I woke up to the sound of shifting furniture and quiet voices again, marking the second day in a row. Candlelight flickered softly against the walls, uncertain and gentle. I rolled over, squinting toward the windows, but all I saw was darkness outside.

  “Oh, he’s up,” Elias said, clearly amused.

  “David, it’s time to eat. We have work to do,” Edmund called from across the room.

  “Who in their right mind wakes up this early?” I muttered, pulling myself out of the cocoon of blankets and imagining some groundhog laughing at me. Breakfast was once again very simple: eggs, bacon, and leftover bread from last night. A good cup of coffee would complete this meal, but I still miss that steamy cup.

  Edmund stood up and brushed the crumbs off his hands. “Time to get ready. The store doesn’t open without us.” This time, I followed Edmund to the storefront. Elias stayed behind to clean up after the meal, and Seraphina hadn’t come out of her room since we returned from seeing the priestess last night.

  When I entered the storefront, I grabbed the broom and started sweeping out the store, just like I did yesterday. This time, I paid more attention to cleaning the areas I might have missed before. Later in the morning, I went to the forge to see Garron. I never saw Seraphina that morning; I might catch up with her later today.

  I arrived at the blacksmith shop just as Garron swung open the barn doors, letting in the cool air and the first light of dawn. Two younger boys were in the back, cleaning out the forge from yesterday’s fires. I could see Garron’s smile breaking through his stoic face as he saw me. The smell of ash lingered even though the fires hadn’t been reignited yet. Garron stepped aside to let me in, nodding toward the workbench with a grunt that served as a greeting. I walked past the strikers scraping out the coals, their hands blackened up to the wrists, and took in the familiar space. It felt different this time, not because anything had changed, but because I had.

  At the workbench, Garron handed me the pile of work orders he was falling behind on. The list was long, but for a single smith with two strikers, finishing on time would be impossible. “How do you want me to handle this? Do you have orders that should be completed before others?” I asked him while flipping through the sheets.

  “I have one that I want you to start with. It’s a smile one, just a dagger," Garron said, pointing to the drawing on the order sheet. “This way, I can see how good you really are.”

  “Shouldn’t be an issue, double-sided, I guess?

  Garron nodded once and turned away. I set the sheet down and moved to the stockpile, pulling a length of metal from the rack. It felt heavier than it looked, cool and rough in my hands. As I stepped toward the anvil, something shifted in my chest, not panic, not nerves. Just focus. I placed the hammer on the anvil, ready to work.

  It was like I had done this a hundred times before.

  “This is James and Ash," Garron said, pointing to the young boys. “They are my apprentices, and James has been here for a year, I guess. Ash just started last week.”

  I nodded and fed the bar into the fire, working the bellows until the forge started to breathe again. The boys glanced over but stayed silent.

  When I pulled the metal out, glowing bright yellow, I didn’t think. My hands moved. Not automatically, not clumsily. Just confidently.

  I lost myself in the metal. Slowly, the dagger’s blade began to take shape from the basic length of steel. Once it matched both the length and form, I heated it close to white hot and then set it aside to anneal for a while.

  “Sir, what did you do there with that dagger blade?” James asked.

  “Good question,” I said, nudging the coals into a tighter mound. “After forging, the blade needs to rest; it’s called annealing. You heat it nearly white-hot, then let it cool slowly. That relieves internal stress in the metal.”

  James nodded slowly.

  “Once it’s cool, you can clean it up with a file before tempering. If you skip that step, the blade might crack later when it’s hardened. Annealing helps prevent that.” I caught Garron watching me for a moment, not frowning, not impressed. Just watching.

  The morning went smoothly, with Garron giving me increasingly complex tasks as the hours passed. The three of us made a significant dent in the work orders, more than he probably expected. I didn’t dwell on it much. I just kept going, one piece after another, each task pushing me forward like the rhythm of a lecture I hadn’t prepared but somehow knew how to deliver.

  The sun was nearly overhead when a gentle knock sounded at the wide barn doors. Garron looked up from where he was setting out tongs and called, “It’s open.”

  The door creaked as it swung inward, letting in a shaft of summer light, then her silhouette filled it. She stood in the doorway, backlit by the noon sun, her figure glowing in gold. Sturdy boots, strong legs, the sway of her skirt catching a breeze. The outline of her body was practical and no-nonsense, but there was grace in how she held herself. No pretense. Just presence.

