Vivi sat with her legs crossed, holding the ether root in her left hand. She felt like a total goblin. She didn't have any safety equipment, no smithing apron, not even gloves to protect her hands.

Eem sat by the side, occasionally glancing at the arched gateway to watch the skeleton pass on its patrol. She was still shaken and didn't smile like she usually did, but she would probably recover. Eem was alive. That was most important. Vivi hoped Eem would be back to her usual nonsensical antics soon.

"Lucius, add as much ether as you can," Vivi said. "But add it steadily. The process will take around half an hour. During that time, we need to spend at least fifty ether. Transfer two ether every minute."

"Fifty ether?" Lucius asked. "So much?"

"The weapon will be useless otherwise," Vivi said. "If we defeat the skeleton, we'll earn much more."

Lucius considered it for a second, then gave in. He initiated the root and poured in a full wisp to start its growth.

The iron root cracked, and a stalk sprouted within. With a lot of ether pouring in, the stalk was thicker than usual. It grew at the pace of a snail. Iron roots were slower at conducting ether compared to adamantite. This made the root slow to work with. Back on the surface, Vivi had once worked with an iron root for two hours straight to shape a single set of veins. Mostly, the process consisted of watching the iron root slowly inch toward its destination.

Vivi guessed today's job would be a similar test of endurance. The egg-shaped root heated up in her hands, slowly burning her skin, while Vivi watched the stalk for any attempts it had to swerve off path. The first minutes were uneventful. Vivi merely held the root in place. Slowly, the stalk reached a foot in length.

"Aren't you going to make the branch thingies?" Lucius asked.

"No, we're not making a runesword," Vivi said. "We don't have any metal to make a sword with. But we can make something just as strong. Fundamentally, the core veins are the strongest part of a runesword. The veins are what distribute ether into the metals. The veins themselves actually hold more ether than the metal."

Lucius tilted his head, but stayed observant.

The stalk attempted to grow to the left. Vivi summoned her runesword and pressed the blade against the stalk, directing the stalk to grow straight up. A tuning fork or one of Grandpa's vein-shaping crochet hooks would have been far more ideal for the job, but Vivi's sword was the only solid object she had.

She already felt her arm growing tired from holding the root perfectly still. The base of the root grew hotter and hotter as the process went on. Lucius had to push ether into her hand just so her skin wouldn't burn off.

After fifteen minutes, the stalk had grown by around three feet. Vivi continued the process exactly as she had before. She guided the stalk perfectly straight with her sword, while holding the root as still as she could. Her left hand was starting to get hot and tired.

"You're making a spear?" Lucius asked.

"Close," Vivi said. A slight smile appeared on her face. "Grandpa called these root javelins. Or ether javelins. I used to make a lot of them when I was around eight or nine as a practice exercise. One of the fundamental skills a runesmith needs to learn is to guide the main stalk perfectly straight. If the veins are crooked, the sword will snap. Crafting root javelins is a great way to practice, especially when using vine roots. Vines are cheap to grow, and they try to swerve off path every moment they can. If a runesmith can keep a vine straight, they can probably do the same with every other ether root."

"We're making practice equipment, then?" Lucius asked.

"No," Vivi said. "Grandpa saw the exercise as purely practice. Vine javelins are still just vines. But in theory, an iron root javelin should be more than strong enough to work as a spear. Iron still conducts ether, and I can carve runes into it. Even if it leaks some ether, the javelin will be more than strong enough to pierce bone."

"Even if that bone is strengthened by seven thousand ether?" Lucius asked.

"That… I'm not sure about," Vivi said.

Lucius gave her a doubtful look. "So we're making this weapon just to try it out?"

"Well, Grandpa and I never had the opportunity to truly test out our weapons," Vivi said. "I didn't think a one-runed sword could defeat a spirit blade. But it did. We won't know how strong runesmithing is until we test it out. In theory, a root javelin should be effective."

Lucius didn't look convinced. But he clearly didn't have any better ideas. His claws, at the strength they were at, would barely scratch the skeleton they had to defeat. Vivi needed a lot more firepower.

By the end of the thirty minutes, Vivi's left hand was starting to lose its sense of touch. The ether root was as hot as a stove, and Vivi had held it for over thirty minutes. She had no other choice. She had no vise to balance the root still, and balancing the root between rocks wasn't secure enough.

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But the first step was done. Vivi told Lucius to stop pouring ether and examined her work.

