The round amber colored egg in Eisen's hand continued to shake for a little longer, until a few cracks formed on its surface, spreading outward until they covered the whole thing.
Komer's eyes opened wide in surprise when he saw this happen, but leaned in closer to see what was going on. "Is it hatching right now?"
Eisen kept quiet for a bit, but nodded in response to Komer's question, only after a few seconds answering properly. "I think so, yes. At least I'm hoping that's what it is."
Immediately following this sentence, parts of the egg's shell started to fall off as a small white form pushed outside, widening the hole that it just created as it crawled onto Eisen's hand.
[Congratulations! You just tamed a Queen Bee Larva!]
[Name the Tamed Beast]
Eisen looked at the small, finger sized larva crawling over his arm, while Komer was backing away from the slimy creature that emerged from the egg just now. Eisen chuckled and smiled, trying to think of a good name. For Caria, he went with the scientific name shown in her race, 'Muscaria Amanita', as in Mus-Caria, so he may do the same thing with this small Larva as well. He wasn't entirely sure, but as far as he knew, the scientific names for bees usually had 'Apis' in them. But that just didn't sound great as a name in Eisen's opinion. So instead of using the Latin translation for Bee, maybe he should use a translation into another language?
"Ah, I've got it! I'll call you Melissa." Eisen exclaimed the moment that he remembered what this name meant. And right now, it may be weird to call a larva with such a Human name, but it would always be possible that she would grow into a humanoid form as well, just as Caria did.
[The Tamed Beast has been called Melissa]
[Taming reached Level 100 in Rank 1, upgrading to Rank 2]
[You can now command your beasts from a distance]
[Due to Ranking-up your Taming Skill, you gained +1 INT and +1 WIS]
Eisen read through the notifications that popped up in front of him, and quickly read through the notifications. He was glad about the new function this skill just gained, as this would make it harder for him to lose sight of Caria and the newly-hatched Melissa.
He smiled as the Larve began wiggling, as if trying to show Eisen that she was happy with her new name. She crawled up Eisen's arm until she ended up at his shoulder, stopping to rest there. "Huh, is my shoulder really that comfortable? You used to like sitting there a lot as well, right?" He asked when looking at Caria, who stretched out her hand to give Eisen a thumbs-up while nodding furiously.
"Well then, I honestly didn't expect her to hatch that soon. Anyway, Bree, let's take a break for a second. Sounds like I need to refill Cabarum's tanks." Eisen exclaimed with a smile while taking the larva Melissa into his hands and setting her down on the spot that would be perfect for her to explore, the Honey-Crystal Hive standing in the corner of the carriage. Happily, she began wiggling her body again and dove straight into some of the openings all around it.
Glad that she liked it, Eisen stepped out the door of the Carriage the moment it came to a hault, bringing a canister of oil with him to feed to Cabarum, the horse automaton. Eisen turned over to the Fey-Kin who was still sitting on the bench at the front of the carriage while disconnecting Cabarum from the carriage so that he could properly relax a bit. It may sound a bit silly to have a mechanical creature relax, but since Cabarum gained quite a lot of intelligence throughout the past few days, he was acting more and more like a real horse, so Eisen felt bad to treat him like an object.
"Thanks for driving the whole day. I'll take over for the rest of the day, so you can just sit down in the back for a while." Eisen said, and Bree smiled at him while nodding.
"Okay, thanks! I never realized how exhausting it is to sit on your butt all day… Ah, you were talking to Komer about magic, right? Do you want me to teach him a few things?" She offered, and Eisen thought about it for a while, but nodded as he held a bowl of Oil in front of Cabarum's mouth before the hatch at the back of the Horse's throat opened up and he began drinking.
"Yeah, that would be great, actually. Could you teach Caria at the same time as well? It can only help with her control, after all."
"Okay~! Oh, and we'll be at a village again soon. It's a bit bigger than the last one, but there's nothing worth getting there so we should only pass through. It would be just a waste of time only to spend the night. They have a pretty good smithy, so maybe you're interested?" Bree explained, and Eisen began to think about it for a while.
"Huh, maybe. It's been a few days, and it's the only thing I can't do in the carriage, so I probably should get that out of the way. Do we need anything forged?" Eisen asked, but Bree simply shook her head.
"No, I don't think so. I'm pretty sure we have everything we need…" She shrugged while leaning back onto the wood of the carriage, watching Cabarum still drink the Oil inside of the bowl Eisen was holding up.
"I see, then I guess I can just play around a bit, haha!" Eisen said with a big smile on his face, happy that he could casually forge for a while today, as long as the owner of the smithy allowed him to use the space, that was.