  Seraphina stepped inside with a basket tucked under one arm, her boots muffled on the packed dirt. She paused for a moment, eyes scanning the forge as if it might bite if she moved too quickly. Sunlight caught in her hair, throwing copper streaks through it, and for a heartbeat, everything else felt too loud, too hot, too slow.

  I blinked. “Hey.”

  She gave me a slight nod, but her eyes lingered on me longer than casual. “Thought you might want lunch.”

  “Thanks,” I said, surprised, not just that she brought it, but that she came herself. “I didn’t think, I mean, you didn’t have to.”

  Garron looked up from his bench and cleared his throat with a grin that was all smoke and iron. “You’ve got a good smith here, Seraphina. Quick hands. Sharp eye. Should be proud.”

  Seraphina looked down at the floor, her face flushing. “He’s capable.”

  I tried not to smile but couldn't help it. She handed me the basket and paused. “About yesterday, what I said to the priestess.”

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  I shook my head. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “I still shouldn’t have said it.”

  We stood there in the warm silence of the forge, the soft clink of metal echoing behind us. I nodded, unable to trust myself to say more. After a moment, she turned and walked away without another word.

  Garron approached from behind and tapped me on the shoulder. “She was waiting for you to say something. That’s not how you treat her.”

  “I know..." I stepped outside to find a quiet spot for my lunch.

  When I finished eating, I noticed a wooden crate under the workbench filled with old tools, some rusted beyond use. I crouched down and dug through it out of curiosity. Hammers with worn handles, tongs that no longer aligned, but one object made me pause.

  It was a hammer, but not like the others. The head had a familiar shape, too smooth, too perfect. It looked like it had never been used. Its surface shimmered faintly, like light moving across water. Not bright, just off.

  “Where’d this one come from?” I asked, holding it up.

  Garron looked over. “That? Just scrap. Doesn’t hold a handle properly. You want it, it’s yours.”

  “You don’t see anything unusual about it?”

  Garron raised an eyebrow. “Looks like a busted tool to me.”

  James and Ash both looked over my shoulder, then shook their heads.

  I turned the hammer in my hands. It felt heavier than it looked, not just in weight but in presence. It wanted to be something more than what it was. I rubbed the grime from one side and paused. There was something beneath the dirt. A shape? A mark? I wasn’t sure.

  I wiped the grime from one side of the hammer and paused. Beneath the rust, something shone faintly, a mark, maybe a symbol, half-embedded in the metal as if it had been forged long ago. I squinted, leaning closer.

  That’s when I heard it.

  [Ding]

  [Skill Unlocked: Analyze]

  The voice wasn’t loud or even external. It was feminine, soft, and clear. There was a strange familiarity to it. It felt like it landed inside my skull, clean and crisp, like an interface notification buried in thought.

  Then the world went white.

  When I regained consciousness, I was lying flat on my back, blinking at the blurry shapes above me.

  “David? Can you hear me?” Garron’s voice was rough and urgent.

  “Should we get the healers?” one of the boys asked. I wasn’t sure. The ringing was slowly fading until I could bear it. I sat up, and the world swayed.

  “Easy,” Garron said, grabbing my shoulder. “I was standing next to you, and you just dropped.”

  Ash offered a canteen. I took it without thinking; the cool water grounded me.

  “I’m fine,” I muttered. “Just lightheaded.”

  But I wasn’t okay. Everything seemed normal, mostly, but when I looked at Ash, I sensed something; it stayed. A flicker. A word.

  [Name: Ash | Human | Class: Blacksmith LVL 2]

  If I stared for more than a few seconds, the labels became clearer. And once they did, I couldn’t unsee them. It was like viewing the world through a thin layer of code, subtle but noticeable. The text stayed until I shifted my gaze away.

  What would this ability bring up in the ethics classes I used to teach? Is it okay to gather information without the person's permission? Oh, the debates I can only imagine.

  “David?” Garron asked again.

  “I’m okay,” I lied. “Maybe it was something that I ate.” He didn’t look convinced but let it go.

  Next to my hand, the hammer head rested in the dirt. I picked it up and tried to read the symbol again. Was that what triggered everything? New text appeared above the hammer in the open air.

  [Artifact: Unknown | Bound | ???]

  I blinked. That wasn’t normal.

  Garron watched me out of the corner of his eye as I turned the hammer over in my hands again. At first, he didn’t say anything, just wiping his hands on a rag and standing there like he was working something out.

