Chapter 505 (2/2)

Ezekiel nodded. Hank said nothing. He simply turned and began to walk forward. One step at a time.

*****

The purified and Refined iron ore was the easy part. The only other task he required was to mix the carbon into the metal. After all, steel was the most commonly produced and bought by the factory. Still, there were other metals trades, based on strange formulas, which could be bought at a premium, depending on how they fared in the tensile strength test.

Humming to himself, Randidly began melting 10 units of his purified iron ore in the crucible. The blast furnace smoked and spat, heat radiating off of it. It seemed to be some portal to hell then, a giant entrance to an unearthly tomb. Very quickly, the heat had reduced the metal to a liquid form. It calmly bubbled in the superheated crucible.

With a flick of the wrist, Randidly produced Acri, who was hiding up against the flesh of his right arm, lurking under the illusion around him. Randidly pointed to a giant monster femur laying on the work table in his station.

“Chop that up. Finely, please.”

Acri chirped its glee and began to slice and dice the bone with his head. Such was his sharpness that even this bone of a Level 50 monster was easily dismembered by it. Randidly turned his attention back to the molten iron before him, regarding it carefully.

Zone 1 was highly advanced, and could no doubt produce steel of a very high caliber without the use of manual labor to get it. They were prepared for the System, after all, and had set up specialty factories long before now. Still, they choosing to push for this now, accepting a inferior grade steel now, for the superior stuff that would likely come along later.

Why? Because they finally realized how weak that left him in the higher end when other people had been successfully using the System for so long.

Well, it wasn’t like Randidly couldn’t make use of his own knowledge to help them along a bit.

Acri arrived at his side, having swept all the thinly sliced shavings into a bowl. Calmly, Randidly stretched out his hand and dumped the shaving into the crucible. Then he began to use small spurts of Gravity Affinity to mix the superheated metal and monster bone together. He withdrew his hand. The flesh was burnt, and the bowl was charred, but it was a small thing, in the grand scheme of things.

Within a second, his flesh had healed. He hadn’t received a Skill Level for it, but Randidly knew it was only a matter of time. This was just the beginning.

What he hadn’t expected was that was the bone mixed with the metal, the volume of the molten liquid would actually shrink. Randidly frowned but would reserve judgment for now. But it did have the side effect of only producing 9 ingots, instead of the 10 he should have received based on the raw materials. They were slightly darker than the steel typically was, with something like a matte finish that didn’t reflect light.

Randidly picked up one of the ingots and squeezed. He smiled.

When he showed 8 of his finished ingots to Foreman Davey, The man seemed surprised. He took a long look at the metal, muttered something, and tried to bend it with his hands. Inwardly, Randidly was impressed, because he very slowly bent the ingot, then bent it back into shape. Then he flicked the metal with a fingernail.

A clear ding sounded out. Foreman Davey nodded, vaguely.

“We’ll take all 8, of course, although I’m not sure this one will hold its shape, long-term. But I wanted to test it. You pay for better recipes and mix them? This isn’t a metal I recognize.”

Randidly shrugged. “I was… a cook before I came here. I know a little bit about using the System to help mixtures along.”

“Mmm… well, it’s good metal, I’ll buy as much as you can make. What’s your name, kid?”

Randidly froze. He hadn’t thought about this and had to force out the first name that came to mind. “Baloo Erickson.”

“Well Baloo, pleasure doing business with you. I’ll buy this for $2.50 an ingot.” The two men shook hands.