Eisen stepped through the door and took a closer look around. All of the equipment he could find was quite high quality, same for the materials. He couldn't really find any problems with the fabrics, leather, or metals that were displayed on the worktables. However, Eisen felt slightly unsure about a few things, so he turned around and looked at Ailren.
"First off… How did you get all of this? You yourself don't strike me to be a craftsman." Eisen said, and Ailren chuckled with a nod.
"Yes, you are right. This place once used to be the hideout of a craftsman. Only about three hundred years ago was it that I took over here, and of course expanded upon the space so that I could move without trouble. I cleaned up a little bit and prepared these materials when I figured out that you would probably come here after all."
"I see, thank you then, Ailren. And I know this might seem rude considering that you did prepare a lot of good items and materials, but would it be alright if I went back to Melroe for about a day, simply to get all that I need? I have my tools down there, and there are a few things I would like to prepare for what I'll be making." Eisen explained, and Ailren ran his fingers through his beard before nodding.
"That's fine with me. This is to test how high your abilities can reach, so it only makes sense to allow for a good base situation. I can bring you down the mountain quickly, and I hope you don't mind if I follow you around to make sure you're not slacking off." The Dragon smiled and pointed toward the exit. "Shall we go right now?"
Eisen nodded and followed Ailren outside the large treasure-filled hall, through the mist room, and then through the tunnels leading to the cave entrance. When they got outside, steam rose from Ailren's body and formed a huge sphere, which dissipated immediately and revealed Ailren's true Dragon Form.
"Climb onto my back, and make sure you hold on tightly, or else you will probably fall off." Ailren chuckled and Eisen nodded with a soft laugh from himself. He placed Caria into his backpack to make sure she wouldn't accidentally fall off during flight, and then climbed onto the Gold Dragon's back. There wasn't really a good place to hold onto, but it seemed like that didn't really matter too much and the game supported him and made sure that he wouldn't fall off. Of course that only worked with Eisen actually trying to do his best to hold on by himself.
A few seconds after Eisen got in a position where he could properly hold on, Ailren prepared to take off. The wings created a huge gust of wind that forced Eisen to close his eyes on its own, and when Ailren actually took off, the wind only became far stronger, obviously. Eisen closed his eyes tightly and gripped onto Ailren's scales as tightly as possible.
And soon enough, Eisen felt completely weightless and his body was slowly being pulled from the Dragon's back. Slowly, he tried to open his eyes and saw the ground approaching quicker and quicker, albeit through a layer of mist, which Ailren probably used to hide himself whenever he decided to fly this close to Melroe.
It was truly a beautiful sight. The sun was slowly setting, so the whole world seemed to be illuminated in a soft red light. This was something that you couldn't easily get in real life, and Eisen appreciated this fully.
But it didn't take long until Ailren reached the ground, as he was in a complete dive while flying downward.
He landed a bit outside of town in the forest so they would be hidden from the townfolk, and Eisen quickly jumped down from the Dragon's back, just before he turned into another form that was easier to walk around in: The cat form.
"Now, I hope you don't mind if I follow you like this. This way I don't need to worry about people trying to talk to me." The Dragon-Cat explained and jumped onto Eisen's shoulder after the old man got Caria out of the backpack, and placed her on his other shoulder.
"That's fine with me, I guess. Now, I'll have to go see my friend and get some things from her. Can I tell her about you, or should I keep who you really are secret?" Eisen asked while starting to walk toward town, mentally making a checklist for what he would need other than his tools.
"If you trust her, then you can tell her. You can have her help with whatever you need to get as well, however, she is not allowed to assist you with your work. After all, it's your test, not her's."
"Yeah, I kind of expected that… Well, it's fine. At least she won't worry, since I can just tell her now that I won't be back for a while. What I'm planning is going to take a while, after all." Eisen chuckled lowly and began to clench his fist at excitement. If his idea would really work, then it would be something that he's dreamt of a really long time!
And something that he promised an old friend to create someday.
He would try and create a fully functional, living automaton.
---
"So, do you have everything that you need now?" Ailren asked Eisen when he placed all the materials, tools and clothes that he would need into a crate.
"Yes, mostly so. You said you would give me whatever material that I would need, right?" Eisen asked while double-checking everything, while Bree was in the background playing with Caria.
They had met up shortly after Eisen and Ailren entered Melroe, and Eisen explained the whole situation to her. Of course, at first she wanted to bring Eisen to bring her, but once he explained that it wouldn't be possible, she gave in after all.
"I will do my best to aquire the best materials you can use. It may take some time, though, depending on what it is that you may need." The Dragon in Cat form explained, and then looked down into the crate. "That is a quite unique assessment of items, though. There are quite a number of different professions involved it seems."