Once Cabarum was finally fed, Eisen let him relax for a bit while he sat down next to Bree on the carriage's bench, thinking about what he could make at the smithy that wouldn't just be random stuff that would just lay around in the corner at the end of the day. "I guess I'll just be making a few tools."
He told himself as he reconnected Cabarum to the carriage after about half an hour of letting him do his thing, and then began driving the carriage further along the road.
While Eisen was now sitting on the bench at the front of the carriage, Bree began to teach Komer and Bree the basics of magic control. It seemed like not too long after that, Komer's Mana Manipulation skill ranked up, since he kept laughing and yelling out excitedly after that, now that it was far easier to control his own mana.
And this all continued until Eisen saw another village in the distance. From where he was then, it really did seem to be about double the size of the last village they stopped at, although it still wasn't really that big.
When they reached the town's wooden gate, the guards standing there inspected the contents of the carriage again and then allowed the group to enter, which they did after Eisen asked one of the guards where the nearest stable was.
Even though they wouldn't be staying too long, as both Komer and Bree seemed to want to accompany Eisen, and since he definitely had to bring Caria and Melissa, he didn't want to just leave the carriage standing by the side of the road with only Cabarum and Aulu protecting it.
So, they parked the carriage inside of the stable, payed the fee, and then Eisen changed his pants from the regular crafting pants he wore most of the time over to the ones that he specifically made for blacksmithing, so that he would only need to take off his shirt and put on the leather apron to be fully wearing his blacksmithing outfit.
After this, the group made their way to the nearby smithy, with Eisen now having two tamed monsters basically crawling all over him. One literally, while the other was trying to hog him for herself due to jealousy over her new sibling.
After a while, they reached the blacksmith of the town and quickly stepped inside.
"Hello! How can I help you today?" The man standing at the counter asked with an excited smile when he saw the group enter. It seemed like he didn't really get customers that often. From what Eisen could tell, this man was probably the owner of the smithy, considering his overall build and attire.
"If possible, could I maybe use some space in your smithy to work? I'm also a smith, but as we're traveling, it will be a while until I can do so again." Eisen quickly explained, and the face of the man at the counter immediately dropped.
"O-Oh, so you're not here to buy something? Erm, well, what's your occupation then?" The man asked, and Eisen chuckled.
"Ah, it's 'Omni Craftsmaster'. I'm not sure if you know it, but trust me, I'm a good blacksmith." Eisen explained, and the man frowned in response. "'Omni Craftsmaster'? I know what a 'Craftsmaster' is, although I don't know what the 'Omni' in front of it is for. Either way, if that's really your occupation, go ahead if you want, but you better pay for all the materials you use. And I'll watch you to make sure you don't mess around back there." The Blacksmith said before leading the group to the actual smithy of the shop. Compared to the one in Melroe, this smithy was incredibly tiny, only possessing a single forge to work at.
"Are you sure I can use this? Don't you need to work on this?" Eisen asked concerned, but the owner of the smithy shook his head.
"Not really, no. Here in this village people only ever order farming tools, and I've got more than enough of those stocked up." He explained and leaned back in a chair he sat down on.
"Ah, that makes sense. Then I'll go ahead and use it." And it really did make sense. After all, the owner here couldn't just go ahead and make whatever he wanted, or make 100 of the same thing. That would just be a waste of money, and nobody could know if any of the items would actually end up being sold, especially if people around here only ever buy the same type of item. So, if the owner already had more than enough items to sell, it wouldn't make sense to just continue forging to fill up the front of the store.
But for now, Eisen grabbed some steel ingots from the small storage space in the corner of the smithy, and threw them into the forge while grabbing his hammer and activating his Flame of the Earth transformation as well as his crafting space and his two racial skills.
Once the steel ingot in the forge was glowing in a bright yellow color, Eisen grabbed it with the help of some tongs and brought it over to the nearby anvil, before starting to hammer onto the metal to shape it properly. Hit after hit, the steel changed its shape under the pressure of his own tool, bending to its will.
Slowly, the steel ended up turning into the shape that Eisen wanted it to be in, a thin, lengthy piece of metal in a slight crescent, with one pointy end and one sharp, flat end.
What Eisen was making right now was the head of a pickaxe.
Once this part was done, Eisen quickly cooled it down and set it to the side for now. He would later still temper in a small makeshift tempering chamber like the one he constructed at Denmir's smithy, but that could wait until the other pieces of tools were ready.
So, Eisen grabbed another steel ingot and threw it into the forge, once more waiting for it to become hot enough, which was when Eisen took it out again and started shaping it.