The Runesmith

“This place is a lot larger than I expected…”

Roland was looking at the high ceiling of the storage facility he was walking around. After going through it he realized that it was probably the size of an airplane hangar. There were rows upon rows of shelves and racks.

On them were various items, some out in the open while others were in cardboard boxes. Everything was somewhat organized and there were even labels on the boxes along with sections dividing the various materials by type and use.

After going around the place a few times he did discover a few other interesting things. One of them was an area that was clearly meant for crafting. It was on the far end of this large storage space.

It had it all, a large smelter that had a somewhat similar design to the one that he worked with. Not far from it was a nice workbench along with a forge, it was a nice smithy that every blacksmith would be familiar with.

This wasn’t all as right next to this place was some kind of office. In it he found a whiteboard with a set of markers with which he could write on it. There were also many sheets of paper of various shapes and sizes.

It looked like some kind of space where he could create schematics for items. This somewhat gave him an idea of what this test was about but there were far too many materials. He would probably be able to make a small battalion of golems with everything here as golem cores were amongst the items scattered on the shelves.

There was one peculiar thing about these items, not everything was just raw materials. Some items were out of place as he even spotted complete joints that would fit on some golemic creations. It was as if instead of making something from scratch he was supposed to assemble it from the parts scattered around this place.

“Maybe the raw materials are only there to fill some gaps?”

Roland spoke out but no one replied, after examining this section of the area he decided to go towards the other end. There he found something peculiar that made him think that it could be used for the coming trial. Various boxes made from some transparent material were lined up. After giving them a knock he realized that they were made from something similar to plexiglass from his old world. What made these strange were the handles on the front through which he could open them.

‘Do I need to place something into these?’

These glass containers gave him that impression. It seemed that the test would ask him to make something and then place it inside of one of these transparent cases. They all varied in size, the smallest one was around half a meter in length and width while the largest could fit a whole car into it.

Behind these transparent containers, there were some peculiar features that he was familiar with. One of them was a timer, this one was a more modern one. It was divided into six sections that were probably for hours, minutes, and then seconds.

This reminded him of all the previous timed trials that he took. It was clear that he would have some kind of time limit to produce something and then perhaps place it in the glass object. Then below it was something more interesting, it looked like a big flat TV screen. But just like the clock, it was turned off.

The screen had no buttons nor could he see any remote control to turn it on. Then to the side of this screen, there was some kind of rectangular slit. It was quite narrow and it was not letting any light through it which made it seem that there was nothing on the other side.

‘I read about some of these tests but none of them were like this one…’

Roland made sure to study up on all the possible trials that could come up. Normally when it came to crafting classes they would only need to create an item that would be graded by the system. Then when battle classes were involved they would mostly just need to defeat a set amount of enemies.

The places that these tests took place were more in line with the world outside. But for him, there was a mix of old and new technology. Even the VR headset and his old room were something that was never recorded by anyone else. This place that he was in also looked like some large company storage from a shipping company from his old world.

‘I guess these tests take into account the life of the person taking the test? This only makes it more difficult to anticipate them in the future…’

His old life and his new one were beginning to mix together. The old trials seemed more in line with the new world he was in but this one did look different. But what was he supposed to do here, there was no writing on the wall and no indication of what he was supposed to build.

“...Brrrp…”

While he was looking around for more clues he heard a strange sound coming from the slit in the wall. It sounded strangely similar to an old printer that he once had and to his surprise, a white sheet of paper started to come out of that narrow opening.

He could clearly see that there were words being printed onto this white paper. This was probably a clue to what his task would be. Roland thus quickly moved over to the piece of paper to grab it before it was dropped onto the floor.

“This is… instructions for manufacturing?”

What Roland was holding was probably the item that he would be building. The words looked to have been printed with an ink printer and as he was going through them he also noticed that one of the glass containers started to change. The metallic part produced a glow while the others remained the same.

“I guess it wants me to make this and then place it into the glowing glass container?”