What Vivi had created looked like an iron pole with a dull spike at the end. The stalk was colored a boring gray. Cheaper ether roots always had their drawbacks. With iron, the biggest problem was its appearance. The grey color was not exactly awe-inspiring. Grandpa rarely used iron for serious products for this specific reason, despite iron being very cost-effective. Customers wanted beautiful swords with veins that shone brightly through the sword's metal. Iron bordered ugliness.

Down in the dungeon, however, Vivi just needed something that could pierce an ethereal skeleton's skull. She smiled, then cut the stem off of the egg-shaped root. "Now for the sharpening," she said.

These days, blacksmiths sharpened spears with mechanical equipment that Grandpa's smithy lacked. He used simple sharpening stones. Those worked well enough.

Down here, Vivi didn't even have those. She had to use a far more primitive method. She used the blade of her runesword to cut the tip of her javelin.

Using the runesword was awkward. But the blade was sharp enough to cut through the iron stalk. After a few minutes of cutting, Vivi had the rough shape figured out.

"Lucius, could I use your claws for a bit?" she asked.

Lucius frowned, immediately knowing what Vivi wanted to do. "It would hurt, Vivi."

"Dying to the skeleton will hurt more," Vivi said.

Lucius sighed, then summoned a single claw to Vivi's right hand. She held the javelin on her left, then cut the tip as sharply as possible with Lucius's claws. The end result still wasn't perfect, but the tip was sharp enough to be called a spike.

Vivi tested the spear, thrusting it, holding it in different angles. The weight seemed to be evenly distributed, and the javelin was solid. It could be used as a weapon. But the iron was still unstable. Ether roots weren't meant to be used like this. The moment the ether within ran out, the root would slowly lose its strength and hardness. She would need to carve the runes quickly to flow in more ether.

Vivi didn't have a carving knife. Lucius's claws probably weren't sharp enough to carve the runes.

So Vivi picked up the one object she had that was sharp enough to carve runes into iron. Her runesword…

"This is going to be interesting…" Vivi said. She picked up her sword near the pointy tip, squeezing the blade between her fingers as if it was some oversized quill. Ether enhanced her grip. Otherwise, she wouldn't have had the strength.

Then Vivi pressed the sword's tip into the javelin's surface and began carving the first runic branches leading to the three power runes.

"With only one ether root, we can only add one rune," Vivi said. "That's the big disadvantage of root javelins. If we try to add two different runes, the veins will start behaving weird. We'll need to choose what fits best."

"What are our options again?" Lucius asked.

"It will have to be one of the three power runes," Vivi said. "Those are strength, mass, and crush."

Lucius stared at Vivi's work, as if he understood what Vivi was saying. She knew he was pretending.

"I'd like to add a crush rune for damage," Vivi said. "Crush is the most destructive out of the power runes. If a crush-runed javelin lands, the skeleton will definitely die in one hit. But the problem with crush is that the rune won't actually make the javelin's tip sharper. Crush is the least helpful in piercing an opponent's defense. Rather, crush applies a lot of force if wounds do open. With one-runed crush weapons, it's possible that an attack lands without piercing through, making the rune's powers useless."

"So a crush rune is like a damage amplifier?" Lucius asked.

"You can think of it that way," Vivi said. "With multi-runed weapons, you usually want to add one for maximum destruction. But this time, we can't. We need to focus on piercing the skeleton's bones. We need either a strength or a mass rune. Those two runes both have similar functions. They shape ether to make the metal's internal structure a lot denser, and thus, stronger. The main difference between the runes is that mass also adds weight to make the sword even stronger. Strength is more well-rounded."

"What if we combine the three together?" Lucius asked. "They all belong to the same category of ether, right? Can't we let all of those powers through at once?"

Vivi raised her eyebrows, surprised. "Ah, that doesn't work. Combining runes has always been an idea. They're called great runes. The ancient dwarves have tried to cram three, or even just two, power runes into one rune ever since runesmithing was invented. The idea is solid. But great runes are impossible to carve. If you try to carve a strength and a mass rune on top of each other, the branches intercept each other. At that point, the runes become unusable."

"What if we carve them next to each other?"

"Then they become separate runes," Vivi said. "Great runes are only possible in tales."

Lucius frowned, confused by his own thoughts. He sat down at a loaf. "This is too complex. Just make the runes, Vivi. Pick the strong rune, or whatever."

Vivi gave him an awkward laugh. Even the simplified answer was too hard to understand?

Lucius was right, however. Vivi just needed to carve the runes. And her javelin just needed to be strong enough to kill a skeleton with four times more ether than her.

Ten minutes of carving later, the rune was done, and Vivi's weapon was completed.

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