  “You still don’t look right,” he finally said.

  I offered him a slight smile. “I’ve had worse days.”

  Maybe. But that doesn’t mean you need to push through one,” he said, nodding toward the open barn doors. “Call it for today. Come back tomorrow when your legs aren’t trying to run without you.” James and Ash had fallen silent nearby, both pretending not to listen too closely.

  I placed the strange hammer on the bench, hesitated, then wrapped it in a rag and slipped it into my satchel. “Mind if I hold onto this one?”

  Garron shrugged. “You’re the only one who sees anything in it.” That was true.

  “Thanks,” I said. “See you in the morning.”

  He gave a grunt that passed for goodbye.

  I stepped out into the afternoon light, the forge heat fading behind me. The air felt cooler than it should have. Maybe I was just starting to notice things I hadn’t before. On the walk back, I kept testing this new ability, glancing at carts, buildings, and animals. Not everything had a label, but enough did to unsettle me. Even people. Especially people. And every time, I looked away, a beat too late. Old instincts told me I shouldn’t be doing this. The new ones weren’t so sure.

  The bell above the door jingled as I walked into the store, and the first thing I noticed wasn’t the voices but the tension. Elen stood near the counter, arms crossed, voice sharp. “You told me it was guaranteed. This isn’t what I paid for.”

  Edmund, to his credit, didn’t flinch. “I told you it was untested, and that we’d refund if it failed completely. It didn’t fail, it just didn’t do what you imagined it would.”

  “I imagined it working,” she snapped.

  I stayed close to the door, hesitant to interrupt. But as soon as Elen saw me, her eyes narrowed.

  “Perfect. Maybe you can explain what kind of operation this is,” she said, gesturing toward me as if I were somehow part of the scam. “Or maybe you’re just the broom boy. Hard to tell these days.

  I held back from replying. Then the flicker appeared.

  [Name: Elen Harengraves | Human | Class: Trader LVL 6 | Trait: Opportunist]

  I looked away. Too late again. My stomach twisted. Opportunist. It only confirmed what I already suspected. “I just got back from the forge,” I said, stepping further into the room. “I’m not involved in whatever this is.” I waved vaguely in their direction.

  “Then maybe you should stay that way,” she muttered.

  Edmund raised a hand. “Enough. If you have a complaint, file it. Otherwise, we’re done here.”

  Elen held her glare a moment longer, then spun around and stormed out as the bell above the door rang sharply behind her.

  Edmund returned to his ledgers silently, flipping a page with slightly more force than necessary. I turned away from the front counter just as Seraphina stepped out from the back room, her hair loosely tied, sleeves rolled up from some task I’d interrupted.

  I looked at her and blinked. Nothing showed up. No flicker. No floating text. No name, no class, no level. Just her. I paused for another heartbeat, half expecting something to change. But still, nothing. I reached up and rubbed my eyes.

  I offered her a small smile. “Thank you for lunch earlier.”

  She tilted her head slightly before nodding. “You’re welcome.”

  I hesitated. “Could we maybe go for a walk?”

  She studied me for a moment, then wiped her hands on her apron as she took it off. “Sure.” I’m pretty sure I saw Edmund glance at us, then leave with a slight smile.

  We entered the late afternoon as the village grew quieter. The breeze gently pulled at the hanging signs, and nearby, a dog barked once before falling silent again.

  “I wanted to say I’m sorry,” I said after walking a few steps. “I’ve been keeping my distance. It’s not about you. I’ve had a lot on my mind, and I’m still trying to understand this place. It’s not like where I’m from. Not even close.”

  She didn’t respond immediately, but she didn’t pull away when I reached out and took her hand. I half expected her to tense up or let go, but she stayed still.

  I exhaled, unaware I’d been holding my breath. “Even simple things are different now. Things I thought I understood keep shifting under my feet.”

  She looked at me, something unclear in her eyes, neither suspicion nor worry, just quiet understanding.

  “Things have changed,” I said softly. “And I want to show you…”

  That’s when we heard the rumble. A caravan crested the hill leading into the village, wagons, guards on horseback, banners fluttering in the breeze. It rolled in like a tide, kicking up dust, voices rising ahead of it. Traders. But there were more guards than usual, and their gear looked serious.

  Seraphina’s grip tightened as the first wagon came into view.