As soon as Arwin and Lillia emerged onto the obsidian floor of Wallace’s workshop, the flaming portal shrank in on itself behind them before vanishing with a pop. Arwin looked around the smithy, not even bothering to hide his interest. It was enormous. He hadn’t gotten a look at the ceiling before. It towered far above them, a curved dome of glistening obsidian. The light from the bubbling pool of lava in the center of the room reflected from the top, illuminating everything as if Wallace had trapped the very sun within the room’s walls. The air was hot and dry. There didn’t seem to be a single drop of humidity in the air, and Arwin could almost taste the heat on his mouth. Even a scorching desert day wouldn’t have had anything on the smithy. At least the desert would have had a chance for wind. Wallace headed over to the wall of tools and hung his hammer from it before turning back to them and thrusting a finger in Lillia’s direction. “You stay out of the way. I can’t have you interfering or you’re liable to get toasted on accident. Lava is not a forgiving medium to work with. If you get too close, you might get turned crispy.” “I’ll keep my distance,” Lillia promised as she walked over to the wall and crossed her arms, leaning against it. “Just pretend like I’m not here. I might as well not be so long as you don’t do anything threatening.” Despite her threat, Arwin wasn’t sure how much Lillia would be capable of here. There was nearly no shadow to work with because of how brightly the room was lit and she was away from her tavern. She didn’t have access to the majority of her powers. We’ll just have to make sure this never gets into a fight in the first place. I’m here to learn smithing, not to try and kill Wallace. “So where do we get started?” Arwin asked, rubbing his hands together. “And do keep in mind that we’ve got deadlines. We can’t be missing dinner.” “Temperature control, maybe?” “Correct. As long as you’re standing by the anvil, the lava running through the paths closest to you is at the ideal temperature. A true dwarven smith can manage perfect smithing with nothing but a pool of lava, but novices need help keeping the heat controlled.” Wallace shifted the lava to one of his palms. He flicked his other, and a small ingot of metal appeared from thin air in a shimmer of purple energy. Arwin’s eyes widened slightly. Wallace had some form of extradimensional space. Had a lot of those when I was a Hero. Not exactly impossibly rare, but I haven’t seen a normal one in a while. He’s definitely got a good amount of magical gear. I wonder if he made that himself. I’d love to know how to make an extradimensional… well, anything. “So you use the lava to melt the metal and remove the impurities from it?” Arwin asked. “That is the first — and easiest — of the steps,” Wallace said. The lava in his hand bubbled, then started to curl up into a bowl. More lava flowed up from the river, twisting like streamers of smoke as it flooded into the growing hemisphere of molten rock in his hands. Wallace then set the bar of metal on it. The metal hissed as the bubbling orange-red lava swirled up to swallow it whole. He looked back to Arwin, then tapped his foot on the ground. “So what’s the hard part?” Arwin asked. It seemed that Wallace enjoyed stopping to make him ask questions, but only the right ones. “Hard parts,” Wallace corrected with a small smirk. “The first is infusing your lava. It must become part of you. An extension of your hands. We do not merely use the lava for its heat. It is molten rock with no identity of its own. That allows a dwarf to fill the lava with their own desire and intent. It is our interface with the metal.” Arwin nodded slowly. “So intent isn’t just for the metal, but the lava as well.” “Yes. You fill the lava with your intent, and through that, you can hear the song of your materials. Their form may be lost in the lava, or it may not. It does not matter. No matter what happens, you must know its song.” Wallace summoned another piece of metal from the air, this one a dull yellow hue. He added it to the ball of lava swirling in his fingers without taking his eyes off Arwin. “And every material you add sings its own song. To successfully connect them, you must harmonize their songs with your intent. You must find the connection. Should you manage to do this, the preparation will be complete.” “Preparation?” Arwin asked, nearly choking on his own words. “That’s just the preparation?” Wallace smiled. “Great effort must be made to make great equipment, and no smith is greater than a dwarf. The next step is to free your harmonized material from the lava once it has cooled.” “Smack it with a hammer?” Arwin guessed, well aware that the answer was probably going to be a bit more complex than that. Wallace’s smile fell away. “You can do better than that.” “The song,” Lillia said from her spot at the corner of the room. “He’s got to hit it to the tune of the song… or something?” “Your lass has dwarf in her, I just know it,” Wallace muttered. The twisting ball of magma above his hand rapidly cooled, some of the light leaving it as it turned to a mass of gray rock. “She’s correct. You must speak to the metal in every step of the process. You must sing to it. And, once it is free, only then you can forge.” It seems I’ve been getting dwarven magic for a long time. My Title, Stonesinger… it lets me communicate with materials, but it’s got singing in the name. Have I been failing to use it to its full abilities? “I understand,” Arwin said, wonder and excitement intermixing in his stomach. “Though I suspect it may be a little easier to conceptualize than to actually do.” “So it is,” Wallace said with a wry smile. He set his cooled ball of stone on the anvil and pressed his hands together. He pulled them apart to reveal a miniscule blue ingot pinched between his fingers. It was of such a faint shade that it was barely even distinguishable from gray. Arwin nearly bust out laughing. The ingot was so small that it was barely larger than a finger. Wallace held it in his palm reverently. “Do you know what this is, boy?” “Absolutely no idea,” Arwin answered honestly.