Roland scratched his head a bit after going through the piece of paper. The instructions were kind of vague so he wasn’t sure what he should make of it.

Requirements:

*Between 300 to 600 luminance*Give out a warm glow*Resistant to minor shocks

The list was quite small and also included a luminance factor in it. Thanks to Roland’s broad knowledge he knew what it meant. Spells that produced light were counted in that measurement scale. He had already created runic lights and even configured them to produce a specific luminance rating.

“I see…”

There was also another change in the environment, besides the now glowing glass case the large clock on the wall started glowing. A number appeared in front that showed twelve and it was followed by more as the time started to pass.

“Twelve hours?”

From how fast it was going he was assured that he had half a day’s time to complete this project. The first test for him would be to fashion some kind of lamp that could take some hits without breaking.

Twelve hours didn’t seem like a lot but there were various items around these shelves that would make the process a lot faster. He would obviously not need to create everything from scratch as he just needed to find some parts and combine them.

There were also no real limits of the shape or size. At most, it needed to fit into the half-meter tall glass box but besides it he was not limited in his design. But was there something more? Did he really only need to look at these three points and fashion it accordingly?

“The lumination factor won’t be hard and this warm glow, I can just use a fire-based rune though it didn’t put anything specific about the heat…”

The only tip towards the glow was the warm part. He could only eyeball it, perhaps he could fail if he made it too hot or too lukewarm for the test. The main part that he was concerned about was the shock resistance. This made it seem that he would not be able to make an old-fashioned light.

Luckily he was not a regular craftsman, he imprinted runes into hard metal to make them work. Making something like a shock-resistant lamp would be quite easy. First, he would need to find the correct components, no limits to the materials were mentioned so he could probably go with anything.

This did seem like a trial test, the instructions were minor and he had a lot of time. Probably after he fashioned this runic lamp he would be shown what this trial was truly about. For now, he was unsure if it would be measured on the three bullet points or if there was something more to it.

‘First, let me find a power source…’

While he would like to have used his own battery design he was unsure if that would be possible. He was only able to charge them after making the wind turbines and wiring up his entire workshop. It was a long process of development but luckily for him, he did find mana crystals that would do nicely.

They were in an aisle filled with other gem-like items. Many monster crystals of varying shapes and sizes were also there but they all capped out at tier 2. The largest one that he could see was somewhat similar to the tier 2 boss monster dinosaur that he had defeated previously.

Thanks to an old experience he knew that using a power source along with a weak runic enchantment would be a bad idea. Something like a runic lamp that only needed to produce a glow similar to a desk lamp wouldn’t need that much mana to work. Luckily mana fluid was also here and he had already seen some other parts with which they could go together with.

Thus Roland began assembling the required components and then brought them all over to the crafting area. While he thought that he had a lot of time, it took him quite a lot of it to find everything that he needed. The whole place was quite new to him, even with the labels it was difficult to get everything that he wanted.

First came the power source, this would be mana fluid that was going to be inserted into a small metal cylinder. The fluid came in a canister that reminded him of ones used for fuel in his old world. He had found a small funnel to help him pour it into the cylinder that first needed to have a hole punctured into it.

“The tools here are outdated…”

He had hoped that this trial would somehow produce his runic power tools but there weren’t any. It would have been easy if he had his runic drill along with his heating wands. It would have been easy to just get the fluid in and then weld it shut. Afterward, he could inscribe runes over it to make it into a working battery.

For the time being, he would have to revert to his old blacksmithing techniques. What would be the battery was hollow on the inside so he only needed to puncture a hole through it after heating it up.

The mana fluid was somewhat heat resistant so even when he was closing the opening via more melting, it wouldn’t blow up into his face. It just needed the proper runes on the outside to prevent it from overheating later when the lamp was drawing power from it.

With the battery in place he now only needed to concentrate on the outer shell. The only requirement would be to make it glow, give out some heat and be resistant to minor shocks.

