"You guys, this is Ning. You all know who he is, right?"
Truven introduced Ning to the group of people he had finally brought him to. There were 5 men and 3 women in the group, and as soon as they heard his name, looks of contempt and disgust flashed through their eyes.
They were not very good at hiding their emotions it seemed.
"Ning, these are—"
"I know who they are," Ning said, looking at them all and raising his glass of wine. "It's good to finally meet someone in the same line of work as me."
These were some of the people who together owned the Four great artifact shops of Ulharis City.
The discontentment was very apparent on the face now.
"You have made a bit of a name by selling some interesting items I hear, sir Ning," a woman with gray streaks in her otherwise smooth black hair that fell around her shoulders.
She wore a blue dress and two teardrop-shaped red earrings on her ears, as if to show who she was.
Ning nodded at the woman's question. "Not at all. I still have much to go," he said.
"Do you really make your own weapons?" one of the men with blonde hair asked. "You don't have someone working in the shed while you took the fame for it, right?"
"Oh no," Ning said. "Of course not. I would consider myself horrible if I took someone else's work and used it to increase my own fame."
That certainly caused a bit of a stir-up. But no one could call him out for trying to defame them, so no one said anything.
"What's the next weapon you're going to be making? You said you'll release it in… what, 3 more days?" another man with long black hair hanging near shoulder length asked.
"I haven't thought about it yet," Ning said. "I'm sure I'll come up with something on the last day."
Ning could see everyone looking at him as if he was being arrogant or showing off.
"Those two items you sold were incredible," another woman with light brown hair in a bun said. "Do you have more of those items or can you make one every few days?"
"I can make whatever I want, whenever I want," Ning said. "I have over a dozen different similar artifacts already."
"So many?" another man said with a doubtful look. "Why haven't you sold them already?"
"Because they are too good," Ning said in a shrug. "If I sold them, it would lower the value of the other items I will later make won't be as high."
"Hah! You say you already have many? I don't believe you," another man said.
"If you have some of those weapons with you right now, can you show us some?" the woman with the red earrings asked.
Ning shrugged. "Sure."
Truven remained standing to the side with a surprised look on his face. He hadn't expected to see Ning bring out more artifacts in his mansion when he first thought to bring him to this group.
Should he perhaps not have done that?
As he thought, something flashed in front of him, and a slightly blue staff appeared in front of him, dropping a cold mist from it.
"An Ice staff?" the man with the long black hair asked. "It's not very good. I don't know why you mentioned it being better than your previous two works."
"It's not just ice," Ning said before tossing the staff to the man.
The man grabbed it midair and frowned, checking the object closely. As he did, another man gasped in surprise. "This is Ice and Crystal mixed together. How is this possible? How can two different Essence be used to form a single item?"
Ning said nothing. Speaking would only reveal something so simple that if people gave it a thought for more than 2 seconds, they would've realized it.
Merging two Essence to form a third was a simple matter.
Fire and Air made an Explosion. Fire and Earth made Magma. Fire and Water made steam. Earth and Water made mud. Earth and Air made sand.
Their simple elements had combinations, and yet nobody else thought of making combinations out of the rest of the essences.
Ning brought out an armor made up of slightly brown crystal.
"Earth and Crystal," someone said in shock and reached out to grab it, but Ning simply put it on the ground.
"You'll hurt your back trying to carry that," he said before bringing out a whip.
"Is that Air and… Shadow?" the final woman of the group, one that had the face of a man asked.
"Your senses are quite acute I must say," Ning said. He handed over that weapon.
Everyone looked at the whip with wide eyes. With the different artifacts in front of them, something that should have been impossible previously has become possible now.
They looked at it from all directions, trying to learn what they could, but without using it, it was a bit difficult. They also couldn't use them while Truven himself stood there. It would be disrespectful.
A few of them wanted to buy those weapons right away, but Ning told them to wait until it was sold through his shop.
"Do you have more stuff like these? Let us see," one man said with little patience.
"I do, but there's no point. It's just similar to these ones," Ning said.
"So these are the best you have?" the woman with red earrings asked.
"These are the best I made," Ning said. "The best I have is something someone else made."
Curiosity took over the lot and every set of eyes turned toward him. In fact, the whole room had gone silent at some point and were staring in their direction.
"Well? What is it? Show us!" the woman demanded.
Ning thought for a bit and shrugged before bringing out the final item that he had to show.
Ning brought out a sword and held it in front of the lot, letting them see its yellowish-brown color and the chaffed look of a land that hadn't seen water for a long time.
He had brought out the Continental Sword.
