"This is it!" Sasha proudly pointed to a large, round object approximately one hand tall and an adult arm's length in diameter.
As Lucas stared at this odd piece of equipment, he noticed many strange patterns seemingly etched onto its surface with some kind of metal, as well as 12 small square slots that were evenly spaced around a fist sized white gem that resembled a piece of carved ice.
The winters in Redwood Town weren't very harsh, but there were always at least a few days each year where snow would fall, so the young boy wasn't unfamiliar with the frozen counterpart to water, but this was the first time he had seen such a strange looking piece of ice that didn't melt regardless of the early Autumn heat.
"Isn't this just a Chilling Tool?" Anna asked with some confusion, apparently recognizing the device.
However, Sasha shook her head and declared happily, "No, no, this isn't some simple Low-Rank Grade 0 Chilling Tool, it's a much more powerful Mid-Rank Grade 0 Freezing Tool equipped with a potent Ice Array!"
"Ice Array? What's an Array?" Lucas asked curiously, having never neared of such a thing before. What's more, he didn't get that nagging feeling in his head when his new memories were triggered, so apparently this Freezing Tool was something the one he inherited knowledge from was unaware of.
Seeing a chance to teach his son something after recently having only been taught new knowledge by him, Drake jumped at the opportunity to explain, "Among true Cultivators, there are various Spirit Professions like Spirit Blacksmiths and Spirit Artificers who build tools which use World Qi or Spirit Qi to produce special effects. These effects can be anything from simple heating or cooling, to more complicated things like producing shields of light or shooting bolts of lightning. The way this is accomplished is through Spirit Arrays, which transforms Qi into the desired effect."
Unlike a moment ago, a literal torrent of memories flooded Lucas' head when he heard this description, as numerous strange and fantastical devices that seemed to operate on similar principles flashed across his mind. Turning back to the Freezing Tool before him and associating it with the kitchen they were currently standing in, Lucas couldn't help blurting out, "So this thing is like a compressor unit for a fridge?"
This time it was Sasha, Charles, and Eris who turned to the young boy, with the former asking, "Compressor? Fridge? What are those?"
Realizing he had made a blunder in front of his Big Sister, Lucas hurriedly tried to cover for himself by saying, "Um… I heard from a merchant once about a box that keeps food cold called a fridge, so I thought this was something similar."
Eris accepted the answer right away, as she had no reason to doubt her smart little brother, and even the adults didn't pay it much mind as they had indeed heard of and seen similar devices. None of them had heard it called a 'fridge' before, but people were always naming their Spirit Tool inventions in weird and wild ways.
Quickly brushing this topic aside, Sasha nodded, "Well, that's somewhat correct, but this Freezing Tool is probably a much more powerful Spirit Tool than the one that merchant told you about."
Lucas nodded to move the conversation along.
"In any case, at full strength, this Freezing Tool is supposed to be able to keep a room about 15 paces by 15 paces cold enough that water will turn to ice inside if left for a few hours. It can also be used in a space 3 times that size to keep the temperature just above when water would freeze, which means it can be used to preserve all kinds of perishable food for very long periods of time," Sasha continued her explanation, seemingly quite pleased with her most recent purchase.
"So, you were planning on creating a large cold storage warehouse?" Charles spoke up, now seemingly understanding why his wife had been so enthusiastic about buying this Spirit Tool despite its high cost.
"That's right!" Sasha nodded, "Just think about it! With this, we can set up a big storeroom where we can stockpile a large amount of food in case of emergencies, keep meats and other vegetables from spoiling, and even have a constant supply of ice to help ward off the summer heat and make frozen foods with!"
While Sasha's eyes were sparkling, and Eris was drooling over the prospect of foods she had never tasted before, Charles, Drake, and Anna were all nodding their heads as they too could see the potential usefulness of this Freezing Tool.
On the other hand, Lucas was feeling a deep sense of discordance. The object before his eyes not only drew his curiosity, but also seemed completely out of place in the world around him. The more he heard about this Spirit Tool's wonders, the more this sense of dissonance grew. Lucas couldn't explain why, but he somehow knew that this Freezing Tool didn't belong with the environment he was living in.
Unable to help himself, the young boy rapidly began asking, "Who made this Freezing Tool? How does it work? Uncle Charles said it very expensive, but how expensive is it? Are all Spirit Tools like this? How does one learn to make Spirit Tools? Is there…"
"Lucas!" Anna suddenly shouted, cutting off her son's barrage of questions and bringing him back to his senses.
Looking up to see the mixture of wry and helpless expressions on the faces of the adults around him, Lucas blushed and whispered, "I'm sorry… I was just curious."
Patting his nephew on his shoulder, Charles let out a hearty laugh, "Don't worry about it. When I first saw a Spirit Tool, I had a similar reaction."
Drake nodded in agreement, "It was the same for me, too. It was when that old smith first showed me a real Spirit Sword that I made up my mind to take up blacksmithing, hoping one day I could become a Spirit Blacksmith."
Seeing how Lucas was still giving them a pleading look, and Eris too had become interested in this topic, the 4 adults began slowly explaining everything they knew about Spirit Tools.