This could be achieved in various ways but he was limited. There was no time to make something eye-catching. The test didn’t mention that the item that he made required to be artistic in nature. For that reason, he decided to make it work while ignoring its outside appearance.

Thus the somewhat ugly and rough outer shell was made. It was fashioned out of deep steel plates that he was very familiar with. He had found ones that would go nicely together, to the bottom plate he would attach the power source by melting some metal and letting it set. The required runes on the battery were already set in place before he attached it.

In the end, the whole thing ended up looking like a box. On the outside, there were visible runes that were engraved on the shiny grayish deepsteel. After years of runecrafting it was quite easy for Roland to plan out the entire runic structure without any need for a proper schematic.

Everything just clicked into place and after injecting mana the box started giving out a light of exactly 450 luminance. He decided to go for the middle spot from the description as he was hoping to get some bonus points for hitting the sweet spot.

With a lack of instructions, he decided to make the box give out light in all directions equally. Thus it could be placed on any side and it would continue glowing. The whole procedure didn’t take him the whole twelve hours as he still had about five remaining. Probably if he was more familiar with the layout and had his own tools he would have done it faster.

The moment of truth came as he arrived at the glowing glass case. In his hand, he had the somewhat bulky-looking lightbox. On one of the sides, there was a small circle through which he would be able to turn it on. The test didn’t mention anything about on and off switches.

‘I hope this is enough…’

After turning it on he placed it into the glass case. He still had some time that he could spend on some improvements but he felt like speed also counted into the test. Perhaps he would be given more time for the next creation if he turned this one in faster.

The moment he closed the container he could see the light on the ground go out. At first, he expected it to just vanish but instead, the whole glass case started sliding down into the ground.

It was similar to the previous trial he took where the workshop slid down into the battleground to make way for the battle. Here it was a bit different as soon as the container with his item disappeared into the ground it started going back up again. There was a difference though, the square box that he placed inside was no more.

“So what now?”

He looked at the empty spot where the lamp he made was previously in. The glowing had stopped and now he was just waiting. It took a few moments but the clock that was ticking down had also stopped which meant that something was happening.

Soon the monitor that was below the timer suddenly went on. At first, it looked like static, it was as if there was no signal but with time he began to see something on the screen. It looked like a humanoid figure, it started out somewhat blurry but soon the image became sharp.

“A mannequin?”

What he saw was not a human, it was some kind of puppet. It had all the required joints that a person would find on a dummy. The face was lacking in any shapes and was devoid of eyes, a nose, and a mouth. This strange thing was just sitting in a chair while leaning forward.

Then Roland noticed it, the box that he made was placed on some other books that were on a desk. This desk was the one that this puppet was sitting in, it made it look like it was trying to read another book while using his box as the source of light.

“What is this…”

At first, Roland was not sure what to make of it but then he remembered some of the old games that he played when he was still in the old world. There were some games where you added things to the world and then watched a simulation play out. For instance, he would create a bridge from provided parts and then see if the simulated cars could pass through it without the bridge collapsing onto itself.

This looked somewhat more intricate but it was somehow trying to simulate a person reading a book. Probably the light requirement was for this part and soon he would know why it also needed to be shock resistant. The mannequin started moving around and it elbowed the stack of books that the lightbox was on.

The box fell down to the ground along with some of the other books. The box had to take some damage from them but survived through this fall. The puppet slowly leaned back down to pick up the box as it went back to reading. From time to time he would also see it reach out towards the light, it was as if it was trying to warm its cold hands on it.

‘I guess that’s why it wanted it to give out a warm glow…’

Roland was baffled by the strangeness of this trial. It seemed that he would need to predict the simulated scenario that would take place on this TV screen. Along with following the instructions that were probably events happening during the simulation. After a few minutes it was completed and the image turned back to the static.

Before he could deliberate if he did well or not the screen shifted to another image. This time around he could see a table with words in it. The moment he read the first one he already knew what it was.