"Well, I'm supposed to make something to the extent of all my abilities, after all." Eisen chuckled and nodded while closing down the crate, before he turned around and looked at the pink-haired Fey-Kin behind him. "Bree, I'll be going now, alright? I don't know how long I'll be gone, though, sorry."
"Oh… that's fine~! But if there's any way I can help from down here, just let me know!" She exclaimed and brought Caria back over to Eisen, setting her down on top of the crate.
"I will, thank you. See you soon." Eisen smiled and then he left for the forest again. While he was in town briefly, he went to a few different places to get all the tools that he might need, as well as some simple explanations for specific skill abilities and special materials to use during the creation of his Automaton.
Once more, Ailren turned into his Dragon form and flew Eisen up the mountain to the platform in front of the Cave entrance.
They walked through the cave system and Eisen entered the workshop once more. Before he would get to work, he would need to ask Ailren for something, though.
"Would it be possible for you to bring me the corpse of a wolf? It should be as intact as possible, meaning that all the bones should be there, most muscle tissue should be intact, and so on." Eisen asked, and Ailren looked through the small door while still in his Dragon form.
"Of course, don't worry. I'll bring it to you as soon as I can. Now, how about you start making preparations already?" Ailren suggested, and Eisen nodded in response.
While Ailren was now gone to get what Eisen asked him to, Eisen himself grabbed a few mana crystals. First, it was time to get his Enchantment skill up to Rank 2, so that he could unlock Ability Enchantment.
One after another, Eisen repeatedly created different enchantments that could complete simple tasks in a complicated way, to give him as much experience as possible. He made mana crystals that were able to vibrate in different strength, float a foot above the ground, or would simply independently roll around in a straight line. He did this multiple times, until Eisen finally managed to Rank his Enchantment skill up to 2 within one and a half hours, allowing him to finally work on the core part of the automata.
Before starting to work, Eisen set up his Crafting space for alchemy, and then set up the Alchemy distillation system that he bought at Morrom's place and got out the two special crystals that would allow to give a golem core a 'mind' and 'soul', as well as the Mana Crystal that he ripped out of the Goblin King's chest. Since he knew that Morrom was only planning to sell his portion of his Mana Crystals anyway, Eisen left him the proper amount of mana crystals needed to make up for the King's after asking Bree how much a Rank 4 Field Boss' Mana Crystal would be worth.
The old man cracked his knuckles and placed the large mana crystal into the mythril mortar, before crushing it up with the mythril pestle after infusing both of them with his mana.
After he turned the Mana Crystal into a fine powder, he poured it into an extra bowl and then placed the next crystal into it and ground it down, before then doing the same for the last of the three crystals.
He poured some water into the bowl and mixed the three crystal powders into it, before pouring the mixture into the glass flask he would use.
Eisen lit the mana crystal with the flame enchantment up and placed it under the flask, connecting the distillation system to the setup.
It didn't take long until all the water evaporated and what was left was a simple, pure white crystal growth.
Eisen grabbed it out of the flask and quickly activated his transmutation to form it into a sphere, that ended up being slightly larger than both his fists combined.
But that wasn't all that Eisen did to the Crystal. After all, to properly push it to the highest heights that he could with his current abilities, he had to make sure that the Golem Core would later break through his skill. He already hoped that using a Rank 4 Mana Crystal would help with that, but he couldn't be completely sure, so he did all he could to ensure this.
Eisen used transmutation to carve runes into the crystal. While he was in town just now, Morrom explained to him that the runes you could use in enchantment could also be used in other ways, and what Eisen decided to do was to give the crystal ball the ability store knowledge, meaning that it could grow through experience, albeit not the literal experience that would heighten the Automaton's stats. Now that he could use ability enchantment, it was indeed possible for him to use parts of his own abilities, but growth through experience was something that was deeply imbedded within one's soul, so his enchantment rank would need to grow further for that, but for now it would at least be possible to let the Automaton truly understand his body, and let it learn how to use it.
For that, Eisen would use a gem that he found while hunting with Jyuuk and Bree: The Beast Gem.
Eisen asked Jyuuk if he was interested in it, but as it seemed like it would only make it possible for Tamers have better control over their beasts or monsters, Jyuuk said that Eisen could keep it. He wanted to truly build up a connection with his beasts, and such a gem would only make it fake.
But apparently, the way that the Beast Gem technically worked, was that it created something like a 'fake beast' to the tamed beast's eyes that they would submit to. For that, it basically collected information on how a specific beast moved, acted, and reacted, and used it against them.
And Eisen would use just that function to let the Golem-Automaton grow to act like a real living being would. In order to let the Golem Core use the Gem's function, Eisen simply carved the runes he needed with Transmutation, and then filled them out with the emerald-green gem.
Once Eisen could be sure that the Runic gem-pattern would hold, Eisen hardened the whole crystal sphere using transmutation, finishing the physical base for the Golem Core.