Half-an-hour later, Lucas briefly summarized to himself, Spirit Tools are the product of various Spirit Professions. One needs to be at least a Spirit Initiate Realm Cultivator to be considered a full-fledged Spirit Professional, but apprentices and trainees also naturally exist. Whether they are simple or complicate devices, Spirit Tools are almost always very expensive as they need special materials to construct and World or Spirit Qi to operate.
There are very few true Spirit Professionals in our Kingdom, so most Spirit Tools are imported from the bigger kingdoms. Spirit Professionals tightly guard the secrets of how their Spirit Tools are produced, so if one wants to take up a Spirit Profession, they generally need to join and train with a powerful force which nurtures them.
Even with a greater understanding of the situation, Lucas still felt that the whole idea of Spirit Professions and Spirit Tools was incompatible with the life he was currently living.
He didn't know why this was, though, and from his vague new memories he had caught glimpses of tools and devices that could produce even more absurd effects, like phasing through solid rock or warping space to travel to other worlds, so he simply chalked it up to him being ignorant of the world around him and decided to learn more in the future to resolve the issue.
"In any case, I was planning on making fruit ice, a dessert I enjoyed when I was growing up," Sasha brought the conversation back to the topic of the meal she was about to make.
Saying so, she took out a single cube shaped crystal about the size of a thumbnail and inserted it into one of the slots in the Freezing Tool.
"Is that a Spirit Crystal?" Lucas asked.
"That's right, a Low-Grade Spirit Crystal to be exact," his mother answered.
"How many Spirit Crystals does it take to operate this Freezing Tool?" Lucas continued to inquire, still eager to learn more about Spirit Tools.
As she was busy adjusting a big knob on the Freezing Tool, Sasha casually replied, "In order to run this thing at full power, 12 Low-Grade Spirit Crystals are required. As for how long those Spirit Crystal will last, apparently it varies depending on what you're trying to cool and how hot the environment is outside. For a sealed underground cellar, 12 crystals should last half a year or so."
That meant if one wanted to keep this Freezing Tool running constantly, it would cost some 20 to 30 Low-Grade Spirit Crystals per year. Lucas didn't know how many Spirit Crystals his Aunt Sasha had bought this Spirit Tool for, but he imagined it couldn't be less than its yearly operating cost, so at minimum that was another 20 Low-Grade Spirit Crystals.
Lucas' concept of money wasn't completely developed as growing up with fairly well of parents, at least by Redwood Town's standards, he had never had to worry about finances. That being said, it wasn't like the young boy was completely ignorant of just how expensive 40 or 50 Spirit Crystals was.
From his experiences going shopping with his mother, Lucas knew that a big sack of grain that could last his family of three a month would be sold for 8 Silvers, while a butchered Red Feathered Pheasant, like the ones Anna had shot in the Great Western Forest when she took him out for his birthday, would go for 1 to 2 Silvers depending on its size.
In other words, food for a month for a fairly well-off family in Redwood Town would cost some 20 or so Silver Coins, the equivalent of 2 Gold Coins.
While learning about cultivation recently, the adults had told Lucas about Spirit Crystals, which were a type of crystal that naturally absorbed and retained World Qi. The concentration and purity of World Qi a Spirit Crystal held determined its Grade, with Low-Grade being the lowest standard quality available.
That was not to say that Low-Grade Spirit Crystals were useless or cheap, however, as a single Low-Grade Spirit Crystal that was filled with World Qi cost about 10 Gold Coins!
Turning his eyes back to the Freezing Tool and realizing that to buy and use it for a year cost almost as much as a house, Lucas couldn't help feeling dumbstruck.
It seemed that Spirit Tools really were extremely expensive!
Hesitating a little, Lucas asked with some trepidation, "Is this Freezing Tool a rare Spirit Tool, or something only wealthy nobles normally own?"
"Hahaha, seems Little Lucas has had his eyes opened," Charles couldn't help laughing, now suddenly feeling a bit better about the expensive purchase his wife had made.
"This Freezing Tool isn't particularly rare or even that expensive, Lucas," Drake explained to his son, "While it's usual for someone in a remote town like ours to own one, in the big cities in the Rockwell Kingdom, it's not strange to find Spirit Tools like this in the homes of merchants or even high-ranking soldiers who have slightly better pay. As for wealthy nobles, their homes are filled with such tools as they make life much more comfortable and convenient. Spirit Tools certainly aren't things everyone can afford, but it's not out of reach for those with a bit more money."
"Actually, this Freezing Tool is a bit special and consumes more World Qi than others because it's meant to cool a much larger space," Sasha contributed further details, "Chilling Tools, like the one your mother mentioned, are much more common as they are only meant to keep small pantries cold, so they cost a quarter or even less the initial price and use even fewer Spirit Crystals to operate."
"Is that so…" Lucas pondered, still feeling like it was quite an expensive piece of equipment.
"If this was just for personal use, it would indeed not be worth the cost," Charles commented, "But if you think about it from the perspective of the entire town, it's actually quite a bargain. For instance, we could store enough meat, vegetables, and fish inside a cold room built with this Freezing Tool to last the entire town a month or two if we ration properly."
Food wasn't lacking in Redwood Town thanks to its stable climate and ample farmland. There was also a large river filled with fish and a vast forest nearby where hunting and foraging was relatively easy nearby. However, Lucas could at least understand that in times of need, being able to have a reserve of food would be very important, so when he thought about it this way, he agreed that the Freezing Tool, despite its high cost, had its value.