statent, but Wu Hao didn't mind. He considered himself closer to a veteran, and the bit about a journeyman could be ignored.
"What kind of sword do you recomnd?" Wu Hao asked.
"Well, sir," Zhang Huai said, scanning over Wu Hao with a practiced eye and rubbing his hands. "Do you have a specific requirent? Sothing that the Art you've cultivated is ant to do well with, perhaps?"
"No," Wu Hao admitted. "My technique should work as well with any sword."
That was because he didn't have one yet, really. It was an interesting question, though.
The salesman's qi showed that he considered that an odd thing to say, but he forged on ahead anyway without the smile on his face twitching. "I see."
Wu Hao just nodded.
"You're a growing young man, yes? I think you need a sword that is on the shorter end of our wares, until you've fully grown. I am not saying you cannot wield heavier weapons, mind you - it just costs more effort, perhaps even qi, to move them. Therefore, sothing light, perhaps."
That seed more or less right to him - it matched with what he'd experienced for the Storm-Cutting Saber, at least.
Taking in the rack, Zhang Huai rubbed his chin and then, making a small movent with his qi, took a sword carefully from the wall. As he'd said, it was a lighter sort of sword - relatively thin, with a hilt that had been made of elegantly carved wood. Minuscule grooves ran across the hilt.
"Here, sir," he said, and handed it to Wu Hao, who took it carefully. "We call this model the Bamboo Cutter. It sells rather well."
It fit well into his hand. Wu Hao didn't know if it'd been made for martial artists his age, but he did appreciate the way that the hilt had been carved to allow for both hands to rest comfortably just below the crossguard. It was lighter than it looked, as well, especially for his qi-enhanced strength. He took hold of it with a single hand, and that seed to work pretty well too.
There was just enough space in the store to do a single swing, but as Wu Hao raised his arms in an attempt to mimic the way that the Stream-Cutting Slash Art was to be used, the salesman stopped him.
"Ah - no swinging the sword inside the store, sir," Zhang Huai said. "It prevents trouble, you understand."
"Right," Wu Hao murmured, lowering his arms again. He didn't apologize, but he did feel a little stupid.
"Pardon , sir," Zhang Huai said, and from the way he was observing Wu Hao it seed that he'd seen sothing that didn't quite sit right. "May I ask another question?"
His attention drifting away from the sword, Wu Hao glanced up at the salesman. "Yes?"
"What's your budget?"
Wu Hao hesitated, handling the sword carefully with one hand, and then plucked the pouch from behind his shirt and placed it on the counter. With one hand he pushed it forward. Zhang Huai took it, already so hesitation in his qi filtering through, and then after pulling it open and doing a quick ntal count of the coins within, he grimaced.
Handing it back, the salesman gave him a sympathetic look. "Sorry, kid. That won't be enough. We don't deal in cheap swords: we deal in quality, and we ask a price that we think is fair for the quality we deliver."
"Oh," Wu Hao muttered. That was all his money.
Damnit.
Zhang Huai extended a hand. "May I have the sword back?"
Wu Hao handed it back, a little unwillingly. He didn't miss that Zhang Huai was now not calling him "sir" or anything like it, though he didn't seem to be an-spirited about it, at least.
"Do you mind if I give you a little advice?" Zhang Huai said, and when Wu Hao had nodded a little spitefully, he continued: "Swords are a gentleman's weapon. I don't an this badly, but maybe you might be a better fit for a spear?"
Scowling, Wu Hao looked away. "Right. Thanks."
He stomped away out of the Sharp Sword Pavilion, feeling stupid and poor. That had been his first ever attempt to buy sothing, and it'd failed. Damnit.
Wu Hao took a last, longing look at the Sharp Sword Pavilion. That was the intended effect, he knew. He might do best with a sword. That sword that he'd held was probably the most fitting thing in all of this Steel Alley.
He hesitated outside a nearby store that sold spears and staves and had a frankly stupidly enormous guandao taking prize place behind the salesman's back, but he still wanted a sword.
So much for his glorious dreams and his full pouch of money, he thought bitterly.
Steel Alley had defeated him, for now, but he'd be back.
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